Freedom is a terrific burden.
The most terrifying thing about being ‘condemned to be free,’ as Sartre put it, is that no one can tell us how to live or what’s right.
And so, we often find ourselves fleeing freedom—lookin for refuge in folk wisdom, codes of conduct, bureaucratic procedures, or the wisdom of our mothers, religious leaders, and favourite podcasters; looking for refuge in anything that might promise a smidgen of moral certainty.
Although we won’t admit it—Trump’s supporters claim to be fighting not only for “law & order” but for freedom too—being ruled appeals to us because it offers some escape from the discomfort that comes with the ambiguities of living.
The ways we let ourselves be ruled are often subtle, and they have to be to avoid too much dissonance with our outward commitment to freedom as a bland universal value. By refusing even to imagine the possibility of things like flaunting convention, failing to perform our duty, or disregarding expert advice, we subscribe to regimes that bound us and shield us from liberty’s howling expanse.
A social order, whether imposed by ‘common sense’ or morality, a cult leader or religion, a fascist dictator or long-standing regime, lets us know our place. It appeals to us precisely because it limits our options, and with them, the very real terror of going badly wrong.
This tendency was described in 1933 and 1941 by the psychologists Wilhelm Reich and Erich Fromm in their books The Mass Psychology of Fascism and Escape from Freedom, respectively.
It’s what Donald Trump is promising — what he’s always promised. Here’s an excerpt from a recent, blood-curdling speech:
“I will make you safe at the border, on the sidewalks of your now violent cities, in the suburbs where you are under migrant criminal siege, and with our military protecting you from foreign enemies…”
“You will no longer be abandoned, lonely, or scared. You will no longer be in danger—you’re not gonna be in danger any longer. You will no longer have anxiety from all of the problems our country has today. You will be protected, and I will be your protector. Women will be happy, healthy, confident, and free.”
The speech purports to be about protection from violence, but that’s not what it’s really about—the threat of violence from migrants and foreign enemies is imaginary and just an alibi for what’s really promised—the ordering of women’s lives by, yes, protecting them (from imaginary threats), but more significantly by circumscribing them into a narrow role that offers freedom from anxiety, loneliness and abandonment in return for the loss of reproductive freedoms, for a start.