Homicide

Meme

One human killing another human.

Identity can be Fatal

Identity and Safety

Elizabeth Anderson, the chair of the Philosophy department at the University of Michigan, thinks we’ve misunderstood the basis for development of a free and fair society.

If you look back at the origins of liberalism, it starts first with a certain settlement about religious difference, Catholics, Protestants - they’re killing each other! Finally, Germany, England, all these places say, we’re tired of these people killing each other, so we’re going to make a peace settlement: religious toleration, live and let live. Then something remarkable happens. People now have the freedom to have crosscutting identities in different domains. At church, I’m one thing. At work, I’m something else. I’m something else at home, or with my friends. The ability not to have an identity that one carries from sphere to sphere but, rather, to be able to slip in and adopt whatever values and norms are appropriate while retaining one’s identities in other domains? That is what it is to be free.

The question we all need to ask ourselves today is: How do we maintain our freedom in a society that is so rapidly changing into one where every company can learn everything about everybody who is just using a cell phone going about their daily routine?