Your Freedom is False

Alexandria Elizabeth Sharifi
6 min readJul 5, 2022

Yesterday was the Fourth of July, a holiday I used to look forward to as a kid. Growing up, celebrating the 4th meant popsicles, parades and face paint. The smell of hot dogs and the sound of fireworks filled the day, celebration everywhere alluding to the freedom we all felt lucky to share.

Yesterday was the Fourth of July, and this year, the parade in the town next to my hometown was interrupted by gunfire on the open crowd. Without even trying to literate the feelings that must have gone through the community at that parade, think about how the rest of the day went for them.

Think about hearing fireworks going off in the distance, people celebrating the freedom in this country, while you’re waiting in the hospital to hear if your father survived the gunshot fired at him earlier that morning.

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I scrolled through my neighborhood’s NextDoor last night, a community page where members share relevant posts. It was riddled with thoughts like these, coming from families bewildered by the thought of continued celebration throughout the day after such a tragedy in their community, disgusted by towns nearby hosting their dinners, parades and freedom demonstrations in light of what they had just experienced. One read, You’re really celebrating today ? while the rest of us are mourning ?

I am beside myself at this disgusting shooting, but even more frustrated at the reality of how these events tend to fade as abruptly as they transpire.

This shooting that hits so close to home is just another statistic to add to America’s never ending list of tragedies. Like the rest of them, it will be tucked away in piles of tomorrow’s news, posted around on instagram stories for 24 hours, maybe even made into a poster or a statue in remembrance, if donations are facilitated!

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How do you feel about this reality? It makes me very upset. All the while, I know if this happened in the town I grew up, or if one of my family members or friends were hurt, I would be inconceivably distressed. The closer to home a tragedy is, the more we feel affected by it.

In the land of the free, how can neighbors celebrate their freedom next to the site of a slaughter?

My next thought made me feel even more upset. Where does ‘neighborly behavior’ start and where does it end?

If I was a resident of Highland Park, and my neighbors in Winnetka were setting off fireworks the same night of the shooting in broad daylight in my town, I would be furious, as would anyone in that position.

To observe others celebrating freedom, freedom that we are all supposed to share, right after experiencing absolute terror and robbery of that freedom, how can their celebration continue?

Why are they allowed to experience ‘freedom for all’ if mine just got taken away? How is it fair to KEEP celebrating a FALSE reality? True freedom is not freedom for some, it is freedom for all. If you are an American who believes that in your country, everyone is truly free, you are living a lie.

In accordance with the anger and betrayal a Highland Park resident must feel upon hearing celebrations continue last night, I invite you to think about the expectation that fires up those feelings.

We expect a level of camaraderie from our neighbors and communities. We expect to feel a level of validation as we experience things together, a level of companionship, respect, trust and shared expression. It hurts when the town over continues celebrations, as if they haven’t given a thought to the tradegy that struck your own. It hurts to see these former principals seem to dissolve into thin air when communities nearby simply go about their day merrily because their town was fine.

These feelings of betrayal and frustration are more than valid. It is human nature to desire validity and the feeling of communal support when your safety is violated.

I feel horribly for all the families affected by this tragedy. I also feel horribly for those who experienced the trauma of being at that parade.

I feel sad for those who had to sit in mourning that night, hearing celebratory fireworks going off in the town over.

However as I sat with my feelings for all of these people, contemplating the animosity of our country, I grew even more upset.

Shooting are disgustingly common all around the country, but especially in an area not too far away from the North Shore — the South Side of Chicago. How many nights have mothers stayed awake sobbing over lost children who got shot on their way home from school? How many fathers never returned from work because of gang violence on their commute? How many teenagers got raped, harassed and murdered just because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time? How often has this been happening right under our North Shore noses while we go about celebrating OUR fourth of July’s without thought?

With all the violence Chicago’s South Side endures, the tragedy stricken hours that come every single evening are habitually agonizing. Years of mourning, lifetimes of despair.

We hear about it every night on the news but never hesitate to celebrate our country’s freedom. It may be happening a mere 45 minutes away from our community but we’re safe, we’re free, there’s no reason why we can’t celebrate OUR freedom… right?

My heart hurts writing this because the following statement is too true; You’ll never understand it until it happens to you.

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Unfortunately, shootings aside, the ‘freedom’ in America has always had its favorites.

In the past month, we’ve watched the entire female gender get tossed out of the favorites pool. Certain races have never even been allowed in.

The parade shooting yesterday made my blood boil for it’s proximity to my hometown. I felt connected to the people affected by the trauma because of my relation to the area. The more I pondered over my frustration, the more perspective I saw.

There are millions of Americans feeling these EXACT emotions every single day of their lives.

Those of us lucky to experience enough freedom to live under a roof with a steady income, decent education and access to love, nurture and support are without a doubt a rarity in the reality of society today.

The way we feel when our safety and freedom gets ruthlessly violated is the way a vast majority of Americans feel every morning when they wake up and every night before they go to sleep.

If we can be angry at the town over for celebrating their freedom after ours gets violently ripped away, we must own responsibility for OUR celebrations amidst a country full of freedom-robbing tragedies and traumas every single day.

To conclude this erratic and emotionally charged piece of writing, I will say this; changing the past is impossible. I can only be so angry at the way I’ve celebrated my freedom while so many were suffering, and no matter how I feel now, nothing in this moment will change what has already passed.

What I CAN do is alchemize these feelings of frustration and anger, truthfully adapt some real ass humanistic principals and start being a neighbor to the whole of my country, the oppressed, the freedom-less and the abused, and not just my community.

I can start applying the sorrow I feel for those I grew up with who endured a tragic day to the strangers I don’t know at all, enduring tragedy all the same.

We are all human beings, citizens of the same country and promised the same freedom. We should be fighting for the rights of all, not just those in our town. We should be showing camaraderie for tragedies everywhere, not just in our community. We should be treating children lost in shootings, teenagers raped and parents murdered as neighborly as we would treat the family in the house next-door!

Change will not happen in an individualistic country. If we keep our circles small and act as if our bubble is the only reality we know, the suffering outside will only get stronger.

As indiviual communities, we are strong. We come together to mourn, fight and elicit change. The issue arises when we are asked to come together with strangers outside our community to fight for the rights we all deserve. This is where change needs to happen.

We better start to get comfortable fighting for the freedom of other human beings alongside ourselves.

Highland Parks tragedy has proven that terror knows no privilege, status or financial security. If we expect others to come to our side, show support and fight back when terror strikes, we must start doing the same in return.

Violence, terror and the robbing of freedom is a continual disgusting reality that rages around every dark corner and open field, while those of us stuck in the bubble of our immediate community unknnowingly perpetrating the false freedom in the lie of a country we call America.

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Alexandria Elizabeth Sharifi

A lifestyle curated discussion of philosophy, psychology, literature and love; an ongoing exploration of the lessons I learn from life unfolding around me.