The Trap: What Happened to Our Dream of Freedom

"Only two groups in society actually behave in a rational self-interested way in all experimental situations: one is economist themselves, the other is psychopaths."

Isaiah Berlin made distinctions between a 'positive' and revolutionary idea of freedom, which he believed was dangerous and violent, and the 'negative' freedom that allows people to live their lives without hindrance. From here, Adam Curtis takes us through the 20th Century, right up to the Iraq War. He shows that sometimes the revolutionary positive freedom is more desirable, by providing individuals with meaning in life, while the pursuit of democratic and capitalist negative freedom can be just as brutal.

The ultimate political goal at the heart of our age is the idea of individual freedom. In the first episode of the trap miniseries, an answer to the question of what personal freedom means and how its meaning changed after world war 2 and during the cold war is investigated.