I'm Going to Agree With Charlotte Gore.....In Part

Charlotte Gore wrote on Wednesday:

"Our constitution, too, represents this appeal to the centre between the two extremes - a masterpiece of equivocation that can mean anything to anyone who wants to read it. Balance liberty and equality? Great! Treating everyone equally is a feature of free trade societies, so I’m in favour of that…. wait, what? Sorry? You think it means treating people differently to get equal outcomes, which obviously means scuppering many people’s liberty? Crikey! Yes George, what’s that? Ah you think it means finding a balance between the two of our positions because we’re both extremists?"

I was intending to get around to around to writing a response yesterday but then Eric Joyce resigned and well one thing, led to another, led to.... well, you get the picture. So before anyone accuses me of brown nosing the top ranked Lib Dem Blogger I hasten to add I'm only agreeing in part.

The part I'm looking at is 'treating people differently to get equal outcomes, which obviously means scuppering many people’s liberty'. This is something I agree with in principle, however, there are still occasions where there is some need to be treated differently that at present because the ability to experience full liberty has yet to be reached.

Charlotte is right of course, we preach liberty for all yet seem to be banning more and more stuff. Banning the wearing of religious imagery is one example. We want freedom for all religions, and those of none to abide side by side, yet just because somebody want to show their faith on their sleeve (more accurately round their neck, on their head, in their label etc.) we get all uppity.

There are exceptions of course the most prevalent is the smoking ban. The libertarians will quote that this is wrong because people should have the right to choose. I agree that people should have the right, should they so wish to inhale carcinogens straight into their ventricular system should they want, it is why it shouldn't be banned in people homes. However, public places are always going to be somebody else's place of work, and are you giving the employees who work there the chose not to inhale the fumes. The libertarians will then say but they don't have to work in an environment that allows smoking, but then surely by allowing the smokers to work wherever they chose you are limiting the liberties of the non-smoking worker to work in certain establishments.

What Charlotte has got right is that you can't always take a middle road between two extremes, you will still have both extremes present and both will be upset for you for trying to moderate their behavior, plus you become an absolute muddle. However, you have to cut out what is harmful while allowing what is expression of difference to occur. That is a fine line between liberty and being overbearing for the sake of something to do.

Freedom means not necessarily being able to agree with everything that goes on, you can only agree with everything that happens with absolute control.

Carnival on Modern Liberty: No Freedom of Speech = No Public Liberty

When the Labour Government first banned protesters in Parliament some people didn't think it would infringe too much on this countries freedom of speech. Under Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights all people have "the right to hold opinions without interference. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression".

No while I don't agree with the views of Geert Wilders nor the views of Fred Phelps of Westboro Church and his daughter Shirley Phelps-Roper the fact is that both Wilders and now the Phelpses have been denied entry to the UK. They have been denied the right to express themselves. However, as with Geert Wilders last week this may get their message across more clearly and louder than if they have been allowed in.

John Stuart Mill in On Liberty wrote:

"The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error."

So Jacqui Smith has twice in a week performed just such a peculiar evil of denying the ability to have discourse to unearth the error in that opinion.

Maybe Wilders in right when he called the UK government cowards for refusing his entry. But as with Derek Draper's LabourList diatribe in recent weeks it appears to be the Labour default position. As position to ban any who don't agree with what you say instead of engaging in debate. It is also generally the default position of those for whom the argument is lost to want to avoid debate at any cost. Is that where Labour is?

Benjamin Franklin said:

"Without Freedom of thought there can be no such thing as wisdom; and no such thing as public liberty without freedom of speech."

Sadly now that we cannot take pictures of the police or things that may be considered useful for terrorism our liberties are being eroded. With the Labour government and its apologists trying to control what can be said or blogged we are heading to a dark place devoid of public liberty.

They can watch you, want to read your emails and keep you biometric data. But you are not allowed to come to your own conclusions, think with you own brain or possible go about your business without proving you are you. The liberties we once held dear are going, going....

Does this mean the terrorists have won because are Government and Labour are too scared to let anything go on that might give them opportunity. And the price? Our liberty.

Carnival on Modern Liberty: Taboo One Religion

John Stuart Mill in On Liberty went to some length about Self Regarding Actions (SRA) and Other Regarding Actions (ORA). Basically the former is self-regarding and subject only to personal persuasion and inducement. Such an action becomes other-regarding and open to public sanction if, and only if, it either harms an interest, violates a right, or neglects a duty owed to another person or persons.



One of the things laid out in that definition of liberty that I wrote about the other day was the right to believe or express oneself in a manner of one's own choosing. Which brings us up against one one in our envelope of modern liberty. The religious believes of someone may be largely malign and a SRA but what is something from those of other faith or none becomes and ORA.



A lot has been made recently of the bus driver who refused to drive the bus carrying the agnostic slogan "There Probably is no god. Get on with enjoying yourself." Or the Christian registrar who refused to marry same sex couples. The actions of both these people of faith in these instances were SRAs there was provision for the driver to drive another bus, and for the registrar others were able to swap assignments with her. However, many on the liberal flanks were up in arms about their actions. Therefore there are two sides to the coin.



People were able to get a bus, driven by that driver. Same sex couples were able to be civil partnered in that London Borough. So therefore no rights or interests were actually denied. You can and many do that the duty to others would have been neglected in the case of the registrar. But looking at it from the other side of the glass if liberty is to allow individuals in society to believe what they want to believe and express themselves as they see fit, does that not mean that in essence the ORAs of others were impinging on these two.



In the past few days somebody did raise with the issue that three of the members of the Disaster Emergency Committee were very much of a Christian ethos and that their aid came hand in hand with a bible and the distribution thereof. The argument being that by supporting the DEC's appeal I was also condoning an added religious tension into the mix. Therefore where does one draw the line. The economist in me said to them there is a cost benefit analysis to be taken into consideration, especially as they along with myself largely wanted to get aid to those in need as quickly as possible.



Which is the greater ORA, the benefit or the cost? With the example of the two individual mentioned earlier there were ORAs in operation on both sides, but which had the greater infringement on liberty?



If we are truly aiming for a modern liberty we have to allow room for those who disagree with us. But as Mill said the line gets drawn where that freedom harms an interest, violates a right, or neglects a duty owed to another person or persons. Indeed Mill himself, in his posthumous essays, saw a "social utility of religion " based on it having a moral code and leading to a benevolence of those who believed. He of course said that the strictures of dogma often impinged on others.



So while our liberty has increased in many areas since Mill's time increasingly humanistic society has started to look down on those of faith; trying to limit the way they express themselves even if it causes no harm to others. Now in some cases that is warrented but in others those with faith are often or are actually agents for social change or justice.

Carnival on Modern Liberty: An Introduction to a Series

When I got tagged by Tom Griffin to take part in the Carnival on Modern Liberty I wondered just which of the areas I have an interest in on the subject I should take up the challenge to write about. I couldn’t really select just one so throughout the week I will attempt to look at one per day.

What I’m going to do is take you to the edge of the envelope to the point where liberty comes up against the point where people start to edge away. People claim to be liberal and uphold Liberty but we all have our breaking points when we say have we gone too far.

First let’s look at the full dictionary definition of liberty.

n., pl. -ties.

• 1. a) The condition of being free from restriction or control.
• b) The right and power to act, believe, or express oneself in a manner of
  one's own choosing.
• c) The condition of being physically and legally free from confinement,
  servitude, or forced labour.
• 2. Freedom from unjust or undue governmental control.
• 3. A right or immunity to engage in certain actions without control or
  interference: the liberties protected by the Bill of Rights.
• 4. a) A breach or overstepping of propriety or social convention. Often used
  in the plural.
• b) A statement, attitude, or action not warranted by conditions or
  actualities: a historical novel that takes liberties with chronology.
• c) An unwarranted risk; a chance: took foolish liberties on the ski
  slopes.
• 5. A period, usually short, during which a sailor is authorized to go
  ashore.

There is quite a lot in there to enable me to take a look at where liberty comes right up against the taboos in society. Indeed as I hope to show you over the next few days there are indeed a number of contradictions within liberty and how we define it.

So roll up, roll up and hope you enjoy the ride as I take you to places you may not have been before, asking questions you may not have considered. The views that I will express in this series are not necessarily all my own. I’m merely looking at where the envelope of liberty does take us in our modern world.

Carnival on Modern Liberty: Update

Well I have to say that I'm quite impressed that following being tagged by Tom Griffin to take part in the carnival on Modern LIberty that two of my taggees have already posted their contibutions.

War Dog has posted a piece of Liberal Civic Nationalism and McChatterer who dispite protestations that "If [he] knew anything about the subject, or had thought about it at all, this might be a good idea. But [he] do[es]n't." has come up with the goods here.

James Graham in his launch post suggested we don't tag the usual suspects, so I deliberately went outside my political sphere, and indeed my knownblogosphere to an extent, but keeping it Scottish to honour Tom's choice of me. The result is while I don't agree 100% with any of the contributions I've inspired thus far, has created two worthy and thought provoking additions.

As for my own contribution, it is in the making. I thought what could I write about and several ideas started to spin in my head. The end result is that I will posting up a series of reflections ona number of issues, working title "When Modern Liberty Butts Up Against Taboo" which I think takes McChatterers idea a little bit further.

The Carnival on Modern Liberty

In a bizzare case of two degrees of separation from the Atheist Agnostic bus Tom Griffen has already tagged me to take part in the carnival on Modern Liberty started by James Graham over at Liberal Consirpacy yesterday. Tom decided to make his tags so that the geographic diversity of the taggees was expanded (so it's a good job I no longer live within commuting distance of my University at Kingston).

Here's what James originally posted to outline the idea.

As an online companion to the Convention, it is intended to help promote debate
on civil liberties on the blogosphere over the next few weeks. Fundamentally
however, it is also intended to spur both bloggers and their readers into
action.

I will be producing the first edition this Friday on Liberal Conspiracy. Over the next couple of weeks it will move to OurKingdom and Unlock Democracy and then we’ll be looking for volunteers to host future editions - what about you? (email offers to modernliberty *at* quaequamblog *dot* net).

If you have an article you would like to be included in the first edition you can submit it either by following this link or emailing modernliberty *at* quaequamblog *dot* net. The deadline is 4pm on Thursday 22 January (if you miss this it is no problem as it will simply carry over to the next week’s edition). We are particularly looking for articles on the following sub-topics:

* ACTION: our favourite category! ideas and initiatives for raising
awareness of civil liberty-related issues.

* EVENTS: civil-liberty related events that you are either organising or
would like to promote (you don’t need to wait until 28 February before holding a
meetup, tweetup or even just a social to the pub or cinema - if it’s civil
liberty related, publicise it here).

* JEERS: reports of the latest assaults on liberties.

* CHEERS: good news (we do get it occasionally!) and praise for the
champions of liberty.

* WHAT LIBERTY MEANS TO ME: think pieces about what liberty in a modern
context actually means (once you’ve been all philosophical, do an action post to
balance things out :)).

As the geographical diversity haa now hit Scotland I think it is only fair to nominate some of the Scottish Blogosphere. I could pick all five from the usual susects, the established Scottish blogosphere people who I know would do a sterling job people like Jeff, IoC, MacNumpty, DoctorVee or STB. But James encourages us not to pick the usual suspects and himself tagged Girl With A One Track Mind, London Underground, Neil Gaiman, Bad Science and New Humanist as his five.

So maintaining that thrust I'm going to mix it up a little and give some of the newer or less well established bloggers a shot.

• A Leaky Chanter
• McChatterer
• Stuart Winton at Planet Politics
• War Dog
• West World