I’ve been mulling this and many other things over for quite some time. I’m somewhat aware of the legal definition of “rights” (as opposed to liberties) and the like.
However, I’m more concerned with a philosophical, or moralistic, ethical definition.
What is a right? From whence springs a right? Are they universal in terms of who has them and where they apply?
This, of course, would help nail down a lot of discussions (for example, the thread on the right to breed).
Basically, I’m interested in defining “rights” and how they apply in ethics. I think. I’m probably not being too clear.
I sold my soul to Satan for a dollar. I got it in the mail.
Closest I ever came to a moral/ethical description was (strangely enough) in R A Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, a goldmine of moral/ethical discourse if you read the book and ignore the movie.
He particularly liked tearing apart the “inaliable” rights… life, and pursuit of happiness, would be a right if there weren’t so darned many of us… who’s right to happiness takes precedence? You have an inaliable right to life if you are drowning? Freedom, on the other hand, is something which necessarily(in his view) must be fought for. Not a right to take for granted.
Why don’t we start with ethics, find the definition of that, and see where rights might fit in?
I offer the following:
A working system of ethics is the extension of the basic survival instinct that most people have. It is the identification of duty on a scale much larger than is “natural” for a human being, who’d be perfectly content to worry about his/her own butt (maybe that of his/her children too) and nothing else. Familial, civic, and national duties (dare I say ought?) must necessarily put the interests of the person bound to those duties on the backburner.
In recompense, rights “are granted” (ok ok recognized) for the ethically-minded member of the system. Duty comes first, perhaps at sacrifice. Rights (such as a voice in election, freedom of speech, pursuit of happiness) are recognized as “belonging” to that individual who has given his/her service to the larger whole, and proven his/her own worth, in a way.
As illustration of the system: R A Heinlein’s society in Starship Troopers, where rights of a citizen (voting) are only granted following the successful completion of a term of service (2 years in peacetime; whenever retired, killed, or released in wartime), on the premise that these men had illustrated more commitment to the ideological “system” by placing his own hide on the line. The “right” for vote is not the motivation; it is not even inaliable. Whether the man lives or dies, he becomes a citizen. Not before his term finishes, either… I paraphrase “Thats all we’d need, a bunch of troopers voting they didn’t wanna drop when the time came to fight.” Think about it… we don’t value the WORTH of voting like that, do we?
I guess there will be many different opinions on this. I think that it may also depend on where you are. For example, I am about to quote the Declaration of Independence. As much as this document means to me, I can see how a non-American could care less what it says.
Well, here is my take on what a Right is in America.
[quote]
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–
IMHO, Rights exist. They are there whether you are alone in the woods, or living on the 10th floor of an apartment building.
Certain rights may have different degrees of usefulness depending on where you are, but the Right still exists. (example would be free speech when you are by yourself)
Jai Pai seems to combine Rights and privledges. Driving a car is an example of this. We have to pass a test and then get liscensed. We can lose this privledge. Free speech is a right. It exists, and can not be taken away from us.
Back to the DOI
Governments, at least ours anyway, are formed to protect our rights, not grant them. If the government chooses to ignore the rights of it’s people, it stops being a legitimate government. Rights are something that always exist.
Rights are freedoms, not results. You have the right to free speech, but not the right to have everyone like (or even care about) what you just said. You have the right to pursue happiness in life, but there is no right to “just be happy.”
Ahh…the pain of screwing up UBB code. Part of the above post should look like this:
IMHO, Rights exist. They are there whether you are alone in the woods, or living on the 10th floor of an apartment building.
Certain rights may have different degrees of usefulness depending on where you are, but the Right still exists. (example would be free speech when you are by yourself)
Jai Pai seems to combine Rights and privledges. Driving a car is an example of this. We have to pass a test and then get liscensed. We can lose this privledge. Free speech is a right. It exists, and can not be taken away from us.
Back to the DOI
I didn’t want it to look like I was part of the Declaration of Independence.
Freedom, you touched on a very important point that Jai Pey seems to have missed, and one that deserves emphasis. The DOI refers to a right to the pursuit of happiness, not a right to happiness itself. There is a HUGE difference.
I don’t know why fortune smiles on some and lets the rest go free…
Double check before you say what I said. You think I missed Pursuit. I mentioned it the first time I said it. I did neglect the second time… and the “pursuit of happiness” as a “right” is still as full of holes as it was with plain “happiness”.
Who’s pursuit of happiness takes precedence?
Freedom, no, I’m not combining one and the other. What I am saying is that the premise that “unalienable” (thanks for clearing that up for me!) rights exist is hogwash.
Of the three “included” in the DOI, Freedom itself best illustrates this. You know and I know that unless “freedom” is defended from time to time, it ceased to become a right at all, pretty darn quickly. What’s unalienable about that?
If you think, Freedom, that free speech cannot be taken away from you, why did we have a debate at length about the necessity of an armed “well-regulated militia”? Not to dredge that up again, but let it illustrate your point. Should the moderators of this board get the whim, they can cut your posts, all of them, just delete the works and ban you from the board altogether. Where’s your unalienable rights then? You have an “unalienable rights” card or something?
I don’t mean, either, to combine rights and priviledges. It is my right to vote in canadian elections, provincial, local, and national. It is because I fit a certain standard, ie. canadian citizen, above 18 years of age.
There can be no right without regulation, if by nothing else than the Rule of Law or an agreeable moral code of ethics. Without regulation, it ceases to be a right… just as my right to self-determination , and/or the pursuit of happiness is bounded by a set of quid pro quos… such as, my right of pursuit of happiness cannot mean I can kill another human being for happiness’ sake. (at least, not without the consequences of the law)
For the record, I agree with you Freedom:
and whats more, the system outlines in Starship Troopers supports this too. It doesn’t grant franchise to the men who complete the term of service, though, the same as your government doesn’t grant franchise when you’re old enough. But you have to be old enough first, don’t you??
The next part loses me though…
Fine so far…
how does statement 1 prove anything about statement 2, Freedom?
Rights always exist, sure, but only within the moral framework they’re established under. Once upon a time I might have had the right to marry as many women as I want; the law forbids it now, its no longer a right. Some people still choose to exercise this right, to be true… but as far as a majority are concerned, its not a right.
Thinking in unalienable terms is the trouble I see here… its like me choosing to believe the earth is flat and square. Far as I might ever know, it is… but does that make it True? If even one convincing piece of evidence causes doubt, one anomaly, it could topple the whole paradigm.
similarly, if you wanna get semantic:
So what right is “Freedom”? “Freedom is the freedom to be free”?: talk about tautological.
I think we could all do with a History and Moral Philosophy class… read Starship Troopers and get another side of the argument. I’ll have to start quoting that book directly, but I’m afraid I’ll have my freedom of speech severly limited.
I might amend that to say that I have and live up to my responsibilities, but I hope you get the idea.
The two are flip sides of the same coin. To the extent that I treat people fairly, you don’t need any laws to protect you.
Conversely, rights do not exist anymore than responsibilities exist. Whatever moral or ethical framework you invent to explain the right or obligation of a government to rule over its subjects, both rights and responsibilities will flow from that framework together.
[rhetoric] So what happen’s then? [/rhetoric]
When you’re deemed old enough, your state and mine decide we are ready to assume the responsibility that comes with the right. In the eyes of the Land and the Law, we are full members of the State, with responsibility for all the rights … but hold on a second…
What about judges? even better, what about supreme court judges? These folks have the ultimate law of the land… what they say, STICKS, and for a long time. Hey, how come they have a right to judge me? I’m a full citizen of this nation, how can they pass judgement on me, in the name of the Law?
They illustrate the difference between individual rights (like franchaise, freedom of speech) and civic rights. A judge had to jump through a lot of hoops to speak in the name of the law, to interpret and reinterpret if necessary, and to have the right to bear judgement over regular joes like me and you. Least of all, Mr Supreme Court Justice has to illustrate, by a long life of Duty and Responsibility to the system (more importantly, to the People that constitute[d] the system), his adeptness and ability.
We can’t even knock this argument down to reality’s level, can we? We can’t say, “That’s all fine and dandy on paper, but we’re not in a perfect world: life, libery, and the pursuit of happiness must prevail.” without being laughed at. I know there’s corrupt judges, and bad military men…
I’m not even going to argue that Heinlein’s system is better than our own; although his premise that on the average every person who’s given of themselves, put themselves in harms way for the sake of everyone else, has done more for the cause of Freedom than the rest of us. I don’t understand how being considered a citizen by spending two years (or more) of your life as a grunt is “mistaking priviledge for right”, but having to be 18/19/21 to vote isn’t.
I have missed our debates on the Second Amendment. I’m more than happy to have something else to disagree with you about. If there was ever anyone here I enjoying disagreeing with, it is you
We seem to have a different understanding of what is included in a right.
As I understand it, according to you, anything that you are allowed to do legally at a given time, is your right.
This would fall under the Rights are not granted by governments for me.
The way I see it, there are rights, and then there are things you are allowed to do.
We could argue about the specifics of what should be classified as a right and what is a privledge, but I think we can agree that there are two distinct categories here.
As I said, rights can be ignored. Your actions can be prevented, but the right still exists.
This is based on a moral absolute of there being a good and a bad, a right and a wrong.
You can put a gun to my head and tell me not to disagree with you. Your use of force does not change my rights. They still exist. You can kill me and end the arguement, but that does not make you right. Neither did it remove my right to disagree with you.
I am using their property. They have the right to regulate it however they choose. I am always free to go open up my own board anytime I wish and post whatever I want. If they deleted every single thing I ever said here, they would not be taking away any of my rights.
Even if the moderators became super human and followed me around the whole net and erased everything I said everywhere I said it, I would still have the right to say what I want.
Think of slaves back in the 1800’s. They had rights, but they were not recognized. We trampled all over their rights. They were locked up, whipped whenever their owner wanted too, forced to breed, seperated from their families, etc… etc…
Just because they were forced into this situation does not mean that they didn’t have the right to all the same things you and I do.
Look at people in China today. The government locks people up for practicing their religion.
The way I read your position, we have differnet rights here in America than they do in China.
IMHO, they have exactly the same rights, only they are being ignored.
This is a contradiction. There is no “only” in my definition of a right. They exist. Just as light exists, just as gravity exists, just as you and I exist. They just ARE.
Ok, I’m out of here. I want to keep going with this post, but I just ran out of time. I’ll be back later.
Amidst all the rhetoric, there are a couple of simple examples y’all seem to have missed:
— A person convicted of a crime loses his “right” to liberty and pursuit of happiness.
— A person convicted of a capital crime can lose his “right” to life too.
— A person convicted of a felony, if I’m not mistaken, loses his “right” to vote, even after he has served his jail time.
So let’s try these definitions, shall we?
“Rights” are the priveleges which the government gives you, even if you don’t ask for them.
“Priveleges” are the rights which the government gives you only after you ask and/or qualify for it in some way.
Keeves, that doesn’t make it. The United States government cannot, by its own constitution, give us rights. It can only guarantee them. It can abridge them for just cause. But if it’s giveable, it’s not a right. Laws make clear that whatever we end up defining as rights, they are things we innately have, which can be taken from us (and one hopes returned) but cannot be given. I can give you $1,000, or forcibly take it from you. I can give you the shirt off my back, or rip your own off yours. But while I can deprive you of your right foot by cutting it off, I cannot give you your right foot.
[Advisory: The following are my opinions based on my libertarian philosophy. If you don’t want to read my views, then skip this post.]
Rights are not a stand alone entity, but are an attribute of free moral agency. Ethically, rights are an expression of ownership. There are no rights outside of any context; there are only rights with respect to property.
Rights are unalienable because their connection to man is a moral one. Depending on whether God or nature gave a man his life, his consciousness, his singular identity, then God or nature gave a man his rights.
“A free people [claim] their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate.” — Thomas Jefferson: Rights of British America, 1774. ME 1:209, Papers 1:134
Hehehe I think I agree with you. Not stand alone, but attribute of moral code of ethics of some kind. Thus, I can hold a right unalienable that you might not. Sounds like straight relativism, but its deeper than that.
What’s with the disclaimer man??
Keeves,
I agree with Polycarp: not something a government grants, but the responsibility of a specific right is definitely granted by governments. In that way, I am still protected (as a minor, say, when I was one) by my rights as recognized by my society, but I’m not held responsible to those rights. Proof: I don’t (in fact, can’t without lying) protect my right to freedom until I’m of age to join the army. Similarly, I don’t (can’t) exercise my right to franchise until of voting age.
Freedom:
thanks for the beginning of that post, I assure you, its a mutual admiration of disagreement. Whatever that is.
Now… here we go.
Nope… just you’re not given responsibility for your right, sometimes, until you meet standards employed by government regulation. Did you vote for anyone (or run for office, for that matter) when you were 14 years old?
I expected this response… I almost put it in the post you quoted from.
My point in rebuttal would be, what good is a right if its only for you? What if everyone did turn against you, you might enjoy the basic freedom to self-determine, and maybe get off on the fact that you don’t break when people repeatedly shove you around at gunpoint… but given time, everyone will crack. So, when you decide death is better than this life, where’s your right to life then? Sure, you have the right to self-determine your fate. But AHA! I could also lock you up and prevent your death… restrain you, put you on intra-venous fluids for sustenance and not allow you to end your own life.
Sure, you still feel you have unalienable rights, but what good do they do you if everyone else around you ignores them? You could plead about this til you’re blue in the face: unless your personally understood rights are adopted by a moral, ethical code of conduct, they’re anything but unalienable.
Shucks, ain’t this what 1984’s all about?
For the record, you answered my hypothesis about tyrannical board operators fantastically. Good job. Predictable, but good.
Now to China and 1800’s US we go:
And I think you’ve read my position right. If I can say that.
They do have a different understanding of rights than us… and there’s not a lot of poor chinese farmers (nor have their classically been) protesting on the streets about their unalienable rights. Its when they get educated in western philosophy that you get uprisings and Tiannamen [sp] Square’s. I’m not agreeing with it, I don’t share their moral philosophy, but what makes our version better than theirs , Freedom? Are their other ways, other than ours?
I do enjoy this, much more than 2nd Amendment, because rights are infinitely more accessible to me as a person than a constitution my country doesn’t adhere to. And you’re a good guy. Hows the lady-friend?
It is about good and evil, sure. But there’s a basic frame of reference, which is moral/ethical framework, and rights are as mutable as people.
Again, for the record, I do believe in an absolute truth, so I argue this from a devil’s advocate position. If I were to latch onto the absolute, I would undoubtably see things exactly as you do, or pretty close to it.
And that, dear friends, oughta bring us to the next stage… where do “rights” and some version of “absolute truth” overlap? You can’t have one without the other… maybe that truth is a belief in a greater good, or perhaps its in an omnipotent being.
Hmm, looks like I posted a good topic, even if I was tired.
All right, though I disagree with Heinlein on a few things, I agree with his coupling rights with responsibilities. I do not think a right is universal, but a freedom earned by showing responsibility. For instance, voting is an exercise of sovereignty, and should only be given when the citizen has shown he will uphold the responsibility of sovereignty, that is, serving all over which he has sovereignty. Basically, each ‘right’ carries with it a limiting ‘responsibility’.
Oh, and legally, ‘rights’ are those things the governmnet legislates to defend. ‘Liberties’ are those things the government is not allowed to abridge. An example of a right would be the Civil Rights Acts. An example of a liberty would be free speech. This is, of course, purely the legal definition.
I sold my soul to Satan for a dollar. I got it in the mail.
you have the RIGHT, to do anything you want, up to the point where it begins to infringe on the right of others to do the same.
any property that you damage, you must either replace, or pay for it–if for some reason, you can do neither, you must do work for the party who’s property you damaged.
for example:
if you want to drive 120 mph down the highway, go right ahead. but if you hurt someone else or their property, you are punished, severely.
if you want to do drugs, go right ahead. but if you are in a stupor, and kill someone, you die.
also, there would be no welfare. if you don’t work, and can’t find someone who will help you out, you’re screwed. it’s not the responseability of the government to give you food, just to see that no one takes it form you.
judges, and all government officials, would be elected (truly elected, no friggin electorial college). if aditional laws need to be made, they will be voted on everyone(or at least everyone who cared enough about the issue to vote on it.), it would not be voted on by a few, so-called representitives(we all know how corrupt they can get).
the right to vote would not be based on age, but rather on a test of one’s understanding of the world, and of what their vote means. it will not be biased in any way to exclude certin beleifs. if a twelve-year-old can pass the test, he can vote.
no scare tactics, or racial predgeduce would be permitted. everyone who has passed the voting test, may vote without fear of reprocussions from anyone. anyone found trying to suppress the vote of someone else, will be resticted from voting, permenetly. a second infraction on other’s right to vote freely, will result in death.
i know it’s a little OT but i think it fits in here.
Not true. Joining the army does not equal protecting your freedom. If you get mugged on a street when you are 15, you have every right to defend yourself. If an army invades, you had better believe that nobody is going to tell a 15 year to put down the gun if he is pointing it in the right direction.
BUT…
I think the adult/kid thing is a side debate on the issue of what a right is. Obviously a 3 year old doesn’t have as many rights as an adult does. (example being free speech)
I’m going to ignore the age requirement for different things when it comes to rights. The fact is that a 12 year old needs to be under some sort of guidance from their parent, and is not ready to exercise their rights.
I can see how someone would have a different take on this than me if they did not believe in God. If the whole world did turn against me, there is still God. Right and wrong still exists. In my opinion, sometimes you have to die in order to retain your freedom.
Any person in China can instantly be as free as you and me if they choose to be. They can choose to fight to overthrow their government. They can choose not to accept being oppressed.
Of course there is no promise of sucess. Death is always a possibility. Freedom does not come cheap.
Just insert my take on God in here
At the risk of sounding elitist…
Freedom is better
This foes back to whether or not you believe in moral absolutes, a right and a wrong. It depends on whether you believe in God.
If you think man randomly developed and crawled out of the sea, lives only the life here on Earth and then POOF exists no more, then I can see rights being what you are allowed to do by your country.
Did you notice that another 2nd Amendment thread popped up? I tried so hard to stay away from it. OOOoooppppsss…
Anyway, I did try to stay away
The lady friend is in NYC again. She works there every once in awhile. She is expected back tonight, but we got s bunch of snow and ice today, so I don’t know if she is going to make the drive. You know how girls deal with snow
See I have to differ here. No, not becuz I’m contrary-minded to begin (though that helps)… you MUST believe, Freedom, that the 3 year old has every right the adult has, but you cannot believe he/she can be held responsible for that right. If you don’t, what happened to your claim “The right just exists” independant? This is not a side issue, it’s intricately the whole issue. Why do we set it up this way, age being a determining factor for exercise of franchise? What changed, when I became 18? Did I suddenly get the right to vote? No, I was given responsibility to exercise my already existing right to vote, as recognized by my government.
Now, the fact that my government (or yours for that matter) choses to grant responsibility to exercise the vote in some cases, and not in others, tells me a great deal about the nature of “rights”… for one thing, it took time for the current understanding of the “right to vote” to be what it was. For goodness sakes, women (legally, in Canada) were not recognized as persons under the British North America Act (our defacto constitution) until this century, and late in it I might add. I can understand your argument that, indeed, they were people all along, and therefore intrinsically had the right to vote all along… but it meant squat until the government allowed it.
I share your belief in God, BTW… and thats why I know what you’re arguing. I do think however, that this is a weak leg to argue unalienable rights from. Case in point:
Conversely, if you believe humans to have been created by God, more or less in the vein of the Genesis story, why are we discussing unalienable rights as recognized by the framers of the Constitution of the USA? The rights mankind was given in Eden and afterward are a far cry from freedom of expression/speech ( and pursuit of happiness, and freedom too, if you wanna get technical):
Example 1: ** Ten Commandments**
Limiting laws… tell us what we MUST, as well as CANNOT, do. Where’s freedom of expression in “Do not hold the Lord’s name in vain” or “Honor thy father and thy mother”? If there’s no provision for freedom of speech in one, why do we look for it in another? Cannot God create a unified, systematic, and non-contradictory moral code of ethics?
Example 2: Book of Romans, understanding motivation for following Law while not bound by it
We follow law of God out of a love for him, desire to do his will; no longer from fear of the retribution the law requires.
Choose the way you want it Freedom, and stick by it… one thing I truly hate to see if inconsistency, and its always easier to point it out when its not yourself you’re examining… grins By all means, people, tear me a new butthole too… am I inconsistent?
Now back to the relativistic humanism of the age:
Yeah they can choose all these things and, as you rightly point out, they gamble with their lives. My question to you is this: Is their motivation stemming from their innate understanding that this is their “right”, to be free? or from outside influences that instruct them “Don’t you people know this is your ‘right’ ?”
Different moral/ethical codes = different set of societal values = different “rights”
Who’s “right” is right?
Glad to hear, BTW, that you’re getting together with the GF this weekend. Many blessings to you both. Lucky man. Lonely and cold here in Newfoundland. Perhaps I oughta get back to RL and get off these darn MB’s.
UGH I can’t believe I just said that [slapping self]
Now, there’s more than Freedom around here…
Surgoshan said:
Apart from questioning the almighty Heinlein (giggling) we’re on the same page. Out of pure curiosity’s sake, have you read Starship Troopers? I have to say, that opened my eyes to a lot of moral/ethical stuff I hadn’t even spent time thinking about. I don’t doubt he is fallible… and I have a sneaky suspicion that if I’d paid more attention in Philosophy classes past I would have heard much of the same in ethical systems from philosophers like Kant.
Hmm interesting too… it brings to mind a hundred and one lawyer jokes. Like the one about 10,000 lawyers at the bottom of the sea.
Back to the OP, I have to say I don’t see rights (as identified by us fallible humans) as being anything more than a subjective understanding, no doubt created by the particular ideological system we’re living “under” or “with”, whichever way it is.
Ethically, philosophically, and morally, they have to appeal to some sort of ‘Absolute’ or ‘Authority’. For some this is a deity, for others its “duty” (civic and otherwise), still others its humanity itself. There must be other authorities too…
Rights apply insofar as:
(a) they’re recognized by a group of likeminded individuals, with and without the auspices of government,
(b) they’re linked to a specific set of corollary “responsibilities”,
(c) a person who takes responsibility for a right is him/herself recognized.
Am I missing anything here?
Regards to all,
Jai Pey
PS Mothers, don’t let your children grow up to be philosophers.
