Are our freedoms eroding ?

Definitely! Our government has gone way out of line as far as controling us. This wasn’t what I wanted but, I suppose! we’ll have to live with jeperdized freedom. I have a feeling our government is going to also control our school systems and other programs. Government won’t solve problems, its corrupt!

That is true, I should have been more specific, although the OP was very vague to begin with. I don’t really agree with the statement “it appears the Government is more and more telling citizens and business, what they can do and what they cannot do “. I think the OP should make a specific reference or give an example to go off of. As you can see, every poster has interpreted the statement somewhat differently.

As for the erosion of our present freedoms, again, it’s a blanket statement. In some ways, we are more free than before, which I mentioned.

OMG yes…What is happening now, would have gotten a non-believing chuckle 20 or 30 years ago…nobody would have believed the “prophecy”…They freedoms lost range from indiviual rights and property rights, to the rights of states…California just passed a sweeping “green” law, that will cost individuals and businesses more, at time when that state is in the red…and the recession is just getting started…

As toadly said, they have laws on top of laws…redundant laws…laws that go against each other…(Remember when sex offenders were gettin Viagra paid for by the state?? And there was NOTHING that could be done about it, because they had two laws, in direct opposition of the other…neither law could be broken, not even by the state)…

Makes ya wonder what ever happened to plain old commen sense??

p

Amen and good question:

Yes, we are creeping closer and closer to socialism every day. Doesn’t help the we elected a democrat. By next year we will be a wellfare country. Whats worse is that we can’t afford it and our children will end up working twice as hard for half as much.

A simple study of history will reveal that, no, our freedoms are not eroding. They come and go with the times. During periods of war, the US government routinely cracks down on freedoms. I’m not justifying it, but that is the trend. It happened in the War of 1812, the Civil War, and World War 1. Many of the things you find Americans blogging about today would have been illegal and punishable under the Sedition Act. American workers had far fewer rights during the Industrial Revolution in the late 19th century than they do today. Oh yeah, and there is the fact that many ethnic minorities are no longer treated like sub-humans by abusive and restrictive laws.

People today whine and complain about the erosion of rights, when the reality is, we enjoy a higher level of prosperity and freedom than the vast majority of our predecessors in previous generations, both American and before. The fact that you’re able to log on to a website like this and bemoan the loss of your freedom, while discussing flag burning, the Iraq War, and the illegal erasure of government emails by the Bush administration, is a substantial act.

yes way back in history people would be killed if they had a moustace or have there legs cut off if they wore trousers instead of shorts because back then, kings and people of high authority made up stupid laws and this crap is still going on today, I dont know if we have less or more freedom but the amount of freedom definently varies dpending on were you live china is a place with little of it, mainly due to there large population the ban of gay marrige is definantly a disgusting way to unessesarily rob people of there freedom as is many other stupid laws they have today and sometimes, the laws they have arnt enough, and need to be changed either way, yes. as civilizeation grows and evolves things change money changes,rights change, living arrangements change, laws change, peoples opinions change as civilization grows, freedom goes down because more laws need to be made to keep everyone in place but…its never enough there either stupid, helpful, not helpful or unfair

I see a trend toward less freedom everywhere I look. Our society is on a downward spiral of authoritarian extremism.

Every year, new laws are enacted to restrict freedom, and old laws are almost never taken off the books. Vast swaths of the population are engaged in political warfare for religious reasons against others who cause them no harm: - the drug war, bans on gay marriage, etc.

yes, I very much see this happening. they say “it’s a free country and everyone is equal”. well, if that is so, how come my boyfriend and I are being discriminated against? I mean, just because people like us have a different lifestyle and different view on how we want our life to be, doesn’t mean they have to take away our rights! plus, there are more people like me and him who feel the same way so if you’re going to disciminate go ahead; it doesn’t hurt us one bit anymore. but the point we’re trying to make is: if this is still a free country, what happened to everyone is equal and everyone has the same rights? that’s all I want to know.

In the old days, you had the freedom to stand on a street corner with megaphone and btch about the same things you can btch about on the internet now…that’s simply a technological difference…People policed themselves better 50 years ago, than they do now…Can’t tell what exactly came first…the “lack of self-discipline”…or the “nannying” of the government in the search for that “perfect world” we hear so much about…Of course, also…back in the “old days”, way back…there was not so much time to gripe about what others were doing…Takes a lot longer to plow a field with mules (not to mention a need for more sleep) than an air conditioned tractor…LOL…

p

yeah the laws are changing and there are some stupid ones but you always have to remember how much our ancestors worked to get us here, ##OMG yes…What is happening now, would have gotten a non-believing chuckle 20 or 30 years ago…nobody would have believed the prophecy…## you do realise thirty years ago wasn’t so long after the second world war where 6o million people may have died and Hitler wasn’t so much a figure of the past, back then (during the war) people wold have been shocked to hear how good OUR lifes are, so instead of b*tching about our ‘lost’ rights, you should brush up on yor history phrannie

* During periods of war, the US government routinely cracks down on freedoms.

You seem to be arguing that our freedoms are indeed presently eroding. Regardless of your predictions for what wil follow, you seem to agree with the OP.

I avoided getting a mortgage for years, and told EVERYBODY I knew that the market was over inflated…nobody listened.

Now, I’m being forced to help (with my tax dollars) to bail out the a$$hole CEO’s who are crying b/c they’re not going to get a 30+ million dollar bonus, AFTER running their business and the entire economy into the ground. I own two businesses - I don’t get a bail out if I screw up. Nor does my mom with her business, NOR does my dad with his flower business.

If we’re going to have a caplitalistic system, make it capitalist: the money that went to the bail out should have been given to the (sorry) suckers who took mortgages they couldn’t afford, based on the idea of “perpetual growth”.

Wasn’t part of the reason the US became independent “no taxation without representation” in the UK government?

So why are both parties, Republican & Democrat, lining up to put me, you, and the rest of the tax payers who had enough brains not to buy into their BS over a barrel?

…I forgot…25 years ago, if someone said that the government was going to interfere even with what type of dog I owned, that person would have been laughed at…but in Denver, the police went door to door confiscated Pitbulls…ALL of them, even if they were 15 years old, and had never caused a problem in their lifetime…The powers that be, even encouraged neighbors to turn in neighbors…and ALL of these dogs were euthenized…is that a bit Nazi like??

Friggin’ scary is what that is.

p

“People today whine and complain about the erosion of rights, when the reality is, we enjoy a higher level of prosperity and freedom than the vast majority of our predecessors in previous generations, both American and before.”

We enjoy any rights because enough people complain and are compelled to action to mandate those rights be observed by their government. Subjects revolted and forced King John to sign the Magna Charta. Anti-federalists bucked against the Alien and Sedition Acts… and overturned them.

The Declaration of Independence bemoaned the loss of freedom…

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.”

It was backed by action… however… and the despots that tried to deny them were forced to observe the unalienable innate rights of man.

It is a never ending juncture. We are obligated against complacency. We cannot expect the powers that be to abide our unalienable rights. We must force their hands.

“What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?” Thomas Jefferson