Freedom Day Observed: Are We Really Free?
Today is Monday, it's holiday in South Africa where I am, where I live, they are calling it Freedom Day Observed, meaning yesterday was Freedom Day. So because Sunday was a holiday hence today we are resting from the holiday yesterday. Now my question is what is freedom. Or according to exactly how he asked it "What is Freedom".
Muzi (the weird guy stays next door): "It is a way that people express themselves without judgement."
Raphel: "Freedom is the ability to do anything, anyhow anywhere without..."
Ontatile: "Freedom to me is whereby I can be able to do whatever I want to, but the whatever that leads me to those things consists of money but I can not do that because I lack money."
The Definition Dilemma (Because Everyone's Got One, Don't They?)
Funny thing about freedom, everyone bangs on about it, waves flags for it, even dies for it, but ask ten people what it means and you'll get eleven different answers. It's like asking what love is, or why people watch reality TV. The answers are deeply personal and often wildly contradictory.
The Good Book has plenty to say about freedom, though it's not exactly the "do whatever feels good" variety that gets tossed around at music festivals.
Galatians 5:13 tells us: "You, my brothers and sisters, were called to be free. But do not use your freedom to indulge the flesh; rather, serve one another humbly in love." (NIV)
Well, that's a bit of a buzz kill, isn't it? Freedom as service to others? Not exactly what the average teenager scribbles in their diary.
But there's something profound there that our mate Paul understood. True freedom isn't just about absence of constraints, it's about the presence of possibility. And the highest possibility? Connection to others.
It's like when Jesus said "the truth will set you free" (John 8:32). He wasn't talking about freedom to binge Netflix without judgment. He was talking about freedom from self-deception, from the narratives we tell ourselves that keep us small and afraid.
Mandela's Long Walk (Not Just a Good Book Title)
When Mandela walked out of prison after 27 years, he famously said: "For to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others."
Bloody inconvenient, that. Would be much simpler if freedom just meant doing whatever the hell we want, wouldn't it?
But Mandela understood something that our modern "you do you" culture conveniently forgets: freedom doesn't exist in isolation. Your freedom bumps up against mine, and how we negotiate that shared space defines civilisation itself.
Mandela could have chosen vengeance and who would've blamed him? Instead, he chose reconciliation, understanding that true freedom required breaking cycles, not perpetuating them.
The Freedom Paradox (Because I Read Books, You Know)
According to psychologist Barry Schwartz in his distressingly popular book "The Paradox of Choice," more freedom doesn't necessarily mean more happiness. In fact, too many choices can lead to decision paralysis, perpetual FOMO, and the nagging sense that there's always a better option just around the corner.
It's like when you spend forty-five minutes scrolling through Netflix only to give up and rewatch The Office for the eighth time. Freedom of choice became a burden rather than a blessing.
Studies from the University of Cambridge suggest that constraints actually boost creativity and satisfaction. It's why poets embrace the sonnet's rigid structure and why some of the best football is played within the boundaries of the pitch.
Unlimited freedom, it turns out, is about as useful as an unlimited data plan in the middle of the Karoo.
Financial Freedom (Or The Lack Thereof)
Our mate Ontatile hit on something profound, didn't she? "Freedom to me is whereby I can be able to do whatever I want to, but the whatever that leads me to those things consists of money but I can not do that because I lack money."
There's brutal honesty for you. In our capitalist paradise, freedom and finance are inextricably linked. You're free to buy any car you want – provided you can afford it. You're free to live anywhere – if you can make rent.
It reminds me of that exchange in Terry Pratchett's "Men at Arms":
"The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. He earned thirty-eight dollars a month plus allowances. A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars... A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while the poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet."
That's the freedom gap in a nutshell, isn't it? The wealthy don't just have more stuff, they have more choices, more security, more ability to say "no." They have more freedom.
Are We Really Free? (The Question You've Been Waiting For)
So here we are, enjoying our Freedom Day Observed holiday, 30-odd years into democracy. Are we really free?
Well, we're free-er than before, surely. The explicit legal barriers are gone. The pass laws. The segregated beaches. The "whites only" benches.
But freedom isn't binary, is it? It's not like a light switch, on or off. It's more like a dimmer operating at different intensities across different areas of life.
Politically, legally yes, there's freedom.
Economically? Well... gestures broadly at unemployment statistics
Psychologically? That's the tricky one, innit? How many of us still carry mental chains, colonial hangovers, internalised limitations that no constitution can legislate away?
Ephesians 6:8 tells us, "The Lord will reward each one for whatever good they do, whether slave or free." (NIV) The implication being that freedom isn't about your circumstances, but what you choose to do within them.
The Way Forward (Or Just My Random Thoughts at 2:43 AM)
Maybe true freedom isn't about absence of constraints but clarity of purpose.
Maybe freedom isn't about having infinite choices but about knowing which choices matter.
Maybe, just maybe, freedom is less about what you can do without consequence and more about what you choose to do despite the cost.
As Viktor Frankl (Holocaust survivor and psychologist who knew a thing or two about freedom) put it: "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."
So as we observe Freedom Day here in South Africa, perhaps the question isn't whether we're completely free – of course we're not. No one is. The question is whether we're using the freedom we do have in ways that expand rather than contract the freedom of others.
Because that's where Mandela was heading with his whole "enhance the freedom of others" bit, wasn't he? Freedom not as a zero-sum game but as a collaborative project. My freedom tied up in yours. Yours in mine.
A bit idealistic? Probably. A bit uncomfortable? Definitely.
But then again, anything worth having usually is.
And now, if you'll excuse me, I need to exercise my freedom to have another cup of rooibos and contemplate why we never get a holiday for International Coffee Day. Now THAT would be worth celebrating.
Freedom is sacrificing one thing for another.
You want to be free? Of What? Sacrifice that other thing!
Because This is What We Do NOW!
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