Son of Timatollah

1. Happy Independence Day!

Let's hear it for a free country.

2. Today, I just made the last EFT to pay off our credit card debt, several months ahead of schedule. I declare Independence from revolting credit. Still have to deal with car- and house-related debt, but that's a little more bearable and sensible.

Let's hear it for freedom from debt.

3. Every 4th of July, my dad used to say, "Today is Independence Day: The day I left my first wife."

Let's hear it for freedom from bad relationships.

4. I have proto-thoughts, have had for a long time, about this whole idea of "self-evident" truths. About these "unalienable rights" being "endowed by their Creator." I'm not trying to provoke an argument about matters of belief, about cosmology: rather, it seems that rights start as ideas, maybe held by one, maybe held by some, and that the expression of those ideas, the eventual putting those ideas down in writing and having them shared by many, creates a context where those rights exist, at least as ideas. But those rights/ideas, without the use of some kind of force—physical, by individuals, by a government based on similar shared rights/ideas—remain just ideas. Not necessarily rooted, maybe not made extant.

At some point, if we advocate our rights, we have to be willing to stand up for them, to fight for them. Otherwise, it's only talk. In a civil society, talk may be a means of fighting for them, but it's probably well advised to keep in mind other means.

Keep your powder dry.

I have little doubt that philosophers have talked this framing out, and that I ought to educate myself about it. I'm open to references, if you care to share.

Let's hear it for freedom. For human rights. For independence.

Labels: 4th of July, debt, freedom, Independence Day, rights