Liberty Can't Be Tyrannical
By C. Apollo Morgan CMC '04

I am writing in response to Ryan Tacher's perverse definition of "tyranny" in the April 4 TSL piece "Fundamentals Misunderstood." Mr. Tacher makes the all-too-common multiculturalist mistake of letting despots speak for the people. Frankly, it is absurd to argue that "forcing" our values of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" on other nations is tyrannical.

I challenge him, or anyone reading this, to find a person who does not believe that they should be allowed to live their life as they see fit. Can you find a Shiite who would like to be forced to practice Sunni Islam, a Presbyterian who would like to be forced to live by the prescriptions and proscriptions of the Greek Orthodox Church, or a Buddhist who would enjoy living under a government that espoused nihilism and forced that ideology on its people?

While you are busy searching, consider this inanity from Mr. Tacher: He says that for "fundamentalists," it is okay to restrict liberties. "[P]eople who believe in life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness as their ultimate goals do not follow the strict guidelines imposed by God, and are sinners." That could not be more wrong. First, all people want life; I do not believe that is a value in question. Second, the same can be said of the pursuit of happiness.

What's that, you say? But people pursue happiness differently?

Of course they do. And that is where liberty comes in. Everyone believes that they should be allowed liberty to achieve happiness as they choose, whether that be through one interpretation or another of God, or some other means. It might be easy for some to forget, but even those people who obey very strict religious rules do so because they believe that is the means to happiness. The key to obeying these rules, or whatever rules one chooses to follow, is liberty.

Mr. Tacher, though, is not convinced that everyone wants liberty. "Who are we to decide what people worldwide should believe[?]" he asks, after pondering the potential tyranny of American-enforced liberty.

Under our rules, though, we wouldn't decide how people live their lives. Look at America, where we have the Amish, Unitarians, Muslims, and conservative Catholics all practicing their faiths as they see fit. In addition, all of these God-fearing groups, and many others, accord even atheists a large degree of tolerence.

Mr. Tacher makes the worrisome presumption that because Middle Eastern or Near Eastern governments enforce certain legal requirements based on Islam, that the people necessarily want to live that way. He overlooks the broad range of persecuted religious minorities in the Muslim world.

If America overthrows these tyrannical governments, we will not be forcing our values on those people. Rather, we will finally allow those people to live as they see fit, no matter their religious beliefs.

It is, in the word of several great men, self-evident that liberty cannot be forced on someone. Liberty can only be taken away.