A few weeks ago I posted a short blurb on Facebook about what I called my “Political Ideals,” advice and statements on the nature and goals of government and politicians. The first ideal I listed was “the freedom and dignity of the individual is paramount. When the two are at odds, dignity wins.” I’d like to explain my definitions of freedom and dignity here.

Freedom

Freedom is the ability to act in a certain way. Action is the key component here. My religion places a great deal of importance on the concept of “agency,” which many people confuse with freedom. Agency is the ability to choose our thoughts and actions. Agency itself cannot be limited or stifled – it’s an indivisible concept – but freedom can. We can be imprisoned, we can be disabled, we can have mental illness. All these things limit our freedoms: freedom to interact with whomever we choose, freedom to express our wants and needs, freedom to be independent. But our agency can never be taken, because even if we were unable to move or speak, we could still think.

It is this definition of freedom that is (or in my opinion should be) used when constructing laws. Freedom of religion is the freedom to act according to one’s religious beliefs. Freedom of speech is the freedom to speak one’s thoughts without penalty. And so on.

Society works because of the voluntary sacrifice of certain freedoms. I give up my freedom to murder or otherwise damage someone in exchange for the security that the same won’t happen to me. Of course, since people aren’t literally chained to the walls all day, it is possible that someone could still hurt or kill me. But society then punishes the offender by the actual removal of freedom, through incarceration or capital punishment. Government is built on the balance of freedom with the safety of the people.

Dignity

Dignity is a sense of safety and pride in yourself. Dignity comes from having all the necessities of life (food, shelter), but also living according to your deepest convictions. Dignity is being able to say that you are yourself. It’s a much less tangible concept, but I hope everyone has an idea of what I mean when I use the word. Starvation, disease, torture, humiliation: these things deprive individuals of dignity by stripping them of safety, autonomy, or pride.

Religious Freedom

You might have guessed this was where I was going.

This country was settled largely on the hope of religious freedom. And religion has played a major part in government and history. When a political issue appears that is closely connected to religious beliefs (such as abortion or marriage), religion often becomes the basis for any argument for or against the issue.

So when I say that dignity is more important than freedom, it means that my freedom to practice my religion is less important than the dignity of those around me. I should not have the freedom to humiliate or harm others in the name of my religious beliefs. While in the other direction, my freedom to express myself (such as sexuality or gender) should never infringe on the dignity of someone else.

This is one of my guidelines in determining how I feel about the political issues of our day. And I believe it strikes a good balance between the freedoms of opposing parties. It promotes empathy on all sides of an issue and emphasizes the importance of respect between those who disagree.

While I’m Here…

Since I brought up the topic and made glancing blows at religious freedom as it seems to conflict with LGBTQ+ rights, I guess I should give my brief opinions on the most popular political issues.

On the right of businesses to refuse service to people based on religious beliefs:

First off, government or other public services absolutely and unquestioningly must serve all citizens regardless of religious belief. The balancing point here is with the availability of the service. If a government official personally feels distress over performing some service (like a marriage), and is easily capable of providing a willing alternative, that person should not be deemed wrong in refusing service. The service was provided and neither party was restricted in any way. However, if there is no alternative able to perform the service, than the government official must set aside personal preference in order to provide it.

Secondly, private business. I have two balancing points here: personalization and endorsement. A business that isn’t personally tailored to the individual – such as restaurants and other retail shopping – honestly has no reason to refuse service, because there’s nothing about the service that has to do with the religious issue. As for personalized services – like photographers and other artists – their participation may be seen as an endorsement that they do not agree with. This becomes the tricky point, because it’s possible there may not be another reasonable alternative to provide the personalized service, and refusal may be viewed as offensive to the individual requesting the service. But in this case I side with the business. Because the requesting individual should not force a private citizen to do work that causes them distress.

On the right of individuals to use their preferred gender restroom or locker room:

This issue is a lot more heated. Lots of fiery language and insults being thrown at “perverted old men that want to see naked girls” and the like. Interesting that it’s always the boys looking at girls, and never girls looking at boys. But it’s always so sad to hear people flinging horrible insults at these transgender people who are just trying to fight for their own personal dignity.

At least this issue has some decent concerns on both sides. The security and safety of the cisgender people cannot be discounted outright in favor of the transgender individual. But the dignity of the transgender individual is real and cannot be ignored.

A good solution is to have genderless restrooms or changing rooms. This way there is no choice to make and thus no assumption about whether or not someone belongs. But this isn’t practical for many locations because they are usually meant for one person at a time and can’t handle large groups of people.

So we have to figure out how to handle groups of people in the same restroom or locker room.

For restrooms, I don’t think there’s any good practical problem. Women’s restrooms (so I hear) only have stalls, so there’s no privacy problem. As for urinals in mens’ restrooms, you can’t exactly sneak a peek without being noticed, so it’s unlikely that trans men would be an issue. And for me, the possibility of abuse in restrooms should be handled on its own, regardless of gender, and shouldn’t be the deciding factor in whether or not someone supports transgender use.

Locker rooms are where things get tricky here, because there often is a legitimate excuse for nudity. Again, the issue of abuse should be treated as a separate issue, which means this is really an issue of how someone feels being seen by someone else. Because we are socially okay with the idea of being seen by others of the same gender, this becomes a social issue in it’s basest form. How do I feel about you as an individual? Do I consider you to belong to my gender? Are you the same as me?

Your perception of others is so strongly based on your childhood upbringing, it’s difficult to change later in life. It often takes years for a cultural shift to take real effect. Which means this is something that may take generations to change.

So it’ll probably be a long time before we have the protections transgender people are fighting for. But hopefully we can speed that up by educating ourselves and those around us. Because, as I was recently reminded, you’ve already been in a restroom or locker room with a transgender person. And everything was fine.