Socrates' invasion of private lives

In Plato’s book The Republic Socrates creates an ideal city where the community is valued over an individual. Socrates takes this to the extreme, giving the government the power take away citizen’s personal freedoms in order to make the city run like a machine. Socrates says, “it is the law which produces such men in the city, not in order to leave each man free to turn where he will, but that it may itself use them to bind the city together” (Plato 270-271). Socrates’ philosophies do not take into account the individuals wants and needs. Socrates thinks that everybody will accept the terms of the city and be content with having one job his whole life, with being stuck in his social class forever, and having to constantly serve the public good. This is not realistic, humans want as many freedoms as possible and they want to take what they have earned and keep it. Socrates’ republic takes away personal freedoms and invades people’s private lives to a point where its citizens will be unhappy and reject the government.
In Book II of The Republic, Socrates comes to the conclusion that one man can only have one job in order to make the city run smoothly. He does not take into account that an individual might want to switch his profession, or that he might be good at multiple jobs and want to pursue both. These basic rights and freedoms are brushed aside in order to make the perfect city, “we gave each man one trade, that for which nature had fitted him. Nothing else was to occupy his time, but he was to spend his life working at that” (Plato 68). Socrates doomed every person in his city to a monotonous life where he did the same thing until he died. The people living in the republic would not give up that personal freedom without a fight, and they would resent the government for controlling their lives.
In Socrates’ republic there is a hierarchical class system of workers, soldiers, and guardians. In Book IV he decides that citizens of his city cannot move from class to class, and to try to do so would be an injustice. “Our classes are three, and meddling and interchange among them is the greatest of injuries to the city, and might justly be described as the extreme of evil doing” (Plato 153). This decision limits people to one class and one fate for their whole lives. People have no hope of bettering themselves by making money and moving up the social and political ladder, instead they are trapped. Socrates overlooks that his people will rebel against this lack of personal freedom. The city will have unhappy merchants and soldiers who feel oppressed and who will cause trouble for the government.
In Socrates’ analogy of the cave, the lucky people who have gone up and seen the light, those who are educated, live in a blissful land of sun and happiness. Those who have gone up to the light then do not want to return to the dark and primitive cave where they grew up. Socrates describes the transition into darkness as painful and possibly dangerous, alluding that the cave dwellers might do the enlightened harm because of their new and radical ideas, “do you not think that they would kill him who tried to release them and bear them up” (Plato 267). Despite this, Socrates does not allow the enlightened to live in the wonderful realm of light, he forces them to come back down to the cave and help the community. “We must not allow them the liberty which they now enjoy…the liberty…of staying there, and refusing to descend again to the prisoners to share with them in toils and honors” (Plato 270). While this may or may not be in the best interest of the city, it takes away from the personal rights of the educated to occupy their time how they please, and puts them in potential danger from the ignorant citizens. This invasion of their private lives could cause the philosophers to resent their government and rebel against Socrates’ republic.
Socrates’ Republic invades its citizens private lives by only allowing each person one job, by confining them to one class for their whole lives, and by forcing the educated become leaders. The people will not stand for this invasion and will rebel against the government, ruining Socrates’ utopia.