by Steven E. Romer
logos64@home.com

This is a little essay about freedom I have been posting on newsgroups. When people do not feel free, and when a government becomes too powerful, they are forced to live lies. After the truth falls, justice cannot be found either. People do not live a lie by choice. I am a neuroscientist/psychologist by training and have a different angle on these Second Amendment issues which you might find interesting:

I had a college professor a while back, in my senior seminar for my honors psychology program, that told us something very interesting and germane to this topic. He said that you cannot force people to do things against their will with psychological principles, but that you can change totally what they want. That is done every day in this country. There are a lot of powerful and smart people out there who believe that it is necessary to do this. Hitler was a master at it, among others, but compared to today's standards, he was just a crude beginning. He did not even have television!

People ask me why I think of those in government as "them"--a separate group. This is because they have totally accepted the agendas of whatever branch they work in. Government employees in the big "imprisonment machine" bureaus (we have more people in prison than ANY other nation on earth--including over 3000 for "paperwork" firearms violations!!) do not vote themselves out of a job--even if they don't like 100% of what their agency does. They vote near 100% liberal in many cases. This situation overall necessarily means they are susceptible to taking on the opinions of others, and not thinking for themselves. They are used to it. They are "just following orders, doing their jobs, and applying the rule of law" like robots. This is the most dangerous type of person on earth to our future--because they can be made to do anything, including crush the truth! Media watchdogs (AIM, etc.) have shown one of the greatest cases of bias ever uncovered in the coverage of second amendment issues, for example. For any employee of the big media, or editor, to totally support the Second Amendment is unseen. They work their way up through such organizations by playing along. Here again, POWER is the corrupting force, the pressure, as is greed, and wanting to be "successful" in the eyes of others. Denial is the chief characteristic of these people that lets them get through. It is a powerful defense mechanism.

In the horrible past of our species, fraught with atrocities and power-hungry states, any who opposed lines of power were made less likely to survive. To go against them meant a drop in status at least, and outright death in more extreme cases. It is written strongly in our very genes. Even chimp studies show this--depending on their rank, chimps will display, or not display, knowledge in front of others depending on their own rank in relation to the others. If the highest ranking chimp is around, this is especially true--they will totally ignore something they have shown to know in private. They do not do what they know or what is in their hearts. They do this consistently, and with uncanny automatic perception of power. We cannot afford to have government have a lot of power over us because it robs all of society of truth, knowledge, and adaptability. Freedom is the first requirement of the human spirit, of REALLY living your life!

I think those especially prone to being programmed by political forces (media/political correctness/school systems) do not understand what it means to truly "be all they can be", and their defense mechanisms that keep them from seeing these things are VERY strong. Some things our genetic biology takes out of our hands because it is so important--like breathing, etc. You can stop in theory, but you WILL start breathing again. The mere appearance of freedom is illusory. Same thing with your thinking. Most people are akin to cattle or sheep--there is an unpleasant reason these animals became domesticated according to evolution. It was in their best interest--the proliferation of docile animals served the purpose of those in power without causing trouble. The animals chosen for giving food and shelter to were the docile ones. Ones who harmed humans were not bred, and probably immediately killed. Not pleasant to think about, but necessary for understanding the true value of freedom!

Some people, I'm sure, are too embedded into this system of lavish oppression (camel through eye of needle and all those other like quotes...) to ever escape. You may want to go on living your life having sold your soul this way, but please let others have a chance to let their spirits grow and rise to the heights that they were meant to and are capable of. It is in ALL of our best interests to do this--to allow the release of the human spirit of life! The Second Amendment DEFINITELY becomes the most important right upon which all others are obviously based from the psychological standpoint--whether they are actually used to defend freedom or not! ALL of our rights are very important, as is a vigilant defense of them by those in power, AND by those subject to that power. Look at history, and you will see this to be true. These are big issues, and we cannot weigh them properly without scrutinizing ourselves and how our own minds work. Knowledge is power, and knowledge can keep you from being destroyed. Knowledge can keep you from being turned into a liar to YOURSELF, as well as to others--unable to fulfill your life's true purpose by things at work that you would otherwise not be able to discern.

There is nothing more horrible than such a living death. Most do not understand the power and the joy of a mind working to follow the spirit, to follow the shining path of the soul where every moment of every day is filled with unutterable beauty. When miracles fill up your hours and paint the world with ecclesiastical prose from a hidden paintbrush of unutterable, quiet, ceaseless power. Many never know how empty they were until they see the light of their own truth and soul.

It is very dangerous that people seem more and more to worship government. Government is seen as the great problem-solver. Problem is, it was never meant to be that. The solutions it comes up with are symptom-oriented, and are feel-good, simple, 30 second sound-byte vote getters. People flock to the polling places to feel like they are doing something good, when all they are really doing is avoiding guilt from not doing something personally, from not having knowledge, for not having true empathy, for not having time... Love of liberty IS love of others. Solving problems with government force is like doing brain surgery with your fists! The more the government tries to "help", the more intrusive and restrictive it becomes--keeping us from reaching down inside and finding the power to change things or to avoid more problems.

"We have separation of church and state in this country to the extreme--but this just hides the fact that our state is becoming a horrid church!"

The more we feel like scared children, the more we want government to do something to protect us. All successful tyrants keep their people from developing fully--like keeping a caterpillar from metamorphosizing into a great, flying butterfly! It is a vicious cycle. Most of the citizens help in this by persecution, ostracization, cruelty, ignorance--just like kids do everywhere to a lesser extent on playgrounds, and to a greater extent in religious persecutions like the inquisition, or in genocides. We have separation of church and state in this country to the extreme--but this just hides the fact that our state is becoming a horrid church! Complete with an overly-large forced collection, and lots of sermonizing about laws and right and wrong. Thinking for yourself can cause everything from a contempt of court charge, to being burned at the stake...or compound.

Truth and knowledge are the most important things in the world because they reveal evil, and allow life to blossom. Truth is our main purpose on this earth, because all other purposes follow from it. Truth is beauty and beauty is truth. That is why I am a scientist and scholar. That is the one thing that drives me above any other. All other goals are pale reflections, false idols, fool's gold. Life is the true vein of gold--without freedom and truth, you cannot discover its riches.

This is why I think this constitution and bill of rights is among the greatest achievements of mankind in history. Even though these things of ink and parchment are much greater than the pyramids, they may not last as long. We are at a crossroads in time, and it is easy to see that evil could lead us to destruction. We MUST not eschew freedom and knowledge for comfort and wealth, safety, or power. When we do not make our own choices, our brains are wasted. These things form themselves into a body of real, true destruction if left unchecked.