A common quotation, which you’ve probably heard (even if simply by playing Wing Commander IV 
) is:
“The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.”
From time to time, we hear it in speeches, read it quoted in newspapers, and so on. But… one thing I’ve noticed is that many people use it in reverse, to justify the abridging of actual freedoms.
How can a phrase like “A is B” be reversed? Doesn’t “B is A” mean the same thing?
In mathematics, perhaps. But here it’s a different context.
The original meaning of the sentence is that freedom is precious and fragile, and therefore people should watch for threats to it, which, oddly enough, rarely come from invading armies, or from rebel guerrillas in the hills. They come, most often, from the leaders we elected. And they’re subtle; they know perfectly well how to take away freedoms “temporarily”, as part of an “emergency”… only, they almost never come back. “Emergencies” (“War on Terror”, anyone?) have a way to extend themselves, to become “temporarily permanent”. So, the phrase tells us to watch against those. To stay vigilant.
But “hawks” in government, the ones who, ironically, say it most often, mean just the opposite.
Their “vigilance” becomes media censorship, wiretaps, imprisonment without trial, torture against so-called “enemies of freedom”, “preemptive wars”, and so on. Why? “To guard our freedom”, they answer. “We must stay vigilant,” they say; “the threats against our freedom are everywhere.”
And so, freedom goes away, because of the “vigilance” needed to guard “freedom”. The original intent is reversed.
Sneaky, aren’t they?
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The problem is translating this as an identity relation rather than as conditional. The correct translation is not A=B but rather B->A (B therefore A, or If “freedom” then “eternal vigilance”)
Freedom requires vigilance but is not identical to vigilance. The statists are vigilant, but obviously they are vigilant about promoting the state and denying freedom.
But they say they’re doing it in the name of “freedom”, of course… and most people don’t notice it.
Oh I agree that they are misleading, and that at best most folks are mindless sheep… After all this all goes back to my refutation that things are always getting better..
Oh, don’t misunderstand me. I never said that people in government have any kind of good intentions. They certainly do whatever they can to remain in power, to take away our freedoms, and to make people as ignorant and sheep-like as they can (reminds me of religion, oddly enough
).
When I say that things do become better, it’s despite those people, not thanks to them. And I mean things like, for instance, the fact that I have very little chance of being burned at the stake for heresy these days (unless I go to certain places in the world, which I have no intention of ever doing). It’s things like these that I meant. But we’d better not go there again…
I think it was Benjamin Franklin who said something like, “He who is willing to sacrifice essential liberties for temporary safety deserves neither freedom or safety.” I probably butchered it, but you get the idea.
Sneaky is their way. This is not news.
As I’ve said before “…Jedi’s know that.”
Further, I’ve thought about all of that and further.
IMO, there was much more planning involved than that.
GROOMING the public to accept.
So beautiful it must be to have a big business right now.
The version I’ve heard is “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.”
Like a lot of quotes which are repeated often, its vagueness is what lends itself to interpretations of many kinds.
The quote disected doesn’t mean the right to wiretap, invade, imprison or any of the other actions that some people use the quote to justify.
The way it is used by some people is to express this. ” My idea of what freedom is must be protected from those whose idea of freedom is contrary to mine.” Or, “The freedom to disagree with what I say freedom is, must be discouraged.”