Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Abbas Beydoun: The person who asked this question must be European. This question is strongly posed in the societies where there is liberty, so security could damage liberty in these societies. In other societies where there is neither security nor liberty we do not know which worry we should have. Should we worry about liberty? Or should we worry about security? In these societies both cases cooperate with each other where people live without liberty and security. Generally in these societies it is said to people that dictatorships can guarantee the stability but without liberty.

by Abbas Beydoun

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Alvaro Restrepo: I have already mentioned the example of my country. Democratical security is the basic idea of the actual government in my country to the costs of the individual liberty. It think that a society which is always worrying about the security has surely many owes. A society that has to barricade itself and to offer itself and to arm itself for protection is surely a society that has lost the word of quality of life. People and individuals that live constantly vigilated are people that lost completely their liberty and that are living at very low levels of quality of life and don’t have any quality of life anymore. They are societies that have to barricade themselves like for example the United States and many other societies in order to protect themselves and so they have completely lost their quality of life.

by Alvaro Restrepo

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Ana Lucy Bengochea: As part of the ancestors who were slaves in Africa this affected at the level of us in America because many of the population [inaudible] come from African ancestors. So much power which existed in Africa if we hadn´t been enslaved I think that some apects of the world had changed. But the best thing of this process of slavery that we [inaudible] us with all our races, our culture, our tradition and our costumes everything was [inaudible] by our African ancestors and for us at the level of America this was a great gift which gave us our ancestors at one hundred seven years we live and handle our own culture and our own identity which not [inaudible].

by Ana Lucy Bengochea

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Andries Botha: Florian, thanks for the question. Of course this issue of the erosion if civil liberties is very much on the lips of everybody. Because as the world kind of cascades towards and into its current conflictual mode, so the high priests of security are able to sing their songs. First of all we should ask ourselves why is it that the world is so insecure at the moment. Well, the world is so insecure at the moment because certain people have made it insecure. You know, that the world is conflicted, and the world is in conflict with itself at the moment. This presents the opportunity of a particular form of government to come to the fore to offer you security, because it’s the same government that made you feel insecure in the first place. You create the [inaudible] of insecurity in order to govern with having security as your main political franchise that you sell people. So, you make them insecure and then you tell them that you will provide them with security. So, I think it’s very important for us to ask a very important question. Why is it that we are allowing ourselves to be governed in a manner that has cost the world in such a [mantle] of insecurity. That’s an important question to ask right now.

by Andries Botha

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Angaangaq Lyberth: Funny, I ask the same question every time I go to an airport. And I go to many airports, Florian. In each airport I meet how my liberty has been robbed because I need to reveal everything I have because they don’t trust me to travel what I need to travel with. So my liberty is being removed. Funny, as it is, because you and I we’re called to be civilized and educated people. But we don’t trust one another. We don’t trust each other. We don’t trust anybody any more. So how much do we need to pay for that security? We’ve become the very ones oppressed as before. We did not like the enslavement of human beings. We did not like dictatorships. We did like colonizations. We did not like the oppression. And lo and behold, because we do not trust one another we’re doing the same just like the old days. Have we advanced? Have we become more advanced in our society? I don’t think so. I mean, look at yourself. Look at yourself the way you are today. Every time you go the airport you’re questioned. Even in the United States every time you go to school you have to go through the metal detectors to see if you have a gun or a weapon. So do you have your liberty? I wonder if you and I we have liberty today. We live in a world supposedly civilized, educated, advanced society and we are so limited because we fear one another. We don’t trust one another. I wonder sometimes do we even like one another? Help me to find the answer. Thank you.

by Angaangaq Lyberth

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Anthony Arnove: I will take this as a rhetorical question in the sense that really it’s a question that people around the world are asking themselves right now. And the question of how that is answered is not a question of philosophy. It’s a question of very immediate practical urgency. Will people reject the equation, which is being put forward by Tony Blair, by John Howard, by George Bush, by politicians around the world that we have to restrict our freedoms in order to have security, that we have to give more power to the states and the states are protecting us from terrorism, the states are protecting us from the dangers of [the world]. And so, I think we have to reject this equation and have to understand that the policies that are being carried out in the name of security, in fact are making the world more insecure, not more secure. For example, the US invasion of Iraq [we were] told just to make the world safer, to counter the threat, the dangers of terrorism, the dangers of weapons of mass destruction. In fact, it just made the world more dangerous, more insecure, has increased instability and violence, has driven a global arms race, as countries around the world conclude that Iraq was invaded not because that it had weapons of mass destruction, but because it did not. And so, therefore, if they want a deterrent to US power, if they want a deterrent to the world’s sole superpower, which has a stated doctrine of carrying out regime change in countries that aren’t in its interest, which believes in the doctrine of so-called preemptive strikes, which uses terrorism as an instrument of policy, and is threatening regime change in other countries, that if they want a deterrent to that sole superpower, they had better develop a military deterrent, a nuclear deterrent if possible. And so, it has made the world more dangerous, more unstable, less secure, and it’s also of course, in the process the United States of invading Iraq create more anger, more resentment in the world, which is making it more likely that people in the United States will be the targets of attack.

by Anthony Arnove

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Anuradha Koirala:

by Anuradha Koirala

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Anuradha Mittal: I think the question here is not so much about how much of a liberty are we going to offer, but really about for how long will we continue giving away our liberty in the name of promoting security. I think it’s a matter of time when we realize that we are making ourselves more insecure by giving away our basic liberties. We are making ourselves insecure as we find in the name of promoting security, communities are being targeted, special certain races are being targeted, certain nationalities are being targeted. And by that, we are creating further divisiveness in the community in our countries that we live in. And as long as that continues to happen, we will not have security. So, if you really want to promote security, I think it is really going to be one day us recognizing that and being able to say for our security, we want our liberties back. The only way to be secure is to have our freedoms.

by Anuradha Mittal

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Ashok Gangadean: Very interesting and provocative question. Because certainly living in the United States and realizing that our hard earned liberties. And we know that vigilance is the price of our liberties. We can’t take it for granted. We must always be vigilant and stand up for those hard earned liberties. And the question of security in times of terrorism. Where deep fears are bound and well-based, really, are the fears of terrorist act. Where leaders who want to sacrifice some of those liberties, of free speech, and free moment, and not being singled out for security searche,s that could be seen as harassment and so forth. How much of these freedoms are we willing to sacrifice for the sake of supposed security? Good question. To me again, what’s interesting in this question is the deeper question, about what is genuine security, human security? What is security? And to live in a secure world? And what is it, in terms of true liberties and true freedom?

by Ashok Gangadean

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Audrey Kitagawa: I don't believe that we've offered our liberty for our security. I think our liberties have been taken away from us under the guise of security, under the rationale of security. But there is a danger of the loss of personal liberty under the guise of security that we must be on guard of. And we must understand that it becomes very dangerous when we create reasons for taking away personal freedoms and security. So for example, during World War II when the Japanese in the United States were interned in camps, and they didn't offer their liberty, their personal freedom for the security of the country. These were executive orders that were entered to move this class of people from Japanese ancestry into relocation camps as they were called. So the people who have been imprisoned, whether in secret prisons that President Bush has admitted to within the last few days or whether in Guantanamo Bay or -- and have not been charged, I don't think that they offered their liberty for security. Their rights have been violated, have not been honored, have not been respected. So this is a danger that we have to be aware of, the taking away of personal freedoms and liberty under the guise of security interests and concerns. We must be able to utilize and uphold the rule of law, especially at times when we are faced with grave challenges as a testament to our commitment to uphold the rule of law.

by Audrey Kitagawa

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Benjamin Fahrer: Our liberty. Liberty and justice for all. How much of this are we going to sacrifice for security. Department of Homeland Security in the states, and a different things that have been sacrificed in order for the security is huge, huge. We shouldn’t have to sacrifice. We shouldn’t have to offer this liberty for security. It’s more of a control of a culture of a people, taking away their liberty, controlling them for security. Now, I’m saying supposed security has the good one, that’s the crux of it, because it is not a true security. Why we offering up our liberty for something that is not for certain? When our liberties are for certain? To know how to grow your own food; to grow your own food that should be something that shouldn’t be a security issue and yet the Homeland Security comes in, in a midnight raid against a direct action to save the oldest community garden in California in Sacramento. They come in and arrest the gardeners. Why? Because they doing a demonstration instead of a protest against agribusiness. We need to reclaim our commons, liberty. Thank you Florian.

by Benjamin Fahrer

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Benson Venegas: I think that we shouldn't give up our liberty for our supposed security. But on the other hand, there are certain consideration where I think my liberty ends where my nose ends. So, my liberty cannot affect other people. So in that sense I think liberty is - has a strong dimensional responsibility, and we need to be responsible with our own liberty. The problem is when under the idea of supposed securities, the leaders, or certain sectors of our societies, start to restrict the freedom or the basic liberty of the collective, of the majority. But this is also something dangerous. Example shows us that when we give up our liberty this can become to be a problem. Right now, there are cases where people that give their information, that open [or] intimacy, that really open, that they don't have anything to hide, we don't have anything to hide, we share everything, now all that information has been used for strange purposes. I know the case sometimes of companies that take private people information, and turn it into business, or getting your intimacy to really knows what is your preferences as a consumer, to be able to target you with products. So there is a line there where we should be very strong advocates of taking care of liberty, but with a strong sense of responsibility. That this liberty, this freedom, my personal freedom is a shared freedom in a collective, in our society.

by Benson Venegas

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Bianca Jagger: Answertext will be available soon.

by Bianca Jagger

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Bill Joy: Probably unfortunately more than anyone would have considered possible before the September 11th and the behavior of the American government in propagandizing and using what went on there. Benjamin Franklin I think said people who trade freedom for a little bit of security deserve neither. We live in a world where people are making a very very cynical use of fear. Hopefully the next generation of leaders and leaders that will come along soon will turn us towards hope rather than fear. We can’t solve the problems with fear. We have to solve the problems with hope. We have to dream of educating people. We have to dream of innovations that we can make that will solve the world’s problems. Not that there’s a short list of such problems, but just one at a time. Each of us can contribute in our own way. Until we change our dialogue and our attitudes to focus on the good, to focus on the hope rather than the fear, the fear is driving us, I think we’ll give up a lot of our liberty and get very little security and get what we deserve, which is neither.

by Bill Joy

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Bora Cosic: You have answered the question negatively, since you called our security "supposed security". Should we at all offer our liberty for something which is foggy, unsure and supposed? Big part of oppressive régimes specially so called socialistic regimes in near past used paroles of outside danger and threaded by unknown enemy, to increase oppression towards the population. By doing so they made lives of population to the living in the armed camps.

by Bora Cosic

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Brian J. Weller: I think, unfortunately, too much, particularly if we buy into this so-called War on Terror. I think with this kind propaganda and manipulation, I think unscrupulous governments justify greater controls over their own people, and they do it manipulating fear; often making it happen through psychological, black psychological operations, state-sponsored terrorism, media manipulation. I think real security can only lie in creating peace and that really requires that we build true consensual relationships between our cultures and our peoples. I think collective peace is going to become more and more the requirement, particularly as our resources get more depleted. I think Dennis Kucinich, an American politician, is right when he says we need a Department of Peace. I’d like to see a Department of Peace in every national government. There’s an old saying that “whatever you put your attention on grows” and if we put our attention on this idea of protecting ourselves against “the fear,” I think that’s where our – that’s what’s going to grow, so. We should never really give up our own liberty, I don’t think.

by Brian J. Weller

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

Catherine David: As less as possible. And we have to be very observant as our so called security is used more and more to obtrude us systems of control which are opposite to the individual freedom. So we have to be very resolute, we have to avoid going where it is too complicated, too impossible, too humiliating, we have to avoid travelling in the United States. And I am very resolute concerning not to travel to countries which annoy us with the demand of visa - there are so many other beautiful countries in the world. We have to try to keep a stiff upper lip and to keep a common sense. And we have to tell to the customs officials that a little pair of nail scissors to cut your nails if you travel a lot is less dangerous than the american foreign policy. Unfortunately, I realise that a great majority of the people is totally unable to react, or they completely agree to what's happening, and I don't know why as I am not a pschoanalyst or a psychiatrist, but I realise how the people accept that enormous safety measures are imposed on them, which are totally oversized, and that happens above all in countries where there were no seriouis accidents or impacts at all. So I have to repeat it once again: you have to avoid getting treated like a minor, you have to avoid that they pollute your life for alleged, unproved and imaginary terrorist threats.

by Catherine David

Sep 9, 2006 1:35:00 PM cite

China Keitetsi: I think it should be on individuals, but we shouldn't also hide behind these liberties. What about those who don't have liberty? I think we should rather not worry of losing our liberty. It is better if we even have this liberty. What about those who have none?

by China Keitetsi