means
being able to do whatever we want.

Being how we want to be. Not having anything forced on us against our will. Even being free from unwanted desire. The antithesis of freedom is domination.

Domination

The power to violate someone’s freedom is a violation of freedom in itself; we aren’t free from the possibility that someone acts on us with violence. We call this violent power domination, and it serves as the catalyst for all forms of active freedom-violation (e.g. slavery, imprisonment, rape).

Domination is sometimes known as “structural violence”. Policies like eugenics or armed police act as holstered weapons, lurking threats, until violently applied. Natural laws like survival of the fittest act as structural violence of the universe itself, reaching its brutal enforcement when a predator strikes its prey or a child dies for simply being born in the wrong place at the wrong time.

[ img: Iceberg of violence | text: Violence was already a feature of the system, it just had to be activated. ]

For distinction, we use the term ‘violence’ for any active violation of freedom. Passive, structural forms like state or parental power often don’t “feel” violent until they’re acted upon forcibly, and we want to make it clear that we’re targeting the root, not just the surface-level growth.

[ img: Diagram | Text: Violence is the act. Domination is the power. ]

Power isn’t just raw physical or intellectual power, it’s also intention and self-control. When someone is trustworthy they’re not a threat to our freedom no matter how much physical power they have.

People don’t want to be dominators and commit violence, they’re simply ugly ‘means to an end’ to achieve what they want. See the section ‘None are free until all are free’ to learn why we believe neglecting another’s plight isn’t just dismissive of their values, but also one’s own.

The free-minded vs the slave-minded

Speaking of desire slavery, one who is a slave to their desires can be said to be slave-minded. One who consciously values freedom above all else is free-minded.

A slave isn’t necessarily aware of their slavery. Like a false promise of fair monetary compensation dangled in front of someone to keep them working, desire-objects are touted as the key to happiness. Even the “spiritual” among us fall victim to the trap, though their desires are more emotional or abstract than material. The true desire – freedom – is hidden beneath layers of attachment to desire-objects, and one is hopelessly lost in the matrix for as long as they ignore the true exit.

Img: Example of desire attachment. The cake is a lie.

We don’t claim to offer a quick or easy escape from the matrix. There’s no red pill. The desire for instant gratification is perhaps one of the most powerful tools of manipulation, with many belief systems claiming to offer freedom in this life or the next, or even instantly with enough self-delusion. The individual who follows the principle of Buddhist enlightenment or “law of attraction” manifestation may find themselves sincerely convinced they’ve achieved the ultimate goal of freedom, but true freedom is universal and enduring, as we explain in the next segment.

None are free until all are free.

Suffering

At the heart of oppression is the power of emotional coercion so we not only want to fulfill our desires, but need to. It isn’t just the master whipping their slave, but the slave’s longing to be spared pain. It isn’t just the river blocking our path, but our longing to cross the river. It is suffering — the conflict of not wanting something but enduring it anyway, or wanting something but being deprived of it. There is no sense of deprivation insofar as whims are concerned, since these are so frivolous and insignificant it doesn’t matter whether or not they’re fulfilled. And that is how we’d like it, to have either jolly, whimsical passions or no desires at all. Once oppression as we define it is abolished, we may then (conditions permitting) focus on achieving our fun goals, with no time pressure and no painful yearning, no grief at failure and no relief at success.

FAQ

“But people can be slaves to their desires!”
One can only be enslaved by a desire if it isn’t something they truly want. Slavery is defined as involuntary servitude. Freedom, by our definition, is the opposite of desire slavery.