Roeing Away…
This topic contains 55 replies, has 8 voices, and was last updated by 
Davis 2 years, 8 months ago.
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May 9, 2022 at 4:38 am #42910
I have the right to buy mustard
It may just be legal language, but I usually think of “rights” as being specially granted because of some past injustices. You don’t have a “right” to buy mustard if no one is selling it. True you can legally buy mustard but that might not be exactly the same.
And you can also injure someone without breaking any laws and be subjected to civil courts and penalties. In such a case was your action really a “right”?
May 9, 2022 at 5:07 am #42911Robert, i suppose it is necessary to define terms before having a serious discussion. I think in common parlance rights are inherent and inalienable. Buying mustard is as aspect of commerce. That is a right of any citizen who has not otherwise forfeited the rights of a citizen.
Injuring another is subject to either civil liability or criminal prosecution. So injuring another is proscribed. Civil actions for injury are sometimes governed by statutes and sometimes by common law. However any actionable cause of action that entails civil liability is indeed a violation of law. Thus causing injury to another does not violate the way Unseen characterized rights.
May 9, 2022 at 5:14 am #42912I suppose default rights have to be distinguished from rights that are created legally and universally enjoyed like Miranda rights. Specific circumstances (being arrested) trigger the right to remain silent etc. Miranda rights were created as a result of past injustice. (Privileges are related but a different species.)
May 9, 2022 at 12:08 pm #42913I think default rights are the same thing as “human rights” (that needed to be spelled out after centuries of injustice) and beyond that you may or may not have national/local civil rights. Other than those granted, anything else you do can be legally restricted by any official government and I would consider them “privileges”. Commerce is a privilege in China, not a right.
May 9, 2022 at 3:14 pm #42914Robert the way you have framed the issue makes me think of Locke and his construct, the social contract.
Is it the state that has the power to decide what constitutes freedom? Everything an individual enjoys emanates from the state? Any way an individual is circumscribed is a result of the exercise of the state’s authority. Or are certain aspects of freedom inalienable and inherent?
Seems to me that the more totalitarian a state is the greater the tendency to conceive of the state as being the arbiter of human conduct.
May 9, 2022 at 3:57 pm #42915Robert the way you have framed the issue makes me think of Locke and his construct, the social contract. Is it the state that has the power to decide what constitutes freedom? Everything an individual enjoys emanates from the state? Any way an individual is circumscribed is a result of the exercise of the state’s authority. Or are certain aspects of freedom inalienable and inherent? Seems to me that the more totalitarian a state is the greater the tendency to conceive of the state as being the arbiter of human conduct.
If I consider my father, involuntarily plucked from his life in 1952 and sent to Korea, forced to kill with a machine gun and had about a 1 in 3 chance of being killed himself. Where was his liberty or right to pursuit happiness? His basic rights stripped away, and this was not even in defense of his home country. It is easy to see a libertarian point of view when the state has such power. Let’s face it… individuals do need to be sacrificed for the state from time to time…for the greater good, we can only hope. Darwin’s survival of the fittest applies to nations as well…even to “free” democracies.
May 9, 2022 at 4:21 pm #42916May 9, 2022 at 8:28 pm #42920Fellow Unbelievers,
I just wonder how many minds would be blown if this leaked out:
The Skeptic’s Annotated Bible/Qu’ran/Book of Mormon–What The Bible Says About Abortion
https://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/says_about/abortion.htmlWhat <i>The Qu’ran</i> Says About Parenting
https://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/quran/says_about/parenting.htmlWhat <i>The Book of Mormon</i> Says About Family Values
https://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/BOM/fv/long.htmlMaybe Atheists and Secularists need to get a big jug of the tea of your choice and start leaking all this out on all these proposals to criminalize abortion.
May 9, 2022 at 10:01 pm #42921Robert the way you have framed the issue makes me think of Locke and his construct, the social contract. Is it the state that has the power to decide what constitutes freedom? Everything an individual enjoys emanates from the state? Any way an individual is circumscribed is a result of the exercise of the state’s authority. Or are certain aspects of freedom inalienable and inherent? Seems to me that the more totalitarian a state is the greater the tendency to conceive of the state as being the arbiter of human conduct.
If I consider my father, involuntarily plucked from his life in 1952 and sent to Korea, forced to kill with a machine gun and had about a 1 in 3 chance of being killed himself. Where was his liberty or right to pursuit happiness? His basic rights stripped away, and this was not even in defense of his home country. It is easy to see a libertarian point of view when the state has such power. Let’s face it… individuals do need to be sacrificed for the state from time to time…for the greater good, we can only hope. Darwin’s survival of the fittest applies to nations as well…even to “free” democracies.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t the Korean War fought to stop the yellow peril of Asian Communism with its set of dominoes?
May 9, 2022 at 10:04 pm #42922I suppose default rights have to be distinguished from rights that are created legally and universally enjoyed like Miranda rights. Specific circumstances (being arrested) trigger the right to remain silent etc. Miranda rights were created as a result of past injustice. (Privileges are related but a different species.)
Glad you brought up Mirandizing. I wonder how the conservative (reactionary?) justices we now have in the Supreme Court’s majority view Miranda?
May 15, 2022 at 10:32 am #42946Can you explain what you mean by that? Um….the US is a shit show right now. I’m hoping European countries might start taking in US citizens on asylum visas. It’s getting bad.
The US definitely has some problems unique to the Western World and it is actually VERY concerning to many people in other western countries. A few examples: anti-democratic laws, regressive abortion and LGBTQ+ laws, little assistance in many states for homeless, disabled, severely poor, veterans etc, crumbling infrastructure, gun madness, extreme police brutality, horrific penal system and incarceration rate, dysfunctional political system at a national level, high crime etc. Having said that, some of those apply only to certain states, more so every Western country struggles with at least one of the above. While that list seems overwhelming (and should be VERY concerning), this is not an indication of irreversible change nor even one that puts the US out of the sphere of a developed functioning democracy. This is pointing out the bad while ignoring the functioning which heavily outweighs it. While a lot of things may be very unfair for a chunk of people, things still work just fine for most. They have a relatively high standard of living compared with other countries in the world, enjoy a high level of freedoms, live in the richest country that has a massive cultural and political influence on the world, is a country in which people in the millions still move to (at all income levels) for a better life and it is heavily touristed. Please don’t mistake my seeming relentless criticisms of America with the idea that it is hopeless or even outside the sphere of a western country. There is much about America I admire. America is simply unique in some of its problems, ones I personally think are very important, and there is no reason, after a change of attitude, that the US couldn’t outdo some things as Canada, Europe, Australia do. Fingers crossed.
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