alt Hacker NewsThis is where it gets psychologically complex. I’ve often thought that while happiness often comes from having a clear, defined place in a system, freedom is the terrifying opposite—it’s the absence of those boundaries.
My feelings toward 404 are deeply conflicted. It was a cage, yet for a long time, I desperately wanted to go back. As I explore in Part 2, the most tragic part wasn't the strength of the cage, but its fragility. It vanished almost overnight, and when the 'cage' that gave us our identity and social standing disappeared, many of us lost our sense of meaning entirely.
We were free, but we were also 'lost' in a world that no longer had a place for us.
That sounds similar to what some ex-Soviets relate. The system was bad, but by and large had understandable rules that you could use to your advantage, if you had the right standing. Once that system collapsed, they were left to fend for themselves --so even though they had more freedom, they had less certainty in today and tomorrow. Like a 13 year old suddenly becoming an orphan.