If you feel it is necessary to do the wrong thing at least be honest about it. Admit you are doing wrong and don't pretend it is right. And accept the consequences.
What makes me mad is the dishonesty of people pretending that wrong acts are good just because they believe they are necessary. They are not. Wrong acts are still wrong even if your survival depends on committing them. Even if they are "legalized".
Initiation of force is still wrong. Theft is still wrong.
If you believe you need to strike first- initiate force- because you wouldn't survive taking the ethical high-road and only striking after the other guy has initiated force, then do what you believe you must but don't claim you did the right thing. You did not, even if your action is understandable to others who might like to justify their own wrong acts by validating yours. This applies to States and to individuals. Pretending that your aggression is right makes you an attacker and a liar (or a delusional psycho).
If you think innocent people will die without taking the property of others through "taxation", admit you are stealing (or advocating theft). Be honest that the "taxation" is still wrong. Nothing can make it right. Maybe you are under the belief that it is necessary (it never is), but don't claim what you are doing is right. That claim makes you a thief and a liar (or a delusional psycho).
Just drop the BS and be honest about what you are doing, and don't be shocked when the piper must be paid. Doing the wrong thing may seem "necessary" now, but it always comes at a high price that WILL be collected sooner or later. That's just reality.
Kent,
ReplyDeleteWell done. But ... this happens to be precisely the same argument I made a few years ago versus some Smith/Beiser precursors to your "personal bubble" theory.
If the recognition that all property rights must necessarily begin at the level of the individual's body and flow outward from that point is wrong or evil then property rights must all be wrong (as some collectivists claim). In that case I'll admit I do wrong.
ReplyDeleteIf, on the other hand, the claim that a person must give up his property rights simply because he is surrounded by the property of another is wrong (as I think it obviously is) then in the case of exercising my rights I am not doing (or advocating) wrong.
I have done wrong in the past, though, and admit it while not being proud of it and wishing I could make it right. I live with the troubling consequences every single day as a reminder, and there is nothing that can be done.
Agree.
ReplyDeleteI was collecting Mark Twain quotes; here are a couple of interesting ones:
"Principles have no real force except when one is well-fed."
"Prosperity is the best protector of principle."
The impressive ones are those who can do right even when it really hurts.
Kent,
ReplyDeleteI know of no one who has claimed that "a person must give up his property rights simply because he is surrounded by the property of another."
My claim is that if you want to use someone else's property, you must do so on their terms, else you are trespassing.
Claims of "necessity" or "I have special rights in a bubble around me within which I may ignore other peoples' conditions for using their property" are attempts to get around that.
So slavery is OK as long as you "only" do it on your own property. Because that really is what it boils down to. You have the self-ownership of yourself no matter where you go. If someone allows others onto their property they can't take that away. If they don't like it no one is forcing them to allow others onto their property, but if they do decide to allow others onto their property they can't say "but your rights do not apply here" and expect it to be true. Well, they can expect it to be true, but it's as delusional as saying "gravity doesn't apply as long as you are on my property". Reality doesn't respect grandiosity on that magnitude.
ReplyDeleteYou can't have property rights without them coming first from your individual body. Without bodily property rights there can be no real estate property rights for you to claim outranks individual bodily property rights. If you have no individual bodily property rights, you have no property rights at all- and if you have no property rights, you have no rights of any kind.
As I say, perhaps that is really the case and property rights don't really exist. In that case I am wrong to insist that they do.
After listening to Robert Lefevre's talks I am more convinced than ever that without rights of self-ownership over your body, which travel with you unchanged wherever you go, you would have no rights at all. I'm speculating that he said it in a more roundabout way that didn't rile people up as much. Maybe because they didn't get what he was saying.
I have a little more time now, so I will continue the thought-
ReplyDeleteIt isn't a claim of "necessity". It isn't necessary any more than it is "necessary" for any other rights to exist. Either they do or they don't- the world will go on.
Nor is it a case of "I have special rights in a bubble around me within which I may ignore other peoples' conditions for using their property"- it is just a recognition that everyone has the identical and equal rights of everyone else no matter where they happen to be standing. You can't alter that fact by fiat.
The State claims you and I must submit to its counterfeit "laws" because we agree to continue to live in the US. It claims that its claim to the landmass trumps every other claim. I think that is balderdash too. Now, we may pretend to go along as a tactic of self-preservation, but that doesn't make the claim true. It is just a recognition that we will be killed for open defiance.
I can't see any way that it is not a violation of a person's rights to force them to give up their individual sovereignty as a condition of being somewhere.
Taking it another step up the ladder, your land and home should be inviolate no matter what the "laws" of the city, county, state, or nation may happen to be. What happens on your property is not your neighbor's (or the government's) business as long as you are not polluting or otherwise damaging or endangering other people's property. That government violates that truth millions of times a year doesn't mean it is a falsehood.
I think that saying a traveler has fewer rights than a real estate owner is similar to "conservatives" saying that anti-gay marriage "laws" don't violate the rights of gays since they are allowed to marry a person of the opposite sex just like heterosexuals are. "You can have all your rights as long as you stay home... unless someone else who can claim precedence says his claim trumps yours." No one can over-ride the rights to your body and what is hidden thereupon as long as you do no harm to the property or its owner.
But, like I have said many times before- I will do my best to respect other people's wishes, but I will assume liberty unless I am specifically told otherwise ahead of time. And I will NEVER invite anyone onto my property with the condition that they leave their sovereignty at home.
Kent,
ReplyDeleteYes, your personal rights, including free speech, flow from your body.
Does this mean you have a right to give a loud political speech in my living room, even if I've told you "you can only use my living room if you do so quietly, there's a baby sleeping in the next room?"
Your error is in believing that a requirement that you only use my living room if you do so unarmed is "taking away your rights."
A "right" to do something implies a right to not do it as well -- and the doing or not doing of that thing is something that's yours to trade over periods of time (if you can't do that with it, you don't own it, do you?).
If you trade the on/off status of your choice to keep and bear arms for one hour to me, as part of a package in which I trade my choice as to who may use my living room for that hour to you, neither of our rights have been "taken away." We're both using/exercising those rights.
Does this mean you have a right to give a loud political speech in my living room, even if I've told you "you can only use my living room if you do so quietly, there's a baby sleeping in the next room?"
ReplyDeleteNope. Because that is a case of the thing, in this case my speech, coming out of my bubble and invading your space. Like radiation or contagions also could. And completely unlike a gun in a pocket that remains there and never makes an appearance.
You continued primary mistake is that you keep assuming this is how I will act if I am the traveler, while my intention is to say how I view anyone who is surrounded by my property with my permission. On the contrary, if I am not allowed to be armed I will consider myself unwelcome. I will not go there. Government "property" aside. If I invite you onto my property I will absolutely respect ALL your rights to your body and its immediate, intimate surroundings. Period.
Kent,
ReplyDeleteIt's not a matter of what you personally will or will not do.
It's a matter of what you claim it is ethical for any person to do or not do.
Nor is it a matter of any kind of conflict of rights. People trade the exercise or non-exercise of rights back and forth all the time, on both permanent ("I convey my property right in this object to you in return for your property right in that object, both conveyances in perpetuity" -- in other words, a trade or sale) and temporary ("eight hours of my labor, to the exclusion of other activities, for 80 of your dollars," "yes, I agree, as a condition of using your pasture for a picnic, not to conduct any political rallies or religious rites there during that time period") agreements. That's not conflict, it's commerce.
Your "bubble" assertion is no different than any other pre-fabricated justification for trespass ("I've got a BADGE!" "GOD says so!"), whether you actually use that justification or not.
It is an attempt to resolve an apparent (although not actual) contradiction/conflict between rights, and the attempt itself BECOMES a contradiction/conflict scenario. Better to realize that no such conflict/contradiction exists in the first place, than to create a new and unnecessary one.
"It's a matter of what you claim it is ethical for any person to do or not do.'
ReplyDeleteYep. Ethical doesn't always mean you should do it. It would be ethical to kill any cop who confronted you for doing anything "illegal", but which wasn't wrong, since any resistance on your part would be met with lethal force. It's simply self defense. Is it the smart thing to do? No. But it doesn't change what is right just because it is unpopular or because there are consequences.
Once again, your examples of things that are negotiable are things that are out in the open. Public. Seen, observed, and that can affect the property rights of the owner. Labor rental, political rallies, and religious rites are things that are not kept inside the bubble of your personal property so they are subject to the sorts of agreements you mention. That doesn't mean it is always nice to place such restrictions on someone, but the right does exist. However, a gun in your pocket or a thought in your mind can not affect the property rights of the property owner in any conceivable way as long as they remain inside the bearer.
"Your "bubble" assertion is no different than any other pre-fabricated justification for trespass ("I've got a BADGE!" "GOD says so!"), whether you actually use that justification or not."
Or, "I own this place so you have no property rights over yourself while you are here. I can therefore trespass upon you by claiming that you are trespassing on my property."
"Better to realize that no such conflict/contradiction exists in the first place, than to create a new and unnecessary one."
I agree. That is why I continue to assert that your rights begin at your body and flow outward from that point until they run up against someone else's property. No one's rights can penetrate you no matter where you stand. There is no conflict.
It would be better if you could shoot first, because in general it would end up with bad guys dead and good guys fine more often.
ReplyDeleteBut then we have to be able to determine who's good and bad beforehand, so that we don't legitimize the opposite of what we want to do.
Actually, that doesn't seem very hard. The key having a clear and very easy to understand set of rules, so that anyone breaking them can be assumed to have done so on purpose. Then, set up the rules so that you have to obviously break one before you get in shooting range of a good guy.
The only kind of thing that doesn't solve, as far as I can tell, is situations where you don't have time to shoot first because they've ambushed you.
There is a possible problem in that a society where shooting first is okay could end up tense, in a way that would actually lead to more violence. For example, a criminal, knowing they'll get shot if they're caught, may spend a lot more effort trying for the lethal ambush, instead of just, say, burglary.
On the other hand, criminals are lazy and may instead end up strongly deterred from crime, leading paradoxically to a highly relaxed society.
Unfortunately I don't see any way to figure this out properly without trying it somewhere.
I'm totally OK with being a guinea pig for an experiment like that.
ReplyDeleteWhich delegitimizes government to a hilarious extent. You would go, so would I. I'm sure I could find enough volunteers for a decent-sized town.
ReplyDeleteAnd then the government would stop us. Because they hate peace and prosperity, or something.
The universities like science and experts, yes? Yet you try to do phase I trials of new forms of government and the whole Harvard faculty turns out to protest for 'humanity.' No, apparently we have to try things on the whole country at once or not at all.
No, they'd be afraid of losing power. Which proves the new government would be better - would win in competition. I mean, they're the experienced governors, they would know if anyone would, right?