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I've posted this before in connection with Feinstein: she is notorious for her anti-gun politics. Why should anyone be surprised that her disregard for human r

I've posted this before in connection with Feinstein: she is notorious for her anti-gun politics. Why should anyone be surprised that her disregard for human rights extends further than gun bans?

dllthomas 13y ago
Because many people do not see gun possession as a human right, rightly or wrongly.
- duncan_bayne 13y ago
  That's true. But in the context of American politics, Feinstein's position on gun legislation has been blatantly unconstitutional. Why then the surprise when she extends that disregard for the constitution into other areas of politics?
  - dllthomas 13y ago
    A certain amount of it is people convincing themselves that the constitution says what they want it to say. But even if you take the position that Feinstein's disregard of the 2nd amendment is so clear and unequivocal that it must be obvious even to her, all that really shows is that "regard for the constitution" isn't a good model for her. That doesn't mean that anti-"regard for the constitution" is a good model; there could very well be other principles we would expect her to hold true to, which this could be in violation of, which would yield surprise.
rdl 13y ago
There are actually some people who are anti-gun but strongly pro specific other human rights (free speech usually, often religion, often various forms of legal defense). There are a lot of reasons for individuals to be anti-gun. There are people who are pro-gun and against many other forms of human rights. Humans aren't necessarily consistent in their positions. (There are people who have much much more contradictory positions than anti-gun but pro-speech; stuff like being pro-economic development and also pro rent control, etc.)
- duncan_bayne 13y ago
  I'm not saying that people are consistent in their positions. To re-iterate my original post, I'm just surprised when people are surprised that someone who acts unconstitutionally in one area does so in another.
  - dllthomas 13y ago
    You make the mistake of assuming the surprise is due to unconstitutionality rather than violation of other shared principles, and you make the mistake of assuming everyone has the same understanding of the Constitution. The second amendment in particular is grammatically awkward, which facilitates misinterpretation. It is also, in its strictest sense, unworkable - nuclear ICBMs are discussed in "arms control talks"; the guy down the block shouldn't be able to keep and bear nuclear ICBMs. Now I think the best thing to do would be to update the second amendment, but we've sort of agreed (since about the 1930s) that we're instead going to be ignoring the strict wording beyond some arbitrary line. Once we're in that position, saying "your views are flagrantly unconstitutional because you draw that line differently than I do" is not really a well founded position. I say this as someone who thinks we've generally gone too far with gun control.

I've posted this before in connection with Feinstein: she is notorious for her anti-gun politics. Why should anyone be surprised that her disregard for human rights extends further than gun bans?

dllthomas 13y ago

Because many people do not see gun possession as a human right, rightly or wrongly.

duncan_bayne 13y ago
That's true. But in the context of American politics, Feinstein's position on gun legislation has been blatantly unconstitutional. Why then the surprise when she extends that disregard for the constitution into other areas of politics?
- dllthomas 13y ago
  A certain amount of it is people convincing themselves that the constitution says what they want it to say. But even if you take the position that Feinstein's disregard of the 2nd amendment is so clear and unequivocal that it must be obvious even to her, all that really shows is that "regard for the constitution" isn't a good model for her. That doesn't mean that anti-"regard for the constitution" is a good model; there could very well be other principles we would expect her to hold true to, which this could be in violation of, which would yield surprise.

rdl 13y ago

There are actually some people who are anti-gun but strongly pro specific other human rights (free speech usually, often religion, often various forms of legal defense). There are a lot of reasons for individuals to be anti-gun. There are people who are pro-gun and against many other forms of human rights. Humans aren't necessarily consistent in their positions. (There are people who have much much more contradictory positions than anti-gun but pro-speech; stuff like being pro-economic development and also pro rent control, etc.)

duncan_bayne 13y ago
I'm not saying that people are consistent in their positions. To re-iterate my original post, I'm just surprised when people are surprised that someone who acts unconstitutionally in one area does so in another.
- dllthomas 13y ago
  You make the mistake of assuming the surprise is due to unconstitutionality rather than violation of other shared principles, and you make the mistake of assuming everyone has the same understanding of the Constitution. The second amendment in particular is grammatically awkward, which facilitates misinterpretation. It is also, in its strictest sense, unworkable - nuclear ICBMs are discussed in "arms control talks"; the guy down the block shouldn't be able to keep and bear nuclear ICBMs. Now I think the best thing to do would be to update the second amendment, but we've sort of agreed (since about the 1930s) that we're instead going to be ignoring the strict wording beyond some arbitrary line. Once we're in that position, saying "your views are flagrantly unconstitutional because you draw that line differently than I do" is not really a well founded position. I say this as someone who thinks we've generally gone too far with gun control.