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Comment by jw1224 | Hacker News Reader

Can you give a few examples of ways in which a US citizen is more free than I, a UK citizen, am?

Freedom of expression has a much stronger protection status in the US than in the UK. That is one example.

If that is just one example, what is another one?

Americans can vote directly for their legislators while in the UK the House of Lords is largely appointed. Again, just another example.

Protections for freedom of expression as an employee are much higher in the UK. Freedom only applies in the USA if you can afford to exercise it and not get let go via at will employment

* In the USA, you are free to deny the holocaust. In Germany and the UK, you are not.

* In the USA, if you're a health insurer, you are free to reject customers you don't like. In Europe, you're not. (Those rejected customers, in turn, are free to cover their own health expenses or die - their free choice).

* In the USA, you're free to buy guns. In Europe, you're not.

https://duckduckgo.com/?q=no+way+to+prevent+this+site%3Atheo...

* In the US, you're free to drink a beer at the age of 20. In Europe, you're not. Ah, no, just kidding, it's the other way around.

* In California, you can have a beer after 2 am. Ah, who am I kidding, of course you can't.

In the UK, you are free to cross the road wherever you want (except the motorway). In the USA, in many states, you can't. Which still boggles my mind.

nice find. i simply love this small, but very deep, quality of life feature of living in the UK.

Very good :-)

In US you are free of people drinking a cold beer in sunny days in parks or in the beaches

I can buy a kitchen knife without ending up on a government registry.

I can own a radio or television capable of receiving broadcasts without having to pay a license and register it with the government.

Wait, what country puts you on a government registry for buying a kitchen knife?

That’s an easy one.

I can say pretty much anything and not have the gov’t come after me for it.

Say something distasteful about a minority group in the UK and you’ll be punished for it.

I don’t think they said “more free than UK citizens”. Although, to be fair, US doesn’t have quite as intrusive CCTV. And I thought gun laws were pretty restrictive in UK? But “most ways” is probably a reach, and there are certainly things UK does do much better.

Edit: would appreciate feedback if my comment is not constructive or could be improved in some way.

For me as a European "gun laws were pretty restrictive in UK" for me means freedom more than access to guns does. I quite value the freedom of not having to worry about guns.

That's a very convoluted definition of freedom. I think there are many other things to call that ("sensible" or "sane" come to mind...) but it's objectively less free, legally/on paper as I stated.

By that definition any law stands in the way of freedom. You're not allowed to kill people in the US, so would it be a more free country if that law was not in place?

From my cultural upbringing having regulation in place to steer society does not stand at odds with freedom. And that's also by my cultural background not "convoluted".

when the fear of guns stifles your movement, then yes, a lack of guns means more freedom. i'm writing this after having lived in the murder capital of the US and now moved to the UK. personal safety (and thus freedom) in Europe is at another level compared to the US. which makes sense. the US is at Zambia and Sudan levels of murders per capita. truly shameful.

If you look at all violent crimes in the US versus UK, they aren’t all that different.

This is where it gets a little “grey area.” If my freedom to have a gun impacts many, many other freedoms of the people around me, is society more free or less?

If my freedom to text and drive impacts the right to life and freedom of those around me, it’s imperative to restrict that one freedom so the freedom of the society remains.

“As a person from China, the fact the gov’t is putting Muslims in camps means more freedom for me from terrorism.”

That’s not freedom.

I want freedom from straw men.

You can’t leave Europe, despite your voters voting twice for it, making the Brexit party the #1, and yet your establishment understood “Leave” as “Stay” and refuses to hold a general election because they know they are illegitimate and hold on to their power?

First of all is the EU not Europe, secondly the UK can leave it. They just are not capable of politically surviving the consequences of leaving it. Countries in the EU can leave the EU a right that states in the US currently do not have about leaving the USA if they so desired.

Well, the leave process is currently underway since a little over three years, and is probably reaching its conclusion in a few days.

On the US side, remember what happened when some states left the Union ?

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