George Orwell's 1984 novel Big Brother never seemed as realistic as today. The writer warns of obsessive state-control over individuals' freedoms. Under cover of security-like arguments, the state pushes for restrictions on individual freedoms like a state disease. Concerned are the freedoms of movement, expression and non-expression, also called right to intimacy or private sphere. What is a private sphere, if not a camera's, microphone's and stranger's free-zone where thoughts and movements can be expressed freely, while being aware of the laws in existence? In a society where the freedom of non-expression is made a rare specie by the indiscretion of www.bigbrothers.com viewers, and where the wealthy and otherwise secretive financial system appears to have become the nightmare of the underpriviledged taxpayer, the issue of how immoral freedom has become must be raised.

Is freedom immoral? The answer to this question probably depends on what the state can offer to its citizens in terms of certainty. If we imagined an all-powered state that satisfied all human physical and psychological needs in terms of security, respect and development, then total freedom would favorably trade for total certainty - see GlobDemons - with a possibility that freedom might even be considered as an evil. The problem is, the state barely offers any physical or psychological degree of certainty, even less in some countries where social subsidies are pratically non-existent to facilitate the access to food, medicine or some degree of social development. Therefore, freedom is needed as a reaction of self-defense against uncertainty. But as long as freedom is allowed to exist, the state is not to blame for the uncertainty. Human needs are so complex that for the state to be regarded as a worthy Big Brother, society would require it to give answers to every possible existential question. In practice, obviously, questions remain unanswered and so uncertainty exists. As a result, individual freedoms are paramount to human equilibrium, and for as long as they do not disproportionately affect others' certainty, they cannot be anything else than legitimate and moral.

When banks ruled by secrecy laws are said to be immoral because they protect undeclared funds, it is like saying that homes are immoral, when they keep lost paintings in their garage. Bank secrecy, like guns at home, is a warrant of liberty that can help families cross bad times. Similarly, should the State not guarantee individual freedoms, the Constitution implies a right to use guns in defense of individual rights and freedoms. While individuals must pay taxes, the duty to pay taxes cannot be any more coercitive than the duty to pay phone bills. Morally speaking, when boxing legend Mohammed Ali refused to participate to the war of Vietnam, famously stating that Vietcongs hadn't called him a "neger", he claimed to be a conscientious objector. Today, a share of people's taxes go to fight non-sense wars and finance high salaries in the banking sector. Taxpayers' money goes to eliminate risks for those who earn high wages, while it increases the national debt burden for future generations and the risks for the disemployed who maintain their families. In that context, does paying taxes not oppose taxpayers' moral rights? The truth is, it is a State's own duty to tax individuals in ways that avoid tax evasion. While we know that those who evade taxes may be prosecuted, we also respect everyone's own right to dispose of their belongings. Money earned honestly, even if substracted from the IRS, morally cannot be assimilated to stolen money. And while there is no right to possess money from illegal activities, because the freedom of the private sphere cannot be used to cover up actions that disproportionately contribute to others' uncertainty, States eventually pay a heavy price for taking protectionist measures that violate human rights and freedoms.

Uncertainty is a measure of the scope of freedom individuals impose on the state and others. The greater the uncertainty, the more freedom we demand from the state as a self-defense measure. During WWII the world was tumbling and hunger hit every other individual in Europe. Black markets proliferated on the continent as a life vest against great uncertainty. Underground economies usually blossom in overragulated economies that suffer from protectionism or a lack of liberalism. Hence, it is fair to say, that leviathan forms of governments - as Thomas Hobbes puts it - which cannot warrant certainty, but pretend to do so by using authoritarism and limiting individual freedoms, contribute to the creation of a rebelling underground society where freedoms can still be expressed in hiding.

Individual's freedoms is not about the breach of law, but the freedom of choice in an uncertain world. Nothing is as clear and simple as it looks, grey zones exist. Therefore, it is the sate's duty to educate individuals so that they are inclined to take the right decisions whenever they are confronted with uncertainty. Restricting individuals' freedoms of non-expression or privacy is an argument for restricting other freedoms. The drawback is the state's distrust of its own citizens; a climate of intolerence and fear that leads to more uncertainty, excesses of freedoms, violence, and a state that distances itself from its natural goal, which is to serve the people that brought it to life. Beware gw's Legal&Privacy.

Read also Protectionism Vs. Liberalism and Bank Secrecy and Capital Movements