1st Post Midterm-Emily Russell Section 11

For my first post, I’ve decided to talk about one of my favorite topics discussed this semester thus far, the power of free will. As I was growing up, my parents and even my church stressed the importance of "free will" but as I grew up I also realized that from birth I have been told what to believe and who to believe. So when does free will come into play? From birth, most of us are already born into a certain beliefs and we are told that there is a tooth fairy, Easter bunny, and a Santa, and it’s not until we are older that we can then decide for ourselves what we believe. What if we would have been born not being told any of that though? If you weren't born into a religion, or born to believe these holiday customs? I remember asking my father many times the question, why? Why this, or why that, and his answer also resulted back to, "because that’s just the way it is." And from that moment I knew that I was going to not only believe something different but also teach something different to my children. I believe that while American and our parents promise we are born with free will, we ultimately are fed lies. I found a few cartoons that I think prove how important free will in philosophy and how it can affect what people believe, and how they live their lives.

I think this cartoon proves my point of how the reputation of these things that we are taught to believe from birth have actually turned into reality and truth in some people’s eyes. I think that people are so caught up in living their life and teaching others from a blue print, instead of going off their own thoughts and beliefs which in return has led many of us to live by the "truth" which is really a lie. While I agree that there has to be some form of organization in the laws of what you can and cannot do, I do not agree with the importance of some of these holidays and teachings that are stressed in society, every day. The picture below shows a great example of how I feel about the way society directs thing. While you may think you have "free will" think again.