Dennis PragerFounder, PragerU · Founder of PragerU | NYT best-selling author

The Thing People Most Fear is Also What They Most Want

13 May 2025 · 1 min

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In this monologue, Dennis Prager argues that the thing people fear most—becoming dependent and losing personal liberty—is simultaneously what they most desire: to be cared for, especially by the state. He points out that as people age they fear losing the dignity of self‑care, yet they also wish for external support. Prager frames this as an ironic contradiction, suggesting that the yearning for state-provided care undermines the very liberty people claim to value.

Chapters

The thing people most fear is also what they most want, to have somebody take care of them. Since I've spoken at fireside chats about the fact that liberty is not what people yearn for, they yearn to be taken care of, which is a loss of liberty. Taking care of yourself is one of the great freedoms of life. I can prove it to you very simply because what is it that people who get old most fear? That they will become dependent upon others, they won't be free to have the dignity of taking care of themselves. So isn't it interesting, the thing people most fear, that others will take care of me, is exactly what people want. They don't want a nurse perhaps to take care of them, but they want the state to take care of them. It's an irony, isn't it? The thing people most fear is also what they most want, to have somebody take care of them.