# What rights should people have, and why? (and what the hey, how to balance them) **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [June 17, 2022, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405 "2022-06-17T21:45:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/81 "2022-06-30T16:31:11Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Were you confused about these two different concepts, or do you believe they are one and the same? I think they’re similar, but of course the existence of borders now changes how things work. But the underlying right (not to be prevented from leaving) is the same. > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > I value property rights over the desires of people to take what is not theirs. …unless it was their great- grandparents that took it, was I guess the part you meant to leave unsaid? > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Which seems to have nothing to do with the purported “right to leave” How is evidence of migration not evidence of an implicit right to leave? You think there was Bronze Age passport control? > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > I don’t believe you can easily sort through what is conquest and what is migration in any reasonable sense for a huge number of migrations. But I can certainly do it for European conquests of the Americas… ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 4:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/82 "2022-06-30T16:40:01Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > You’re free to say “Not going to read your cite”, but I’m not going to type up paragraphs for you, mate. **puzzlegal** is free to do as she wishes, but I’ve had enough of these sorts of arguments to know when I’m wasting my time doing so. I could say “They say the Wendat had freedom to ignore their chiefs’ commands”, and you’re going to come back with “quote the actual paragraph” and on and on it goes. Well my response to puzzlegal suggests that you are wrong on that. But of course it is up to you what you choose to engage in and you are free to merely make an appeal to authority. It is certainly an easy way to debate. I’ll remember in future that, according to you, there is no need to actually talk about the evidence that lies behind a claim and that “you have to read book X” is a valid rhetorical device. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/83 "2022-06-30T16:51:16Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > make an appeal to authority I’m not making an appeal to authority - the argument isn’t correct because it’s G&W making it. It’s correct because of the mountain of evidence they provide. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > It is certainly an easy way to debate. Not as easy as refusing to read cites. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > there is no need to actually talk about the evidence that lies behind a claim Talked about it plenty, actually. Just didn’t copy it here verbatim for no profit. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > “you have to read book X” is a valid rhetorical device. When it’s a dense book that doesn’t give you information in pat soundbites, yes, it is. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/84 "2022-06-30T16:57:06Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > It’s actually one of the most interesting and persuasive books I have read in years, and while it’s long, I highly recommend it. It’s extremely well-documented, and has changed my opinion on a number of issues. It may be, I’m sure it gets lots of things right and overturns previous thinking, it is also pretty much guaranteed to be guilty of overreach and will almost certainly get some things catastrophically wrong. Especially if it is a book based on incomplete evidence and speculation to some degree (which all books dealing with pre-history, protohistory and archeology are likely to be). That’s not a bug it’s a feature. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/85 "2022-06-30T17:06:59Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > I’m not making an appeal to authority - the argument isn’t correct because it’s G&W making it. It’s correct because of the mountain of evidence they provide. Correct? are you sure you mean that? What they say is some sort of objective fact now? That is a heck of a claim. > [@MrDibble](#): > > Not as easy as refusing to read cites Have you provided a cite that is any more specific than “buy and read the book”? > [@MrDibble](#): > > Talked about it plenty, actually. Just didn’t copy it here verbatim for no profit What profit are you talking about? this is a message board for discussion, none of us profit. > [@MrDibble](#): > > When it’s a dense book that doesn’t give you information in pat soundbites, yes, it is. Ah, [the courtiers reply](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtier%27s_reply#:~:text=The%20courtier's%20reply%20is%20a,any%20sort%20of%20criticism%20whatsoever.). I’m sorry but that won’t wash. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/86 "2022-06-30T17:23:34Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Correct? are you sure you mean that? What they say is some sort of objective fact now? No, the scientific evidence and historical accounts they cite are the objective facts. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > “buy and read the book”? They don’t have libraries where you are? Hell, I can find an illegal pdf of the book online if I wanted. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > What profit are you talking about? this is a message board for discussion, none of us profit. You seriously think literal monetary gain is the only sense of the word “profit”? No, I don’t think you do. I think this is just performative. > [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Ah, [the courtiers reply](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Courtier%27s_reply#:~:text=The%20courtier's%20reply%20is%20a,any%20sort%20of%20criticism%20whatsoever.). That’s not the courtier’s reply, but nice try. I’m not saying you lack the _ability_ to read the book. I’m explaining why I’m not wasting the time to summarize it for you. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/87 "2022-06-30T17:25:39Z")
You know what? I’m done with this hijack. I don’t even need _TDoE_ to justify my beliefs on what rights we should have, that stands alone, and that’s all I’ll continue talking about here. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/88 "2022-06-30T17:33:03Z")
I read TDoE and liked it (though probably didn’t understand all of it). I think they made a compelling case that, at the very least, pre-historical human societies were likely highly varied and very commonly completely unlike modern societies in terms of class, rule, and government, with many lacking any discernible hierarchy of citizens. It’s my personal hypothesis that these less structured and more equal societies may have been at a disadvantage in terms of resisting military conquest as well as raids-for-loot (effective military force may have been easier to raise, organize, deploy, and supply in a more structured, hierarchical society), but I don’t have any real evidence for that. And even if that were true, it still seems to me that the more equal and less structured societies described in TDoE were likely much more moral, ethical, and pleasant to live in for most residents. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/89 "2022-06-30T18:09:44Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > How is evidence of migration not evidence of an implicit right to leave? You think there was Bronze Age passport control? The existence of behaviors in the past is not proof that something is a “right people should have.” This thread isn’t asking “what could people do at X point in history” it is “what rights should people have.” I see no compelling reason a “right to leave” ought be on any sort of list of fundamental rights. > [@MrDibble](#): > > I think they’re similar, but of course the existence of borders now changes how things work. But the underlying right (not to be prevented from leaving) is the same. Similar but not the same, there’s a reason the UN made statements it made but does not strictly enshrine the right to migrate wherever you want for any reason (chiefly because you would never get the nations of the world agreeing to that.) International law has gotten some (restricted and contested) agreements in place about refugees and their rights, and obligations towards them by signatory nations, but that’s a far cry from any broadly generalized migratory right. > [@MrDibble](#): > > …unless it was their great- grandparents that took it, was I guess the part you meant to leave unsaid? This is a vague statement and thus cannot be meaningfully addressed. > [@MrDibble](#): > > But I can certainly do it for European conquests of the Americas… As I can for the Turkish conquest of Anatolia. Would you like to help me drive the Turks back onto the steppes and re-seed the region with Greek settlers? ---
**Author:** ![thorny\_locust](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thorny_locust/32/431_2.png) [@thorny\_locust](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thorny_locust)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/90 "2022-06-30T19:24:22Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > The existence of behaviors in the past is not proof that something is a “right people should have.” This thread isn’t asking “what could people do at X point in history” it is “what rights should people have.” I see no compelling reason a “right to leave” ought be on any sort of list of fundamental rights. OK. Then that whole long discussion of whether there is or isn’t evidence that people did behave any given way in the past is irrelevant; in which case I’m not sure why you were arguing that people did and didn’t behave in particular fashions, let alone over whether you’re not going to read a particular book, or any book at all, on the subject. I do think that “a right to leave” should be a fundamental right. Failing to grant it means that nobody has a right to choose where they want to live; and I can’t think of much more fundamental than that, other than, as has been brought up in thread already, the right to bodily autonomy. A major complication with the right to leave is that it doesn’t mean much if there’s no place to go. Providing all people with a guaranteed right to live where ever they feel like could mean that some places get massively overloaded (though that itself would make them less desirable, in a sort of market forces of the feet); but I think it’s currently more of an issue of a combination of governmental barriers and of every place on the planet already having some complicated set of governmental rules. The Mormons ran into this even a couple of hundred years ago: they couldn’t find anywhere to live that didn’t forbid polygamy, and when they tried simply moving Away the USA caught up to them. I’m not defending Mormon-style polygamy; just pointing out an example. If everybody has an individual right to leave, then everybody would have had the right to leave the Mormons; especially if they knew of examples of places that didn’t work like that, and that they could go there. So part of the right to leave, if it’s going to work, has to be a right to knowledge about other places; and a willingness of at least some of them to take others in, or else the availability of vacant land suitable to live upon. I think a lot of rights are entangled like that. A right to property, of whatever sort (and there are a whole lot of different ways to have the right to use property of various sorts), is useless to somebody imprisoned or otherwise constrained in their bodily autonomy that they can’t use it. A right to total bodily autonomy is useless if there’s no right to at least have a fair chance to get food and shelter. And I doubt there’s any society that grants or has granted any right without restriction – except maybe for the right to leave. Because pretty much any other right is going to, in some cases, impinge on other peoples’ rights in that same area. (Even the right to leave could impinge, say, on somebody else’s right for child support; though that at least isn’t in the same area.) ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/91 "2022-06-30T19:36:16Z")
I’m a Jew. My grandfather was in Germany when Hitler came to power. But my grandfather was a US citizen, so he had somewhere to go. (and at first, Hitler let the Jews leave.) My grandfather cut short his planned stay and went home. To me, the right to leave, and the right to be accepted someplace else, are obviously incredibly valuable. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2022, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/92 "2022-06-30T20:15:50Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > That’s not the courtier’s reply, but nice try. I’m not saying you lack the _ability_ to read the book. I’m explaining why I’m not wasting the time to summarize it for you You are right it is not exactly the courtiers reply but it more than hints at it. And no one asked you to summarise the book, I just asked someone else to summarise the evidence that the they found in the book that convinced them to make the claim they did (which they did with far less drama than you). You will argue your corner in your own way no doubt. I am fairly certain though that if I posted an opinion in rebuttal to a claim you made, did not summarise why I thought it but merely stated that it is in a book that convinced me and you should read said book, you quite rightly would not accept that as a valid position. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2022, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/93 "2022-07-01T05:21:11Z")
What part of “done with this hijack” did you and Martin not understand? ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2022, 7:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405/94 "2022-07-01T07:38:23Z")
I understand that you don’t get to say what others choose to do or say. You being “done with this hijack” does not mean others are somehow banned from commenting on what you said _before_ your withdrawal. You are not lord of the thread. I’m not interested in carrying on this line of debate either, Hijack over for me. I said all that needs to be said to you and you’ll notice that my last response to you didn’t ask you a question and didn’t invite a response back, nor does this one. If you truly want to stop responding then you had chance to do so then, and indeed, to do so now. As I will now be doing. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-rights-should-people-have-and-why-and-what-the-hey-how-to-balance-them/966405.md?page=4)