TAKE ANY early American politics or history class and you will easily learn that freedom was once widely considered a gift from the Creator, something to be tended and respected with limits and boundaries. While many pay lip service to traditional freedom, it is my firm conviction that this sense of freedom is no longer taken seriously. At a university so conscious of the legacy of one founder, Mr. Jefferson, we fail, especially in our private practices, to implement the classical sense of freedom.
In contrast with a lofty vision of freedom, our idea of freedom is an absence of boundaries. The modern liberated man does what he wants with himself and does with others those things which both parties give their consent to. To many, it is unimaginable to think that anyone could abuse their freedom and enslave themselves in excessive liberty. These are the reactionary ideas of days past; if a man is doing what makes him happy, it must be right. However, denying that widespread licentious personal behavior does not significantly corrupt culture is the quintessential naïveté of the modern world. Excessive freedom creates a culture in which humans are allowed to indulge in their basest passions. Far from forming a noble citizen, modern freedom, devoid of boundaries, creates humans without limits, enslaved to vicious excess.
On the one hand, the modern concept of freedom has completely revolutionized our private sexual practices. Licentious sex, instead of a social ill, is socially sanctioned as a way to discover oneself and necessary in the pursuit of maturity. But when a great number of people participate in this behavior serious social ramifications emerge. As a result, sexhas no mystery, no substance and no consequences.
In a battle over which came first, it is most likely that individual licentiousness created a culture in which sexual excess is widely acceptable -- even funny and entertaining. People like Anna Nicole Smith do not develop a cult of interest around them for no reason; these excesses directly relate to a perverted sense of liberty.
On the other hand, the regularity of partying (especially on university campuses) is another result of excessive liberty. The fact that it is widely popular and acceptable to drink cheap beer and hard alcohol in pursuit of a good buzz indicates that we have not taken seriously the cultural effects of irresponsible liberty. Most visible in the temperance movement of the early 20th century, moderation was fundamental for a cultured, educated, civil people. Today we can hardly articulate sound reasons why more serious drugs are illegal and unfit for a free society.
Some may object to this argument by saying that the excesses I describe do not affect me and therefore are not for me to judge. By applying this "harm principle" to its logical extreme, which is simply modern individualism, we become figurative slaves to passion, entertainment and untold personal excess.
Humans cannot live properly without boundaries. In fact, a child who grows up without boundaries can be vicious, excessive, spoiled and intolerant of any reprimand. By promoting excessive individualism and a perverted sense of freedom we have become limitless, spoiled children. An Australian School economist, Wilhelm Roepke, wisely called us to be more than spoiled children when he said in the late 19th century, "We can breathe the air of liberty only to the extent that we are ready to bear the burden of moral responsibility associated with it."
Of course these matters are private and not to be regulated by our impersonal, gargantuan government. We must look to why and how limits have been lost in this society. Important institutions that place boundaries on individual excess, such as the strong traditional family unit and religious institutions, have all but been obliterated by modern man's proclivity to see himself as an individual first. If there is to be any measurable change, it must start with cultural reform.Moral responsibility for the maintenance of liberty, average citizens must participate in keeping liberty virtuous by protecting oneself goes beyond the soldier's duty in time of war. We mustreconsider what we want when we claim that we want liberty. If what we clamor for is primarily the freedom to allow our basest passions and desires to flourish, we do not now, nor never will, deserve our liberty.
Christa Byker's column appears Tuesdays in The Cavalier Daily. She can be reached at cbyker@cavalierdaily.com.
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