The meaning of freedom

There is an interesting disgusion going on at Devil's Kitchen about freedom. Mostly about the difference between the freedom TO and freedom FROM. DK is arguing that Jahdi twats are not freedom fighters (and a I agree) because they are actively fighting against other people having the freedom to do many things. Whereas some people are trying to muddy the waters by saying that they are fighting for the freedom from most products of the last thousand years.

A similar digussion is also going on at Harry's Place about freedom, sparked by a Madeleine Bunting article in Al Guardian. She says how Muslims feel excluded because in native culture the pub acts as an important part of social networks on account of their religion forbidding them to drink.

The commenters at Harry's Place seem to have quickly pointed out the falicy of the Bunting argument, and the freedom from arguement in general, that just because something is possible does not make it manditory. You can go to a pub and not drink. You can also hang around with people in short skirts and not be turned into a sex crazed monster, you can even live in the 21st century while rejecting most of it. You do not have to kill everybody that chooses to do these things to exercise your own ability to choose not to.

As Harry says 'Liberty, if it means anything, is the right to tell people what they don't want to hear.'