I was writing up my email “Vacation Response” for today and tomorrow as I prepare for the Passover seders (the holiday is celebrated two nights in a row) and realized I wanted to share it here. So — voila!
Hi Friend!
Today marks the beginning of Passover, the holiday celebrating freedom from Pharoah — and tyranny.
Not sure that this holiday is what forged by worldview, but it helped. Each year we tell the story of how we were slaves in Egypt until we couldn’t take it anymore and left. (Rather dramatically.)
The causes I believe in, starting with childhood independence, share this through line: People, even kids, even the formerly incarcerated, even the disabled and the dying all have the right to freedom, self-direction, and respect.
That’s why I support everything from our Reasonable Childhood Independence laws (parents, not the state, decide when to let their kids play outside), and our push to give kids swaths of free time to fill (letting them find their own interests without constant adult supervision), to things as far afield as criminal justice reform, and the right of autistic people to communicate using whatever means work, and even choices and compassion in dying.
I trust people. I want them to live their lives free from the oppression of overbearing bureaucrats, laws based on “worst-first thinking,” and practices rooted in CYA — all Pharoah by a different name.
Yours in the never-ending quest for freedom —
Lenore