Freedom or Security?

The whole idea of a ‘united world’ appeals to me. The planet is becoming a global village in every sense and I think we should all be glad. I speak to my cousins and relatives scattered all over the world with minimal effort, I can travel to any country within a day. My textbooks were shipped to me from another continent, the movies I watch were made on the other side of Mother Earth. In short, globalisation kicks ass at a first glance. But as a true cynic, I am forced to look at the negative side of it and I must admit, what I see looks ugly.

In my opinion, ’freedom’ is the key to civilisation. No great civilisation can ever exist without providing the public with a certain amount of freedom. Remember, the extent of this has to be taken with consideration to the lifestyles of all cultures at the time. The Greek kingdom might not be a tolerant one by today’s standards, but they did pride themselves on their ability to understand the other side of the coin unlike the other ’savages’.

But the world’s most powerful country today seems to have disregarded freedom and human rights to help them on their war on terrorism. I am not a sympathiser of terrorists, but I do feel that a look at this disregard for human rights is required.

No one can deny that the USA has become a country where the president, on his own proposal, has the supreme power to send the country into war against any nation on earth, especially considering that this war on terror extends all over the planet. The president, the CIA, and the military have the power to take any suspected terrorist — foreigner or American — into custody and torture, abuse, and execute him/her without due process of law and trial by jury. The president and the NSA have the power to tap telephones and monitor emails without a warrant. The president, the CIA, and the military have the power to send missiles into cars and drop bombs into buildings anywhere in the world, including even the United States, in their attempt to win their war on terror. In fact, the president even wields the power to ignore any constitutional or legislative restraints as a "wartime" commander in chief.

If a government has the power to arbitrarily take anyone into custody and torture and kill him, how can the people in that society truly be considered free? How can any other nation be considered free if the most powerful government vests itself with such power? Even if there is freedom of religion, freedom of the media, freedom of assembly, the freedom to vote, and even the freedom to own guns, all such freedoms are meaningless if the supreme force on the planet has the power to arrest, torture, and execute anyone it wants.

I could not help but think of Braveheart, which portrayed a period in English history when the English king and his cronies possessed and exercised the right to rape a newlywed bride on her wedding night. Can any sane person imagine the woman’s husband exclaiming, as his wife was carried away, "At least we can peacefully protest the king’s actions without being thrown into jail"? He has every power to protest, but he has no power to stop them from raping his wife. He can follow any religion he wants, he can protest freely, he can start a petition to preserve the virginity of his bride, but he has no real power to change things because the government has the ’right’ to do it and were merely exercising that right. And they can do it again if they want to.

To me, these policies only seem to expose a trend that started many decades ago and continues to occur at a steadily increasing rate. That is, the movement of the most powerful nation away from its original principles of a republic and in the direction of an imperialistic force. The second World War introduced the American government as the supreme military power in style, and the government has not forgotten it. Freedom is increasingly sacrificed for 'security'. While I have no problems with a balance between the two, an overwhelming importance of national security over human rights will not help us move forward in any way. I only find it ironic that the USA uses these powers in the name of security, but they have earned far more enemies than friends with these policies.

Let me end this with a quote from none other than Benjamin Franklin, who was one of the pioneering figures behind the USA becoming a great nation. "Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." I am not in complete agreement with the statement but he sure does drive the point home.