Freedom is a worthwhile goal, most would agree. Crucially and more specifically, freedom with responsibility is a worthwhile goal. A libertine society where anything goes and consequences are ignored is less American-style freedom and more a scene from an antifa-led autonomous zone. The American founding is based on ordered liberty. Our sense of liberty is based on the idea that was so well communicated by St. John Paul II: “Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.”

Once you start talking about the need for responsibility as a critical part of freedom, you lose some people. Responsibility is hard. If freedom means charting your own way, taking care of yourself, and living with the consequences of your actions, then freedom is indeed risky. With the possibility of great reward comes great risk, after all.