Is the U.S really all that free?

[Evil_Captor]

One thing that does not seem to have been considered is that the U.S. has the highest proportion of its people in prison or on parole in the world. Period. It is very, very easy to go to jail in the U.S. and once in jail you are subject to beatings and homosexual rape. If you are a woman, not so much subject to beatings, but there’s still plenty of rape going around.

Even if you are not in prison and in no immediate danger of going there, I would argue such an oppressive legal system makes us all less free.

And of course, the Homeland Defense thing created a state security apparatus of frightening scope of power. There’s no evidence that it’s being misused right now, but so long as it exists, it represents a constant temptation to the powers that be.

[even_sven]

*Originally posted by Tristan *
**I can go to book stores and buy almost any book ever printed, if it’s still in print. I can buy the Communist Manifesto, Mein Kampf, and the Anarchist Cookbook. And nobody will stop me, and my name won’t go down in some big ledger somewhere.
**

Actually, with the Patriot Act, it just might. They can now access library and bookstore records to see what you’ve been reading. If they do look at these records, the people involved (librarians, bookstore clerks, etc.) are legally required to deny it. There could well be some ‘big ledger’ somewhere, and we’ll never even know.

[msmith537]

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
One thing that does not seem to have been considered is that the U.S. has the highest proportion of its people in prison or on parole in the world. Period. It is very, very easy to go to jail in the U.S. **

It’s very easy to stay out of jail in the US. Don’t steal. Don’t murder or rape anyone. Stay off the drugs (or if you must do drugs, be discrete about it). Sounds pretty reasonable to me.

Simply having a large prison population is not an indication of the relative freedom of a country unless you look at the nature of the criminal activity. We don’t imprison people for their beliefs or for speaking out against the government.

The crime rate in totalitarian countries tends to be very low. The reason for that is everyone lives in constant fear of being arrested for even the slightest infraction and subjected to a legal system where they have no rights.

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
I feel far less free in the US than I do here (although of course not nearly as restricted as some dictatorships I have visited.)

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
When it comes to vices, America is still extremely prudish IMHO. If I wish to drink (to excess if I so choose), smoke (whatever), bet on sport or gamble or even laze around somewhere in public, I find the opportunities to do so are very limited.

The opportunities are there. But I also have the right to not put up with your smoke blowing in my face or having cigarette holes burnt in my jacket. So can drink as much as you like, you just can’t drive or become a danger to other people. You want to gamble, go to Vegas, or Atlantic City, or Foxwoods, or Mohegan Sun or New Orleans, or find an OTB and so on.
You can go lay in the park if you feel tired. Not on my property or the middle of the street.

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
I find far less diversity of opinion in the mainstream media.

That is not a “freedom”. That is hundreds of distinct and separate companies all trying to appeal to the mainstream.

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
If I own or rent a car I have freedom of movement. If not, I have almost none due to the woeful inadequacy of public transport and the pedestrian-unfriendliness of American civic planning.

Sorry if there is too much space between our cities. Bad urban design is not a restriction of your freedom. Personally, I would rather live free in a poorly designed city than in an efficient, well organized prison.

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
There are a few crime-ridden “no-go” areas in some British cities but they are very small (often merely a single block centred on a rough estate) and far between, whereas there are entire suburbs in American cities where I am warned not to walk where I choose at night. (Whether your infinitely greater freedom to own firearms has any part in this is peripheral.)

And you wonder why our prison popultion is so high.

*Originally posted by Evil Captor *
Finally, when I hear of the mammoth working hours and paltry holiday allowance of American employees, I cannot help but feel better off in terms of my own comparative “freedom”.

On this I have to agree. The fact that corporations can pretty much make you work as long as they want, whenever they want, and then fire people almost arbitrarily seems to me like the biggest threat to personal freedom. It used to be that only certain jobs like bankers or lawyers worked crazy hours. But those jobs had the payoffs in terms of salary. Now every company wants their employees to work like its their lifelong ambition yet pay them almost minimum wage. The governement is bound by the Bill of Rights. The petty, idiot manager most people work for isn’t.

I could go on for an entire thread about that so that’s all I’ll say for now.

[Mojo]

Zoe said:
The poor and the elderly often cannot afford to see a doctor or buy medication.

Well, yeah- that’s pretty much the definition of being poor- not having money for stuff. I’m not knocking socialized medicine as whole as there are the obvious advantages of making sure everyone gets a minimum level of treatment, but I wouldn’t say that’s an indicator of freedom. You use the example of HMOs not allowing you to see another physician. Here you can go to another HMO/PPO or pay out of pocket (I know that’s not realistic for most people) if you’re not happy with that. In countries with socialized medicine, the system is basically one big HMO with no alternatives.

[Eclectic_Skeptic]

According to worldaudit.org, the US is #12 in press freedom and #10 in democracy.

http://www.worldaudit.org/press.htm

[Ms2001]

*Originally posted by msmith537 *
It’s very easy to stay out of jail in the US. Don’t steal. Don’t murder or rape anyone. Stay off the drugs (or if you must do drugs, be discrete about it). Sounds pretty reasonable to me.

Well, for that matter, it was easy to stay out of jail in Soviet Russia. Don’t speak out against the government, don’t question your place in society, and so on.

One reason we’re more free than the Soviets were is that many things that were crimes there are legal here. Similarly, many things that are crimes in the U.S. are legal in other countries, or at least don’t result in jail time. You aren’t likely to spend a night in jail for smoking a joint on your porch in England, Canada, or Holland.

“Be discrete about it” is a terrible justification. A society isn’t any more free simply because its extreme laws are poorly or selectively enforced. The police aren’t likely to break down your door to catch you violating sodomy laws, but the fact that your sexual behavior might be illegal forces you to take precautions to avoid being caught. It’s hard to feel free when you’re looking over your shoulder to make sure no one sees what you’re doing.

Of course, if you happen to be under investigation for anything else, you’re looking at one more potential charge against you, which the local officials may or may not prosecute (depending on whether they like your clothes or your haircut).

[Evil_Captor]

Originally posted by msmith537 *
**
Simply having a large prison population is not an indication of the relative freedom of a country unless you look at the nature of the criminal activity. We don’t imprison people for their beliefs or for speaking out against the government.*

Oh, so we’re talking political freedom, not freedom freedom. Silly me, I thought freedom had to do with how likely you are to be locked in a cage, not what for.

The crime rate in totalitarian countries tends to be very low. The reason for that is everyone lives in constant fear of being arrested for even the slightest infraction and subjected to a legal system where they have no rights.

It can be argued that in totalitarian, the crime rates aren’t accurately reported, at least in part becuase the govenment is committing a lot of the crime.

Finally, the only quote which I’ve actually committed … er, said … is this first one. All the rest are from other people. So your comments are misdirected.

[Tristan]

There is a large and growing movement within the US to reform the legal system. The prevalence of drug crimes and the subsequent jail time have created an alarmingly overcrowded prison system.

Oddly enough, I feel it’s the freedoms that are allowed us that on occasion feeds some people directly into prison.

example- I am arrested for haveing weed. I do a few months in jail, do my parole and probation, and within a few years I’m free and clear. Then, I buy weed and get busted again.

The fact that once I’ve served my time I’m free, and not subject to different laws than my neighbors may tend to set me up (if I’m weak, and prone to drug abuse) to commit a crime. However, if I lived in a totalitarian police state (which the US is NOT), I could be stopped, frisked, questioned and drug to jail for testing for the rest of my life based on one conviction.

cliff notes- Prisons are overcrowded. We know that. We’re trying to fix it, but we don’t want to let violent criminals out on the street.

also- Prison. While I’m in prison, I am given quite adequate health care, I have access to any books I wish, get legal counseling, amd given fresh air and exercise if I so choose, and have lots of opportunity to learn a vocation. While there is violence, and rape, it is not like Oz. Ask Quagdop the Mercotan.

Hell, my uncle goes to jail aobut once a year before the winter, to get well fed and a medical work up. That’s not why he’s there, but that’s what happens.

If I have to be in jail, I’d rather be in Jail here in the US than pretty much any other place on the planet.

[SentientMeat]

msmith537, all but one of the quotes you attributed to Evil Captor were from my post.

My intention was not to enjoin Americans to justify my examples of feeling less free when over there, merely to provide a personal testimony of one six-billionth of humanity, ie. me.

As scr4 and ** amarone** insightfully point out, “freedom” is an exceptionally subjective term based largely on what you expect to be able to do from past experience. I expect to be served alcohol unless I can barely stand, which I can drink in the street, to smoke in smoking areas of bars and restaurants, to bet on whatever I like or gamble somewhere within 10 minutes walk, to catch a train almost anywhere, to walk almost anywhere after dark and to hear substantial and incisive criticism of government/opposition policy in mainstream media.

And I pointed out there are many ways in which I find America preferable. (Of course, in terms of freedom as described by the UN Charter of Human Rights there is little if any difference between our two countries.)

[msmith537]

Originally posted by SentientMeat *
As scr4 and ** amarone* insightfully point out, “freedom” is an exceptionally subjective term based largely on what you expect to be able to do from past experience. I expect to be served alcohol unless I can barely stand, which I can drink in the street, to smoke in smoking areas of bars and restaurants, to bet on whatever I like or gamble somewhere within 10 minutes walk, to catch a train almost anywhere, to walk almost anywhere after dark and to hear substantial and incisive criticism of government/opposition policy in mainstream media.
**

Right…but I think we are bluring the lines between freedom and convenience. Everyone would probably agree that the government shouldn’t restrict basic human rights. But how much should they be responsible for making sure everyone can do everything they want to do? For example, just because the government may not restrict drinking does not mean they have to provide a bar on every corner.

[mooka]

Originally posted by SentientMeat *
As scr4 and ** amarone* insightfully point out, “freedom” is an exceptionally subjective term

I’d disagree with that slightly actually. I think we can all agree on what freedom is, but where we differ is in how we assign relative importance to various types of freedom. This matters because some types of freedoms are to some extent mutually exclusive.
How any given person will rank differing freedoms will obviously depend on what that person actually wants to do, as well as certain cultural expectations.

For instance a previous poster mentioned Europe’s anti hate speech laws, concluding that Europe had less freedom of speech than the US. While this is to some extent true, i myself feel that it doesn’t restrict my freedoms at all, as i have no intention of going out and inciting racial hatred. Although that law restricts everyones freedoms in a theoretical (for most people) way, its intention is to protect the freedoms of people against whom hate crime might be committed.

If most people don’t mind not being allowed to incite racial hatred, then you can argue that that law actually increases total freedom. Consider a different society, where people value total freedom of speech, and resent any restrictions on that whatsoever, even if they have absoluetly no intention of going out and inciting racial hatred. In this case, such a law would decrease total freedom.

What i’m arguing is that different people will have differing amounts of total freedoms, even in the same conditions. It is interesting that there are americans here arguing that the US is more free, while a couple of British say that they find the US less free than the UK. I say that not only are both sets of people right, but also that this is a good sign. It shows that both european and US laws, government etc are tailored to their peoples preferences in freedoms.

So relax everyone, you’re all right, and noones wrong!

(it took me that long to come up with that conclusion?!)

[Ms2001]

*Originally posted by msmith537 *
Right…but I think we are bluring the lines between freedom and convenience. … For example, just because the government may not restrict drinking does not mean they have to provide a bar on every corner.

Most of SentientMeat’s examples are more related to freedom than convenience, since many areas have laws against serving alcohol during certain hours or to people who appear intoxicated, consuming alcohol (or being drunk) in public, smoking in public places, and gambling.

Those aren’t cases of the government failing to provide something; the government is prohibiting others from providing it.

[Gyrate]

*Originally posted by Zoe *
**For me the greatest lack of freedom in America is caused by the people themselves. We are often terribly intolerant of the religious beliefs and political opinions of others and are quick to slap a label on someone and then react to that person as if the label were true. I saw a peace protestor hit by someone with large U.S. flag on a wooden pole. Which one was acting in an “unAmerican” way? Which was trying to deny freedoms to the other? **

As an American living in the UK, I feel more free here than in the US, although it’s for the above reason and not something the government is doing. So in the US there are de jure freedoms that are limited by well-meaning but (IMO) misguided individuals.

In the UK there are probably more legal prohibitions on the books, but the media covers a much broader range of opinions than in the US and I’m not likely to get lynched (figuratively or literally) for criticizing the Prime Minister (in fact, it seems to be the National Pastime at the moment), so I feel less repressed.