Hi Kevin, On Nov 5, 2011, at 5:53 AM, Kevin Kervick wrote: > One is not capable of love unless he is free. One cannot volunteer unless he > is free to make that choice.
You don't have kids, do you? :-) Love precedes freedom. Community precedes individuality. That's just the way it works. Sure, a certain level of mature love requires freedom of choice. But one of the great fallacies of Western philosophy is that it starts with the *individual*, rather than the *family*. Historically, sociologically, evolutionarily, psychologically, and I would argue even ontologically society is derived from the _family_. And family is in many ways the antithesis of freedom -- although it is the essence of empowerment. Neighborliness is nice to have, but family is life and death. Surely you know that as a psychologist. We need a political philosophy that takes the idea of family seriously. Not in an oppressive paternalistic way, but in the empowering sort of way the best families function. Otherwise you're missing at least two-thirds of the truth. -- Ernie P. -- Centroids: The Center of the Radical Centrist Community <[email protected]> Google Group: http://groups.google.com/group/RadicalCentrism Radical Centrism website and blog: http://RadicalCentrism.org
