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The lockdowns are different because it’s not just someone’s own freedoms, but everyone else’s right to life. A virus that can kill and we have no way of knowing

The lockdowns are different because it’s not just someone’s own freedoms, but everyone else’s right to life. A virus that can kill and we have no way of knowing how well it transmits seems like a good enough reason to enforce social distancing and the like. I have the freedom to own knives, but I can’t go out in public brandishing one like a weapon. Is that an infringement on my rights?

aww_dang 6y ago
Watch for that phrase, "this time is different". It commonly signals the special pleading fallacy. Parallel: "Spying one everyone's communication is different because it is not just someone's own freedoms, but everyone else's right to be protected from terrorists."
- albntomat0 6y ago
  I'm not sure that follows from the circumstances. There are plenty of instances of the government restricting individual freedoms for the safety of others. Examples include everything from speed limits to prohibitions against developing my own nuclear weapons. The balancing test is which freedoms for what degree of protection. We collectively make that determination through a system of government.
  - aww_dang 6y ago
    It depends upon the premise which you extrapolate from. You could start with the premise of natural rights as described in the founding documents. Alternatively you could proceed from a realpolitik perspective of what has been possible for the US gov historically and in the present. The government does many things and without exception these actions are construed as being for the public good. Despite this, we have witnessed countless abuses of authority. Simply observing that an action is possible for government or that a precedent exists for a particular government action, is not the same as rationalizing it as just. Of course there's still room for moderation and pragmatism. It would be impossible to exist in the real world without some measure of pragmatism, but we should also strive for our ideals.
- lukifer 6y ago
  This seems to analogize roughly to the halting problem proof: because one can have no rights or liberty while dead, there is no right which is immune from a contrived example (real or imagined), which would demand violating that right for collective survival. (For example: a "Dark Forest" scenario, where a hostile alien intelligence would destroy all life in Earth if we're discovered, and therefore worldwide surveillance is required to prevent anyone emitting an interstellar signal.) I never thought that terrorism was an existential threat that necessitated the Patriot Act or the GWOT, but one could imagine a scenario in which it was. What makes a worldwide epidemic so comparatively unique, is that it's quantifiable, and imagining alternative scenarios involves a smooth probability distribution. Those against lockdowns: would you change your mind if the fatality rate or R-number was 10% higher? Those for: same question, 10% lower? 50%? 1000%? Indeed, those making (specious) comparisons of COVID to flu season, have instead prompted me to wonder if we should have seasonal mask mandates to reduce flu deaths also. I'm a pretty fervent civil libertarian, with a healthy distrust of the state, but it's not clear where that line should be drawn.
  - syshum 6y ago
    >> but it's not clear where that line should be drawn. For civil libertarians it is very clear where the line is... It is certainly not criminalizing every person that wants to make a living in a business deemed by a despot governor to be "non-essential" while similar businesses that happen to be political allies or have higher priced lawyers are allow to remain open (for example Walmart could still sell Lamps, chairs, tables, etc, but Acme Furniture Store was forced close (True story from PA). Or Amazon was still allowed to ship online orders, but Jane Doe's Knickknacks was not allowed to even sell online during the pandemic....(true story from NJ)) For Civil Libertarians livelihood can not be separated from Life, and Life with out freedom is not life at all. Simply taking in oxygen and exhaling CO2 is not "life". Life is living, interacting, being productive, enjoying the fruits of our labor, etc. Life is not about existing, people that believe that are some of the saddest people on earth.
    - lukifer 6y ago
      There is a difference between holding a principle, and holding an absolutist principle, absent thoughtfulness and discernment. While there are circumstances where it's admirable to risk death for a principle (fighting to free slaves, refusing to comply with literal Nazis), there are also circumstances where it is the height of foolishness (the right to keep lights on at night in an apartment building during the WW2 London bombings). > Life is not about existing Existing is necessary but not sufficient for life. And while there's a strong argument for allowing the individual to risk or even choose death (seat belt laws, assisted suicide), the real crux of the matter is when the individual should be allowed to create mortal risk for others. The moral evil of reducing freedom through the state's monopoly on force (such as a mask mandate) must be weighed against the moral evil of reducing freedom through harm (such as infection with a fatal illness). Whatever plausible scenario you can imagine that goes too far in one direction, you would be correct; and yet I can balance it with a plausible scenario that goes too far in the other direction. There is no rule or principle that frees us from the necessity of thoughtful discernment and debate.
ARandomerDude 6y ago
> it’s not just someone’s own freedoms, but everyone else’s right to life So...not "my body, my choice" then?
- ryan_j_naughton 6y ago
  Somehow many on hacker news willfully forgot about the concept of externalities and simply saw government policies enforcing social distancing as a violation of one's rights. The consequence of the virus on leaving your house is similar to you walking around with a Russian roulette pistol that randomly fires at others who are sufficiently close to you (with the probability determined by a myriad of factors including if you have covid). In that case, you are a clear harm to others and a bring that can deprive them of their rights. It is why we will likely need to force people to get vaccinated, despite their objections, as their choices don't simply affect themselves. "Your body, your choice" is valid for things where there isn't some massive externality on others from your choices. Abortion has no impact on other beings with rights (as we do not assigned rights to a fetus). If you decided to irradiate yourself like the firefighters in Chernobyl and then in the few days you had remaining to live try to be around people you disliked, it would be totally reasonable to force you to be confined to a medical space where you couldn't kill others. However, a communicable disease is even worse. I would be fine with people who understood the risks of radiation making the choice to be around you because they would be basically only choosing to take that radiation/cancer risk on themselves (their body, their choice). But with a communicable disease, they can catch the disease and spread it to others who don't consent. That is where the "my body, my choice" is no longer valid.
  - aww_dang 6y ago
    Leaving aside the hypothetical, let us examine what we know to be rights in the US. The first amendment provides a right to assemble. There is no right to be protected from COVID. It seems relatively straightforward.
    - colejohnson66 6y ago
      There’s also nothing in the constitution about murder, but it’s still illegal. Your rights end where they harm someone else. And killing someone is a valid reason to restrict your rights. Vaccines are a good example of this.
SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
Privacy invasions are always about everyone else's right to life. Supporters of Patriot Act honestly, wholeheartedly believe that there'll be more 9/11s if the government isn't allowed to spy on the public. I'm not an absolutist on this, there are some situations where there's just no reasonable choice but a temporary restriction on rights, but appealing to the sacred value of life doesn't work here.
dunce2020 6y ago
> but everyone else’s right to life which is why - pre-covid of course - you rarely left the house, and if you did you wore a mask and kept your distance from others, right? To preserve the right to life of those that died of other communicable diseases?
DreamScatter 6y ago
Actually, you do have the right to walk around with a knife or sword as a weapon as long as it is not conealed and your local city has no laws against it. For a concealed weapon you do need a permit.

aww_dang 6y ago

Watch for that phrase, "this time is different". It commonly signals the special pleading fallacy. Parallel: "Spying one everyone's communication is different because it is not just someone's own freedoms, but everyone else's right to be protected from terrorists."

albntomat0 6y ago
I'm not sure that follows from the circumstances. There are plenty of instances of the government restricting individual freedoms for the safety of others. Examples include everything from speed limits to prohibitions against developing my own nuclear weapons. The balancing test is which freedoms for what degree of protection. We collectively make that determination through a system of government.
- aww_dang 6y ago
  It depends upon the premise which you extrapolate from. You could start with the premise of natural rights as described in the founding documents. Alternatively you could proceed from a realpolitik perspective of what has been possible for the US gov historically and in the present. The government does many things and without exception these actions are construed as being for the public good. Despite this, we have witnessed countless abuses of authority. Simply observing that an action is possible for government or that a precedent exists for a particular government action, is not the same as rationalizing it as just. Of course there's still room for moderation and pragmatism. It would be impossible to exist in the real world without some measure of pragmatism, but we should also strive for our ideals.
lukifer 6y ago
This seems to analogize roughly to the halting problem proof: because one can have no rights or liberty while dead, there is no right which is immune from a contrived example (real or imagined), which would demand violating that right for collective survival. (For example: a "Dark Forest" scenario, where a hostile alien intelligence would destroy all life in Earth if we're discovered, and therefore worldwide surveillance is required to prevent anyone emitting an interstellar signal.) I never thought that terrorism was an existential threat that necessitated the Patriot Act or the GWOT, but one could imagine a scenario in which it was. What makes a worldwide epidemic so comparatively unique, is that it's quantifiable, and imagining alternative scenarios involves a smooth probability distribution. Those against lockdowns: would you change your mind if the fatality rate or R-number was 10% higher? Those for: same question, 10% lower? 50%? 1000%? Indeed, those making (specious) comparisons of COVID to flu season, have instead prompted me to wonder if we should have seasonal mask mandates to reduce flu deaths also. I'm a pretty fervent civil libertarian, with a healthy distrust of the state, but it's not clear where that line should be drawn.
- syshum 6y ago
  >> but it's not clear where that line should be drawn. For civil libertarians it is very clear where the line is... It is certainly not criminalizing every person that wants to make a living in a business deemed by a despot governor to be "non-essential" while similar businesses that happen to be political allies or have higher priced lawyers are allow to remain open (for example Walmart could still sell Lamps, chairs, tables, etc, but Acme Furniture Store was forced close (True story from PA). Or Amazon was still allowed to ship online orders, but Jane Doe's Knickknacks was not allowed to even sell online during the pandemic....(true story from NJ)) For Civil Libertarians livelihood can not be separated from Life, and Life with out freedom is not life at all. Simply taking in oxygen and exhaling CO2 is not "life". Life is living, interacting, being productive, enjoying the fruits of our labor, etc. Life is not about existing, people that believe that are some of the saddest people on earth.
  - lukifer 6y ago
    There is a difference between holding a principle, and holding an absolutist principle, absent thoughtfulness and discernment. While there are circumstances where it's admirable to risk death for a principle (fighting to free slaves, refusing to comply with literal Nazis), there are also circumstances where it is the height of foolishness (the right to keep lights on at night in an apartment building during the WW2 London bombings). > Life is not about existing Existing is necessary but not sufficient for life. And while there's a strong argument for allowing the individual to risk or even choose death (seat belt laws, assisted suicide), the real crux of the matter is when the individual should be allowed to create mortal risk for others. The moral evil of reducing freedom through the state's monopoly on force (such as a mask mandate) must be weighed against the moral evil of reducing freedom through harm (such as infection with a fatal illness). Whatever plausible scenario you can imagine that goes too far in one direction, you would be correct; and yet I can balance it with a plausible scenario that goes too far in the other direction. There is no rule or principle that frees us from the necessity of thoughtful discernment and debate.

ARandomerDude 6y ago

> it’s not just someone’s own freedoms, but everyone else’s right to life So...not "my body, my choice" then?

ryan_j_naughton 6y ago
Somehow many on hacker news willfully forgot about the concept of externalities and simply saw government policies enforcing social distancing as a violation of one's rights. The consequence of the virus on leaving your house is similar to you walking around with a Russian roulette pistol that randomly fires at others who are sufficiently close to you (with the probability determined by a myriad of factors including if you have covid). In that case, you are a clear harm to others and a bring that can deprive them of their rights. It is why we will likely need to force people to get vaccinated, despite their objections, as their choices don't simply affect themselves. "Your body, your choice" is valid for things where there isn't some massive externality on others from your choices. Abortion has no impact on other beings with rights (as we do not assigned rights to a fetus). If you decided to irradiate yourself like the firefighters in Chernobyl and then in the few days you had remaining to live try to be around people you disliked, it would be totally reasonable to force you to be confined to a medical space where you couldn't kill others. However, a communicable disease is even worse. I would be fine with people who understood the risks of radiation making the choice to be around you because they would be basically only choosing to take that radiation/cancer risk on themselves (their body, their choice). But with a communicable disease, they can catch the disease and spread it to others who don't consent. That is where the "my body, my choice" is no longer valid.
- aww_dang 6y ago
  Leaving aside the hypothetical, let us examine what we know to be rights in the US. The first amendment provides a right to assemble. There is no right to be protected from COVID. It seems relatively straightforward.
  - colejohnson66 6y ago
    There’s also nothing in the constitution about murder, but it’s still illegal. Your rights end where they harm someone else. And killing someone is a valid reason to restrict your rights. Vaccines are a good example of this.

SpicyLemonZest 6y ago

Privacy invasions are always about everyone else's right to life. Supporters of Patriot Act honestly, wholeheartedly believe that there'll be more 9/11s if the government isn't allowed to spy on the public. I'm not an absolutist on this, there are some situations where there's just no reasonable choice but a temporary restriction on rights, but appealing to the sacred value of life doesn't work here.

dunce2020 6y ago

> but everyone else’s right to life which is why - pre-covid of course - you rarely left the house, and if you did you wore a mask and kept your distance from others, right? To preserve the right to life of those that died of other communicable diseases?

DreamScatter 6y ago

Actually, you do have the right to walk around with a knife or sword as a weapon as long as it is not conealed and your local city has no laws against it. For a concealed weapon you do need a permit.