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Every once in a while, I get a question I cannot answer off the cuff.
But some questions are so good that I don't mind doing research for a
worthy reply - not that I want to be held as a paragon of patience, just
that I find the extra work edifying and therefore worth my while. If you
have an interesting question to ask, send it in. I won't mind going the
extra mile in your behalf. In fact if it's interesting enough, I'll be off
to work right away, no question asked.
In this case, the question comes from two university students arguing
over the Statue of Liberty far away off in the harbors of New York, the
United States.
One student thinks it is called the Statue of Freedom. Another, who
believes, correctly, that it's called the Statue of Liberty, waged a bet
that the other is in the wrong, and wrote in asking me to be the judge.
I don't care two hoots which one of you is right or wrong, I wrote him
in reply. They needed not have gone all the way to me either - a google
search would've done the trick.
However, I do care about the difference between liberty and freedom,
which is what helped turn their silly argument into a good question.
Liberty, though often considered as a synonym of freedom, is more
philosophical and abstract than freedom, which is concrete.
It's a matter of gratis vs. libre, as I find out. Gratis is an
adjective in Latin meaning free, in the sense that one does not have to
pay for some goods or services.
The hotel you're staying in, for example, offers free beverages at
lunch. It means you get fruit juice and other soft drinks at no additional
cost, or free of charge (Actually, you have paid for this added privilege
in some other form. The lunch itself perhaps cost you 10 dollars more than
for a meal of the same quality at another hotel. The saying "there's no
such thing as a free lunch" holds true).
Libre, on the other hand, is a word in Spanish and French meaning free,
in the sense of "having freedom", as in "free speech". Free (libre) speech
is distinguished from free (gratis) beer, as the word "free" in English
does not distinguish between these meanings.
Free software usually means the former. Free internet can mean the
latter, meaning internet access should be made available to all no matter
their nationalities, political inclinations, age, gender or body fat. You,
for example, are entitled to demand your right to searching the google for
more on "liberty" or "freedom" without always drawing "the page you are
looking for can not be opened" or similar such in return.
This is one of the many civil liberties demanded by law-abiding
citizens. Singly and put in concrete terms, it could mean freedom to act
any way you like (and take the consequences). The two students were free
to wage a silly bet like that as long as it did not hurt a third party, in
which case it didn't. In other words, they are free to make arguments over
the name of the Statue of Liberty as though that's a matter to be argued
about.
Liberty is an integral part of the western psyche. In political
philosophy, it's often equated with freedom, such as freedom of
expression, freedom of information; freedom to exercise one's civil rights
by running for a public office and so forth.
To socialist philosophers, liberty is often equated with equality. Karl
Marx argued that civic rights were only abstract rights insofar as the
material conditions to exercise them were not insured.
In the United States (I'm very fond of the United States in that, over
there, you can find bountiful good examples on any subject), concentration
of media ownership are seen by some as an impediment to exercising one's
right to free expression, because only those sharing similar views with
the editorial policy of a given media are likely to have their views
expressed in that media without fuss. The advent of the blog threatens to
change that and a good thing it is too, if you ask me - At least people
can talk more about environmental issues over the blog.
People generally believe that spiritual freedom comes after material
freedom. These people tend to be fatalists who believe one's thoughts and
actions are determined by one's environs, by previous causes and effects.
That is not the view of those with a genuine free mind. These people
believe that metaphysical freedom exists regardless of reality, that
people have the power to choose their own deeds, and in doing so, change
reality itself.
Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi belong to the latter group.
I'd love you to tell you more about these two men, but I'm afraid I've
drifted too far from the copper structure across the seas.
I know a lot of people prefer trivia to talks about the Mandelas and
the Gandhis. Great men as they are, I understand they are even farther off
to the average man than the Statue of Liberty is.
So, here are a few trivia about the Statue itself:
The statue was gift to the United States by France to mark the 100th
anniversary of the United States. Lady Liberty (not Lady Freedom, mind
you) holds a torch in her right hand and a tablet in her left. The tablet
shows the caption JULY IV MDCCLXXVI - July 4, 1776, the date of the
adoption of the Declaration of Independence.
The designer was French sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi. Gustave
Eiffel, the designer of the Eiffel Tower in Paris, engineered the internal
supporting structure.
Perhaps this will give you an upper hand in similar silly betting games
in future. Silly, but feel free to do it.
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