Left/Right Dichotomy and the Concept of Freedom

Much has been written about left-wing and right-wing politics, and many people have chosen a position without fully understanding what their side actually represents; or of why it supports the one or two issues which they have deemed important enough to sway them fully into the embrace of these vast and encompassing ideologies. In my personal experience one of, if not the most common reason for support of either is an abstract idea that we refer to as 'freedom', and to which we place immense importance and a sense of corporeality which largely does not exist. In the modern Western world it is the 'Left' that is constantly supported through media, film, radio and academia; the 'Right' largely portrayed as 'oppressive' and 'bigoted' with the 'Left' being characterised as 'liberal'; a word that denotes a follower of the idea of 'liberty', that is freedom. This is misleading.

If we are to imagine a line, with the left most point called the 'Total Left' and the right most point the 'Total Right':

The 'Total Right' is absolute and unrestrained freedom, it is total individuality wherein the adherent may act in whatever way he so desires. There are no laws.

The 'Total Left' is absolute control, the adherent living according to laws which influence every facet of their lives.

This is likely an image that many would reject upon first being introduced to it, as their perception of the left/right dichotomy is full of words that imply the opposite. However my use of the word 'freedom' in regards to the 'Total Right' may be deceptive, as 'freedom' is largely an abstract concept. In general we can define freedom as 'the ability to act as one desires', to have 'absolute freedom' would by such a definition imply the ability to act as one desires in regards to any and all circumstances; however the 'Total Right' would likely be very oppressive and in practice a lot less free than a more central position between the 'Left' and 'Right'. Allow me to demonstrate with an example:

In this world of the 'Total Right', there is a man who grows a hallucinogenic plant and intends to trade it for the resources he needs to further his life and grow his business. Another man takes a different path in life; rather than creating something and trading it, he decides that he will dedicate his life to martial ability, and then force the first man to give him his money or else he shall kill him. This is all perfectly legal as there are no laws.

For the first man to be successful, he has to hide from the second man or train himself in the way of combat. As we can see, he is no longer 'free' to pursue his life's work of growing his hallucinogenic plant and selling it. Instead he is forced to take steps to protect his life and his business; he is no longer 'completely free' as was first implied by the 'Total Right'.

Were there laws agreed upon by society that stated unwarranted physical violence and theft were 'illegal', and would be punished by the 'collective' of society if broken; the first man would be 'more free' to live his life in the way that he desired. As such by sacrificing some 'freedom' (in this case theft and assault) you in fact gain 'more freedom' and can act to a greater extent as you desire to. If one's adherence to the Left or Right is to be defined by how much freedom one has, it is therefore necessary to find the perfect balance of rules (the left) and lack of rules (the right); and this is where politics becomes complicated.

For the second man in the example, his freedom is restricted by the already conceived of laws, and thus he may well be against their construction. To the modern day Leftist, anyone supporting the 'Right' is similar to this man. They embody oppression and violence, and if not restrained by 'laws' will potentially run rampant and ruin their ability to live life. To address this they must make laws, enforced by violence, to stop him acting as he desires. Now in the scenario that I have constructed it looks like the 'Left' are being the rational ones; they are desiring to stop theft and violence, which allows everyone to live a decent life so as long as they are content with what we might call 'honest work'. Society as a whole can grow and be fruitful.

Let us now look at the opposite extreme. If you have been paying attention to the media in recent years, you will have heard much about 'freedom of speech' and a thing called 'hate speech'. 'Freedom of speech' is a right-wing concept that allows for criticism and discussion of any concept; be it a monarch, a religion, a cultural norm or anything. It allows for us to push boundaries, for humans to find flaws in what might have previously been called 'sacred', to refine and perfect institutions, beliefs and life in general. 'Hate speech' is a Leftist reaction, declaring that unrestrained 'free speech' leads to 'oppression', and thus affects their 'freedom'. The Leftist here has changed the abstract meaning of 'freedom' once more, where before it was assumed that we were free to 'physically' act as we so desire; the Leftist is now asserting that they desire 'freedom' from having their feelings hurt or their sacred concepts blasphemed. This is of course a very different perception of 'freedom' than that of the previous example of the man being at risk of having his livelihood stolen, or his life ended should a law not be in place. This is putting a law in place to protect one's feelings, or their understanding of the world (even if they are wrong). To the right-winger the Left is now being oppressive, threatening violence (for that is what law is, a collective decision to unite to enforce a rule should it be broken) if the Right criticise them, their beliefs or their institutions.

To uphold the 'freedom' of the Leftist who desires 'hate speech' to be illegal in the above scenario would be similar to upholding the 'Total Right' man who desired to steal from others by the threat of violence. If the Leftist believed that all races should be equally represented in all positions (as many do with their 'affirmative action' and quotas), it may well go against a man's desire to create a family business. For the family-business desiring man, arguing that other races are not necessary in his company could be construed as 'hate speech', and thus end with him being punished. Such a law deprives him of his freedom to act as he desires. As with the example of the 'Total Right' thief prone to violence, the reason why we should be on the side of 'family-business desiring man' is because you are interfering with their right to make an 'honest living'. By only allowing people in his family to partake in his business he is not harassing anyone, yet by forcing him to take people he may not want you are harassing him; thus his right to an 'honest life' has been taken away.

It is now necessary to examine what 'honest living' is. Honest living is a simple concept; it means that everyone is capable of living and prospering in their lives should they be left un-harassed, and not harass others themselves. It would include agriculture and hunting, merchants and retail, artisans and craft-men, fishermen and builders. These professions, assuming practised 'fairly' (which means much the same as 'honest living', that it does not exploit or harass others in its practice) allow a person to lead a prosperous life without causing harm to anyone else, and should they all be leading such a life no 'law' would be needed. We of course still need some laws to protect these people should another decide that the 'honest life' is not for them. 'Hate speech' is thus an enemy of 'freedom' in its 'fair and honest' incarnation, as it potentially deprives a man of living an 'honest life'. It is important to note that the law can only truly protect one's freedom in regards to actions; feelings are impossible to legislate for, as each man may feel differently in his reaction; and the purpose of the law is to allow for physical freedom for the collective of society, not one individual or another.

In my view it is by this concept of 'honest living' that we can define when a law becomes tyrannical and oppressive, and when it exists to prevent tyranny and oppression. If our desire in politics is to create the 'most free' society we must use this method to determine whether or not a law would serve to restrict the freedom of the 'honest life' or whether it would grant more freedom to the 'honest life'.

To me it appears that the average modern 'Leftist liberal' has simply been led astray by the manipulation of the term 'freedom' to justify whatever the user of the term desires. I would imagine that despite their mass number in our age, few genuinely want to deny the opportunity of an 'honest life' to anyone; and instead have simply been tricked by the abstract nature of the term 'freedom' and subsequently believed they were trying to uphold a free, fair and honest life for all. However I feel it would be wrong to simply discount the Leftist on this ground, for even if my assertion is true; that does not necessarily mean that what they desire is 'bad' or 'wrong', it simply no longer has anything to do with the unfortunately imprecise term of 'freedom'; and so our conversation now evolves from a simple 'what is freedom' and 'how can we attain the most freedom', to 'does freedom even matter?'

Now that is a question that only you can answer; but let us not pretend any more that the 'modern liberal' Leftist is concerned with 'freedom', or that they want to be rid of 'oppression'. A larger state is more oppression; and whilst it is true that some people may live a better life under the all encompassing guidance of another; we must remember that this is nonetheless 'tyranny'. The Western world has traditionally desired as small a state as possible, a largely 'right-wing' construct which allows for the 'left-wing' authoritarianism to only intervene when the ability to lead an 'honest life' is infringed upon. It is my view that this is the ideal upon which all laws should be based, and when they do not adhere to this they should be pointed out as tyranny; and if to deny a person this ability to live an honest life thus is restricted, then it is my belief that the collective should use violence to protect the right to an honest life; for was that not the purpose of having law in the first place?

This is where I'm getting some disconnect.
This seems… overtly utopian in scope.

This 'honest living' seems contextually infeasible in the present context, and perhaps in all contexts; including, for example, in the evolutionary context.

I would request further elucidation in this vein.

And what of duty?

To self, to family, to kin and kind, to nation and race, to species, to gene-line?

How does this fit into your paradigm?

If the ideal upon which all laws should be based is the inhibition of infringement upon 'honest living' (the capacity of an individual to live and prosper in their lives as should be the case were they left unharrassed and did not seek to harrass others), how does the inherent obligation implied in the concept of duty interract with this perspective?

Left and Right is usually place on a four tile grid for economic and social freedom.

seems like you finally figured out that will trumps all and force is what matters.

Duty in an abstract sense cannot be legislated for. You cannot tell people they must obey their family at all times regardless of what they ask, for that could go against other laws. I do believe duty should be encouraged, but to legislate for it is going a step too far (just imagine all the 'inspectors' you would have nagging you all the time trying to make sure that you had been 'dutiful' that day).

But if law is based on 'honest living', then harassment to one's self or family, or nation, requires lawful intervention. As such stuff like conscription could be permissible in a situation of defense.

Do note that this is not to say that duty should not exist. It is simply that it should only be enshrined in law; as in, you do this or the collective of society will use violence to punish you; if it directly affects how much one can be harassed whilst trying to live out an 'honest life'. Having no laws does not mean that we do not have other morals; for instance one might choose to be a vegetarian, or feel an obligation to raise orphans or feed the homeless, but such things should not be 'forced' upon other people as at that stage it becomes tyranny.

I do not believe so. It would stop usury, it would stop slavery, it would stop big banks or opposition companies from shutting you down, it would allow you live how you desired so long as you did not hurt anyone else. I would argue that the vast majority of us and our ancestors lived in this way, and that the law never stopped them from living and working. The state would stay out of your life entirely unless you infringed upon someone else's freedom physically (as in violence, theft, squatting, etc).

I think that most of our laws concerning 'freedom' originally were created to facilitate this 'honest living', and that historically no one saw the necessity of spelling out exactly what it was, as it was so obvious to most. The other kinds of laws were not based upon achieving 'freedom' but in doing the will of whatever dictator was in power. You can argue that the desires of the dictator might have been in the best interests of the people; but just because it is not a 'law' does not mean that it still cannot happen. Military training is in my opinion a very important thing, and I would advise most young people to spend some time doing it; however forcing people to do it is crossing a boundary. You might justify military service as it appeals to you, but what if someone else thought it was important that everyone be trained in regards to how to converse with others; in what is okay to say and what is not? What about being trained in how to think? What about being told that if they do not believe X/Y/Z, they are a 'racist/sexist/hate-mongerer/bigot' and should be punished by law for not attending this 'beneficial' training?

Make the state as small possible whilst retaining the rights of the masses to an honest life.

Your central premise is false.

Right wing does not mean or imply freedom. There has recently, in the U.S., been a movement within the right wing for smaller federal government. This is not the same thing as freedom at all.

Right wing generally means people who want society to enforce strong moral rules. Right wing people in the U.S. want abortion to be illegal, and prostitution to be illegal, and drug use to be illegal, and gay marriage to be illegal, and perhaps homosexuality in general to be illegal.

What you are speaking of when you talk about "right" are libertarians, who are outside the right/left continuum entirely.

when its all those things thats not right wing thats just a christian fundamentalist in todays terminology
possessing one or two of those that wish to be illegal is enough these days to get deemed right wing

It is not that freedom is bad - but only whites think its rad. I do not embrace the NAP.