Freedom but whose freedom?
“They can take our lives, but they will never take our freeeedommm!” Mel Gibson’s character, Sir William Wallace, implored the patriots around him to fight until the end in the against-all-odds fight for Scotland’s independence against England in the late 13th century.
Let’s skip the debate regarding whether Gibson’s accent is annoying and inauthentic.
Later in the 1995 movie after demonstrating remarkable determination while getting tortured before a crowd, Wallace gets one final chance to avoid his execution by merely uttering the word, “mercy,” He doesn’t.
“Freedom!” he roars with his final act of strength. And then he got beheaded.
Now, let’s fast forward to modern times. “Freedom.” What does that word mean? In politics, it’s many things. Some claim that they were protecting their freedom by storming the U.S. Capitol Building on January 6, 2021 in an effort to stop Congress from certifying Joe Biden — instead of Donald Trump — as the president of the United States (that day remains one of the most jaw-dropping experiences of my lifetime in our country).
We also hear politicians use “freedom” as part of reproductive freedom debates or the freedom to marry the person you love. We’ve heard it described as your freedom to get vaccinated against COVID-19 or the freedom not to get vaccinated. It’s the freedom to attend the school of your choice (if the school also chooses to accept you). Or it’s the freedom to worship or the freedom to live or work where you want. It’s the freedom for teachers to talk to students about gender identity or the freedom to not allow that in the classroom.
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem used “freedom” in a confusing Twitter post (or at least confusing to me) that talked about declining drug use and freedom. Is drug use declining because of freedom? Drug use hasn’t declined as much in other states because they don’t have as much freedom? Again, I’m confused.
https://twitter.com/KristiNoem/status/1682489375538532358?s=20
Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds uses the word “freedom” in a variety of ways. Reynolds, who has worked for the government over the past three decades, alleged that government restricts freedom in this Twitter post.
https://twitter.com/IAGovernor/status/1626261663967051782?s=20
She has now incorporated “freedom” into the state’s new marketing slogan. Reynolds is plowing under the phrase that Tom Vilsack instituted as governor. No more “Fields of Opportunities.”
Moving forward (until a future governor changes it again), Iowa will use a new slogan as it tries to reverse a century-long slide as the state with one of the country’s slowest growing population rates and its several decades-long erosion of nearly two-thirds of its counties actually losing residents. There’s work to be done, for sure, if you want to see the state thrive one day.
Here’s the new slogan and it’s about freedom.
“Freedom to Flourish.” And much like the previous disagreements on issues regarding what actually constitutes freedom, this slogan triggered different responses, too.
Not sure which person created the alternative. But the meme made its way around following the governor’s announcement.
Freedom is in the eye of the beholder. Not sure that I’ve ever met a person who moved to a state because of its slogan. But they have the freedom to do so, if they choose.
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Dave Price’s Perspective is part of the Iowa Writers Collaborative, a group of independent writers who share unique voices on what’s happening in our communities. Check out the other members.
I liked your post and I’ve heard others focus on what the governor means by freedom, but I haven’t heard much about what it means to flourish. Do you think that the governor wants members of the LGBTQ community to flourish? If so, what does she think flourishing means to them? Does the governor want immigrants and their children to flourish? Are her policies consistent with this? It seems to me, the governor does very little to help people, other than her tribe of constituents, to flourish.