Wasn’t it Margaret Atwood who in one of her books asked the highly educated and overall developed minds of the modern world to clearly and reasonably answer one question: the freedom to affect other people and the freedom from being affected by other people – which is more important? The highly educated and overall developed minds, although did not answer the question directly, pointed out one fundamental part of all societies as the answer: the law.

And there it is: the law. An institution that is free to tell us how many days we have to spend in school, when can we vote, what we can’t call our teddy bears. Governments are free to affect our lives almost as much as they like, and that freedom certainly isn’t an illusion.

However, don’t we, ordinary, grey citizens have the freedom from being affected by all those abortion or divorce acts, euthanasia and loyalty to the royal family laws, tax and drug regulations? No, but if you don’t like something, you can move to another country, some would say. And be affected by its laws. So the only freedom we really have is choosing which restrictions to this absolute, ideal, anarchy-like freedom we prefer.

But, hold on for a second. Isn’t this what we want? Anarchy, the complete lack of any laws or restrictions, the state where your personal liberty and your free will really matter; where you can do whatever, whatever, whatever you want; not care about anyone else and their needs or rights; where freedom and illusion finally become absolute antonyms?

And here we brush against another freedom-related aspect of law. It protects people from being harmed by racial, homophobic, sexual or any other abuse, really. Maybe it restricts people’s freedom to terminate their pregnancies, but it allows the foetus’ freedom of life to exist. Maybe sometimes it stops people from fully expressing themselves on issues like racism and homophobia, but it protects people’s freedom from being abused on these grounds. So, the freedom to affect other people and the freedom from being affected by other people – which is more important? Neither, some would say. They cancel each other out, and the whole freedom business is just an illusion, so get back to work, you ordinary, grey citizens. And, is it just me, or would anyone else suggest that these “some” people are our highly educated and overall developed minds?

But these are big questions. Almost as big as what is freedom and what is illusion, and since illusion is a false perception of reality and freedom is the exemption from the power or control of another, is the exemption from the control of another a false perception of reality? I don’t know. But I know, that whatever freedom is, that’s what Martin Luther King was fighting for. That’s what Nelson Mandela devoted his life to. That’s what the Nazi opponents died for. A free world. Free will. Free actions. Did they all do it… for a mere illusion?

Maybe they did. Maybe in the minds of people who truly matter, in all the issues of real worldly importance, freedom is just an illusion. But as long as I can stand up, look into people’s eyes and smile, I am free.