Freedom Has Priority Over Safety

American Thinker.com ^ | October 28, 2021 | Anthony Matoria

[Kaslin]

There is a natural tension in human affairs between freedom and safety. This tension has been highlighted by the COVID pandemic and was brought into sharp focus by resident Biden’s fallacious and dismissive remark about freedom during his recent, odd appearance on a CNN townhall. His uncomfortable attempt at sarcasm “’I have the freedom to kill you with my COVID.’ No, I mean come on! Freedom...” was addled by any number of factors. The President appears to believe that freedom and safety are exclusive matters of preference, like iPhone versus Android. The President’s rather shallow attention to the issue is consistent with Arnold Schwarzenegger's more pointed opinion, “Screw your freedom!”

Both Mr. Biden and Mr. Schwarzenegger seem of the opinions that safety is preferable to freedom, and that one can be had by merely relinquishing a sufficient quantity of the other. Both propositions are false.

The relative importance of liberty and safety is not a novel question. It is the basis of Benjamin Franklin's aphorism that those who would give up liberty for a little safety deserve neither liberty nor safety, and the more subtle metaphorical adage of J. A. Shedd: "A ship in a harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for."

Common experience does not support the notion that safety is preferable to liberty. People are noted to take great risks, including risking their lives, to flee oppressive regimes. There are constitutional protections for liberty interests such as privacy and due process, even though those protections may be accompanied by risks to public safety. History is full of examples of people who risked and gave their lives, both in pursuit of, and in defense of, freedom.

[Babba Gi]

I gave up after mandatory seatbelt laws .

[Kaslin]

The only time I had problems with my seatbelt was few weeks when I was pregnant with our daughter. The pressure was unbarable.

My husband and I used to go a lot on Motorcycle rides, I as a passenger because there was no way that I would ride a motorcycle. It had to do with a song that we sang as children which went like this: Meine Oma faehrt Motorrad ohne Bremse, ohne licht, an der Ecke steht ein Schutzman sieht die alte Dame nicht. Translated into english it goes like this: My grandma rides a motorcycle with out brakes and light. On the corner stays a policeman who does not see the old lady.

The song was kind of embarrassing to me, but I loved riding on the back and the faster my husband rode the better I liked it. I felled safe with a helmet on and it never bothered me.

One time we rode without a helmet where it was allowed and it actually felled good.

When I grew up in in Germany my eldest brother came to visit with a motorcycle that he had bought himself. It reminds me of a Harley, as it made the same loud noice. The faster he rode, the better I liked it.