posted
I'm working on a web site for RJR Tobacco and one of the links on the site is phrased: Tobacco Rights. And I was thinking about another fellow who works at this same company. Every time he sees me drinking a soda he says, "They're going to make that illegal. If they can legislate tobacco because it's bad for you, they can legislate soda. (This is a matter of fact in New York).
Another avenue of discussing current issues with rights is gay rights.
So just what is a right? As a first thought, I would say that a right is something I must have to fulfill my existence. But, then again does that mean I should be given food?
Lately it seems like people are throwing out the term "right" when they want something but can't have it, or it seems that choice is about to be taken away from them.
So people go about saying I have right to do this or that, but really what is a right?
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quote: Your answers will vary depending on the political beliefs of the person giving answer.
Isn't the same as saying a right is whatever I feel like saying a right is? Seems to me that a reasonable guideline containing fundamental guidelines could be created.
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posted
Rights are not provable, they are assumptions in your world-view. Thus, the Declaration of Independence says
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.
Note that Jefferson did not try to prove the existence of these rights- they are "self evident", i.e. assumed.
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I agree, and I don't expect to prove the existence of any particular right.
However,
quote:Note that Jefferson did not try to prove the existence of these rights- they are "self evident", i.e. assumed.
seems equally self-evident to me that Jefferson had some mechanism by which he knew that something was a right.
And as I contemplate this, of the three iterated by Jefferson, two of them are fundamental, life and liberty. The pursuit of happiness boils down to being able to choose (IMO).
So, perhaps, it could be said that all rights must be composed of life and/or liberty. However, while there is significant debate about the right to life (can certain criminals be put to death). There is less debate about denying liberty.
In all the cases I can think of where people say I should have the right to do something, they are saying should have the ability to make that choice. So, perhaps, that then is the question, when should an action be denied?
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posted
I think the overarching point is when an action should be denied when it conflicts with a fundamental right of someone else, such as liberty, life, or pursuit of happiness. I tend to see them as listed in order of importance.
When you want to ban something, is it because the action I want to ban: a) takes away my life? If not, does the action b) take away my liberty? If not, does it c) take away my pursuit of happiness?
If c, then by banning it, will it a) take away someone else's life b) take away someone else's liberty c) take away someone else's pursuit of happiness ?
etc.
If something is not permitted, and it restricts life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness without granting greater ability for others to live those principles/rights, then there is a justifiable question as to whether that thing really needs to remain not permitted. IE, Civil Rights laws.
quote: Seems to me that a reasonable guideline containing fundamental guidelines could be created.
"Your right to swing your fist ends at my face” – Often quoted remark that sounds like down-to-Earth, common sense but is really totally useless. The attitude is (and I agree with this): as long as what you’re doing doesn’t hurt others then we have no right to curtail it. But it’s useless because everything has some impact on the rest of society. And almost any action can be shown to be causing some kind of demonstrable harm to someone else, even if on balance, it’s a completely positive action. That’s why defining rights from some base assumptions is nearly impossible: some level of compromise is always involved, or an ability to predict the results of actions that exceeds what is even theoretically possible for us in this mortal state.
That’s why, to me, a right is what we define it to be as a society. If you want to talk about what it should be in a divinely-run Theocracy perhaps it’s possible though I’m not sure. But Christ does not lead any of the Earth-based governments so even if we followed the rules He would use we’d still be wrong since we don’t have the right or the abilities to have Celestial government here.
quote: There's also the "teaching function" of law, which Elder Oaks talks about. There are laws which are not enforced but which serve to teach us what is right and proper in society--what we value and wish to preserve. That's the context in which he views the gay marriage debate--that a constitutional amendment defining marriage as the union of one man and one woman is a worthy consideration to teach us what is good and proper and to remind us what we consider valuable and worth preserving.
I find that attitude (if I’m understanding it correctly) very disturbing. We have laws on the books that we don’t want enforced? In my opinion we should never pass a law we don’t want the government to enforce. OSC made this argument some number of years ago, that sodomy laws were good to have even if we didn’t enforce them because it declared societal values and allowed expression of them in worst case. But that just seems to go against the idea of law. Now, not only do we not have defined rights, but we haveill-defined rights, were it’s a right until someone in power decides they don’t like us personally and decides to start enforcing our “teaching function” law.
I don’t think I’m explaining myself very clearly, but I hope I’m just misunderstanding you in the first place so it’s irrelevant…
quote: Rarely do they stop to consider the rationale behind their inconsistent positions
Along these same lines of inconsistent thinking, I've noticed that Liberals tend to be in favor of abortion and against the death penalty, and Conservatives the exact opposite. Yet if a human life is deemed important, then you would think someone would both be against abortion and be against the death penalty, or in favor of both.
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posted
Our collective problem with the abortion debate is in calling it pro life, and for abortion. No one is "for abortion". They are FOR government not having the right to tell women what to do with their bodies. They are for individual choice.
The conservative right calls Mormons pro-abortion because we do not administer church discipline for abortions when incest or rape was the source of conception, or when a mother is at risk of dying or the child cannot survive birth. But that doesn't mean that a LDS member should automatically get an abortion in any of those circumstances. It just means the church will leave that judgment up to God.
And LDS consider themselves solidly pro-life and can't understand those who want to eliminate choice in those rare circumstances, and in doing so compel the woman once again to live through deprivation of agency and the pain that causes.
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posted
There's also the issue of what people "deserve". I know that's a loaded word, but there is a train of thought that points out that some people really have a negative net effect on the world. Some of them WAY negative. How can you rationalize keeping someone around who has killed 12 people and wounded 72 others? Don't they deserve to have their one life taken? And why the bleep would we spend $50,000 a year (or more) for the next 50 years keeping them alive, and keeping them away from other innocent people they could potentially injure or kill? They CONTINUE to have a net negative effect on the world. Maybe we should just get rid of them. If we could figure out how to do that without it taking $2,000,000 more.
There's also the idea that an awful lot of unplanned pregnancies, if they are actually born, are going to have a negative net effect on the world. Freakonomics makes a pretty good argument that in some ways legalizing abortion has had an unforseen but fortunate side effect on crime rates.
From a purely economic standpoint, we should get rid of lots of people that are a drain on the world. Old people, criminals, unwanted fetuses, injured or sick people, mentally ill people, drunks and drug addicts, uneducated people, and idiots. And if you're a Nazi, Jews. And if you're a Muslim, Infidels. And if you're a Christian, sinners. And if you're a supremacist, Blacks. Wouldn't the world just be a better place if we didn't have to worry about these people? Couldn't we just ship them off to Australia or somewhere and be done with them? Or just kill them? In some societies in History, this has been tried.
Economics can't be the only issue, or nobody would make it past childhood. Children are a useless drain on resources for an awful long time. Some of them never get out of that stage. Which brings up the concept of potential, and the concept of repentance. Maybe those fetuses and children and uneducated idiots will grow up to be functioning, contributing members of society. Maybe those criminals will reform and become a force for good.
And then there's the concept of individual v.s. community rights. Exactly when do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few. Or the one? When am I more important than you guys, and when are you more important than me or us? When do you lose yourself in the service of others or sacrifice yourself for your friends, and when do you put on your own oxygen mask before assisting the child in the next seat?
Since each of these concepts (among others), is rated differently in importance by each of us, I no longer wonder at the apparent inconsistencies in opinions. Roper's example of insisting that the government must not restrict gay people from marrying but must restrict people from using guns is a great example. If you look at it from the single standpoint of whether the government should restrict things or not, it is inconsistent. It makes a great sound byte for a political campaign, and I really like it. But in reality, it's a false dichotomy. Turns out only die-hard libertarians or anarchists and die-hard fascists or communists have consistent opinions on that one issue. The rest of us believe there are things the government should restrict and things they should not. The debate is all about which things, how many, and why.
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posted
Roper66, where in LDS theology does personhood begin at conception. Isn't the official position that we don't know when life begins?
(And this mini-derail makes it clear that all faithful LDS don't look at the issues and science and theology the same either.)
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Some of them are politically charged, to be sure, and I don't agree with all of them, but I think they did a decent job in general. My personal opinions would be that less things are really rights. I wouldn't think that protection from unemployment would be a right, or paid holidays. But I expect it will be the same as with most codified things done by committees--they will add more and more things in time, and rarely remove things.
I was impressed particularly by article 16:
quote:Article 16.
(1) Men and women of full age, without any limitation due to race, nationality or religion, have the right to marry and to found a family. They are entitled to equal rights as to marriage, during marriage and at its dissolution. (2) Marriage shall be entered into only with the free and full consent of the intending spouses. (3) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.
posted
Thanks for the link. Interesting list of rights they believe should exist. There are a few that I wonder how could it be implemented reasonably.
For instance article 23, "protection against unemployment", What does this mean? The government must provide free education for people whose careers have become obsolete? The government must provide for a person till they find a new job? Not sure what they mean or how this could be reasonably implemented.
Article 25 is an expansion of the above mentioned clause in 23. And thus suffers the same how could it reasonably be implemented.
I'm fairly certain when they say "social security" in article 22 they are not referring to the U.S. government elderly retirement plan. Rather, a person shouldn't need to worry about being harmed in a riot (i.e. society is stable).
I really like 26 part 3.
I like that in 29 part 1 they acknowledge that people have a duty to the community. However, if they mean in some sort of socialistic mandated way, that would be backward and wrong.
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(1) Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care and necessary social services, and the right to security in the event of unemployment, sickness, disability, widowhood, old age or other lack of livelihood in circumstances beyond his control.
I have issues with this, that were probably passed down by my parents. They experienced the depression of 1929 firsthand, and learned at a very early age that if you didn't work, you didn't eat. This standard of living, including food, clothing, housing, medical care, and social services was something you EARNED, not a right. People that weren't willing to work and earn it, were welcome to enjoy the standard of living they chose.
The times, they have a-changed.
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posted
The times have not a-changed. It's just that much of the world finds itself in a phase of prosperity and plenty that has lasted a generation or three, so naturally they forget about the realities of human existence and think printed words and lots of nodding heads can change it.
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posted
A good friend of mine told his boys, "You better choose a career that will make a whole lot of money, because you're going to be providing for a lot more people than just your family."
OTOH, they could choose to live under a freeway, be bums, substance abusers, or career criminals, & people like you & me will be providing for them AND their families.
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