Have you ever thought what does the word “freedom” mean? I think it is quite an abstract thing which is different for each individual. For example, for me, freedom means doing something that I want if it doesn’t harm other people. However, it cannot be described in simple words, because the word itself contains numerous deeper meanings. It depends on the individual understanding of freedom, and each of us understands it in different ways.
Someone thinks that the freedom is connected with the right to say anything the person wants without a fear of being punished or restricted of doing so. Others think that freedom is connected in walking anywhere they want. Some people think that freedom is your right to choose the government. But no one can say, what is the freedom itself? And in my essay, I have decided to drive deeply into the issue of freedom definition and share my thoughts what does freedom actually means.
I agree that freedom is the right to speak and do everything you want, but only when it doesn’t limit others rights and freedoms. Numerous countries don’t have freedom for their citizens. People are not allowed to criticize their government and cannot freely express their opinion on public. And when they are trying to say something different from the opinion of their government they are being punished. There, people can be fined or imprisoned because of their will to have freedom.
When I hear the word freedom from others, I am thinking about the freedom of choice. This meaning of freedom is easy to understand. People usually connect it with the elections. When there are several politic parties to choose from the person experiences freedom when choosing the one he or she believes in most. Of course, there are countries where politics is connected with the criminal world, and their people don’t have freedom of choice because of corruption, and their choice was paid for by someone else. But there are people who in these countries fight for liberty and sometimes they are changing everything. Like it was in Georgia and then in Ukraine, because their people understood what freedom is and that the choices they made before were not right.
Freedom can also be connected with the right of opening your own business and gain the financial independence. You can produce goods and services and work on your own. But in corrupted countries, I think it is impossible to open your own business without criminal support. That is because the economy of such countries is not healthy and competition is not connected with marketing and advertising activities, but in real money, which you are ready to pay corrupted law enforcement officers and criminals to start your business and then maintain it. And countries, where freedom is respected, provide equal opportunities for all. In this particular case, freedom is joined with financial wellness.
There are also cases when freedom means the right to say “no”. If you don’t agree with the government decision, community decision or another person decision you can say “no”. You don’t need to follow these decisions and you will never be punished for that. But this works only in cases when your ideas and actions do not violate the law and won’t cause harm to the people around you.
So what does freedom mean to me? At my opinion freedom can be connected with not following standard our society has. Freedom is something beyond stereotypes and templates and real personal freedom is a strong opportunity to express yourself in any possible way. Tattoos, piercing, hair style or clothes, we are free to wear or do anything with our body, and this is our freedom of expression. People why are thinking beyond stereotypes understand and respect that freedom.
Freedom is a way of thinking and understanding world around us, and each person understands it in his or her own way, and of course all of us has an own understanding of it. And each of us in some cases needs to fight for this freedom
