There’s a popular idea circulating, especially for young Americans, that the highest form of freedom means having no one need you. It usually comes packaged attractively: summers in Europe, spontaneous road trips, disappearing off-grid on weekends, money invested in “experiences.”

On its face, this framing sounds harmless—just another lifestyle choice.

But it reveals something deeper and far more troubling about the way modern culture has taught us to think about adulthood, fulfillment, and especially womanhood. There has been an undeniable shift in the way culture defines freedom—as an absence of responsibility rather than a deeper sense of purpose.

Travel is not new, nor is adventure. Leisure, beauty, and autonomy are all things women have wanted for as long as we have existed.

What is new is the insistence that responsibility is a threat to a good life rather than the very thing that gives it shape.

This cultural script doesn’t spare men, who are increasingly encouraged to delay commitment, avoid permanence, and treat responsibility as something to be taken on only once every other box is checked.

It is reinforced not only by economic pressure and social norms, but also by modern

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