Welcome to the Third Degree: Tough, Brief, Weekly Interrogations that force thinking and response. This Sunday we target: Ownership
As today marks the 50th anniversary of the now defunct Roe v Wade, see EE Cumming’s poem, “Buffalo Bill”, is there any ownership, any power, more precious than control over one’s own body?
Did de facto and de jure 50 year challenges lead to abolition thereby positioning power, indeed ownership, back to the people in the 50 states?
If ownership of person and property are foundational to the American concept of freedom, should women, the most affected by birth of a child, be considered chattel, unable to possess personal power, unable to own themselves?
Given thousands of years of chattel slavery, practiced by every people in every region/nation of the world, is it very likely that your (and my), blood line ancestors, were, at a time, both slaves and owners?
Today, what should we do about the estimated 41 million slaves worldwide. Where are they? Is it a matter of ownership or responsibility or both?
Can tyranny and submission, or depth of love, create slavish conditions of ownership in families? In truth, do (or should) wives and husbands own/owe, hence owe/own, each other? What about the kids?
If primary ownership is ‘of self’, are four ownership tenets worthy of inclusion and inculcation?
- You own your own thoughts, feelings and actions.
- Create and carry your own weather with you.
- Pursue excellence in everything you do (It’s still OK to call the plumber).
- Strive to make your family and you proud of you.
What do those aims of personal ownership reinforce?
Does Shakespeare sum it up: “To thine own self be true”? (Hamlet: Polonius to son Laertes off to university)
Socrates reminds: “The unexamined life is not worth living. The answers and actions remain yours.
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