#59- 18 Words for Freedom, Liberty & Fighting for Justice

It's our Independence Day. So on today's episode of the Real Life English with Gabby podcast, I'll be teaching you 18 phrasal verbs, slang words and idioms for freedom, liberty, and fighting for justice.

You'll be learning vocabulary like grassroots, a burning issue, stick to your guns, raise your voice, and more. Let's get to it. Hey there, welcome to the Real Life English with Gabby Podcast.

I'm your host Gabby, your fun and friendly English teacher from the one and only New York City. My goal is to teach you phrasal verbs, idioms, and slang that will help you speak English confidently

and understand real American conversations. Are you ready to improve your English skills? Let's jump right in. Hey, hey, hey, hey, welcome to episode number 59.

Greetings from a very red, white, and blue New York City. It's our Independence Day, July 4th, here in the USA. This year, honestly, it feels very different, as you can imagine. Let's talk about that for a bit.

Finally, I'm proud of my country. I love my country and have always been a patriot. Despite understanding my country's dark history as well. I'm not proud of many things that we have done throughout history and that we continue to

do now. But despite everything, I still love my country, even though I want many things to change. Since January, though, with this new fascist regime in office, I had been feeling ashamed. This country that I love is not the country that I recognize anymore.

It's not the country that I grew up with. It's honestly been so crazy to see the way our new government has been treating people. I've been watching my country unravel slowly since January, and most of us here don't know quite what to do.

I thought this independence day I would be sad, but then something happened. A few weeks ago, we had something called the No Kings protest. Maybe you saw some of it on social media. It was a protest in all 50 states, and it was amazing.

Millions of Americans went out to protest against Trump and our government to show that Trump is not a king and that he can't do whatever he wants with our government and our constitution. I felt so empowered.

It made me so proud to realize that yes, Americans are fighting back. The American spirit is to fight and never back down. And so now I feel encouraged. I feel encouraged that we aren't going to lose this country and that we will keep fighting.

It's going to honestly be a very long road and I don't know exactly what's going to happen in the next four years, but I do know that we aren't going to take things sitting down. So this fourth of July, I'm encouraged and not as discouraged or sad as I was earlier in the year about the state of the USA.

We're going to fight all the craziness and all the chaos, and we're going to fight it hard. Let's see what happens. I know that some of you come from countries like France,

where protesting and fighting back is normal and encouraged. You guys are the professionals when it comes to fighting back against government policies. And I wish Americans could be a little bit better at protesting

like all of you are. However, I also know that some of you listening are from countries where protesting is not common, or even not allowed. For some of you going to a protest could mean going to jail, or even getting killed.

It's very interesting to see the range of freedom that people have all around the world. In my classroom, we often talk about censorship and how much control the government has on what you post on the internet, what you say about the government. And so I'm aware that some of you have the freedom to speak out against your governments

and some of you don't. Americans have always had freedom to do this. However now, things are changing a lot. Today's episode is focusing on vocabulary that's used to fight for justice, gain freedom, and liberty.

These have always been American values and it's what most Americans will tell you that they love about the United States. So this vocabulary you can use on a grand scale meaning you can use it to talk about your government Or you can use it to talk about small-scale things like trying to negotiate with your boss about unfair practices at your job or maybe at your university. Or maybe even within your own family or friend group.

So let me tell you the vocabulary that you'll be learning in today's episode. Speak out against. Stand up for. Break free from.

Fight for. Push back against. Call for change. The system grassroots. Woke. The man. Cancel culture. Take a stand. A burning issue. To draw a line in the sand. To stick to your guns. Power to the people. The voice of the people.

and raise your voice. Do you want to practice what you learned in today's episode so that you can remember everything you hear and start using it right away? Then I have something special for you. There's a free study guide PDF that has everything you need to practice and remember these words. We have all of the words, definitions and example sentences, along with the transcript,

the story and practice activities. Click the link in the episode description and then you'll get the link to the folder that has all of the study guides from every episode. All right. Now I'm going to read a story that has all of today's vocabulary in real life context. Listen along as I read and see if you can figure out any of the meanings of the vocabulary by listening for the context. After the story, we'll go over all of the vocabulary and definitions together.

Today's story was inspired by the true story of American freedom, which is what Americans celebrate today across the country. Here we go. Back in the 1700s, the American colonists were experiencing intense oppression from England. Slowly, the colonists started to unite and speak out against England's unfair laws and taxes. They were tired of being controlled from so far away and having little to no representation in the government.

The colonists decided to stand up for their rights and their freedom. They wanted to break free from England's rule.