Choose Freedom!

One thing I notice a lot these days is the use of emotive language to try and sell me something, even if it's only someone else's dream. And the place I notice this most is in the many phrases I hear where there simply isn't a logical opposite. If you can't express an alternative, what's the purpose of saying someting in the first place? You might as well walk on one leg.

There's a good example of this on my computer. The Toshiba 'Sceen Saver' has four photographs presented against a black background with the admonition "Choose Freedom!"

What's that supposed to mean? Do they believe there are lots of people out there scratching their heads and muttering "OK guys! What's it to be? Freedom or Slavery eh? It's a tricky one ... hey! Let's ask Toshiba!"

Is 'Freedom' a brand? A kind of chocolate perhaps? It seems to me that you can have the freedom to do, or not to do, something. And you can be free from something - hunger for example. But you can't 'choose' to be 'free' or even 'be free' - other than in the restricted meaning of not being locked up in prison.

What's also curious to me about Toshiba's 'freedom' is that it's equated with solitude. The four photographs illustrate 1: A man hauling sledges across arctic ice 2: The vapour trail of a fighter plane across the sky 3: A single hut in the jungle and 4: A man on the top of a hill typing in his laptop above the sea (or is it clouds?). Is just being alone really to be free? Isn't that like saying to be rich is to be happy? Do you think that to be wise means going somewhere where no one will pester you and be a nuisance? Where the neighbours don't cook fish late at night and play pop music too loud?

Anyway, I only wondered.