OTHER ISSUES

Freedom Magazine. Addiction issue cover
April 2017
Vol. 49, Issue 2
Freedom Magazine. The Data Demon issue cover
February 2017
Vol. 49, Issue 1
Freedom Magazine. The 2016 Expansion issue cover
December 2016 Special Edition
Freedom Magazine. The Shocking Truth issue cover
October 2016
Vol. 48, Issue 3
Freedom Magazine. Military Spending issue cover
June-July 2016
Vol. 48, Issue 2
Freedom Magazine. Pill Pushers issue cover
April-May 2016
Vol. 48, Issue 1
Freedom Magazine. Back to School issue cover
September 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 8
Freedom Magazine. Veterans issue cover
August 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 7
Freedom Magazine. Infrastructure issue cover
July 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 6
Freedom Magazine. Net Freedom issue cover
June 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 5
Freedom Magazine. Freedom of Information Act issue cover
April 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 3
Freedom Magazine. People Who Read Are a Dying Breed issue cover
March 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 2
Get Religion? issue cover
February 2015
Vol. 47, Issue 1
Freedom Magazine. Scientology Expansion issue cover
December 2014 Special Edition
Freedom Magazine. Held Back issue cover
November 2014
Vol. 46, Issue 4
Freedom Magazine. Created Equal issue cover
October 2014
Vol. 46, Issue 3
Freedom Magazine. LA Under the Influence issue cover
September 2014
Vol. 46, Issue 2
Military: Are They Drugged to Death issue cover
August 2014
Vol. 46, Issue 1

FLORIDA ISSUES

Freedom Magazine. The Year in Review issue cover
December 2016
Clearwater Special Edition
Freedom Magazine. Clearwater Building cover
Special Clearwater Edition.
August 2015
Freedom Magazine. Building a Great City issue cover
Florida.
Vol. 20, Issue 1
Freedom Magazine. Flag issue cover
July 2014
Special Edition
PUBLISHED BY
Church of Scientology
since 1968
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Oh, baby

Freedom Magazine. Patriot Games issue cover

The final days of a magazine editorial cycle are always a challenge. If, for editors, there’s joy in crafting pithy words and playing clever angles, or for the designers in compositing graphical elements to tell a visual story—well, it’s a distant memory. At this stage, both sides are paddling against riptides of reviews, revisions and proofs—it’s easy to forget why we’re here.

And then you remember.

The world and its people are in a bit of a bind, and the knot’s pulling tighter and tighter. In just the last week, riots broke out in Baltimore after a healthy young black man died of spinal cord injuries inflicted while in police custody. Two gunmen were shot dead after opening fire with automatic rifles at a Texas exhibition of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad. Eight million people’s lives were shaken by a devastating earthquake in Nepal. Oh, I could go on.

It was in the thick of that trying time—the final stages of getting this magazine out the door—that early one Sunday morning I was awakened by a Twitter alert on my phone. I groped for it, figuring there was some emergency with the magazine, to see this notification: @everyone is tweeting about the royal baby.

Sigh.

Here we were fussing over the fine points of Freedom’s coverage on eroding civil liberties, historic free trade agreements, and the impossibility of real public discourse—and all anyone is going to be talking about is the length of the royal baby’s eyelashes and the degree of slope on the royal baby’s nose.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m sure the royal baby is cute, and we all need a diversion. But there’s bigger fish a fryin’ and it’s time everyone paid closer attention to the stove.

Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard wrote in 1964: “A people who wishes to be free must not just know about the latest wine. They’ve got to know pretty well across the boards about most everything in sight. They’ve got to keep on the ball, they’ve got to keep on the qui vive, they’ve got to be right up there and alert.”

That’s why we at Freedom are in the business of bringing news to people, not in this very moment, faster than anyone else, but in a way that’s fresh and thoughtful, to inspire people to intellectually invest in things, compel them to see things differently—from everyone else or even from how they themselves viewed things before. That’s what we aim for in this and every issue.

Our cover story this month looks at the controversy over whether to rein in USA Patriot Act provisions that give the government authority to engage in wholesale spying on the American people. Give me freedom, or give me security? Thank you, but we’ll have both.

We also have a rare interview with , best-selling author of Ender’s Game (and 60+ other books) and a guy who won’t blindly toe the party line.

Another brilliant thing Freedom covers this month: the Writers and Illustrators of the Future competition. It was truly moving to be there at this incredible moment in the lives of the winning writers and artists—one that was both a profound ending, where all their toil paid off in a dream realized, and a beautiful beginning—because as you’ll read in the story, winners of this competition tend to go on to very big things that ripple outward. Now, their impact and inspiration will live on, like the magnanimous spirit of L. Ron Hubbard in the contest he created to this aim.

Freedom this month also offers a glimpse of the past—in Bob Fletcher’s stunning photos of the children and families of the Child Development Group of Mississippi in 1965, the year they took an incredible leap of faith toward bettering their lives, and in doing so also left an important lesson for history: Where there’s a will, there’s a way to rise up and break free of repression’s cruel tether.

I’m thankful for these stories—and all of them in this issue—for reminding us that this work we do at Freedom—helping people expand their minds and their perspectives—is a pretty noble endeavor. And thank you, dear reader, for joining us here, to learn more than just about the latest wine, to take in the issues across the board. Thanks for keeping your eye on the ball, and your head on the qui vive—for being right up there and alert.

You are people who want to be free.