R.I.P. Charlton Heston

[alfonso]

that has nothing to do with rights.
...........................................rights have been removed unfairly and wrongly...

I think we are slowly approaching to the real node. There is a confusion in the meaning of the word "rights" that we are using, we are not alone though, there are many different schools and definitions. Well, all the doctrines agree in dividing "rights" in many categories, this primarily because real life poses some issues that have to be solved and while everyone is entitled to his own belief system that differs from other ones, the only way to make a shared system of rules, that is the only one that can work, some criteria have to be set. You might not trust democracy , I do under a certain extent, but for sure the ONLY system that grants the freedom of every person to have his own beliefs is a system who bypasses the belief systems to set the social rules and that uses some procedures on which the majority agree in order to determine its contents.

I respect your freedom to believe that you have some rights descending from the creation, but this won't change my refusal of that concept, I believe that my rights are historically determined. Now, only a democratic system of shared procedures can grant both of us, in a large system, that despite the objectionable origin of or rights that is respectively bullshit as for what are the other's beliefs, we can agree on how will the content of those rights be determined. If we agree that steeling has to be sanctioned we will also agree to pay someone who will take care of that task.

Out of this it's all babbling. You might get crazy one day and say that god gave you the right to the "jus primae noctis" and claiming to make sex with any fresh married bride (btw this right existed in the feudal society at a certain point, the Lord had that right over all the young women of his land, in some places), If you have a personal army and an effective power in some lost village of the third world this right will be effective, god or not god. But, fortunately, if you try that in your neighborhood you'll have some problems.

See, there is something in the juridical doctrine and historical analysis that shows a link between some of your concepts and mine.

It's demonstrated that no rule can be enforced if there isn't a substantial consensus in the society, no matter what are the prescribed sanctions, they will not be effective. For example in the Soviet Union the corruption of public officers was punished with death. In theory. Practically one of the most corrupted systems in the planet never saw a capital punishment for such a crime. Basically because the bureaucratic power had set such a diffused system of corruption that enforcing the law would have decimated more than half of the population...

In fact one of the weak points of the dictatorships which brings them to an inevitable end, often violent, is that they are the same cause of their own crisis.
All the dictatorships start with a huge consensus, but their own ways destroy the same base on which they started. Only a system that is based on "relative" and "conventional" values can be respectful of the individuals, there is no need that they all believe the same things if the only juridical reality is conventional.
In fact the very heart of any fascist system has been the claim of "natural" or "super-ordered" rights, which, as such, couldn't be discussed, no matter if they had racial or other abominable contents. The concept is wrong. What works and is essential in the private sphere is not appropriate for the public one.

I'm still perplexed and quite surprised on how pessimistic is your view. On the other hand I can understand it, with the glasses of absolutism the real world must seem really desperate.

Not that I don't see the horrors, but I also see the chances.

[FrancisHarmany]

Ok this is a nice thread about rights & freedoms.

As gary rightfully says, he has the right to defend himself... When you get down to the basics, everybody is a free to do as he/she/it pleases, there is no way getting around this fact.

But I wonder about the right of a family, community, or other groups in general. Do the rights of many out-way the rights of few ? If a group decides to defend themselves by agreeing on a set of guidelines/laws..... isnt that their right ? How is the individual more important in this case ? I have no answer for this one.


So what I would like to throw in this discussions.......

Do Not Commit Violence
The only exception is where NOT commiting violence would cause MORE violence somehow..... not killing the gunner who intends to shoot down 20 people is an ACT of violence by not doing (for the spiritual people among us: you carry that karma by your non-action).

As we all know we can commit violence on mental/emotional/physical levels.



If you cant physiicaly be violent, why can you be so mentally and emotionally !? Is this not a good reason to "regulate" "free speech" ? How do you propose people defend themselves against mental & emotional violence ?

I think its often overlooked we are more then some stinking bag of flesh & bones. Mental and emotional violence can be felt a lifetime. A punch on the nose fades rather quickly.

[astroman]

the crucial point is awareness - to learn from history, from observation and to contemplate beyond borders that society and/or the education system sets.
You'll not only find your own way, but you'll also become a most suspective individual for those in charge of power resources...
One may also find out to be a part of the contradiction that scenario may create

cheers, Tom

[FrancisHarmany]

the crucial point is awareness - to learn from history, from observation and to contemplate beyond borders that society and/or the education system sets.
You'll not only find your own way, but you'll also become a most suspective individual for those in charge of power resources...
One may also find out to be a part of the contradiction that scenario may create

cheers, Tom

Awareness Beyond Names & Forms

[braincell]

as i said, even a bug has the right to defend himself. bugs were given armour, poison, stings, pincers, acid and bad taste. a right is not an idea.

It is not true that bugs have rights because we can kill them for no reason legally. Some animals have rights I'm not aware of any bugs protected under the endangered species act. Probably there are a few rare butterflies that are protected but most insects have no rights.

[braincell]

Obviously no one cares about the bible commandments preached by no other than Moses, reincarnated as CH. Remember "Thou shall not kill"? This is the same as being baptised on the deck of USS Nimitz.
What a farce!

Yep, Although we are a Christian nation, most of the commandments are not followed. Hypocrites!

[garyb]

Alfonso, i'm not pessimistic, i'm cynical!

the optomist wil;l always lend uncle fred $5
the pessimist will never lend uncle fred $5
the cynic has already lent uncle fred $5

never the less, my rights don't come from my belief and people find the strength and power to overcome those dictators you speak of through their innate sense of their basic rights which are already theirs. a righteous cause cannot be stopped....there is only a semantic problem between us....

brain, just because you can kill a bug doesn't mean they don't have the right to fight back. crush a black widow spider which has crawled inside your shirt and find out. is the spider bad? no, she is defending herself. the creatures right to defend it's self doesn't come from any laws. corner a bear and see if the bear waits to check congress to see if it's protected....

[braincell]

What good is the right to self defense when the attacking bug has the same right to kill it? The two rights negate each other, therefore they are pointless.

[next to nothing]

speaking of bugs, i find this one to fit the topic:

"People who fly have a different view of the world than those who spend their lives on the ground. A very wise man once wrote a poem while he was flying, and he called this poem "The God's Eye View," and he said that this view was entirely different than the view he always had on the ground, which he called "The Bug's Eye View."

Out there, somewhere, in the air we fly through, exists an old Persian legend much like this poem about a bug who spent his entire life in the world's most beautifully designed Persian rug. All the bug ever saw in his lifetime were his problems. They stood up all around him. He couldn't see over the top of them, and he had to fight his way through these tufts of wool in the rug to find the crumbs that people had spilled on the rug. And the tragedy of the story of the bug in the rug was this: that he lived and he died in the world's most beautifully designed rug, but he never once knew that he spent his life inside something which had a pattern. Even if he, this bug, had even once gotten above the rug so that he could have seen all of it, he would have discovered something - that the very things he called his problems were a part of the pattern.

Have you ever felt like that bug in the rug? That you are so surrounded by your problems that you can't see any pattern to the world in which you live? Have you heard anybody say lately that the world is a total mess? That, my friends, is the Bug's Eye View, and seeing only a little of the world, me might be inclined to think that this is true. "

[BingoTheClowno]

Insects don't have a conscience, humans do (most of them that is). Comparing an insect's reflex action with human's deliberate and conscius action is ludicrous at most. Unless you consider yourselves automatons please stop with these kind of silly comparisons.

[BingoTheClowno]

Yep, Although we are a Christian nation, most of the commandments are not followed. Hypocrites!

That's exactly what I was implying.

[Me$$iah]

Goddamn it.... America is not a 'christian nation'

It may be populated by mostly christians, but it is not a christian nation.


Damn.


Also, people here still seem to think that rights are given to the people by the government, this is plain wrong. If you have to ask for the 'right' to do somthing, its not a right. Its a privelidge, a right is somthing you dont need to ask permission for. Thats why it called a right.

cmon people think.

[garyb]

don't compare humans to bugs, how interesting from a guy who thinks that humans are just a biologcal phenomenon.

[braincell]

You were the one who said insects have rights. Rights are uniquely human. No animal is able to understand this.

[garyb]

rights don't need to be understood to be real and existant.

[braincell]

They are not real. They don't exist outside out brains so therefore they are imaginary. Why can\'t you understand this?

[garyb]

rights are not an invention. they just are. what people think about, say about, regulate and catagorize about rights is the invention and social agreement.

after centuries of obiesence to a ruler, either a king or a democraticly elected dictatorship, it may be hard to wrap your head around this, but what makes them rights is that they are. as has already been mentioned, you are confusing rights with priviledges.

if an authority wishes to take me away, it's my right to fight back, even if it's in vain. no one can take that from me. if a bad man tries to mug me, it's my right to fight back(or not).

my rights don't come from society, but from my creation and birth. my right to breathe and drink water and live are mine, no matter what society thinks or does. of course i have no right to violate other's rights! if i do, it's their right to oppose me!

NO ONE OWNS ME, even if they force me into slavery. if my rights are taken away, then my rights are violated.

what a sad and sorry excuse for human beings are any who woud give up their rights for wrongs.

[next to nothing]

call me an idiot but i kind of like this one

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html

[zangsta]

Consider using the word instinct, rather than right.
In the case of a death-threat, any sane animal does what it takes, and what´s possible, to stay alive.
Goes for most sane humans too.
Death-wish, anyone ??

J_S

[garyb]

who says a sea lion won't fight back if it gets a chance. you try to harrass one and see how viciously they will defend themselves. dolphins will hunt sharks in the area preemptively.

the universal declaration of rights is a piece of shite. it only grants rights when they fit the "purposes and principles of the UN", which is the same as no rights at all. read it carefully. the words are pretty, bus useless.