City Park Merry Go Round, By Eli Mandel

Have you ever thought about what it would be like not to be free? What would it be like not to be able to make choices? What would it be like not to be able to do what you want? It's scary to think about not being free, but even in the world today some people don't even have basic human freedoms. Lois Lowry shows us in her books The Giver and Gathering Blue what it would be like not to have freedom and how important it is that we have it.

A majority of people that chose to accept freedom believing it would give them better opportunities in life soon realised that life as a free person wasn’t as positive as they initially thought.

“The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion,” is a quote written by Albert Camus, which displays the complexity of defining the term freedom. Jean-Paul Sartre’s play “The Flies,” defines the concept of freedom as the accountability of one’s own guilt, which allows individuals to recognize their own freedom. Furthermore, an individual that accepts accountability for one’s own guilt and responsibility for the city, or complete isolation, is living in freedom. Likewise, Zora Neal Hurston’s novel Their Eyes Were Watching God explores the notion of being or becoming absolutely free, finding her voice,

In The Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption, Stephen King researches freedom using various frameworks. Freedom was symbolized in the book as pin-ups, rock figures, and Jake. Andy never lost hope that he will be free again. Andy as we know was different from everyone else in prison, that’s what made him stand out. His personality is what made his escape succeed. He didn’t rush for his freedom he was wise to be patient about it. Freedom is your decision, however you must strive to get it. You need to acknowledge what your principle point in life is, if it’s to find genuine freedom, you must give all that you got. In any case, first you have to understand that you are living in a jail. You have to get a look of what's conceivable. When you encounter what genuine freedom poses a flavor like, there is no doing a reversal, paradise is conceivable in this life

Jim Morrison has once said, “The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask.” We as human being are free from birth. We are given the ability to choose. This freedom makes us who we are as human being. Each individual make choices and learn through consequences. Through the consequences, we learn and the learning becomes experience. Through experience we slowly shape into who we want to be as human. This is the reason why we as humans are so special. Each individual is unique from others. Each of us has different ethical moral rights and wrong. Each of us has something we like and dislike. Each of us are different. Therefore,

Freedom is defined as being at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint; furthermore, to be released from an external force or control (dictionary). “Harrison Bergeron” is a short story that is in a society where the government is trying to make everyone equal, using handicaps to decrease certain individuals traits or qualities that are above average. In the novella Anthem, the people and society went back to the past when they are far into the future. The people are living in caves and have seemed to have lost or forgotten what people before them have discovered and believed. “Harrison Bergeron” and Anthem are very different but also have many similarities, especially referring to family and education.

During this conversation, the narrator asks, “Old woman, what is this freedom you love so well?” to which she responds, “I done forgot, son. It’s all mixed up. First I think it’s one thing, then I think it’s another. It gits my head to spinning” (Ellison, 11). In chapter eleven, the narrator himself struggles with freedom, both abstractly and physically.

Fun House, the autobiography written by author Alison Bechdel centers around her life growing up and the death of her father. The autobiography is in a graphic novel format that artistically depicts relevant events that occurred in Bechdel’s life when she was growing up. The novel shows the problems that dysfunctional families have in a realistic way without sugar coating anything. The plot of Fun House centers around Bechdel’s life and what it was like living in a household where the parents did not pay that much attention to their children and focused on other things, where the father who is supposed to the head of the household, has a dark secret concerning his sexual orientation, where the protagonist (Alison) is dealing with gender

The lack of freedom is shown in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest when Nurse Ratched prohibits Randle and the others from watching the World Series. In order for Randle to be able to watch the World Series, he must obtain a certain amount of votes. At first, he does not, leaving Nurse Ratched once again feeling successful. The second time Randle asks to watch the game, he does obtain the required amount of votes, yet Nurse Ratched claims it does not count, as the requirement was not met while the group meeting was still running. Small instances like this leave people such as Randle left feeling helpless and as if they are not entitled to basic forms of enjoyment. The lesson that each of the texts attempt to show the reader is that freedom is an important aspect of life, even having the freedom to do what we view as minuscule activities, such as to choose what to watch on television.

Freedom is being free from rules and ability to speak for your self. Bryon and Mark had been in fights and going places like to a bar, different towns, and hippie places. Mark and Bryon one time went out of town for two weeks. They have freedom to do all that because; Bryon’s mother was in the hospital. Mark and Bryon were either stealing or selling things to pay off Bryon’s mother hospital bill. Their freedom is not truly free because, of jobs and the hustling, and helping out their friends. Mark, Bryon, and Cathy went to a dance. Bryon and Cathy were on a date and found Mark there also. (Hinton, p54). When Mark got into a fight with some random guy their age, Mark got hit with a bottle and had to go to the hospital. (Hinton, p57). Their freedom

Within a piece of his writing, american essayist and social critic H. L. Mencken stated “The average man does not want to be free. He simply wants to be safe.” I strongly agree with Mencken’s claim within this essay. He is saying while people may believe that they want safety, they are subconsciously desiring the safety that comes along with freedom. Mencken was born in 1880, and did not die until 1956; concluding, he lived within the times of the civil rights movement.

It seems as if freedom is obtained by everyone besides ourselves. It is human to envy someone else’s circumstances as an escape from one’s own troubles. No matter how fortunate or unfortunate one’s situation truly is, freedom is something only others can possess. Throughout O Pioneers!, it seems as if “the grass always is greener on the other side”. For most of the characters, they see freedom as something that does exist, but not something they ever possess. It is no coincidence that each character’s idea of what freedom represents greatly differs from their own circumstances. To me, freedom does not have one concrete definition; instead, it is an escape from one’s own life, no matter what that life may be. For example, it can be argued that Carl and Alexandra both possess freedom. Carl is not tied to land and is thus free from the responsibility that comes with owning property. On the other, Alexandra has to be responsible for her land, but it has given her prosperity and authority over circumstance. Neither of these characters, however, see themselves as free. When Alexandra tells Carl that "I'd rather have had your freedom than my land, Carl suggests that his situation is far less desirable than it seems: “We are all alike; we have no ties, we know nobody, we own nothing.” (pg. 64). It is obvious that Carl’s and Alexandra’s definitions of freedom are widely different. For some, freedom means security and wealth. While for others, freedom represents the latitude of choice. The definition of freedom is one that differs from individual to individual. While many people desire freedom, and most have an idea of what freedom means to them, it rarely matches one’s own conditions. In my own life, I have felt this. Students at Breck often feel restricted by their responsibility and the challenges of school; to them, this is not their idea of freedom. However, many people in less fortunate circumstances probably think that

The fact that one’s freedom has the potential to limit the freedom of someone else is a widely acknowledged phenomenon that is prevalent in today’s socio-cultural world. When examining the implied sense of freedom within one’s physical movement, it is clear that certain people’s freedom of movements bound certain people into a confined boundary where they have access to a lack of movement. The irony that the freedom of certain individuals inhibits the freedom of others is clearly portrayed through discourses that are created and structured within our daily

Freedom has a large range of meaning. The encyclopedia Britannica defines freedom as “the quality or state of being free, and the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action” (Britannica). In the American society there is a lot of emphasis on freedom, and the right to be free, but one must question to what extent we are truly “free”.

Three people are walking down a New York City street. One is a Black man, one is an Asian woman, and the other person is a White man. One can easily picture the three people walking beside one another because the image is not bizarre or strange, rather; the image is completely normal. The vision is normal because these three American citizens have the freedom to walk where they choose, with whom they choose. The word freedom is often overlooked and taken for granted by those who have it. A popular idea of freedom is: “Freedom lets someone do whatever he chooses to do.” Although this thought of freedom is technically correct, the phrase barely scratches the surface of the idea of freedom.