I AM CONDEMNED TO BE FREE. (sartre) Youuuuuppiiieee

By: Khairi janbek.

When someone says to you "its a free country", you know I guess what he/she means. You're generally free to do what you want (which is known as positive freedom), and generally free from persecution for your views (which is known as negaitve freedom). Positive freedom involves choices, while negative freedom involves consequences.

For people whom have those twin freedoms, they can consider themselves lucky. But the important word here is "lucky". If in any event a dictator seizes contro and decides to abolish those freedoms in a second, well, no more freedoms. So what would be left?. is there an essential freedom that can never be taken away from us?.

Well, according to JP Sartre, there is. The answer is yes. But this "yes" is a mixed blessing. Sartre says, to be human is to be absolutely free, to always have the power of choosing. But the one thing we cannot choose, is to renounce choice, or to quote Sartre's paradox " I AM CONDEMNED TO BE FREE". Choosing not to act is still achoice. This is the existential
dilemma.

According to Sartre, all action arises out of nothingness. If you were always directly attuned to the present, unable to escape it, you not only couldn't imagine, but also you couldn't act. The present is just what it is, and unless you consider how things might be different, there's no motive to do anything. Sartre took this point a step further. He said, all our actions are directed at a goal that doesn't exist in the here and now. Our actions, then, being based on nothing, are never necessary either. Goals are things we freely create for ourselves, and along them we create our own values.