Regulation is freedom, and freedom is authoritarianism.
"Freedom," warned the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, which is funded by the Trudeau government, is a word that has "become common among far-right groups."
To prove its point, the CBC quoted Elisabeth Anker, a George Washington University prof, who claimed that freedom is a "slippery concept" and that those on the right want "violent" freedoms that reject being "bound by norms of equality" or "norms to remedy inequality."
On, in other words, freedom from state coercion to create the ideal society of the state.
Anker wrote a book titled Ugly Freedoms which argues that "individual liberty has always been entangled with white supremacy, settler colonialism, climate destruction, economic exploitation, and patriarchy.” The leftist author of articles such as "You Can Love Me Too — I Am So Like The State" and “The Communist Manifesto in an Era of Late-Capital” takes her anti-freedom views to state-owned media forums such as Al Jazeera, the BBC, and Voice of America.
It’s understandable that anyone whose business is going on government media to explain why the government should take away individual rights wouldn’t be too fond of “ugly” freedom.
In George Orwell’s 1984, the Ministry of Truth is decorated with party slogans that include, “Freedom is Slavery” and “Ignorance is Strength.” The organization was based on the actual British Ministry of Information which Orwell had a great deal of experience with while working for the wartime BBC even while his wife worked for the Ministry’s censorship division.
Orwell would not have been in the least surprised by state media trotting out an academic who regularly appears on state media (including that of totalitarian nations such as Qatar) to explain that freedom is really a very naughty thing even as the state crushes a “Freedom Convoy” using emergency powers that were meant to deal with wartime emergencies, not peaceful protests.
But “Freedom is Slavery” propaganda has become extremely ubiquitous on the Left.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau argued that by using the Emergencies Act to suppress protests, he was actually doing what is "necessary to reinforce the principles, values, and institutions that keep all Canadians free." Taking away the freedom to protest against his regime was actually keeping all Canadians free. 1984’s version of the same logic was a good deal pithier.
Long before the Freedom Convoy, media in this country had begun vocally insisting that Gov. Ron DeSantis was an “authoritarian” for refusing to impose onerous regulations on Floridians.
“Ron DeSantis is creating a paradise of authoritarianism,” a Washington Post column argued.
An authoritarian paradise, like a place where tyranny is the right not to be told what to do, is a contradiction in terms, but in a backward world where freedom is a threat, elected officials who don’t force people to do things are authoritarians, while politicians who take away rights are liberators. The greatest tyranny is making your own choices and the ultimate freedom comes from...
