3 ms·
Negative/positive rights, yeah. It's gotten really complicated recently, though, hasn't it? It's pretty hard to provide your own water. Domestically and globall
by xnull2guest 12y ago
Negative/positive rights, yeah. It's gotten really complicated recently, though, hasn't it? It's pretty hard to provide your own water. Domestically and globally (Nestle and China each own close to half of the world's potable water). So at some point, even where someone 'owns' something - withholding it will cause people to clamor about their right to e.g. water (case in point the Water Crisis in Detroit). The point of the parent is that access to the internet is becoming so much part of life that it's starting to seem like a cultural and practical necessity.
- javert 12y agoThe Nestle water situation doesn't actually pose any problem for the negative/positive rights distinction. I'm not familiar with the exact legal situation in parts of South America where that is an issue, but basically, if it's illegal to draw water from water sources and purify it yourself and sell it to others (perhaps via a municipal water system like we do in the civilized world), property rights have been misunderstood and misapplied.
- zanny 12y agoThat is the state guaranteeing access to water. It isn't picking a guy out of the crowd, pointing a gun at his head, and telling him to work the well and give everyone else water. States usually reimburse private utility companies, or run them themselves. The superposter means, I think, that you cannot have a right that deprives someone else of their freedom. If nobody wanted to work at the water treatment plant, the government is hard pressed to compel anyone to work there within any sane persons logic. They would have to offer higher pay until someone did the job, but they couldn't point a gun at someone and make them do it. Unless they were a prisoner, or maybe a soldier.