I think you define freedom eloquently. It sounds like basic libertarianism to me and that pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter.
I'm a white guy living in rural Vermont. Can't get much more white than that in one respect. I was born just barely outside Baltimore though, and have known black folks and Poles and Italians all my life.
For most of my life I have been in the majority wherever I was, but I did a Peace Corps stint in the Phillipines, and at least learned what it was like to be stared at everywhere I went because I stood out like a sore thumb.
I've moved around quite a bit, lived in 7 different states, both coasts and in between, big cities, medium ones and very small towns, and somewhere along the way I imagine I have met just about every race, sexual orientation, age, size, color, economic class, and idealogical stripe people can be.
The one lesson I have learned from this is that people are just people.
There are assholes and saints, genuises and morons, workaholics and lazy bums to be found everywhere.
I just don't understand why simply getting along with each other seems to be so damnably hard.