From the mind of critic: “If the price of freedom is eternal vigilance, how do we pay it? Is it pre-paid and pre-ordered, so the payment is in hand before it’s been fully manufactured? Is it available on C.O.D., where we don’t pay until it arrives? Do we know the cost. but believe it’s to expensive? Are we willing to pay whatever the cost is, because the end result is all that matters? Have elected officials convinced us the price is higher or lower than it actually is, tayloring the value around business and political aspirations? For freedom to be authentic not only does it have to cover all people, but it must be constantly tested. Sometimes it needs to be fought or bargained for, but it always reuiqres being earned. We earn freedom by standing up for rights of people, full stop. We earn it by taking care of the lesser of us, because we know it could be us. We earn it by paying a living wage and leveling the playing field, by not skewing all the economic and financial benefits to the gatekeepers and money changers. True freedom only exists if we’re all free. When we say somebody else’s freedom steals ours, we’re the ones bloocking freedom. When we say people hate freedom, we’re saying we hate true freedom. There will always be minorities in every population, religion and culture who use beliefs to further enhance darkness. The majority however, all have the same human needs. When we exhale freedom for others, we inhale it for ourselves, that’s how we stay vigilant.” 🙂