Personal freedom of the individual.

[Thalius]

Since I just re-read the idea of TheInsanePumkinCarver, an idea came to me. Since it is quite far from his original thought processes (sports reporter) and I do not come to write (and I would be too bad at it) here as a separate thread.

An arch-conservative gun lobbyist from the USA has already made several short documentaries about personal freedom etc.. ( as far as I can tell as a non USA citizen it's one of the main reasons for gun ownership?).

Now, because of these reports, she is invited/sent to Germany to report on the expressions of personal freedom there. She is, of course, thinking about driving on the Autobahn (no speed limit). But she has to do a report on FKK (naturism), which is very widespread here, among other things because under Communist rule in East Germany (DDR) it was one of the few ways to express personal freedom.

I could imagine this so that it first goes into the voyoristic. It is with the Kammera in the nudist area. She now has to struggle with the fact that on the one hand she has to be professional although she does get a little excited, on the other hand this does not correspond to your conservative moral code.

After that it goes over to exhibitionism, she adapts. First in a bikini under nudes, then topless and finally completely without.

Finally, I could imagine that she has gotten so used to it that she doesn't notice when she leaves the nudist area and gets on the train naked. At least until she realizes that everyone is taking pictures of her.

________________

Possibly other countries and their expressions of personal freedom?

 

[Hypoxia]

A former USA military officer known as a singer-songwriter famously wrote, "Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose." This forum is not the place to discuss USA politics but in my opinion, 'freedom' does not entail responsibility while rights and liberties do.

Let's say that your USA ultra-right propagandist travels to a "total freedom" enclave somewhere, an independent enclave without stated rules but with unwritten guidelines: people may do whatever they wish until somebody stops them. I envisage something like the Lawless Zone in Samuel Delaney's novel Triton. Does your protagonist find "total freedom" as liberating and attractive as she expected?

 

[WalterAndOliveAnn]

..........

 

[AvroAnsonXIX]

In the Eastern Caribbean a small island sits across a narrow channel from a much larger one. Over 100 years ago, after a hurricane had destroyed the salt ponds there, the British sold the smaller island to an American citizen who built a warehouse and marina to re-provision, with tax-free goods, the yachts that sailed in those waters.

Today the island is basically a for-profit-resort-hotel-marina-warehouse-airport-nation. Run as a business and governed by the descendants of the original buyer. It pays a small fee for the now independent government of the larger island to operate a customs control operation at the airport and marina where inbound travelers pay a per head price for international security.

Nobody is a legal resident of the small island, everyone is legally a guest although some have "lifetime stays" or bookings lasting tens of years. Like a hotel it has private security and "guests" may be evicted -- but if unwarranted it would come at the cost of potential future bookings.

It is literally Las Vegas without police. But being a tiny island there is no potential for escape and little crime. The crime that exists is extremely petty, usually arising from conflicts. There are no courts and no jails. Offenders are simply put on the ferry to the big island. Banned workers return under assumed names.

Except for the tiny island, the big island across the strait has the best economy of all the islands in the vicinity because it serves the tiny island next to it. Farms located there produce fresh foodstuffs, and hundreds of residents board ferries to travel to and from work each day.

The government of the big island builds monuments to politicians and provides a massively corrupt police force and judicial system. But on the plus side it has low taxes. Churches and non-profits run the schools. It's located in the tropics, so the fact there is no infrastructure to speak of is annoying, but until COVID was rarely fatal.

There isn't much property crime on the big island. Because people are poor and its hard to steal land and cumbersome to steal truckloads of vegetables. Murders are rare although there are a whole lot of -- mostly unreported -- simple assaults and a few aggravated assaults.

If you are wealthy life is good, you don't pay taxes or for anything you don't personally use. (But that isn't so different than other places I have lived.) If you are poor, getting to work is time consuming and inconvenient. There are no public services.

Public health and sanitary services are provided by an NGO. Water and fuel is bought off of a truck. There is no electricity save wind or sun powered. But the weather is nice -- unless there is a hurricane.

I never thought of it as a Lit story, but it could actually be many.

 

[Thalius]

In the Eastern Caribbean a small island sits across a narrow channel from a much larger one. Over 100 years ago, after a hurricane had destroyed the salt ponds there, the British sold the smaller island to an American citizen who built a warehouse and marina to re-provision, with tax-free goods, the yachts that sailed in those waters.

Today the island is basically a for-profit-resort-hotel-marina-warehouse-airport-nation. Run as a business and governed by the descendants of the original buyer. It pays a small fee for the now independent government of the larger island to operate a customs control operation at the airport and marina where inbound travelers pay a per head price for international security.

Nobody is a legal resident of the small island, everyone is legally a guest although some have "lifetime stays" or bookings lasting tens of years. Like a hotel it has private security and "guests" may be evicted -- but if unwarranted it would come at the cost of potential future bookings.

It is literally Las Vegas without police. But being a tiny island there is no potential for escape and little crime. The crime that exists is extremely petty, usually arising from conflicts. There are no courts and no jails. Offenders are simply put on the ferry to the big island. Banned workers return under assumed names.

Except for the tiny island, the big island across the strait has the best economy of all the islands in the vicinity because it serves the tiny island next to it. Farms located there produce fresh foodstuffs, and hundreds of residents board ferries to travel to and from work each day.

The government of the big island builds monuments to politicians and provides a massively corrupt police force and judicial system. But on the plus side it has low taxes. Churches and non-profits run the schools. It's located in the tropics, so the fact there is no infrastructure to speak of is annoying, but until COVID was rarely fatal.

There isn't much property crime on the big island. Because people are poor and its hard to steal land and cumbersome to steal truckloads of vegetables. Murders are rare although there are a whole lot of -- mostly unreported -- simple assaults and a few aggravated assaults.

If you are wealthy life is good, you don't pay taxes or for anything you don't personally use. (But that isn't so different than other places I have lived.) If you are poor, getting to work is time consuming and inconvenient. There are no public services.

Public health and sanitary services are provided by an NGO. Water and fuel is bought off of a truck. There is no electricity save wind or sun powered. But the weather is nice -- unless there is a hurricane.

I never thought of it as a Lit story, but it could actually be many.

I really like the setting!