The Purpose of Freedom, Part 1

“The purpose of freedom is to create it for others.”  -  Bernard Malamud.  I came across this quote the other day and loved it instantly.  It can be used in a variety of situations.  For instance, it can be used on a societal level, on a group level, or on a personal level.

It reminds of a couchsurfer I stayed with in Wellington, New Zealand back in 2008.  She said something along the lines of, “If we have the ability to live however we want we have the responsibility not to.”  Sometimes sayings just stick with me.  They are so true instantly that they really resonate with me and stamp themselves on my brain.

Let’s get back to the original saying.  Americans cherish our freedom as a nation.  Are we using that freedom to create it for others?  It is so difficult to do as a nation.  Sometimes we try to use diplomacy, other times sanctions, other times war. 

Operation Iraqi Freedom was one such example.  We tried to free the Iraqi people and ended up making it worse overall.  How many people are killed every day there now?  How many soldiers did America and other countries lose in battle?  How many soldiers now suffer terribly from PTSD on a daily and ongoing basis?

Would anyone say the Iraqi people are now free after we “freed” them?  It would be a pretty tough argument to make.  What do you do though?  There was a terrible dictator in Saddam Hussein who was killing his own people.  We saw people suffering on the news every day.  We had the military resources to put an end to Saddam.

A few weeks ago I listened to a podcast that talked about sanctions and how often they worked for the states.  The expert they interviewed had looked over the past 50 or 60 years and all the times we had used sanctions.  He had evaluated what the purposes of the sanctions were and whether we had achieved those purposes or not.  He found sanctions worked about 30% of the time.  Maybe that’s why some Americans are so quick to want to pull the trigger.

“Freedom isn’t free” is a favorite saying among Americans as well.  It’s the idea that people fought and died so we could be free as a country.  How do you stop a dictator like Assad or Putin from just doing whatever they please?  Many people think we should get in there and use our military resources to defend the rights of the powerless. 

Is there possibly a better way?  Is there a third way like Walter Wink suggests?  He has a book entitled The Third Way that talks about the way of Jesus.  Is that possible in today’s geopolitics?  Is nonviolent resistance effective?  Can it possibly work against a violent regime?  What is the way forward in all these war-torn countries?