Susan Callaway
Sunni: Yeah, that’s a really tough one to live up to all the time. [pauses] Got any suggestions on helping the snolfs understand this? They’re both at ages where they often try to play the blame game.
Susan: Let’s see ... That can be a tough one. It starts very early, of course. My sister and I were never allowed to play the blame game. We were never punished much or severely, but we both learned early to tell the truth and to own up to our own mistakes. Whining and fighting were simply not tolerated. I did as well as I could with my own two sons in this, but I didn’t have the backing of my husband often, so it was not as successful. Or didn’t seem so at the time. They are both well-adjusted young men, self-supporting and truthful. They are both self governors for the most part, and I’m proud of them.
The trick, it seems, is to give them appropriate responsibility for themselves and their choices, make sure they live with the consequences of those choices—where not fatal, of course—and gradually increase that level of accountability—to themselves—as they mature. That means letting them make a lot of bad decisions and choices, of course, and that is very hard for a loving mother to do. At some point—younger the better, they must learn on their own that choosing to stay up all night, for example, is not going to work out well. How do you convince them of it if they never experience it themselves? That way they don’t spend the rest of their lives making bad choices about the same things, over and over, expecting someone else to make it all better. This isn’t compatible with a government school schedule, so your homeschool environment is ideal. I know you already do a lot of that, so you are miles ahead of most folks. As far as the “blame game”, maybe you need to just stop playing—ignore it and see what happens. Really listen and support them when they own up to their individual problems and faults, but turn a deaf ear when the blame and tattling come out... Yes, it’s very hard to do this, but I suspect they will respond quickly.
Sunni: You aren’t kidding it’s hard! But back to you: you’ve been busy with various projects, and I’ll try to get to them all. Perhaps the one you’re best known for is The Price of Liberty [subsequently referred to as TPoL], a site devoted to pro-freedom commentary and analysis. What led you to start it?
Susan: After leaving the LP in 1980—more on that some other time, perhaps—I was carefully apolitical for a long time. I became immersed in raising my children after a sudden divorce, with all of the usual problems of making a living and preparing for the future as a single parent. I went back to college and began my nursing/teaching career in earnest. In 1999 I discovered the Sierra Times online and became the volunteer managing editor soon afterwards. 2001 was a challenge, quite aside from the terrible things that happened in New York that year. By 2003 I was seriously disillusioned with J.J. Johnson, owner of ST. Most of that had to do with a lack of communication and his unreserved support for George Bush and his insane war in Iraq and elsewhere. Somehow, an oppressive government was suddenly OK as long as Bush or the Republicans ran it. By September I had exhausted all avenues to work out our differences. Three of those who had written for or otherwise contributed much to ST worked with me to establish a new web site we called “The Price of Liberty”.
Sunni: Did you have particular goals in mind when you launched it? Are you happy with how it’s progressed?
Susan: Our mission statement says it pretty well. I’ve been amazed repeatedly at the response from both readers and other journalists/bloggers and the public. It’s very gratifying to know that people like Tom Knapp and L. Neil Smith know who I am and even care what I’m trying to do.
Sunni: Those are two fine gentlemen.
Susan: Yes indeed, and so many others—Sunni Maravillosa, Lobo, The Hunter, so many more come to mind. But I don’t think about the responses very much. I don’t produce TPoL because of the feedback or anything much beyond the desire to reach out to others with what I’ve learned, doing what I can to preserve at least the seeds of liberty and justice. I’m very aware that the children of those who now practice their individual liberty are the soil in which those seeds must be planted. I “cast my bread upon the waters” and let it drift with the tide where it will. I can never know the real results, and don’t need to. As long as the whole affair is driven by the need to communicate the ideals of freedom, I’m happy.
Sunni: Don’t need to? Do you want to? I don’t think my ego is inordinately involved in what I do and why, but I definitely am interested in learning how others respond to my ideas—especially when they offer good critiques or add to what I’ve said.
Susan: Oh, I’m definitely interested in what others think, and receive praise or critiques happily, but I don’t need to know the final results of all I’m doing—and we can’t know, really. As long as I am satisfied that some individuals, somehow, are getting the message, I’ll keep doing what I’m doing. I guess, in the long run, I’m doing it as much for myself as for anything else. I want a world where people live with integrity and non-aggression, etc. I don’t want to be alone. The more people I can help see the advantages of living free, the more company I have. I really couldn’t give you any better reason why I do any of this. I have often asked myself about this, and never had any better answer. It’s also like an itch; I stop scratching sometimes, get tired of it, but the itch returns inevitably.
