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"What's good for thee is not for me." Taking away peoples rights may sound appealing if its something you disagree with until the topic changes and it's used ag

"What's good for thee is not for me." Taking away peoples rights may sound appealing if its something you disagree with until the topic changes and it's used against you.

braythwayt 7y ago
It’s a difficult problem, because the reverse is also worth contemplating: Giving people rights sounds appealing if it’s something you agree with, until those rights are used against you. At either extreme—no rights or complete anarchy—society breaks down. Everything in between is a society trying to find the most workable compromise.
- mLuby 7y ago
  I'd say the extremes are "I am above the law, you are not" and "every law applies equally to us all, no exceptions."
  - braythwayt 7y ago
    I like those. I think they’re orthogonal to the axis I was suggesting, which makes them all the more interesting.
- starkd 7y ago
  "giving people rights" sounds kind of odd. No one has the power to "give" rights to anyone else. Government can confer privileges and protect rights. But rights themselves are inalienable.
  - justin66 7y ago
    It can also, strangely, discover "inalienable" rights that were previously being... alientated.
  - dylan604 7y ago
    I would add that government can also take away rights whether inalienable or not.
  - detaro 7y ago
    "inalienable rights" exists as a term precisely because not all rights are considered inalienable.
    - nybble41 6y ago
      Yes, "inalienable" was the wrong term here. Neither alienable nor inalienable rights come from the government, however. Governments have the power to infringe on people's rights but not the authority to grant them or take them away. Even alienable rights can only be alienated of the individual's own free will.
  - Icathian 7y ago
    This is nice in theory. In practice you can take rights away (obviously) and so protecting them instead is functionally identical to giving them. Mincing words about inalienable rights from the inside of a gulag falls rather flat to me.
    - nybble41 6y ago
      > In practice you can take rights away (obviously) You can infringe rights; that's not the same as taking them away. There is a clear difference between having the power to do something and having the right to do it. There is nothing unusual about having the right to do something but lacking sufficient power to accomplish it. A right does not disappear merely because one lacks the power to prevent it from being infringed. As the name implies, rights are fundamentally about right and wrong: they are expressions of how one ought to act, or respond to another's actions. Saying that a right exists is the same as saying that your own actions ought not infringe that right for others. Practicality is irrelevant. The "theory" (or rather, philosophy) you've casually dismissed is the entire point of the exercise. Of course one needs power also, if only for self-defense, but power—or lack thereof—does not dictate right and wrong. Power merely expands the range of options available to you. Your rights—the things that it would be right for you to do—are the same whether you are powerless or omnipotent. So what exactly are your rights? Well, that's for you to decide. Even true omnipotence wouldn't be enough to grant anyone else the power to make that decision for you.
  - jjgreen 7y ago
    I've always found the idea of inalienable rights rather odd, as if they were in some way outside their societal context. If so, where are they located?
- whatshisface 7y ago
  >until those rights are used against you This is handled by the old common law saying, "your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins." Countries that operate on common law systems (like the US) are a lot better at handling rights than statutory law countries like the UK, which have to decide all of these things in advance. In the US system there is really not anything tort law cannot handle.
- clairity 7y ago
  > "At either extreme—no rights or complete anarchy—society breaks down." at neither of those extremes does society necessarily break down. in both cases, it simply aligns along the new gradients of power. an actual extreme for breaking down society is apocolyse/genocide. with "no rights", we're slaves, and social structures are completely subservient to the whims of the overclass rather than broken down. with "complete anarchy", society reconfigures around "might makes right" (more tribal social ties), as in the romanticized old west rather than mad max. extreme resource constraints, not simply lawlessness, typically define (imagined) dystopias; many are excessively lawful.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

"What's good for thee is not for me." Taking away peoples rights may sound appealing if its something you disagree with until the topic changes and it's used against you.

braythwayt 7y ago

It’s a difficult problem, because the reverse is also worth contemplating: Giving people rights sounds appealing if it’s something you agree with, until those rights are used against you. At either extreme—no rights or complete anarchy—society breaks down. Everything in between is a society trying to find the most workable compromise.

mLuby 7y ago
I'd say the extremes are "I am above the law, you are not" and "every law applies equally to us all, no exceptions."
- braythwayt 7y ago
  I like those. I think they’re orthogonal to the axis I was suggesting, which makes them all the more interesting.
starkd 7y ago
"giving people rights" sounds kind of odd. No one has the power to "give" rights to anyone else. Government can confer privileges and protect rights. But rights themselves are inalienable.
- justin66 7y ago
  It can also, strangely, discover "inalienable" rights that were previously being... alientated.
- dylan604 7y ago
  I would add that government can also take away rights whether inalienable or not.
- detaro 7y ago
  "inalienable rights" exists as a term precisely because not all rights are considered inalienable.
  - nybble41 6y ago
    Yes, "inalienable" was the wrong term here. Neither alienable nor inalienable rights come from the government, however. Governments have the power to infringe on people's rights but not the authority to grant them or take them away. Even alienable rights can only be alienated of the individual's own free will.
- Icathian 7y ago
  This is nice in theory. In practice you can take rights away (obviously) and so protecting them instead is functionally identical to giving them. Mincing words about inalienable rights from the inside of a gulag falls rather flat to me.
  - nybble41 6y ago
    > In practice you can take rights away (obviously) You can infringe rights; that's not the same as taking them away. There is a clear difference between having the power to do something and having the right to do it. There is nothing unusual about having the right to do something but lacking sufficient power to accomplish it. A right does not disappear merely because one lacks the power to prevent it from being infringed. As the name implies, rights are fundamentally about right and wrong: they are expressions of how one ought to act, or respond to another's actions. Saying that a right exists is the same as saying that your own actions ought not infringe that right for others. Practicality is irrelevant. The "theory" (or rather, philosophy) you've casually dismissed is the entire point of the exercise. Of course one needs power also, if only for self-defense, but power—or lack thereof—does not dictate right and wrong. Power merely expands the range of options available to you. Your rights—the things that it would be right for you to do—are the same whether you are powerless or omnipotent. So what exactly are your rights? Well, that's for you to decide. Even true omnipotence wouldn't be enough to grant anyone else the power to make that decision for you.
- jjgreen 7y ago
  I've always found the idea of inalienable rights rather odd, as if they were in some way outside their societal context. If so, where are they located?
whatshisface 7y ago
>until those rights are used against you This is handled by the old common law saying, "your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins." Countries that operate on common law systems (like the US) are a lot better at handling rights than statutory law countries like the UK, which have to decide all of these things in advance. In the US system there is really not anything tort law cannot handle.
clairity 7y ago
> "At either extreme—no rights or complete anarchy—society breaks down." at neither of those extremes does society necessarily break down. in both cases, it simply aligns along the new gradients of power. an actual extreme for breaking down society is apocolyse/genocide. with "no rights", we're slaves, and social structures are completely subservient to the whims of the overclass rather than broken down. with "complete anarchy", society reconfigures around "might makes right" (more tribal social ties), as in the romanticized old west rather than mad max. extreme resource constraints, not simply lawlessness, typically define (imagined) dystopias; many are excessively lawful.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]