Freedom

In a quote from Malcolm X, he says that someone who truly believes in freedom must be willing to do “anything under the sun” to gain that freedom or they do not believe in freedom. Not everyone would be willing to do anything to gain self determining freedom. People always have circumstances limiting their will to act to a certain point. Freedom is an ideal that is loved and valued by all yet also denied and with held from many. I disagree with Malcolm X’s statements; for though peoples moral conscience often keeps them from doing anything to gain freedom, it does not keep them from believing in and desiring freedom.

When Malcolm X says “anything” it can be assumed that he means “anything.” Anything, could mean that one could start anarchy. Anything could mean that one would put the lives of those he loved in danger. Anything could mean that one would kill, steal, and destroy. Yes a person could do anything for freedom but weather or not someone will is another matter.

There is always an ideal of what is moral competing with the ideal of freedom. Most people will do almost anything for freedom but there is always a moral conscience in a person preventing them from doing somethings. Just because a person lets this moral conscience divert him from gaining freedom does not mean that the person did not believe in freedom or put the proper value on freedom. Many people would not allow the fight for freedom to bring them to take the life of someone else. If a person valued the life and soul of a man higher than the ideal of freedom it does not mean that they do not believe in freedom; they simply hold the value of life higher. Taking a life is denying that person the right to freedom and life that they deserve; taking a persons life would make a freedom fighters life hypocritical.

If a person lets the desire for freedom, however strong in may be, cause them to loose their moral consciousness then they trade their humanity away for what they see as a higher cause. In Rachel L. Jones’s “The Price of Hate” Jones describes a member of the Ku Klux Klan who had been dehumanized by his hatred of African Americans. If she had just shown him hate back she would have been no better than him. Nothing would stop freedom fighters from becoming inhuman and hateful if they give up their morals to fight their oppressors; freedom would no longer be worth anything if no one had any sense of justice. It may be that the person was driven by justice to fight in the first place but in denying his morals he pollutes his just cause.

In “Black Boy” by Richard Wright the boy looses his innocence. In loosing that innocence he gains violence which will effect him for the rest of his life; he has lost part of his moral conscience. Nothing in him prevents him from resorting to violence in the future when he feels that someone is threatening him. If he had not have resorted to violence he would have not gained freedom, but in using that method to gain freedom he lost part of himself. Not everyone would be willing to dispense with morality even to fight off injustice because in the end the people themselves become just as unjust as those they were fighting. In “Hair” by Malcolm X a boy gives into popular fashion trends and looses part of himself in the process. That is what could happen to a person should they give into their desire to give up morality for freedom. A man is more free if he can control his actions than if he was not discriminated against.

Martian Luther King talks of fighting injustice in his “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” He talks of a “misconception of time” which does not cure all ills. Sometimes it takes intense fighting to gain something like freedom, especially when time is not always an ally. If people did not make moves for freedom it would never come. There were people who did everything they could for freedom, but even they had their limits. They would not let injustice hold them back and they kept themselves from also becoming unjust as a result the freedom that they gained was real.

Freedom is a higher cause indeed. It is desired and cherished by every man and woman. In fighting to gain it everyone has their limits. This does not mean that they do not believe in freedom, for no one could view freedom as a curse, it means that they hold their morality above actions which could gain the freedom. People who desire freedom do not always have the desire to take actions that would cause them to loose themselves nor should they. People will do almost anything under the sun to acquire or preserve their freedom but they will hold to their moral ideals when fighting for their freedom.