Every morning when I am having my coffee at my favorite place along the Intra Coastal Waterway two words are always going through my mind. Freedom and Suppression. I remember from the movie, Pirates of the Caribbean, Captain Jack was explaining what the boat the Black Pearl meant to him. He said the boat meant freedom. Being a person that spent 30 plus years sailing my boat on Lake Michigan I could kind of relate to how a sailboat could give you freedom. Freedom to go wherever the wind will take you is a great feeling. I miss those days and am envious of the people my age that still have the body to enjoy that freedom. Freedom and suppression seem to be two sides of the same coin.

The generation before mine, the one called the greatest generation I think really understood the meaning of freedom. During World War ll they liberated millions from the suppression on the Nazi’s, millions. At the time I don’t think that most of them even realize what a murderous mob the Nazi’s were. They killed millions in the name of racial purity. The horrors that they inflicted on the world were like something none of them had ever dreamed a race of people could do. The world will forever owe those Allied Soldiers a tremendous debt. What is the most interesting part was they were not mostly fighting for their own freedom they were fighting to free others. To take with them to their graves knowing that they had done a great service for their fellow man is a feeling that I will never know. Today people are crying that their freedom is being taken away because they have to get a shot in the arm or have to wear a mask. The greatest generation freed others at the cost of their lives. Today’s so called freedom fighter thinks that their freedoms are being taken away because they are being asked to think of the person standing next to them.

The opposite side of the coin is suppression. Suppression is what the Nazi’s brought to the world. There have been other groups that have also brought suppression to the world. Communism brought suppression. Other forms of fascism has brought suppression. Slavery was suppression. Minority rule like apartheid is suppression. Making it harder for a person to vote is suppression. Even the Church in many ways has brought suppression. You cannot cry freedom if you are suppressing the person next to you. That is not freedom. Taking a woman’s right to choose is suppression. You are not protecting a baby you are suppressing a woman. The religious aspects of abortion are just made up by a group that wants to suppress women. Women are not a possession that should have to submit to the suppression of anyone or anything.

I have been watching the humanitarian crisis at the border. I have been appalled by some of the images. Whipping another human being with the reins of a bridle I had never seen before. Treating another human being like he is an animal is just criminal in my opinion. I will not get into the discussion of legal and illegal immigration I will just talk about humanity. Haiti is a nation that is in crisis. It has been in crisis for years. Not just the United States, not just the western hemisphere,  but the whole world has turned their back on the crisis in Haiti and we are now seeing the results. Poverty is also a form of  suppression. Do I want to see all the Haitian refugees here. No, but we could take some Haitian refugees, just like other countries should do. I don’t know if Haiti can be rebuilt but something besides whipping the refugees at the boarder has to be done.

I have seen a few suppressors crying freedom and giving the original “Black Panthers” salute like they are some type of revolutionary fighting for the suppressed. They scream things like socialism is attacking your freedom in hopes that you don’t know what socialism is. The people they are really working for are the people that do not want you to know what real freedom is. Healthcare that would follow you would give you real freedom. They want you to remain trapped. They want to stifle upward mobility by keeping people in poverty. I swear to god that they want to divide the world into two groups. The rulers and the ruled. You want to read about a socialist all you have to do is read Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. I once saw a posting that there were no white men in the Bible. I think that is wrong. There was one white man. Pontius Pilatus.