Freedom: Who actually has it?

Freedom. Its such a wonderful word. Glorious in its elegant simplicity. Say the word freedom and immediately one thinks of the United States since we are allegedly the last bastion of true freedom. But, are we? Are we really free? Are we the most free?

Freedom House is the oldest American organization devoted to the support and defense of democracy around the world. It was formally established in New York in 1941 to promote American involvement in World War II and the fight against fascism.

In 1973, Freedom House launched an entirely new initiative, a report that employed the methods of social science analysis to assess the level of freedom in each country in the world, with a numerical score and ranking as Free, Partly Free, or Not Free. The report is known as Freedom in the World. Through the years, Freedom in the World has gained attention and influence in the media, the policy world, among foreign governments, and among educators and scholars. Freedom in the World has been called the “Michelin Guide to democracy’s development” and “essential reading for policymakers and political leaders.”

Freedom House has a new list of the most free nations no Earth. How did the US rank?

Three nations scored a perfect 100. They are Finland, Norway, and Sweden. All three ranked highly in basic freedoms such as speech, religion, etc. They also have good scores on fair media, election integrity, workers rights, and have made great strides in reducing discrimination in any form.

The rest of the top 25 by order of score are:
99 New Zealand
98 Netherlands
98 Uruguay
98 Canada
97 Australia
97 Ireland
97 Luxembourg
97 Denmark
96 Belgium
96 Japan
96 Portugal
96 Switzerland
95 Barbados
95 Slovenia
94 Estonia
94 Germany
94 Cyprus
94 Iceland
94 Taiwan
93 San Marino
93 Tuvalu
93 Austria

You may have noticed the Unites States did not appear in that list. That is because the US received an honorable mention with a score of 83. The US didn't even make the top 50. Among the reasons for the abysmal score for the US are election fraud, government corruption, economic inequality, and controversial immigration policies.

It should be noted that although Freedom House touts itself as a bipartisan organization, many of its determining criteria are liberal talking points. The higher you score on those points, the higher your rank on the list. Personally, I believe this gives the liberal side a little too much voice in these ranks. For example, if a European nation prosecutes too many musilms they are considered to be profiling and their score drops. It does not take in to consideration that the people prosecuted may actually be guilty as charged. The same goes for lgbt issues. At a macro level using these topics as benchmarks is one thing. But micro-examination of individual events to lower an overall national score again places too much weight on the liberal side of the scales.

link to article

About Freedom House

a reply to: Vroomfondel

While I don't doubt the US' place, I have to assume this list is garbage knowing Canada is in the top tier. We all saw what happened in Ottawa.

a reply to: network dude

Look at how tightly sewn up both New Zealand and Australia kept all of their populace during COVID. Just as soon as someone sneezed, they were all back indoors, and if they complained, they were being shot with rubber bullets.

a reply to: ketsuko

Free to do as you are told. What more could you want?

a reply to: ketsuko

Yup, NZ, Canada, and Australia went full covid Nazi.

This list has no credibility.

originally posted by: network dude
a reply to: Vroomfondel

While I don't doubt the US' place, I have to assume this list is garbage knowing Canada is in the top tier. We all saw what happened in Ottawa.

Exactly, in some ways, we Americans are less free, cause our government only goes so far, they screw us over in more subtle ways

a reply to: Vroomfondel

Nobody is really free unless they have 100 % economic security and are not reliant on any income from being a wage slave.

a reply to: Vroomfondel

Their definition of freedom differs from mine, my list would be different.

originally posted by: infolurker
a reply to: Vroomfondel

Nobody is really free unless they have 100 % economic security and are not reliant on any income from being a wage slave.

Came here to say this. Most of those countries aren't even free, let alone their people. They have all grown too reliant on the world bank, global commerce, and a hypersocial interconnectedness.

Even with that consideration removed, like others have mentioned for good reason, I have trouble taking this ranking seriously. Freedom means self reliance and the liberty of an individual to exercise one's will, not strictly whether a democratic government is held accountable to their people.

A majority within a democracy can exercise great terror and marginalization toward the minority. This is usually done in the name of "the greater good", like three wolves and a sheep voting on what to eat for dinner. How would one quantify mathematically the degree of justice in such a situation? They don't seem to release the foundational data, so I cannot begin to imagine. I can imagine from the conclusions that individualism and personal accountability were not substantial factors.

No country with a Rothschild controlled central bank is free.

If New Zealand makes the top 10 the world is in deep doo-doo.

a reply to: watchitburn
a reply to: network dude

Well, considering the list is from Nov 2021 it may not be accurate considering what we know now. At the time I think it might have been well conceived. At least based on the criteria they cite as determining scores that is.

a reply to: AstroDog

You are putting constraints on the ratings that the writers did not use. Of course your results will be different. The important thing is that all the nations were judged on the same criteria. That criteria has to be measurable as well as impacting freedom.

I know people are looking at things like covid lockdowns and related data as qualifiers for this list. I did not see that criteria as part of the determining factor in these rankings. On one hand it makes sense to use them since they were lost liberties. On the other hand, they were (as far as we know) temporary and tied directly to covid. And therein is the problem. Some consider the reactions an over-reach and draconian. Others think the mandates and lockdowns were a necessary evil. Since they are largely transient in nature, it isn't really fair to use them to judge the overall freedom of an entire nation. I would, however, include that data as an asterisk on the final score noting that the score would be lower if the restrictions on liberty became permanent. But, its not my list...

originally posted by: ketsuko
a reply to: network dude

Look at how tightly sewn up both New Zealand and Australia kept all of their populace during COVID. Just as soon as someone sneezed, they were all back indoors, and if they complained, they were being shot with rubber bullets.

I live here in NZ and the rest of my family live in Australia.

Yes there were lockdowns, but the US had them too (just entirely uncoordinated and months longer than the ones in either Australia or New Zealand). The difference between the Australian and New Zealand lockdowns and the US ones were that Aust and NZ locked down quickly, rather than waiting for months to respond, and eased up when the situation was showing signs of being resolved, rather than just opening up again at the peak of the outbreak after realizing the response was too little, too late.

Also, the rubber bullet stuff was simply untrue. Photos Of People Wounded By Rubber Bullets Are NOT From Melbourne, Australia

I'm fairly sure that the US used rubber bullets against rioting crowds in the same time-frame, and that wasn't faked.

originally posted by: VictorVonDoom
No country with a Rothschild controlled central bank is free.

Rothschild family - Rational Wiki

originally posted by: Asktheanimals
If New Zealand makes the top 10 the world is in deep doo-doo.

Why?

New Zealand is independent of the rest of the world and a fairly small economy and population. There is no way that they are influencing the rest of the world, except, perhaps, by example.

We have states bigger than some of those countries, different states in the US have different levels of freedom.

Is it as good as it used to be, no not at all but the top 10 in that list is pretty comical, I have been to several of those countries and well Ill leave it at we have wildly different ideas of what freedom is.

I think the scale should go from complete freedom to entirely restricted . . .

Full freedom, a condition in which the individual is subject to no form of restrictions.

Moderate freedom, somewhere about halfway between no restrictions and fully restricted.

Zero freedom, fully restricted with no personal freedoms.

On such a scale, there would rarely be a situation where you would experience being fully free or completed restricted. Expanding this absolute scale to country sized populations, the real world averages would never reach either extreme and an excepted range of moderate freedom would be hard to determine.

What's missing from this Freedom House method of determining a ranking of Freedom by country is an input component relating to the fractionalization within the counties society.

When your society is highly homogenous like in Finland, Norway, and Sweden its easy for everyone to get along and pass laws that all agree with. One could argue you are only as free in those cookie cutter countries as you conform to their dominant sub-culture.