There Can Be No Individual Freedom Without Discipline

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Department of english Lexicology

school of english

minsk state linguistics university

There Can Be No Individual Freedom Without Discipline

Alina Tomas-Mironova

group 429

Minsk 2010

For centuries people struggle for freedom, but do they realize what freedom is? Is it doing what one wants? I doubt so. If it were, it is frightening to imagine what our world would be like! The issue of whether freedom is an advantage or disadvantage for the society has been widely debated all over the world. A variety of different arguments have been put forward about this issue, which is important because it concerns fundamental moral and economic questions about the way we live and make our choices every day. This essay will consider arguments for giving people total freedom and point to some of the problems with such a model of life. It will then put forward reasons for not allowing so much freedom as is considered necessary for a democratic society. But first of all I suggest making clear the definition of `freedom'.

This word has a very wide field of notions. I do not think it is worth taking into account such of them as physical freedom from prison, slavery or feudalism, for they are obvious. The first definition, which gives us the Collins Cobuild Advanced Learner's English Dictionary, is that freedom is the state of being allowed to do what you want to do [5]. New Oxford American Dictionary suggests first of all that it is the power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint [7]. People in general understand it just in that sense only. But when having thought deeper on these definitions, I, personally, begin to imagine chaos and lawlessness. That's why these statements are not enough. The same dictionaries introduce some other sides of freedom, such as “freedom from something you do not want means not being affected by it» or “freedom from the state of not being subject to or affected by (a particular undesirable thing)” [5, 7]. Well, it's already something. But for me it is still not enough, because it is so contradictory: on the one hand we are allowed to do what we want, on the other hand there are still restrictions, for if one does what he/ she wants, someone else could be affected undesirably by this. Would it be freedom for all people? I think it would not.

So, more definitions were found in The Great Soviet Encyclopedia and in the explanatory dictionaries of Dahl and Dmitry Ushakov. For example: возможность проявления субъекта своей воли. «- Энгельс говорит: "Гегель первый правильно представил соотношение свободы и необходимости. Для него свобода есть познание необходимости"» Ленин [4]. Возможность проявления субъектом своей воли в условиях осознания законов развития природы и общества (в философии) [6]. Great Encyclopedic Dictionary and The Great Soviet Encyclopedia dwell even more on these ideas, leading to a conclusion that freedom is more responsibility than mere doing what one wants to do. This is acting in line with one's interests and aims being guided by the cognition of the objective necessity.

I think that is enough with the definitions, but they need to be based on some reality. It is the contention of the journalists and speakers all over the world that freedom of speech is as necessary as water. Such kind of freedom turns into irresponsibility of what we say [3]. Living within such laws, people are overloaded with biased information or information which could negatively affect people's minds and even health [8]. A lot of shallow, scandal or even dangerous ideas and opinions are piled on us from television, radio or internet resources in such a sophisticated way that we, adult educated people, are often not able to distinguish the truth from the lies.

Then what about our children? They watch television and surf the Internet every day. Television is at least censored, but the least source of Information is absolutely uncontrolled. Children may not only find harmful sites such as pornography there. Any other sites and forums may contain ideas and comments which can change their minds and beliefs forever. And who knows which it could be? Parents should supervise what kind of information is available to their children and not allow them using internet till they become confirmed of what is right and what is wrong in this world, i. e. till they grow up.

However, it would be wrong to go back to the beginning of history and obey the ancient laws which provide no freedom at all for the majority of people. People must not be ordered to believe in only one idea or point of view. People must have the right to choose their own point of view, but only in that case if they really orientate in all the aspects of the issue. So, that is why the need to have the freedom of education and learning. People must freely choose the sphere of their professions, the freedom to live on their own [9].

Indeed, freedom is truly necessary for the society and individuals. But the position goes on to assert that still in reality it has some limits. Everything which was mentioned above leads us to the thought that penal responsibility should be legislated on individuals, on every of us. That would make us think twice before acting or saying something, if it would or would not be harmful to the society. Therefore “private citizens should have the freedom to act as they wish provided their actions do not harm others” [10]. Thus while making our choices we ought to remember always that our freedom meets its end where the freedom of others begins. freedom society moral

In conclusion must state that it would be a perfect world if all the humans were so conscientious that they would not need all the restricting laws we have today. They could live in peace and order, enjoying their freedom and respecting the freedom of the others. This would be a communist world [4] which was never reached and is still unreachable for our society. Because people are not ready yet for such a great freedom. Indeed the society is mainly egoistic and lazy, so it could not exist for a long time if everyone was free to behave, speak or act.

DICTIONARIES

Большой энциклопедический словарь (Ru-Ru) (for Lingvo x3) Great Encyclopedic Dictionary. © «Great Soviet Enciclopaedia», Moscow, 1998. Approximately 66,600 entries

Большая Советская энциклопедия (Ru-Ru) (for Lingvo x3) The Great Soviet Encyclopedia. © «The Great Soviet Encyclopedia», 1970-1977. Over 86,400 entries

Словарь Даля: Dahl (Ru-Ru) (for ABBYY Lingvo x3) The Explanatory Dictionary of the Great Russian Language. 2nd edition. V.I. Dahl. 1880-1882. over 200,000 words

Ushakov'sDictionary (Ru-Ru) (for Lingvo x3) Dmitry Ushakov. Explanatory dictionary of Russian. © «ACT, Astrel», Moscow, 2000. Approximately 85,850 entries

CollinsCobuild (En-En) (for ABBYY Lingvo x3) Collins Cobuild Advanced Learner's English Dictionary. New Digital Edition 2008 © HarperCollins Publishers, 2008

Explanatory (Ru-Ru) (for ABBYY Lingvo x3) The Comprehensive Dictionary of the Contemporary Russian Language. © 2006, T.F. Yefremova. 180,000 entries

OxfordAmericanDictionary (En-En) (for ABBYY Lingvo x3) New Oxford American Dictionary, 2nd Edition. © 2005 by Oxford University Press, Inc. 250000 entries

John Scott. Defining Individual Freedom <http://www.individualism.com/?p=280>

Adam Barthmare. Individual Freedom. Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness <http://www.individualfreedom.com/>

Society For Individual Freedom <http://www.individualist.org.uk/index.htm>

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