Freedoms are often an illusion. This is my cynicism showing full power, but...
People who want freedom the most are the people who don't have it. People who have it tend to take it for granted. That would be okay, except that there are people who want to inhibit freedom of others to gain for themselves... so the vast majority of people who are taking their freedom for granted tend to want to stay out of the muck when a fight breaks out and it doesn't seem to directly affect them.
Speaking for the US, since that is where I've been all my life... I go back to freeing the slaves. That's a loaded topic right there. It gets typically framed as the evil South wanted slaves and the righteous North wanted to end slavery so all people were free. Except, that isn't quite true. There were benevolent people in the South who treated slaves better and there were some free black people as well. Meanwhile, the driving force in the North to end slavery was not so much about freeing the slaves as it was NOT wanting to take black people into the westward expansion. The North didn't want black people around at all... slaves or otherwise... so it wasn't really about freedom but was about trying to not have them around. When you think about it... next to the people in the South who outright abused their slaves, the people in the North wanting to get rid of them was the next worst thing.
Also... post freeing the slaves, how free were they really? They didn't own anything, couldn't own anything for a very long time, and had no generational wealth for all their time in the country and working hard. How many things did slave labor build and they reaped no benefits once they were free. And to rub it in, the North rubbed it in the face of the South for losing the war by sometimes putting black people in positions of power in the South. Not in the North... no... in the South... trying to rub it in the South's prejudice face AND really not doing the black people any favors by supporting them when trouble happened.
We still don't have true freedom and equality across the races.
Now about women... Know why women really got the vote in the US? Sure, women wanted the vote but not as many as you might think were in the movement AND how were women going to get the vote unless they either fought a civil war over it OR men voted to give the women the vote... and guess what happened? Women got the vote in time for the vote on Prohibition. There were a lot of men who wanted Prohibition, but not enough to pass it... they rightfully figured that IF they gave the women the right to vote, which was an easier sell than Prohibition... then they could get enough women to vote for Prohibition to pass that. Sure enough, that's how it happened. Those men mostly didn't give two fucks about women being free to vote, and you see that by decades going by before women could own property or open bank accounts in their names, etc. Hell, women today are losing rights like for abortion (whether you are for it or against it, it is a right being taken away) and women can't have hysterectomies usually without permission of a man. Think about that.
We have the illusion of choice in all our elections because the people in power pick the candidates that they tell us we must choose between every time. It is nearly impossible to run a random candidate and get any traction.
I could go on and on and on, and also on and on and on... The people running the show foster the illusion of freedom because it helps keep people in line. Throw a few cookie crumbs out now and then to keep people from truly rising up in opposition and you can have whatever you want at the top... and on the side sell hard on the idea that people can work hard and earn a spot in the power broker club, and every now and then let someone rise as a token proof of that to keep the doubters from revolting too.
Democracy and Capitalism are two of the best friends to people who want to maintain power over a long period of time. The old despots finally learned that their time was limited because if you keep your boot on the throats of the people too hard for too long they eventually realize they have no choice and will die to revolt and overthrow you... but give them the illusion of freedom and choice and they will follow you right off the cliff without blinking an eye. Most of them anyway.
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