Police officer denied right to vote after refusing to surrender weapon...

[headcase]

Sure it does. With natural rights, 'that's just the way it is.' Civil rights, on the other hand can change, and are a far cry from absolute.

I disagree. Every right you have, you do not have because that's the way it is or because the government says so. Every right you have, you have because someone recognises it. You can say you have the natural right to live, but it means nothing if someone is able to kill you with impunity. You need a legal system to provide penalties for infringement of, and to recognise the validity of, a natural right in a civilization. Without a civilization, the people you run into must recognise, and respect, your natural rights, whether by their own understanding or by your forcing them to do so, in order for you to have them. In hostile enemy territory, you probably don't have the right to live in their eyes. You may think you have that right, but that doesn't really matter if your life is taken by someone who believes you don't. All rights are subject to circumstance.

Under current law, by your definition, the TSA has an absolute right to search you in very invasive ways as soon as you enter their secure area. I'm betting that will change, just as voting 'rights' have changed over the years.

Well, they kind of do. Paul introduced a bill to change that. The right to life has also changed over the years. Slaves didn't have the right to liberty at one point.

I think we need to either dramatically reduce the size of government, or stop identifying the .gov/citizen contracts as rights... Or, better yet, do both.

I agree about reducing government. However, I believe we need to understand that all rights are basically a .gov/citizen contract.

Well, just in case I am mising something... What exactly does a right entail? How do you define the term, 'right,' as applicable to our discussion? It would likely be helpful to break it into two definitions, one for each, natural and civil, rights.

A right is something that no one should be able to stop you from doing, except in the most extreme circumstance. Period.

The circumstances between existing or not, vs. 'because the .gov says so,' are pretty significant. The circumstances are actually wildly different, and have wildly different implications.

The circumstances required for a right to exist can be wildly different, depending on the right.

Well, I suspect that 'choice' matters quite a bit... But, you seem to be, inadvertently, suggesting that .gov has the absolute right to force education, social security and other such things on you. After all, these laws are based on the circumstances of our society.

They have the absolute right to do whatever we, as a whole, allow them to do. They are constrained, in reality, only by whatever line we draw.

Our Constitution is a meaningless piece of paper and ink, unless we recognise it as law, and punish transgressions against it.

[t1m0thy]

Civil rights cannot exist without natural(absolute) rights, but natural rights do exist without civil rights. Civil rights are simply how we define the application of our natural rights within civil society. They are not two different things entirely they are just like the right to bear arms is to the right to self defense; one is derived from the other not separate from it.

Civil Government is a compromise between individuals to form an agreement that infringes upon their natural liberties in so far as it serves to preserve their rights. The creation of government is innately an infringement upon liberty but it is a necessary one in order to protect it. This is why we must always be vigilant and restrain government; because its natural tendency is to overextend itself for its intended purpose. Civil rights are the fruit of this compromise.

[Carnes]

I disagree. Every right you have, you do not have because that's the way it is or because the government says so. Every right you have, you have because someone recognises it.

When I exercise my right to pick my nose in private, it is not dependent on someone recognizing my right. It is my natural right, and it exists independently of anything outside myself.

In fact, my natural rights are pretty easy to define: Anything that I want to do, or not do, is my natural right so long as it does not infringe on the ability of someone else to do whatever they want to do, or not do.

Now, you are suggesting that my rights depend on other people respecting my rights... Well, yes, but they have no right to infringe on my rights. I have the right to take action against someone that fails to respect my rights, assuming that their failure to respect my rights is not the result of my failure to respect their rights.

Sometimes it can get a little difficult to sort out who was in the wrong, and who is not respecting someone's rights. In feudal times there was a lot of senseless killing that resulted from people trying to sort out rights violations on their own. As such government thought it might be a good idea to try to run a system of justice that would resolve the issues.

Unfortunately, most governments aren't particularly 'just' to begin with, so their justice systems were lacking to a pretty significant degree. Then along came the US, where it was established that all natural rights would be protected equally. (It didn't exactly work that way since blacks were not considered whole people and other such things, but they were the closest to getting it right in the history of mankind.)

See, the concept of 'civil rights' is pretty much meaningless because it just means, whatever the law says. Roman slaves had what were expressly identified as 'civil rights', but they were still slaves. Now, the 'rights' they were granted might have helped them to be better off than slaves in other places... but really? To even include the term 'right' in that kind of situation just sullies the entire concept of rights.

In the US, they wanted a 'more perfect' union, and decided that in the interest of avoiding tyranny, the rights should be respected equally across the board. All natural rights. The primary 'civil right' that the us.gov established was that it would respect all your rights, all your liberty. It was not a case where your rights would be respected up until your rights conflicted with the whim of the king, it was not a situation where your rights were protected up until they conflicted with a certain religion, it was not a situation where your rights were recognized so long as they did not threaten a political party... Nope, none of that... The US decided that your rights would be recognized up until the point where your rights infringe on the rights of others... AKA, liberty.

So, along comes the bill of rights. They wanted to enumerate your rights, so they could recognize them. But, some of the founders were against that idea because it would destroy the understanding of rights. Some founders thought it necessary because there would be no other way to convince the people that they could speak freely and carry a gun, and furthermore to ensure that the government never tries to encroach on those key freedoms. But the opposition thought that as soon as you make a list like that, anything not on that list will be ignored, which would someday result in people not understanding that Carnes has a natural right to pick his nose. They tried to rectify that with the ninth amendment... But it doesn't really matter now, does it? Since no one knows what a right is anymore, it doesn't matter if 'the rights not listed' are still protected by the ninth. (Not that anyone really bothers to pay much attention to the Constitution much anymore anyway.)

You can say you have the natural right to live, but it means nothing if someone is able to kill you with impunity.

Sure it does. Assuming the person has no right to kill me, but does so anyway, that person violated my rights. Just because he can get away with it, does not mean that the violation did not occur. The only person that is ultimately responsible for protecting my natural rights is me. It is also true that most people think it wise to have a government help provide justice for rights infringements, as I discussed above.

You need a legal system to provide penalties for infringement of, and to recognise the validity of, a natural right in a civilization.

Absolutely not. While a government that doles out justice may be more desirable, it is not necessary. Think of the ideal of the 'wild west,' or feudal times. If you insult me, infringe on my rights, or infringe on the rights of those for whom I take responsibility, we are going to sort it out. It may be as simple as demanding an apology, or it may go all the way to a fight to the death, but the rights violation can be resolved between the violator and the violated without any government intervention.

Unfortunately in that kind of environment justice is frequently not served, and bullies and tyrants will tend to abuse power, so most people desire a government to assist with the adjudication of justice.

In hostile enemy territory, you probably don't have the right to live in their eyes.

If I'm a soldier engaged in war with an enemy force, I forfeited my right not to be killed by the enemy.

You may think you have that right, but that doesn't really matter if your life is taken by someone who believes you don't. All rights are subject to circumstance.

There has to be some kind of consistency to it, otherwise there is no meaning what so ever. The way you use the language has to have meaning, otherwise there is no reason to discuss the issue.

Off topic, but as an example: There is no point to discussing the issue of racism if you simply identify that all people are racist. It's pointless if you don't try to identify characteristics that are more or less desirable in regard to racial disposition. If you can't say, this person is a racist, and that person is not... then there is no point in having a discussion about racism.

Same with rights, if you are going to apply a definition to rights that makes the term absolutely meaningless, then there is no point in discussing the issue. I can say, my natural rights end where your natural rights begin, and civil rights are a contract between the .gov and the people... From there, I can have all manner of meaningful discussion. However, if I say there is no consistency to rights at all, then we may as well be trying to talk about what things are like ten thousand trillion light years from here.

Well, they kind of do. Paul introduced a bill to change that. The right to life has also changed over the years. Slaves didn't have the right to liberty at one point.

Gah! So is the right to life inalienable? Is it given by the creator? Or is the right to life something the government gives you?

Slaves had the right to liberty, and if they had revolted they would have been right in doing so.

I agree about reducing government. However, I believe we need to understand that all rights are basically a .gov/citizen contract.

No way, Jose. If we don't recognize the difference between natural rights and the .gov/citizen contract, then there is no reason to even bring rights into the discussion. All we would really ever have is the .gov/citizen contract and the usage of the term 'rights' would not be necessary anywhere in that.

If the government is stopping me from doing something that is not infringing on the liberty of another person, then the government is oppressing me... Unjustly infringing on my natural rights. If the government declared that picking boogers is unsightly and illegal, even though it posed no public health threat or infringed on the rights of others in any way, that would be an example of oppression and likely tyranny.

If the concept of rights came to be understood only in terms of the .gov/citizen contract, the question of oppression would not even be able to come up. It would not matter if my action did not infringe on the 'rights' of another person, because that concept of 'rights' would simply be 'whatever the government says.' That is the difference between a legal system (like we currently have) and a justice system (as was the original intent). A legal system only accounts for compliance with the laws. A justice system accounts for actual justice based on natural rights.

If rights are defined as a .gov/citizen contract, the people would never be able to shrug off a tyrannical government. That government would have the power to write the contract however they choose and in the eyes of the government your rights would never be violated.

A right is something that no one should be able to stop you from doing, except in the most extreme circumstance. Period.

Maybe you could break this down for me, kindergarten style. I mean, this entails the absolute 'might makes right' concept. Anyone with a gun will be able to stop you from doing anything that does not involve you having a gun. Rights seems a concept pretty far removed from this definition. I don't like to pick on definitions because they are exceptionally hard to craft, but I'm not able to figure out what you mean here at all.

They have the absolute right to do whatever we, as a whole, allow them to do. They are constrained, in reality, only by whatever line we draw.

Okay, so they have the absolute right to exterminate the Jews in the world?

Maybe you are pursuing the 'might makes right' approach here. Because the government is powerful enough that no one can tell them to do otherwise, whatever they are doing is right.

I don't buy that.

I think it is necessary to have a metric for what is right, and what are rights, that exists outside of the government. I think that if a government misbehaves the people have a right, a duty and an obligation to 'shrug off' that government. If we identify rights as 'whatever the .gov tells us they are' then that creates a serious problem with the ability to rise against tyranny.

Our Constitution is a meaningless piece of paper and ink, unless we recognise it as law, and punish transgressions against it.

I think we are well beyond that point. We have state legislators passing legislation, the purpose of which is to stop letting the federal government ignore Constitutionally identified states (civil) rights.

So, if you don't believe in the existence of natural rights, and there was a revolution tomorrow and the people told you you had to decide what rights the people had and what rights they don't have... Since, as you indicate, rights are just a contract between the people and the government, what rights would you give people?

Me? I'd kinda do what the founders did. I'd say you have the right to do whatever the hell you want, so long as it does not infringe on the ability of someone else to do whatever the hell they want. I would establish a government for the purpose of maintaining a judicial system that involves a strong civil contract with the citizens such that liberty and justice are protected.

[Carnes]

Civil rights cannot exist without natural(absolute) rights, but natural rights do exist without civil rights. Civil rights are simply how we define the application of our natural rights within civil society. They are not two different things entirely they are just like the right to bear arms is to the right to self defense; one is derived from the other not separate from it.

The right to keep and bear arms is as much a natural right as the right to self defense. You can have a gun because you having a gun does not violate the rights of others.

Having a 'right' to trial by a jury of 12 of your peers is purely a civil right. It is entirely a contract between you and the government.

Being that the government that we live under here in the US was developed with the intent of protecting and respecting your natural rights, there is a good bit of overlap between natural rights and civil rights.

The nice thing about the US is that all the civil rights are supposed to be centered around the concept for developing an organization that can protect liberty and justice. The reason we have elections, term limits, trials by jury and other such things is because all these things will be able to develop and maintain an organization with the power to provide redress against transgressions of individual liberty/rights.

The bummer is that since power is necessary to be able to provide consequences for rights violations, that power is also going to be sought to be used in other ways.

There is a lot of bad stuff that goes on in the world, for example poverty. Now, if you have a government that, more than any other organization, has the power to stop/reduce poverty should they be obligated to do so? I think the founders would have said no. However, the saying that the only thing necessary for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing still holds true.

So there is a conundrum. A government with the power to influence poverty, but not the constitutional authorization. As such, the original civil rights in the US that were intended entirely for protecting liberty and justice have come to include a wide array of other things. We now have a right to an education, healthcare, social security and so on and so forth.

In some ways it has been good because your quality of life is tremendously better in a world where you are entitled to such social protections. But the down side is an erosion of the concept of rights. Because now, what do we have when one of my natural rights is in conflict with a civil right?

We have a civil right to healthcare, and I have a natural right to smoke a cigarette. My smoking of cigarettes infringes on the civil right to healthcare that other people have because I am going to cause undue burden on the system. So which right trumps the other?

To me it is obvious that natural rights trump civil rights, but as civil rights become more and more central to our lives and people are less and less able to discriminate the differences between the two, we are coming to a time where civil rights trump natural rights.

When civil rights trump natural rights, the government has absolute and entirely unfettered authority to enact any tyranny it desires.

As such, it would behoove liberty minded individuals to work toward stripping the government of the ability to enact civil rights that are not specifically for the express purpose of protecting my natural rights and my liberty.

[headcase]

When I exercise my right to pick my nose in private, it is not dependent on someone recognizing my right. It is my natural right, and it exists independently of anything outside myself.

In fact, my natural rights are pretty easy to define: Anything that I want to do, or not do, is my natural right so long as it does not infringe on the ability of someone else to do whatever they want to do, or not do.

Now, you are suggesting that my rights depend on other people respecting my rights... Well, yes, but they have no right to infringe on my rights. I have the right to take action against someone that fails to respect my rights, assuming that their failure to respect my rights is not the result of my failure to respect their rights.

Sometimes it can get a little difficult to sort out who was in the wrong, and who is not respecting someone's rights. In feudal times there was a lot of senseless killing that resulted from people trying to sort out rights violations on their own. As such government thought it might be a good idea to try to run a system of justice that would resolve the issues.

Unfortunately, most governments aren't particularly 'just' to begin with, so their justice systems were lacking to a pretty significant degree. Then along came the US, where it was established that all natural rights would be protected equally. (It didn't exactly work that way since blacks were not considered whole people and other such things, but they were the closest to getting it right in the history of mankind.)

See, the concept of 'civil rights' is pretty much meaningless because it just means, whatever the law says. Roman slaves had what were expressly identified as 'civil rights', but they were still slaves. Now, the 'rights' they were granted might have helped them to be better off than slaves in other places... but really? To even include the term 'right' in that kind of situation just sullies the entire concept of rights.

In the US, they wanted a 'more perfect' union, and decided that in the interest of avoiding tyranny, the rights should be respected equally across the board. All natural rights. The primary 'civil right' that the us.gov established was that it would respect all your rights, all your liberty. It was not a case where your rights would be respected up until your rights conflicted with the whim of the king, it was not a situation where your rights were protected up until they conflicted with a certain religion, it was not a situation where your rights were recognized so long as they did not threaten a political party... Nope, none of that... The US decided that your rights would be recognized up until the point where your rights infringe on the rights of others... AKA, liberty.

So, along comes the bill of rights. They wanted to enumerate your rights, so they could recognize them. But, some of the founders were against that idea because it would destroy the understanding of rights. Some founders thought it necessary because there would be no other way to convince the people that they could speak freely and carry a gun, and furthermore to ensure that the government never tries to encroach on those key freedoms. But the opposition thought that as soon as you make a list like that, anything not on that list will be ignored, which would someday result in people not understanding that Carnes has a natural right to pick his nose. They tried to rectify that with the ninth amendment... But it doesn't really matter now, does it? Since no one knows what a right is anymore, it doesn't matter if 'the rights not listed' are still protected by the ninth. (Not that anyone really bothers to pay much attention to the Constitution much anymore anyway.)

Sure it does. Assuming the person has no right to kill me, but does so anyway, that person violated my rights. Just because he can get away with it, does not mean that the violation did not occur. The only person that is ultimately responsible for protecting my natural rights is me. It is also true that most people think it wise to have a government help provide justice for rights infringements, as I discussed above.

Absolutely not. While a government that doles out justice may be more desirable, it is not necessary. Think of the ideal of the 'wild west,' or feudal times. If you insult me, infringe on my rights, or infringe on the rights of those for whom I take responsibility, we are going to sort it out. It may be as simple as demanding an apology, or it may go all the way to a fight to the death, but the rights violation can be resolved between the violator and the violated without any government intervention.

Unfortunately in that kind of environment justice is frequently not served, and bullies and tyrants will tend to abuse power, so most people desire a government to assist with the adjudication of justice.

If I'm a soldier engaged in war with an enemy force, I forfeited my right not to be killed by the enemy.

There has to be some kind of consistency to it, otherwise there is no meaning what so ever. The way you use the language has to have meaning, otherwise there is no reason to discuss the issue.

Off topic, but as an example: There is no point to discussing the issue of racism if you simply identify that all people are racist. It's pointless if you don't try to identify characteristics that are more or less desirable in regard to racial disposition. If you can't say, this person is a racist, and that person is not... then there is no point in having a discussion about racism.

Same with rights, if you are going to apply a definition to rights that makes the term absolutely meaningless, then there is no point in discussing the issue. I can say, my natural rights end where your natural rights begin, and civil rights are a contract between the .gov and the people... From there, I can have all manner of meaningful discussion. However, if I say there is no consistency to rights at all, then we may as well be trying to talk about what things are like ten thousand trillion light years from here.

Gah! So is the right to life inalienable? Is it given by the creator? Or is the right to life something the government gives you?

Slaves had the right to liberty, and if they had revolted they would have been right in doing so.


No way, Jose. If we don't recognize the difference between natural rights and the .gov/citizen contract, then there is no reason to even bring rights into the discussion. All we would really ever have is the .gov/citizen contract and the usage of the term 'rights' would not be necessary anywhere in that.

If the government is stopping me from doing something that is not infringing on the liberty of another person, then the government is oppressing me... Unjustly infringing on my natural rights. If the government declared that picking boogers is unsightly and illegal, even though it posed no public health threat or infringed on the rights of others in any way, that would be an example of oppression and likely tyranny.

If the concept of rights came to be understood only in terms of the .gov/citizen contract, the question of oppression would not even be able to come up. It would not matter if my action did not infringe on the 'rights' of another person, because that concept of 'rights' would simply be 'whatever the government says.' That is the difference between a legal system (like we currently have) and a justice system (as was the original intent). A legal system only accounts for compliance with the laws. A justice system accounts for actual justice based on natural rights.

If rights are defined as a .gov/citizen contract, the people would never be able to shrug off a tyrannical government. That government would have the power to write the contract however they choose and in the eyes of the government your rights would never be violated.

Maybe you could break this down for me, kindergarten style. I mean, this entails the absolute 'might makes right' concept. Anyone with a gun will be able to stop you from doing anything that does not involve you having a gun. Rights seems a concept pretty far removed from this definition. I don't like to pick on definitions because they are exceptionally hard to craft, but I'm not able to figure out what you mean here at all.

Okay, so they have the absolute right to exterminate the Jews in the world?

Maybe you are pursuing the 'might makes right' approach here. Because the government is powerful enough that no one can tell them to do otherwise, whatever they are doing is right.

I don't buy that.

I think it is necessary to have a metric for what is right, and what are rights, that exists outside of the government. I think that if a government misbehaves the people have a right, a duty and an obligation to 'shrug off' that government. If we identify rights as 'whatever the .gov tells us they are' then that creates a serious problem with the ability to rise against tyranny.

I think we are well beyond that point. We have state legislators passing legislation, the purpose of which is to stop letting the federal government ignore Constitutionally identified states (civil) rights.

So, if you don't believe in the existence of natural rights, and there was a revolution tomorrow and the people told you you had to decide what rights the people had and what rights they don't have... Since, as you indicate, rights are just a contract between the people and the government, what rights would you give people?

Me? I'd kinda do what the founders did. I'd say you have the right to do whatever the hell you want, so long as it does not infringe on the ability of someone else to do whatever the hell they want. I would establish a government for the purpose of maintaining a judicial system that involves a strong civil contract with the citizens such that liberty and justice are protected.

Actually, I agree with you 100%. I was just trying to help you stop pussyfooting around. I don't often get to play the other side of the fence, it actually gave me a headache...

[Carnes]

Actually, I agree with you 100%. I was just trying to help you stop pussyfooting around. I don't often get to play the other side of the fence, it actually gave me a headache...

Thanks for the opportunity to better develop/articulate my thoughts on that... Regardless, I'm going to slap the shit out of you if we ever meet.