"Freedom's just another word ..."

Not even sure if I am still required to blog, but what the hell ... I feel like procrastinating and old habits die slowly.

Friday I had about 5-10 minutes at the end of class, after textbooks were distributed, so I wrote the following quotes on the board and asked my students to respond however they wish ...

"Responsibility is the price of freedom" ~ Elbert Hubbard

"Liberty means responsibility, that is why most men dread it" ~ George Bernard Shaw

"Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing the earth" ~ Frederick Douglass

I got a lot of responses that weren't much more than a rewording of the quotes themselves, but a few had a little more insight.

• I think Frederick Douglass is talking about those men who are sitting back and waiting for freedom to come to them without wanting to go out and work for it. They don't realize that laying down doing nothing can only hurt them in the long run. If you go out and work for what you want, good things will eventually come your way. Claiming what isn't rightfully yours will not get you to the end of the struggle, and will hold others back also. Putting forth the effort and doing whatever it takes the right way will. - JJ
• Elbert Hubbard was trying to say that without responsibility how can there ever be true freedom? Freedoms like those we have in the United States are there because of many responsible and hard working men. Without these men taking the initiative to make sure our country is free, where would society be? Decisions made have to be thought out in a mature and responsible way. For example, if our country was run by an irresponsible person who made bad decisions and didn't protect our country then we would lose our freedom. Freedom is very precious and something that doesn't need to be taken lightly. It give us the choice to decide right from wrong. - SC
• Most men would like to see changes made but don't want to put in the work to see it done right. They would rather tell someone about what needs to be done and then wait to see what they plan to do about it. They are not being responsible for their world. They don't want to put in the work to actually make a change. - JL