John Stuart Mill

Here's something that needs to be heard:

"A state of things in which a large portion of the most active and inquiring intellects find it advisable to keep the most genuine principles and grounds of their own convictions within their breasts, and attempt in what they address in public, to fit as they can of their own conclusions to premises which they have internally renounced, cannot send forth the open, fearless characters, and logical, consistent intellects who once adorned the thinking world."

-John Stuart Mill On Liberty

Booya. That is not the John Stuart Mill who I heard about from one of my professors who always equated utilitarianism with the Nazi's, nor is it the John Stuart Mill who Air Force Academy Cadets are forced memorize. This is the John Stuart Mill who is against coercion and for the absolute freedom of conscience within the context of what would make a good society. I like this guy, he's good.