Alcove Activities: Second Level: Explicating a Text, On Liberty

Second Level: Explicating a Text, On Liberty

Now use the excerpt below to explicate the thesis of the excerpt below and on the previous page, following these directions:

State the main point of the paragraph in one or two sentences.

Then elaborate on what you have paraphrased (“In other words,...”).

Give examples of the meaning by tying it to concrete situations in the real world. (For example,...)

Generate metaphors, analogies, pictures, or diagrams of the basic thesis to connect it to other meanings you already understand.

On Liberty

Background Information:
The following excerpt is taken from H. L. Mencken’s article entitled “On Liberty,” published in the December 5, 1923 edition of the Nation Magazine. Mencken’s work is highly acclaimed by scholars for its literary, social and political critique. Mencken is arguably the most distinguished journalist in United States history.

I believe in liberty. And when I say liberty, I mean the thing in its widest imaginable sense — liberty up to the extreme limits of the feasible and tolerable. I am against forbidding anybody to do anything, or say anything, or think anything so long as it is at all possible to imagine a habitable world in which he would be free to do, say, and think it. The burden of proof, as I see it, is always upon the policeman, which is to say, upon the lawmaker, the theologian, the right-thinker. He must prove his case doubly, triply, quadruply, and then he must start all over and prove it again. The eye through which I view him is watery and jaundiced. I do not pretend to be “just” to him — any more than a Christian pretends to be just to the devil. He is the enemy of everything I admire and respect in this world — of everything that makes it various and amusing and charming. He impedes every honest search for the truth. He stands against every sort of good-will and common decency. His ideal is that of an animal trainer, an archbishop, a major general in the army. I am against him until the last galoot’s ashore (pp. 193–194).

Specimen Answer:

1. Statement of the thesis...

As long as they are not actually harming others, people should be allowed to say what they want, think what they want, and do what they want. This is what it means to live in a free, civilized society.

2. Elaboration of the thesis...

There are many righteous people who believe that the way they think and act are the only correct ways to think and act. These people are narrow-minded in view, and they expect everyone else to see things as they do. They do not allow for autonomous thought. Moreover, these people are often in positions of authority. In order to maintain individual liberties as espoused in a free society, people with authority over others (such as police, judges, social workers, politicians who create laws), when attempting to take away someone’s rights, must always prove beyond any doubt that this action is the only reasonable way to deal with the situation. But people in these positions of authority are often self-righteous, unable to look at life from multiple perspectives. They therefore cannot be trusted either to see what is right in a situation or to do what is right.

3. Exemplification of the thesis...

For example, some “Child Protective Services” workers profess to be concerned with the well-being of children, while at the same time ignoring information that would help them best serve the child. For instance, in some cases, children have been taken away from their parents simply because the CPS worker thought the parents didn’t keep the house as clean as they thought it should be kept. At the same time, children taken into state custody often fare much worse than they would have done if they had stayed with their parents (due to the dismal conditions of many foster care programs). People in positions of authority often use their prejudices to determine what is right in the situation. Without knowing it, they often impose their personal beliefs and value judgments on others, as if their own views were part of the law.

4. Analogy of the thesis...

To illustrate the point that Mencken makes in this passage, imagine a bird soaring through the air, free to go wherever he chooses whenever he chooses. Then imagine that bird harnessed, entrapped, caged in by those more powerful. People, like birds, are meant to fly free, to live according to their own desires, to develop unique thoughts, to pursue personal ideals. Our distinctive and individual ways of taking flight, our varying destinations, our alternative viewpoints are what makes living interesting. When this natural freedom is denied us, we, like the trapped bird, find ourselves in a cage, everyone unable to fly, all expected to act in the same narrow-minded, judgmental way.

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