# "Freedom's just another word..."--meaning? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [February 17, 2006, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911 "2006-02-17T04:07:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [February 17, 2006, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/21 "2006-02-17T21:42:56Z")
> [@Pochacco](#): > > It’s a great lyric. You can’t be truly free unless you aren’t beholden to anyone or anything – no obligations, no responsibilities. She and Bobby were living the free hobo life but they still had each other. Now he’s gone and she’s totally free but she’s not happy because she misses him. Very bittersweet. In addition to the main interpretation here, I think there’s another related meaning that’s intended. Bobby may have told her that he was freeing her, and she’s saying that this freedom he gave her is bullshit. “Nothing, that’s all that Bobby left me,” she says: having everything taken away is an empty kind of freedom. As such, it’s not fatuously dismissing poverty or tyranny. Daniel ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/22 "2006-02-18T00:21:13Z")
How I wish she had grown old and could be interviewed about the lyrics by Terry Gross on _Fresh Air._☹ ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/23 "2006-02-18T01:20:59Z")
I always thought it had meaning on several levels, one being that “freedom isn’t all it’s cracked up to be-- it’s just another way of saying you have nothing left to lose.” IOW, you’d don’t have anything. No posessions to tie you down, but no one to count on, either. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/24 "2006-02-18T02:07:48Z")
Tom Petty sang, more recently, that “When you got nothin’, you got nothin’ to lose.” I think that’s one of the meanings of the line we’re talking about. That can be freeing, but it’s also lonely. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 2:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/25 "2006-02-18T02:26:52Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Tom Petty sang, more recently, that “When you got nothin’, you got nothin’ to lose.” That was Bob Dylan and it was in the same era. ---
**Author:** ![Nic2004](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/4491bb/32.png) [@Nic2004](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nic2004)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/26 "2006-02-18T02:30:47Z")
I think my favorite line was > [@](#): > > But I’d trade all o’ my tomorrows for one single yesterday > To be holdin’ Bobby’s body next to mine Sometimes the independence you imagine isn’t truly as great as the interdependence you have. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 2:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/27 "2006-02-18T02:42:23Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > That was Bob Dylan and it was in the same era. Ah, right you are. Dylan _also_ said it, and Petty referenced it in “Climb that Hill” about a decade ago. ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [February 18, 2006, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/28 "2006-02-18T05:48:48Z")
> [@bluethree](#): > > I contend that “People who need people are the luckiest people in the world” is actually the stupidest statement in all of pop culture. I know what song you are quoting, but I have, by maintaining a very careful regimen throughout my entire life, so far managed to avoid hearing it. ---
**Author:** ![Boulter\_s\_Canary](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/e79b87/32.png) [@Boulter\_s\_Canary](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boulter_s_Canary)\ **Post date:** [February 20, 2006, 11:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/29 "2006-02-20T11:01:23Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > That was Bob Dylan and it was in the same era. I’ve just realised: - Richard Thompson’s song **‘Beeswing’** is ' **Me and Bobby Magee’** re-written _but from Bobby’s point of view_… And I said that we might settle down Get a few acres dug Fire burning in the hearth And babies on the rug She said O man, you foolish man It surely sounds like hell You might be lord of half the world You’ll not own me as well…etc ---
**Author:** ![Cicero](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cicero/32/3594_2.png) [@Cicero](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cicero)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2006, 9:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/30 "2006-10-19T09:15:23Z")
Mods, please chastise if I am resurrecting a thread that is too old… But what does this part mean: I pulled my harpoon out of my dirty red bandana I’s playin’ soft while Bobby sang the blues, yeah What is a harpoon? (apart from a whale thing) ---
**Author:** ![glee](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/b5a626/32.png) [@glee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/glee)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2006, 9:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/31 "2006-10-19T09:28:19Z")
[QUOTE=Cicero] Mods, please chastise if I am resurrecting a thread that is too old… But what does this part mean: I pulled my harpoon out of my dirty red bandana I’s playin’ soft while Bobby sang the blues, yeah What is a harpoon? (apart from a whale thing) [/QUOTE] Purely from context (it’s small enough to fit in a bandana; you can play it and it sounds like harpoon), I’d guess ‘harmonica’. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2006, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/32 "2006-10-19T14:57:55Z")
[QUOTE=glee] Purely from context (it’s small enough to fit in a bandana; you can play it and it sounds like harpoon), I’d guess ‘harmonica’. [/QUOTE] That’s what I’ve always thought it meant as well. ---
**Author:** ![Spoke](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a88e57/32.png) [@Spoke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoke)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2006, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/33 "2006-10-19T15:45:24Z")
[QUOTE=Marley23] Ah, right you are. Dylan _also_ said it, and Petty referenced it in “Climb that Hill” about a decade ago. [/QUOTE] And Petty did pen the conceptually-related lyric: _And I’m free – free fallin’_ ---
**Author:** ![chappachula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d2c977/32.png) [@chappachula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chappachula)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2006, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/34 "2006-10-19T19:43:11Z")
[QUOTE=picunurse] Other versions change \*this line to: “nothin’ ain’t worth nothin’, but it’s free” [/QUOTE] I always liked the play on words involved-- This line versus the first line in the verse. The first line (“freedom = nothing left to lose”): means that being free isn’t the most important thing in the world. In the exciting atmosphere of newfound freedom during the hippy 60’s, that was an unusual statement. Being free was the ultimate goal, to defy the conformity of your parents and the 1950’s . Wear jeans and a long hair, not penny loafers and brylcream. Posters proclaiming “do your own thing”, " free love" were ,like, man, really _deep._ Very few young people then would dare to say that freedom ain’t so great. The second line (“nothing aint worth nothin’ , but its free”) is a great double entendre. It reminds you that, in your freedom, you only have a whole lot of nothing. But, you can still try to convince yourself that you’ve got something–'cause you’ve got your freedom. Sour grapes!–sure, you’re lonely and lost without a girlfriend or boyfriend to love. But you can still love your freedom–for whatever it’s worth (sorry for over-analyzing, and sounding like an unemployed grad student. But, man, those lyrics meant a lot to me back then. Nostalgia just ain’t what it used to be…) ---
**Author:** ![Sonia\_Montdore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/90ced4/32.png) [@Sonia\_Montdore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sonia_Montdore)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2006, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/35 "2006-10-19T19:50:15Z")
[QUOTE=Elendil’s Heir] I always hated that line. Nobody who ever actually lived in tyranny - in Germany under Hitler, Russia under Stalin, Iraq under Saddam Hussein - would ever say anything so fatuous. [/QUOTE] Good lord, lighten up. This is _pop music_ we’re talking about here. ---
**Author:** ![Jon777](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/3e96dc/32.png) [@Jon777](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jon777)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2019, 3:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/36 "2019-11-05T15:19:42Z")
I think the words ring very true. As having lost parents and a spouse, the pain from the voids created by the losses outweighs any increase in freedom from any obligations from the relationships. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2019, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/37 "2019-11-05T16:12:28Z")
Since this has been revised, and I missed it the first time… You have to remember it was written in a time when hippies roamed the earth. It’s written from the perspective of one of those free spirits. These innocent souls thought they could go on like that forever. People could be free from responsibility and yet could still eat and hitchhike. Look at Lobo’s “Me and You and Dog Named Boo”. Look at The Girl in _Two Lane Blacktop_. I wonder what happened to the singer character (“me”) as she got older. I hope she didn’t die young. It’s been a long, long time. ---
**Author:** ![AHunter3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ahunter3/32/368_2.png) [@AHunter3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AHunter3)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2019, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/38 "2019-11-05T16:15:37Z")
Go at it from the other direction. Assume someone values freedom – from tyrannical bosses, from obligations that cramp their style, from having to conform to the expectations of the neighbors, everything. They don’t compromise. There are price tags. People won’t hire them, don’t treat them like “normal folk”, don’t include them, dont’ trust them because they aren’t playing by the rules. Fast forward a bit, let’s say a couple years, and you find the uncompromising freedom worshiper hitchhiking, unemployed, no home, owns only what’s in their bag or on their back. They’re still free though. A wry commentary on the price of freedom. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2019, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/39 "2019-11-05T16:46:49Z")
The flip side of the 2006 coin is the beginning of Pippin’s finally song (words by Stephen Schwartz) I’m not a river or a giant bird That soars to the sea And if I’m never tied to anything I’ll never be free I wanted magic shows and miracles Mirages to touch I wanted such a little thing from life I wanted so much I never came close, my love We never came near It never was there I think it was here ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2019, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911/40 "2019-11-05T17:21:53Z")
> [@The\_Hamster\_King](#): > > It’s a great lyric. You can’t be truly free unless you aren’t beholden to anyone or anything – no obligations, no responsibilities. She and Bobby were living the free hobo life but they still had each other. Now he’s gone and she’s totally free but she’s not happy because she misses him. Very bittersweet. And the flip side that if you are truly free, then you don’t have anything either. That’s always how I interpreted it; that having nothing left to lose was essentially negative, and that saying that you’re free, means that you’re also truly unattached/unengaged. Basically what **AHunter3** says… (read it after my post). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/freedoms-just-another-word-meaning/344911.md?page=3)