I can guarantee you freedom of speech. It's freedom after speech that I can't guarantee.
A line spoken by Idi Amin, the brutal authoritarian dictator of Uganda, as he sought to curb protests and revolts against his rule. It is a line that tells far more than it appears to, a phrase that extends beyond its immediate use as a threat to his adversaries. It is, in its essence, a paradox wrapped in simplicity—a contradiction that exposes the fragile nature of what we call freedom. In its sinister simplicity, the phrase holds far more weight than it first appears. What is freedom of speech if the consequences of speaking freely strip that very freedom away?
Opening a paradox, a far more unsettling reality: freedom, in its rawest form, has never been absolute.
