Freedom ain't easy
8/9/12 00:08![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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talkpoliticsHi, my dear apathetic drones fiery fighters for freedom! Thursday was a big holiday in my country, especially in my town. It commemorated the only time we had the guts to do something that was right - totally on our own, against all odds, and in defiance of everybody else's interests. And then to stand by it and stake everything to defend it. "Unification brings strength" are the words hanging over the entrance of our Parliament to this very day. How very true... (Well, Friday is the birthday of our late dictator from the commie times, but that's quite another story; let's stick to the point).
This reminded me of another, much older story, which went quite the other way. Somewhere around 70 BC a large horde of freed slaves who had escaped from bondage in the Roman republic, managed to reach the foothills of the Alps. They were standing just one step away from their freedom. All they had to do was reach out and grab it.
Nothing stood in front of them, there was no obstacle to making that final step. The Roman legions were left far behind, scattered and defeated. And somewhere there, beyond the mountain, were the various lands of Spartacus' men and women - vast, free, and wild. Their barbaric homelands, the lands of their ancestors, full of memories from their childhood. Lands full of lush forests, dashing rivers, broad fields and endless steppes, without masters and slavers, without chains and cells, without fighting pits and lions, without service - a place where anyone lived as they pleased.
And that's why the slave army turned their backs to the mountains, and marched back on Rome, to ultimately meet their doom.
I'm sure there've been tons of reputed historians who've given all sorts oflame excuses reasonable explanations why the slaves had chosen to do that. But here's another, and IMO deeper, reason.
Okay, they'd cross the mountains and go back there, to re-join their barbaric relatives, to dwell in their damp wet huts in the forest, where their people slept in wooden shacks with hay roofs, hugging their cattle and pigs at night to warm themselves and waking to the strange sounds of the wilderness. They'd go back to their smoked yurts where the only thing they could do during the long dark nights was making more babies half of whom would not live to see their first birthday, or listening to horror tales told by the old grandmas, about grumpkins, werewolves and witches; and where smelly rugged men and women copulated on beds of goat furs under the gaze of bewildered barefoot kids and frowning relatives. They'd go back to a place where the humiliating service to the Roman masters would be substituted with ceaseless digging and shoving into the dirt for a few bulbs of onion and a bundle of barley; and running after cattle and sheep all day under the sticky rain, or chasing stubborn boars through dusty fields under the scorching sun, just to be able to live another day.
They might've been barbarians, but they weren't dumb. So they stood facing that mountain, they contemplated a little, they met at a council, and after tossing all options around, they lingered in the foothills for another month, then headed back south, to Rome. Where Crassus was awaiting them with the full force of his new legions.
Why did the slaves turn their back on the wilderness? It's not that they wanted to be slaves again, did they? Well, turns out they just didn't know what to do with their freedom any more. Somehow they wanted to be like the Romans: not free in the barbaric sense, but free in the urban, Roman sense; affluent, self-confident, washed and clean, knowledgeable, capable, deft, skilful in both architecture, urban development, technology and warfare; literate, interested in philosophy, arts and entertainment, and all in all, dynamic and alive. Ruling the world, the Roman way. That's what they wanted to be. Because they had seen what it's like.
Except, they didn't know how these things are really done. They had been part of this machine, but they had never had access to the intricacies of its way of operation. They had only seen the outside of this shiny facade, but they had no grasp of how it was built and maintained. And yet, they wanted to emulate it because it attracted them like the candlelight attracts the moth.
The slave mind has several peculiarities that are inherent to it. Its most insidious, most depressing and meanwhile least explored characteristic is its inability to make decisions. To act. To do things.
It's simple. The master takes the decisions. He acts. Or at least orders what should be done, when and how it should be done. Or forbids what shouldn't be done. And the slave follows the command, and rants under his nose. In time he even forgets what exactly he's ranting about. All he remembers now is that he's a slave, and this is not good. But when confronted with choices, he'd shrink and realize that not having to do them is not that bad either, after all.
Because it's too easy to keep one's mouth shut and do nothing of particular import, and have someone else make the decisions. Because every decision requires thinking, and carries responsibilities with it. And dangers - what if the decision turns out wrong and detrimental? And responsibility is bad too - you'd have no excuse if you fail, no scapegoat to wash your hands with if you do something stupid. So it's much easier not to try thinking too much, and you wouldn't have anything to worry about.
But this inevitably leads to degeneration. This way people sink into the sweet, muddy, warm and in many ways, cosy swamp of slavish existence. I'm not even calling it "life".
You'd say it's way more preferable to try making decisions, even if they're sometimes the wrong ones, than living a life with none. The latter being as if someone else is living your life. You'd argue that it's better to fail, try again, fall and try, and try again until you succeed, rather than do nothing and see your life going to waste. Others would argue that the masters are often so strong and they have such a firm control on the situation that nothing could be done even if the slaves wanted to.
Which brings us back to the holiday I talked about in the beginning. Seems like this is not exactly true, and the small ones are capable of achieving their goals, even against all odds and in defiance of the strong of the day - as long as they're persistent and resilient, and make their case convincingly enough. Or we might argue that this is too far back in the past, the times have changed and this is not possible to happen that way any more.
I don't know. If everyone had thought that way, then we'd probably still be living in the times of Spartacus, under the boot (the royal "we"). The thing is, we seem to have progressed a wee bit since then.
...Or have we?
This reminded me of another, much older story, which went quite the other way. Somewhere around 70 BC a large horde of freed slaves who had escaped from bondage in the Roman republic, managed to reach the foothills of the Alps. They were standing just one step away from their freedom. All they had to do was reach out and grab it.
Nothing stood in front of them, there was no obstacle to making that final step. The Roman legions were left far behind, scattered and defeated. And somewhere there, beyond the mountain, were the various lands of Spartacus' men and women - vast, free, and wild. Their barbaric homelands, the lands of their ancestors, full of memories from their childhood. Lands full of lush forests, dashing rivers, broad fields and endless steppes, without masters and slavers, without chains and cells, without fighting pits and lions, without service - a place where anyone lived as they pleased.
And that's why the slave army turned their backs to the mountains, and marched back on Rome, to ultimately meet their doom.
I'm sure there've been tons of reputed historians who've given all sorts of
Okay, they'd cross the mountains and go back there, to re-join their barbaric relatives, to dwell in their damp wet huts in the forest, where their people slept in wooden shacks with hay roofs, hugging their cattle and pigs at night to warm themselves and waking to the strange sounds of the wilderness. They'd go back to their smoked yurts where the only thing they could do during the long dark nights was making more babies half of whom would not live to see their first birthday, or listening to horror tales told by the old grandmas, about grumpkins, werewolves and witches; and where smelly rugged men and women copulated on beds of goat furs under the gaze of bewildered barefoot kids and frowning relatives. They'd go back to a place where the humiliating service to the Roman masters would be substituted with ceaseless digging and shoving into the dirt for a few bulbs of onion and a bundle of barley; and running after cattle and sheep all day under the sticky rain, or chasing stubborn boars through dusty fields under the scorching sun, just to be able to live another day.
They might've been barbarians, but they weren't dumb. So they stood facing that mountain, they contemplated a little, they met at a council, and after tossing all options around, they lingered in the foothills for another month, then headed back south, to Rome. Where Crassus was awaiting them with the full force of his new legions.
Why did the slaves turn their back on the wilderness? It's not that they wanted to be slaves again, did they? Well, turns out they just didn't know what to do with their freedom any more. Somehow they wanted to be like the Romans: not free in the barbaric sense, but free in the urban, Roman sense; affluent, self-confident, washed and clean, knowledgeable, capable, deft, skilful in both architecture, urban development, technology and warfare; literate, interested in philosophy, arts and entertainment, and all in all, dynamic and alive. Ruling the world, the Roman way. That's what they wanted to be. Because they had seen what it's like.
Except, they didn't know how these things are really done. They had been part of this machine, but they had never had access to the intricacies of its way of operation. They had only seen the outside of this shiny facade, but they had no grasp of how it was built and maintained. And yet, they wanted to emulate it because it attracted them like the candlelight attracts the moth.
The slave mind has several peculiarities that are inherent to it. Its most insidious, most depressing and meanwhile least explored characteristic is its inability to make decisions. To act. To do things.
It's simple. The master takes the decisions. He acts. Or at least orders what should be done, when and how it should be done. Or forbids what shouldn't be done. And the slave follows the command, and rants under his nose. In time he even forgets what exactly he's ranting about. All he remembers now is that he's a slave, and this is not good. But when confronted with choices, he'd shrink and realize that not having to do them is not that bad either, after all.
Because it's too easy to keep one's mouth shut and do nothing of particular import, and have someone else make the decisions. Because every decision requires thinking, and carries responsibilities with it. And dangers - what if the decision turns out wrong and detrimental? And responsibility is bad too - you'd have no excuse if you fail, no scapegoat to wash your hands with if you do something stupid. So it's much easier not to try thinking too much, and you wouldn't have anything to worry about.
But this inevitably leads to degeneration. This way people sink into the sweet, muddy, warm and in many ways, cosy swamp of slavish existence. I'm not even calling it "life".
You'd say it's way more preferable to try making decisions, even if they're sometimes the wrong ones, than living a life with none. The latter being as if someone else is living your life. You'd argue that it's better to fail, try again, fall and try, and try again until you succeed, rather than do nothing and see your life going to waste. Others would argue that the masters are often so strong and they have such a firm control on the situation that nothing could be done even if the slaves wanted to.
Which brings us back to the holiday I talked about in the beginning. Seems like this is not exactly true, and the small ones are capable of achieving their goals, even against all odds and in defiance of the strong of the day - as long as they're persistent and resilient, and make their case convincingly enough. Or we might argue that this is too far back in the past, the times have changed and this is not possible to happen that way any more.
I don't know. If everyone had thought that way, then we'd probably still be living in the times of Spartacus, under the boot (the royal "we"). The thing is, we seem to have progressed a wee bit since then.
...Or have we?
(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 20:47 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 20:56 (UTC)Who knows with those vague Balkanites...
(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 20:59 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:01 (UTC)Indeed you were.
(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:03 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:07 (UTC)When you say surveillance state, the first name that comes to mind is Britain. Can it be argued that it's a slave society? Or a servant one? Or maybe a society of subjects? Or just
dronesindifferent folks who prefer to have things as they are because it's more convenient?(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:13 (UTC)I would argue that the British are more of a surveillance society due to improper handling of technology coupled with some existent authoritarian trends in the British state. The UK hasn't had slaves since the 1770s, so the root of their issue is elsewhere. I would note that a great many average Britons do not like this, but this means relatively little so long as not liking it means they don't have enough MPs to reverse the process, as simply bitching from the sidelines changes nothing.
(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:15 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:28 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:20 (UTC)Certain people (regular posters on this forum) will tell me that I'm a delusional fool for valuing free will, or thinking that I have any control what-so-ever over my fate. They may even be right.
But if you abdicate responcbility for your own circumstances, where does that leave you?
(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:26 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:36 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 09:16 (UTC)If you're going to say something like this, you better be able to substantiate it, or else you'd be called out on making shit up.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 18:25 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 19:55 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 7/9/12 21:59 (UTC)I'm like..."fuck, I am a slave." :(
I hate it when reality slaps you like that.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 04:30 (UTC)To say that slaves were simpletons or that people didn't have to know a good deal about crops, agriculture, caring for livestock, weather & other topics in order to survive in that era is a mistake.
I suspect those alive today may well be less capable of making decisions than those of previous eras. What do people do? They go to work at some mundane and boring job. Most of which do not require them to make choices or think independently, much less use their imagination. If they make a mistake at worst they lose their job and have to find another one.
In past eras, if people made a mistake planting their crops at the wrong time or in the wrong place, they would starve to death. It was much more important that they make the correct decisions and be competent in their actions than it is today, as the world was a far less forgiving place.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 09:24 (UTC)That's very true, btw.
> To say that slaves were simpletons
I do recall very clearly having said they weren't dumb.
> I suspect those alive today may well be less capable of making decisions than those of previous eras
Now you've approached somewhat closer to my point.
However, I'm not talking about the decisions when and where to plant crops. They knew pretty much anything they needed to known in order to supply themselves with food and shelter; indeed they probably knew much more than your average schmuck does today. That's not the point. The point is, when presented with a crucial choice like A) Return home to your previous way of life or B) Return to Rome and try to be like the Romans, they took the
crazybold option. Either because they had overestimated themselves, or they had underestimated their former masters, or simply they were just too hungry and preferred to risk everything but plunge into the unknown. Or maybe, now that they had seen both worlds, they chose one over the other. Either way, their choice is the choice of many people even today - in this you're very correct. If anything, it at least warrants some contemplation.(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 10:22 (UTC)I think we take for granted how accessible, convenient and easy information is to attain.
This could be an interesting read:
http://theaporetic.com/?p=228
They had no weathermen, no satellites, no sensors or weather balloons. Just gauging, cataloguing & anticipating the weather is a job in itself. Farming, livestock breeding, irrigation, shelter construction & maintenance, domesticating animals, waste disposal, firewood & other concerns on top adds a good deal of responsibility with many important decisions to be made considering they were constantly battling nature, the elements, sickness & disease, malnutrition, etc.
It could be more difficult & proliferate with tough decisions than living in rome or another civilized country.
I'm not sure what their mentality or rationale was. I think in analysing different periods of history the normal method is to project the mentalities of the current era upon those who lived in different time periods. Maybe you're right, who can say for certain?
I would guess having been slaves and seen far more than their fair share of death and suffering they would have a good comprehension of what really is important in life and little regard for their own safety knowing full well how fleeting and short life is. Given the choice, they would choose to fight rome because they knew rome would never tolerate the embarrassment and humiliation it had suffered at their hands in the slave revolts. In travelling back to their homelands they might only bring the roman legions marching back to their homes and families. In fighting romans on their own territory they at least had a chance of freeing enough slaves to form an army. It may have been their best chance from a tactical & strategic position considering a unified army of their respective home countries may well have been a distinct impossibility with political dissent and pro isolationism being prevalent, etc.
Given how much was at stake and that it was a life or death thing, I would guess it was much more complicated than it might seem on the surface. And I wouldn't be surprised if they had spent weeks if not months deliberating, discussing and debating it amongst themselves before arriving at some type of conclusion.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 13:17 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:03 (UTC)I *never* said its not good for people to try to rationalize or understand things.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:05 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:18 (UTC)By the same train of thought, we don't know anything and we shouldn't try to know it because it's impossible to ever know anything about anything that every happened.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:24 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:48 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:54 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 19:16 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:02 (UTC)Gadafi, Mubarak and the rest are examples of extremes or worst case scenarios. Its incorrect and improper context to suggest they resemble social norms.
As you're citing worst case scenarios you would need to compare your worst case modern day circumstances with worst case circumstances from the roman era. That would be the beginning of an accurate comparison.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:04 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:19 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:26 (UTC)Perhaps it's more like an exception? A non-extreme one?
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:47 (UTC)I'm not sure where rome stands in terms of human rights violations, oppression and injustice. It being a republic for most of its history could imply republics like the united states are the most valid comparison?
I think there were countries, tribes and nomads who might qualify as being worse than rome? In which case comparing rome to mubarak and others who represent worst case offenders might not be a good comparison to make?
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:53 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:59 (UTC)My point was not connected to Rome, but rather to the reality that in real life dictatorships are extremely fragile, so when they push past the real limits have humans have these regimes generally collapse overnight. Even where they contest this, the result can and will end badly for them. The Bulgarian and Greek Revolutions, to some, would actually qualify as this, though I see them as more Libya with the role of NATO being played by Russia in both cases.
(no subject)
Date: 8/9/12 21:55 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 10/9/12 23:22 (UTC)However, just as often, people will consent to even the most heinous of acts or stand by while it happens simply because it is done under the guise of authority (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/aug/26/compliance-authority-failure) . This pattern repeats itself in history, much to our shame as a species.
(no subject)
Date: 11/9/12 14:03 (UTC)People rise up against the tyrants, but rising up itself is no guarantee of success. After all nothing stops a Qatar or an Austria-Hungary from asking in a Saudi or a Tsar to send their bloodsoaked jackboots to repress their enemies.
(no subject)
Date: 11/9/12 21:13 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 12/9/12 01:45 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 10/9/12 22:32 (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 11/9/12 07:34 (UTC)And then again, there isn't such a thing as complete freedom. That's an utopia, and is probably not even too recommendable.
(no subject)
Date: 11/9/12 21:19 (UTC)As I understand it, what makes the most sense is for everyone to be free to be able to create her or his life as s/he sees fit with equal access to all that is necessary for this project of self-realization, Only in this way can new social relations based on free association without hierarchy or privilege come to exist.
But an important point is that my freedom ends where yours begins. The moment exercising my freedom threatens your freedom (i.e. attempting to kill, polluting the environment you use, restricting your free movement, stealing what your labor produced etc.), is where I expose myself to the natural consequences of that tyrannical oversight--your retaliation in defense of your freedom. We have to be free to face the consequences of our own actions or its not true freedom.
But I completely agree that the only way freedom would work is that everyone who obtains it has to be involved in the struggle for it. Otherwise, like you said, they won't know HOW to be free. They have to learn by taking it back and doing. Then they will be ready for a free society.
(no subject)
Date: 11/9/12 21:25 (UTC)No rules, free for all, anarchy, etc. Dissolution of society.
(no subject)
Date: 11/9/12 23:02 (UTC)Anarchists have not historically advocated the "dissolution of society" (remember that the abolition of the state is not the same thing, polis vs imperium) or "free for all" against all.
The issue is that I hold as false that a requirement of a good society is for a one class of people to take guns to hold against everyone else's head in order to keep them in line. If that is what is necessary for society to function, then something is wrong.
(no subject)
Date: 12/9/12 07:32 (UTC)