On Freedom
from the other side of the screen
Editorial Column by Alexa Manning – July 2026
A few weeks ago, I recognized a very specific shade of orange. I was walking home from work when I spotted a patch of golden poppies right in the middle of my English city. The sunlight through the thin petals was shocking; my state flower had never looked so beautiful.
My algorithm started showing me more California content—small businesses, inside jokes, and scenery. Even though I knew it wasn’t the right place for me, I do love California. I feel lucky to have been raised there and at the same time I struggle to feel warmly about the United States more widely.
Of course these thoughts are partly fed by the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence this month. A declaration that meant freedom for the white man and the white man only, I might add. The Independence Day of my childhood was Old Navy t-shirts and watching fireworks from sleepy eyes as we drove across the Bay Bridge. For years now I have instead avoided wearing any patriotic colors and struggle to treat it as a holiday worth celebrating.
I am challenged by the falsehood we are fed from childhood: everyone is welcome, this is the land of the free! Instead, I feel chained by the societal expectation to chop myself into pieces and feed it to the capitalist monster that pulls the strings. I fear the data centers spreading like pox and the climate imploding as a majority of the population chases their nonexistent chance at the big bucks. I am nauseated by the systemic racism and the decline of education.
While politicians appropriate taxpayer funds to obliterate Palestine, their own home has cracked at the foundation.
Just as the sight of golden poppies inspired a glow of warmth for me, I think it is time to rediscover meaning and community within the natural diversity of the landscape.
There is a reason why the occupier of the oval office cut funding for the national parks; beauty inspires and invigorates. From the Grand Canyon we can see the value of consistency and persistence cutting between a rock and a hard place. I see freedom in the monarch butterflies that migrate as a community across thousands of miles. There is strength and memory in each mountain, down to the smallest pebble.
A valid counterargument is that America, and other western countries, are much farther along than others when it comes to human rights but that doesn’t absolve the nation’s sins. As the Ethel Cain lyric goes, “God loves you / but not enough to save you”. The United States political machine loves freedom until it comes to the freedoms of its own people.
America’s claim to freedom is not valid until it is true. Freedom should feel safe, it should preserve individuality without risking the lives or rights of others. Freedom should conserve all that is good about humanity, and violence is not a tool for freedom.
