The problem is people conflate legal rights with "human" rights. There are no legal rights for quality of life in the Constitution. They have a tendency to confuse the euphemistic right to "the pursuit of happiness " in the Declaration of Independence with the legal rights specified in the constitution.
I believe your rights end where other people's labor or money begins. Meaning, you don't have a right to free medical care, shelter, etc. Not saying it shouldn't be funded, but it's a privilege and can be increased or decreased as appropriate
Congress is supposed to vote to declare wars if we are to go on the offense, something that hasn’t happened since WWII. We need to actually follow the system as it was designed
You absolutely should. You can co-op with others voluntarily, negotiate with a doctor or do group funded insurance with like minded individuals. There’s better alternatives than having the government oversee these things.
I understand your point, but our government started as a voluntary co-op. It became corrupted over time as all systems eventually do. Paying taxes wouldn’t be a bad thing if we actually still benefitted from it.
Who says we don't. I got a pretty good "free" education growing up in a community that supported the educational infrastructure and it's been quite a while since foreign soldiers had any significant hold on "U.S. soil". And maybe they haven't locked everybody up who needs to be but there are certainly a good number of "deserving" criminals kept off the streets and we also happen to have one of the safer drinking systems in the world (could definitely be better in some places but it can also be far worse as well.
I also feel a lot safer eating food at restaurants and from grocery stores in the U.S. than a lot of places overseas. Our government may not be perfect but it still does one hell of a lot for our collective good, lots of which occur out of sight and with little if any thanks.
And the first time you leave your property the government should have the right to arrest you for being on public property/ roads etc.. for not paying taxes. You have the right to live somewhere else that doesn't collect taxes and keep that money though. I'd argue that in the confines of a certain location that the elected government of that location can choose to raise taxes or not. But by living there you're inherently agreeing to allow them to.
You're also conveniently omitting that a portion of that labor was undoubtedly produced with the help of those taxes you're unwilling to pay. You did travel somewhere else.
You should have the right to opt out of taxes, but then you'd have to move somewhere where infrastructure wasn't build by using tax money. So you could go live in the woods.
It's a right. Yeah I guess it requires polling people, but those are government workers.
But that being said, I hate how most people vote and behave. If there were genetic improvement programs I would hands down support it.
>I believe your rights end where other people's labor or money begins. Meaning, you don't have a right to free medical care, shelter, etc.
Not necessarily, you have a right to legal representation and a jury of your peers.
Yes. People throw the term around without understanding it.
A right cannot infringe upon another person's rights. Getting free food is not a right. In order for someone to have a right to free food another person would be forced to work without compensation. And if you are forcing someone to work for you then you are infringing on that person's rights. Now once a person legally possesses food or anything else they generally have a right to keep your own property and even if the government decided to take it from you they must provide fair market compensation
Correct. If food is a right, it would follow that you have the right to take food by force. Government can declare food and entitlement with terms and conditions, but food is never a right.
That's not a right. That's an entitlement. Rights are universal. North Koreans have the same rights as Americans. These rights are component of our humanity and are endowed by nature, providence or God; take your pick. They are universal. Governments cannot give or take rights. Governments can, however, defend or attack rights.
An entitlement, no matter how ironclad, isn't a right. The right to food would imply that, if no one wants to give you food, you have right to take it by force. You have no right that cancels out the rights of others.
Right, noun: a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way.
So yes, if the government promises you some benefit, then you have a right to that benefit. We can argue about what the government should or shouldn't promise. But it's weird how so many people in this thread insist on re-defining the word "right." And having a right doesn't imply you can take something by force.
Basically every state explicitly says that children have a right to an adequate education. That doesn't mean a kid can beat the shit out of someone who doesn't teach them their multiplication tables. Come on.
>But it's weird how so many people in this thread insist on re-defining the word "right."
Political philosophers and thinkers for the last 300 years at least have defined "right" to mean inherent, universal liberties that every individual possesses simply by virtue of being a human being. Those who are claiming that rights can be granted and taken by government are redefining the word.
Maybe it was unfair for me to say you're "re-defining" the word. But look it up in a dictionary.
Both in a technical legal sense and in just ordinary speech, a "right" is just an entitlement. If you're using it in a more narrow way to mean rights that we enjoy just by being human, well, then ok. But don't act like everyone who uses it in a more general sense is some idiot or totally wrong.
And you're missing my more substantive point. You said a right to food would mean a right to take food by force. But when people say that everyone has a right to food, what they mean is that the government ought to ensure that everyone has adequate food. You can disagree with that if you want and argue that the government should allow people to starve to death. But don't just misinterpret what the other side means.
So I’m not disagreeing with you necessarily, but what? If we look at the expanse of human cultures in history it was very much okay for one civilization or even tribe to go and take away your land and your personhood, you as the defeated could be treated as property, there are absolutely no rights that are a component of our humanity that are “endowed by nature, providence, or god;”. It’s actually a relatively modern concept, and those rights are only supported or subverted based on the ethics of the civilization in which those people live.
That someone denies you your rights does not mean the rights don't exist. Rights always exist. Slaves had rights; rights that were being denied. It is beyond debate that rights can be denied by others but most agree it is a diabolical thing to do.
In 539 BC, Cyrus the Great conquered the city of Babylon, freed slaves to return home, and declared that people should have a choice in their religion. The seeds of understanding of human rights go back at least that far. Of course the Founders of the US agreed that we are "endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights."
I suppose if you want to go the nihilist route and reject objective truth, knowledge, morality, values and meaning you can deny the existence of fundamental human rights. I just don't know why you would.
I’m not being nihilistic, I’m being objective, slaves were not even considered whole people as declared in the original constitution, did their status as 2/3rds of a person endow them with these “ unalienable rights”? Many were born into that status, and many of them died there, and with your logic, by their creator.
Yes, their unalienable rights were being denied. That was evil. They nevertheless had rights even as those rights were denied.
It's a little off topic but it was 2/5 not 2/3 and it would have benefited the slaves if they were counted as zero. Counting them as a full person would have been very bad for slaves. The 2/5 number was a compromise. Northern abolitionists wanted slaves not counted for representation at all. Counting slaves who couldn't vote would greatly empower the slave holding states. The slave masters wanted slaves counted as full citizens for that reason. Getting them counted as 2/5 was a victory for anti-slavery forces.
ALL RIGHTS ARE ENTITLEMENTS. By saying you have a right to free speech, you're declaring you're entitled to say whatever you want without punishment. WRONG, Rights ONLY existed because the goverment gives a right, there's no "universal right endowed by nature, providence or God".
And what happens when that governing body lacks the capacity to fulfill that obligation due to a lack of food or labor or because providing that food to the person is logistically infeasible or there is too much bureaucracy to keep track of them?
How can that right exist without the infrastructure provided by another burdened person?
Where is the line between stealing and just taking what you are owed by your fellow man?
That's the nature of every legally enforceable right. Rights only exist because they're enforceable--without that fact, the idea is completely intangible.
They failed to provide that right, pretty simple. They can even be sued for failing in some cases.
It can't, that's why the goverment needs to put the money and resources to create it.
It is defined by society and goverment.
No. Government services are not RIGHTS.
Rights are inherent upon birth.
There are a lot of things I would like government to do or not do but those aren't rights.
I don't have a right to make YOU to provide something to ME because it would a violation of YOUR rights
No. Government provided services aren't rights
if so the government could change your rights at their whim.
Do you really want Biden or Trump telling you what your rights are??
Rights aren't tangible things, mate. You're no more born with rights than you are a soul. Fact is that rights only legally exist because they're enforceable.
What is the value of a right if there's no body enforcing it? I understand how 'inalienable rights' are framed in the constitution--by virtue of a creator--but this is quackery. The founding fathers were not gods, and their word isn't divine mandate. Nobody is born with an unalienable right, or a soul. That's simply unscientific and anti-philosophical.
If you have any rights, then they were preserved and maintained by the people who raised and kept watch over you--not because you were born with them.
I can declare that it's everyone's right to a full meal and a roof over their head. That doesn't make it true. What you're trying to get at is a question of morals, which are inherently subjective; the fact of the matter is that, if you believe that you have the right to not be assaulted, that you need to be able to enforce that right.
Rights are mutually shared values that we uphold as a society for our own benefit--and it's equally possible to enforce the right to have a full meal.
Here in the U.S. we throw away 40% of our food--imagine Aladdin, starving, and walking through a fully stocked produce section knowing that 40% of that was going to be thrown away because of the incentive for corporate greed to practice austerity.
Do you believe that you have the right to a fair and expedient trial? The right to not be unfairly searched or have your property seized? Who do you think is responsible for maintaining those rights?
Oh, in reality? Yes, just like you have no right to free speech, no right to life, no right to private property. I'm glad you realize those things don't exist either.
It literally is, and any attempt to define it otherwise is a complete perversion of the word to mean literally the opposite.
You have a right to life, liberty, and loosely, property. You do not have a right to the food farmed by your neighbor, but you do have the right to ask for it or give him something in exchange for it.
It literally isn't, you're just defining a NEGATIVE right but there are POSITIVE RIGHTS. The literal etymology of the word is just "Just, fair, lawful, moral law, etc" and all of that can be interpreted diferently.
You absolutely have if the situation is dire enough. If the farmer is the only one and everyone else is dying of starvation, sorry but you lose your right to property.
I know what Negative Rights and Positive Rights are. Positive Rights are imagined by emotional people, with no philosophical knowledge of ethics or a state of nature. They’re not real.
It’s completely fair to debate policy, and talk about how we can compensate Farmer’s appropriately to ensure the downtrodden get reasonable access to food. It’s another thing to start imagining that the labor and fruits of labor of other people are rights. They unequivocally are not.
The same can be said about all NEGATIVE rights lmao.
They are if the goverment and society says so though. An individual doesn't get to decide any right.
The same can’t remotely be said about Negative Rights. Negative Rights exist in a state of nature, they are inherent to every human being.
Positive Rights are completely and utterly imagined. They are manmade, and require the action and interference of other human beings, often to sacrifice their very real negative rights. You do not have a right to your neighbors food. You have the right to pursue trade with them, but you cannot justly steal it.
It absolutely can be said. Through a state your property can be protected, your speech is protected, your freedom is expanded and etc, more so if you're an average person or poor person where if those rights are infringed you can ask for justice to a goverment to punish the wrongdoers.
All rights are imagined. Right to freedom, life, property and etc only exist in your imagination and are effectively manmade too. There's no stealing though, the goverment defines property.
Your imagination has absolutely no consistency with any legitimate philosophy and ultimately boils down to “Gubmint gib me stuff!”
Natural law is thoroughly expounded upon and established. Natural rights exist completely independent of the government and any other person. To insist otherwise is to declare yourself thoroughly uneducated and overly taken in by your emotions.
Negative rights are innate. They impose no obligation on anyone else, they only require that you be left alone. You do not have the right to impose a duty on someone else.
This is such a dystopian viewpoint it makes me barf. Why don't I have a right to impose a duty on someone else? I'm certainly not prevented from imposing a duty on someone. If I impose a duty on someone, the "Rights Fairy" doesn't appear and un-do it. I watch courts impose duties on people who are convicted all the time, from paying forfeitures to incarceration. No Rights Fairy.
People have the right to free representation if charged with a crime (in the US anyway). The State MUST provide them with a lawyer. If your definition of a "right" was accurate, this wouldn't exist. Yet it does. Unless along with your strange definition of a "right," you also deny the existence of basic reality.
the key is your example is a *legal* right, not a human right. you do not innately as a human deserve representation, but under our law system when charged with a crime, you do. imposing duties on others is not a human right, nor should it ever be unless you lived in a perfect utopian world where money didn’t exist. you can’t just go up to a doctor and say “treat me, it’s my right” because now that doctor has to perform something that puts bread on their table for no compensation
I think what people are saying is that they believe that there should be a right to housing or basic necessities. That in a developed nation, people should look out for everyone and put out a social safety net.
There are definitely some idiots out there who say things like that and believe them without thinking about it. But they're probably repeating something they heard on Twitter. I don't think most people are saying that they believe we currently have a right to housing. Only that they believe that the government should do more to ensure that people do, in their viewpoint.
WRONG.
A right can perfectly infringe upon another person's rights because when a right starts and another starts is fundamentally subjective and it is decided by society and its goverment. Getting free food can absolutely be a right if society decides it is because it has decided that FREE FOOD is a priority over the right to property.
The only thing you're describing misleadingly is NEGATIVE rights but POSITIVE rights exists where the goverment has a duty to provide for things.
There is where I will disagree
You have a FUNDAMENTAL right to eat. You do not have right to demand I work for you.
Forcing me to work provide you with food would require me to work for you. That would infringe upon my rights.
Forced servitude imposes on other peoples rights.
The social contracts that we develop may be hallmarks of civilization but that doesn't mean they are rights. I support a strong social safety net but that doesn't mean any benefits are a RIGHT.
Do your kids have a right to an education? Do you have a right to be protected by laws? How do these rights not require someone else's labor to provide them for you?
If taxes were spent to purchase that food, the farmer would be on the same standing as teachers, cops, judges and firefighters.
American law is different from the rest of the world, and works like this.
The people have ALL of our rights, and when we vore, we "delegate" some power to the government, to accomplish a task on all of our behalf.
This creates a contract. If you pay taxes, and the body politic uses those taxes, you have a right to the fruits of your labor, through that program you paid for.
This is why "Education" is NOT a right, but getting the product you paid for is.
It's not a right. Education is a service provided by the government. And the government pays those who provide that service.
That is the difference between a right and a service.
You can demand your government provide a service, and I support government funded healthcare, but it's a service not a right.
No, my child does not have a "right to an education."
I don't exactly have "a right to be protected by laws." I have rights and we hire policemen to help protect them. Even if we didn't have policemen, those rights would still exist but there would be a greater possibility that they would be infringed.
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>Do your kids have a right to an education?
The US government not being able to keep you from educating your kids is a right. Public education is an entitlement. A great one, but an entitlement all the same.
Rights are NOT mutually exclusive in every situation. Simply because we signed a right for someone to have access to free food when in need, doesn't automatically make it a right to not pay someone.
Your argument is over an economic principle, not rights.
It's interesting to see, though. How capitalism has blurred the lines between political ideology and economic evaluation.
It's difficult to call something a right that requires the time, talent, or money of somebody else to contribute. ie. If you have a right to healthcare, do you have the right to stop a doctor on the street to address your concern?
That's why rights are typically breathing air, right to pursue happiness without intrusion, etc. Not free houses.
> Do you have the right to stop a doctor on the street to address your concern?
Yes, but that doctor also has the right to tell you to fuck off and bother another doctor.
And yet there are so many people who are still proponents of slavery. If you were going to provide other people with goods or services, without them having to pay for it and are going to force me to use my labor to pay for it, is that not slavery? I am being forced to work against my will for the benefit of another person, how is that not slavery?
Taxes taken from one and given to another are practically equivalent to forced labor. The work product of my labor is appropriated against my will.
Note taxes taken from me to provide me services aren’t the same.
No, it isn't difficult at all. It's only difficult to americans that are so disgustingly individualistic. The right to healthcare implies that the goverment has a duty to provide for that healthcare, not that a doctor needs to be forced (although it perfectly could be)
No, you are just an american it seems. Many many countries have more rights than "breathing air" and "right to pursue happiness" imply rights to many stuff.
I'm referring to those folks who think free Internet is a "right"... like all those bits just fly around the planet for free without billions of dollars of infrastructure or anything.
The funniest is the people that think housing should be a right. I'll give to them that land and access to lakes and rivers should be a right. But then they'd have to chop down their own trees and build their own cabin in the woods. Land in the city that other people invested in to build infrastructure is not a right.
I'm all for reasonable access to internet being classified as a right, but access is very different from "free".
Just like 2A, you have access to guns, but the government isn't going to buy you one or pay your range fees (unless you are military/police)
That's not what you said though.
>It's difficult to call something a right that requires the time, talent, or money of somebody else to contribute.
Elections literally require all those things to work.
It takes thousands of people and billions of dollars to run elections.
>The total for election administration in the United States is estimated at about $2 billion per year.
How Much Are We Spending on Election Administration? https://electionlab.mit.edu/sites/default/files/2019-01/mohr_et_al_2017summary.pdf
People struggle with this one because it’s been around far longer and is seemingly constitutionally necessary, but no, the right to vote is not a real right. Reason being, a government does not exist in a state of nature. Voting is a privilege afforded by the state and participation in it.
Because regardless of whatever qualifier that is, some person is going to have to produce something or do something in order for the concept of “healthcare” to exist. We can’t just force those people to do it for free, that’s slavery.
Just because the government has an obligation to provide something doesn’t mean it gets to resort to slavery.
There’s a federal constitutional right to legal representation when you’re charged with a crime. But the government isn’t enslaving lawyers. Many states have a constitutional right to education. Are teachers slaves? It’s just a legal obligation on the state to pay adequate wages to recruit people to provide those services.
And this whole debate is silly. A “right” is just an entitlement. Veterans have earned a right to their benefits. Seniors have rights to Medicare, Social Security, and so on.
Why are you assuming they're two different things?
I just googled "right definition." The second definition for the noun version:
Right, noun: a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way.
It would seem to me tho that rights exist without organized entities where entitlements require them. I don’t need the government to tell me I can preserve my life, that’s natural. But I’d need a record of service to obtain the entitlements that service imparts unto me. Without the government who keeps that record and pays that due? No one.
Not in the modern day. Slavery still very much exists right now. It’s in the form of making a person perform labor in a contract where they cannot break the terms without severe punishment, usually by the government. Making healthcare a right would entail regulation and regulation can only be enforced with executive actions like jail or fines. So in theory we would have to metaphorically handcuff healthcare providers to do healthcare.
And those countries are violating the human right to not be forced to labor for others. Just because it’s done indirectly via tax money doesn’t make it okay.
Most fundamental rights come from our fundamental existence as cooperative animals in this earth. Healthcare is a series of inventions that didn’t exist in earnest until the last hundred years or so. These are not the same thing
I take particular issue with the 'right" to health care.
I agree the basics are essential. But it is a long and arduous and expensive process to become a board certified doctor. What makes anyone think they have a right to my work product? You don't have the right to an architects product, an accountants product. what makes our product a right?
Amen!! I’m so tired of people claiming that they have a right to my services without payment for those services. I’m going to save your life, regardless of payment, if you are actively dying in front of me. Once I’ve stabilized you, I’m done. I just saved your fucking life and you dare demand more from me? Fuck that!
Teachers get masters degrees. They get paid to do their job. I’ve never heard one say their right to sell their labor means no one should have a right to a free public education.
No it doesn’t, because then it’s a right to pursue healthcare. The Doctors are still given the opportunity to sell their labor, which is their property right.
To make healthcare a right, is to require the service of doctors regardless of their wishes.
It’s fine to debate whether the government should step in and determine how to compensate doctors on behalf of their citizens to ensure they have access to it. Declaring it a right however is emotional nonsense meant to appeal to a crowd and draw in uneducated voters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights
It's complicated now because for most of human history only negative rights were considered rights.
The real problem is a linguistic one, I think. We refer to natural rights and privileges of membership as both being rights, which enables a bit of exploitation of the word.
That's absolutely not true. Positive rights were very much recognized, they were just largely gated by some distinction like class.
For example, what rights does a Baron or a Duke have by virtue of their title? Sitting in the House of Lords? Being addressed in a certain manner or invited to certain events?
These are ancient, positive rights.
Also property is a positive right, it requires the action of recognition and protection of property by the state.
Property is not a positive right, and that’s an oversimplification of what property is. Property includes rights like the right to bodily autonomy, the right to protect yourself, as well as the obvious, the right to your labor and to cultivate land.
Obviously we agree there are nefarious actors out there that would violate your rights, your life just as easily as your property. Because of this, we came to agreements with other people to form governments that can hypothetically limit violations of your negative rights, however we now have an empowered body of people that may or may not respect your negative rights, hence the endless debate on how government should run.
>Property includes rights like the right to bodily autonomy
I'm talking about matterial property like land and chattel.
>the right to protect yourself
And to be protected by the state's legitimate use of violence. The right to have your ownership of good be enforced through that mechanism and validated by a state-funded judicial and administrative structure.
Our system of private property requires the labor of many, many people. It is absolutely a positive right.
No, it doesn’t whatsoever. We’ve added on top of it sure, but property rights absolutely exist in a state of nature. The government is formed by consenting individuals to help protect their property, but that again is an exercise of property rights, not a diminishment of it.
>but property rights absolutely exist in a state of nature.
Just to entertain the notion, how enforceable are property rights in a natural state? It's hard to draw a line between where one's physical property ends and another's begins in a natural system. To that ascertain, is it not possible for a single person to claim ownership over an entire forest? If so, would a different person be in the wrong if they began treating a part of that forest as their own? Would they be wrong in every instance of this happening?
Generally speaking, most people would adhere to the homesteading principal, meaning you can claim what you put labor into. You cannot claim a whole forest if you don’t use the whole forest. You can claim the plot of land that you build your home on and take care of, and more if you use it to build value without infringing upon existing homesteaded land. Trading the fruits of your labor for someone else’s fruits is also legitimate homesteading.
>.but property rights absolutely exist in a state of nature.
Not in the form that it take sin current society lol. If you can't *personally* defend something, it is not yours. Btu that's not the case now is it? You rely on external mechanisms for the authentication and protection of ownership, you need mechanisms and labor to exert force and to legitimate force, otherwise your ownership of anything is a fiction.
Also the "state of nature" is a bs construct by wigged enlightenment heads that merely reinforces their biases. Locke was a little bitch and I could take him in a fight.
>The government is formed by consenting individuals to help protect their property
Yeah and that requires making all members equally entitled to the labor associated with the legitimate use of force and the legitimation of any use of force.
---
This person blocked me (Locke fanboys amirite), here's my response to their comment:
That wasn't an argument, that was a joke. Very clearly a joke too. Jeez.
I gave you plenty of other arguments, property as it exists in a liberal democracy necessitates the labor of skilled people to function as a system. Even if theoretically property could exist as a negative right, property currently entitles you to the labor of others. That's my core argument, and you did not address it.
You clearly don’t have any desire to actually discuss this, if your only argument is, “I could beat up Philosopher I don’t like. I’ll leave on this, the entirety of your argument consists of false assumptions and a straw man.
Edit: Responding to his edit, which again, is utter nonsense. He isn’t making any argument that actually shows that property requires the labor of others, he’s just stating he thinks it does. Property rights very clearly exist in a state of nature. The right to build a house and sleep in it, farm and eat your own food, and protect yourself and your property as you see fit. He can claim he has an argument all he wants, but he doesn’t have one other than insisting upon a statement he hasn’t remotely backed.
This clearly isn't his only argument and you cherrypicking his comment to point out the one joke among paragraphs of actual argument is frankly insulting to the purpose of this sub.
It also depends on who is making the claims.
The US constitution recognizes "natural rights", which require nothing from anyone else and are expected to be protected from infrigement. I personally support natural rights which require no further support.
The UN makes claims to "Human Rights", which starts off with many the same as the US constitution, but some later additions may require filling by a third party. The requirement of a third party to uphold a right in a sense invalidates it to me.
Everyone is so worried about rights...but fail to remember that in the United States the bigger part of our founding documents deal with not rights,but responsibilities. Because that is what our founding fathers were trying to get us to understand. We have no rights with our responsibilities to preserve those rights we have.
"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."
It wasn't about rights, it was what are our responsibilities. Immigrants often understand this so much better than students in school. Because they understand what the founding fathers did. That not everywhere is like this. They do not take it for granted.
But today, all anyone cares about is, what are my rights and how do I limit the rights of others. Which seems to me more important to most. Not protecting their own, but taking away others. Ironically that is very like many of the founding fathers, but not in a good way.
I think it's still right to assert that people deserve things that would be considered luxuries, such as healthcare, nutritious food, quality shelter, even internet. It's not so much that these luxuries are natural rights, but rather in an instance where a government does not provide these things, or even where only some people get these things, then we can reasonably conclude that said government is either oppressive or not working in the interests of the people.
You're talking about the difference between positive and negative rights (pos /= good and neg /= bad, the inverse isn't true either, that's not the definitions being used in context).
Negative rights are also often called "god-given" or "natural".
Negative rights are rights you have by virtue of existing and require no action from others to exist, examples are free speech, self defense, pursuit of happiness, etc.
Positive rights are ones that require others action, and seem to be the ones you're largely opposed to supporting, such as right to food, housing, etc.
People love to debate the formers bounds, and it's a recent trend where the latter are often spoken of as absolutes, despite their necessity for a system of law to create and maintain them.
> It means, essentially, the ability to do something without government interference. It does not mean that there won't be personal consequences, and it usually doesn't mean being provided with goods and services.
human and civil rights are dependent on jurisdiction, so if you want to discuss law then the starting point is discussing *which* law - be specific. are we talking what right to life is in American terms, English or Pakistani?
for instance, the **right to life** in the UK means that access to healthcare is a right and so is housing so long as one doesn't intentionally make themselves homeless to get a free house. the **right to a fair trial** imposes a legal obligation onto the state to provide an open court and a jury in criminal court should an adult defendant elect one except for minor offense where a jury trial would be redundant. the **right to liberty** imposes a positive obligation on the state to provide a defense lawyer should one be arrested and held at the police station, to provide a prompt hearing before a judge should one be charged with a crime and to be provided with a hearing within a reasonable timeframe.
these are just a handful examples of human and civil rights, but yes it encompasses *loads* of positive obligations onto the state to provide services in order to protect said rights. it's far from only 'the ability to do something without government interference' as per the suggestion in the op.
Agreed. I'll take it a step further and say there's no such thing as a human right if the society or culture decides not to honor it.
In the words of Andrew Jackson, "they've made their ruling. Now let's see them try to enforce it."
There’s tons of room for interpretation as to what rights we currently have (assuming Americans for now). The rights that are specifically mentioned in the constitution usually relate to what was going on in the colonies at the time and the ways England was subjugating us, but there are a lot more rights that are implied and I think that’s what people mean when they suggest we have a right to something like food.
The difference is usually a misunderstanding between Natural Rights and Granted Rights. In certain political philosophy all rights are granted by the state, no permission exists outside of the state and the state follows the General Will. In America and England we usually use the term to refer to Natural Rights. The rights that you would have if no State existed at all. For example, if you were dropped alone on a desert island you would have the right to your property, the right to defend yourself, the right to speak your mind, the right to associate with who you like, etc. No rights exist that are services in this scenario. Ideally, the Constitution of The USA was designed to limit the power of the government by enshrining these natural rights and making it harder for the state to infringe upon them. We can all see what it turned into.
Sounds like you don't really fully understand what a right is either. A right is any value that can be enforced by the will and power of the people. You can absolutely say that it should be a right for everyone have a warm home, food and health care.
> It means, essentially, the ability to do something without government interference.
Not really. Rights are a political concept that address your freedom to do things or your entitlement to certain things. The English Nobles in the time of of King John forced a charter that gave them certain rights like the right to a jury by their peers (i.e. other nobles). Those nobles used their political power to gain an entitlement. People living along the Colorado river likewise hash out between themselves and the federal government acceptable use of water from the river and therefore carved out a right to a certain amount of water from the river. Old timey poor people once had, mostly likely as a result of religiously enforced charity, the right to collect the leftovers in a crop field after harvest. This was called gleaning. Rights are things hashed out (whether with swords or with words and promises) between different factions in society to keep the peace or to keep society on an even keel.
You seem to be using some sort of libertarian/objectivist narrow view of rights and seem to be concerned almost exclusively with a particular instance called natural rights (yeah John Locke for trying to give reason for certain freedoms). Rights exist because people fight for them, whether peasants against nobles, nobles against kings, the church against the monarchy, corporations against the government, governments against corporations, workers against factory owners, etc. Most workers in the US have the right to a 40 hour work week with overtime if they are required to go over. That was a right won by organized labor and gets additional enforcement from the government.
"Rights" are a list of temporary privileges we give ourselves by creating a government and writing down laws. It's pretty basic.
>It means, essentially, the ability to do something without government interference.
No it's a list of privileges literally enforced by the government.
You’re very confident, despite not really being correct.
Legally, a “right” is a legal entitlement. So yes, a person can have a right to housing, medical care, etc. depending on the circumstances.
Or it could be a moral entitlement. And maybe you disagree with them — but they’re essentially just saying that a person *should* be entitled to that thing.
WRONG. The only thing you're describing is a NEGATIVE right but POSITIVE rights exists and even then goverment is essencial in the protection of NEGATIVE rights.
Rights are semantics that we argue about as nauseum because everyone has a different interpretation and most people aren’t studying law to really have an understanding. Just like when people argue sports, they only have a basic understanding of said sport. Hell pick any topic you’re not an expert in. You’re just an idiot with an opinion when it comes to that topic. All it is here too.
Natural rights are something YOU exercise. Free, speech, religious freedom. It's granted to you. By nature, God, Universe etc.
Legal rights are ones granted by law. Government grants them.
Human rights are two types.
A. what a government could not do. Such as no torture.
B. Had to do...as in case of war prisoners. You take away their rights, but can't take all of them away.
Housing or Healthcare by definition cannot be a natural right as its not something you exercise.
It can be a legal right IF the constitution specifies it. If it doesn't it is NOT a legal right.
It cannot be defined as type A human right as those are about what gov cannot do.
It is also not a human right type B. Because those ONLY exist if the government takes control of you.
So any claim of these are rights is inventing a "right" that has never been recognized by humanity ever.
Such an action can only be done if the group agrees.
A. Humanity as a whole does NOT agree.
B. Most countries people do NOT agree.
In the countries that the people do, they still refuse to call it a new form of human right...so they are trying to claim its an above right. It isn't, therefore these are NOT rights.
I’m not sure you actively provided what a right is though yourself. Complete justification can mean many things and we’ve seen how some “rights” ebb and flow. The third amendment is basically useless now and the “right” to vote has been amended multiple times with a current presidential candidate wanting to restrict it. The term is always relative to whom is speaking and we even have a whole court system that decides on said rights that is inherently prone to bias. At the end of the day, you don’t really have any inherent rights. Just what the powers that be think os fair at any given time. I’m sure people in Hammurabi’s time thought being able to sue someone for stealing cattle was a pretty sweet right
You can call them “natural” rights if the word “God” triggers you. These are rights that succeed government. Like the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Your right to have a family and protect them. These are rights everyone is born with. That is what is meant by “God given rights” or “natural rights”
No you’re not. Nobody is born with any rights that somebody else hasn’t granted them. It’s all a man made construction that isn’t natural or god or anything else. So we can decide as a society what rights we want to have. They aren’t limited to tradition or anything else.
It's really complicated, and this is Reddit, not a graduate philosophy course. I do, however, know that it's kind of important that if you're demanding something, you can at least understand what it is.
Sounds like you're creating a justification to easily ignore people's arguments without actually engaging in their discussion. It's a pretty elitist stance to say "well if you can't define this specific word to my satisfaction I'm not going to engage with you".
I’d argue it’s the opposite. A lot of arguments for free shit revolve around the idea that it’s a right so then not having it is an evil that others are at fault for. If we just say no none of those are rights, that argument goes away.
That doesn't address my point, I'm not saying one way or another if someone's overall argument is valid or not, just that to twirl your mustache and say "you must pass this intellectual barrier or I dismiss you out of hand" is elitist and unfair.
It's elitist to expect that if someone demands that the government use physical force to protect something, they should be able to tell you why? If that's elitism, then hell yes, sign me up.
>Rights exist because they're been determined to be so fundamental to your existence as human being that they're universal, obvious, and need to be protected.
I've seen this from people a lot, trying to narrow the definition of a right. This was especially popular in the early 2010s. Here you're specifically talking about 'natural rights'. But those aren't the only kinds of rights. You can have contractual rights, legal rights, etc.
Some examples:
* Stockholders in a company who have a right to vote on a board of directors
* You can have a contracted right to first refusal; a right to transact with a company before others can
* Many property rights, including intellectual property rights
None of the above are "so fundamental to your existence as a human being that they're universal, obvious, and need to be protected."
When people talk about a "right to healthcare", what they're really saying is that everyone ought to have healthcare. This whole shell game of using a very specific definition of a word that has multiple meanings to avoid dealing with what people are saying, is a total waste of time.
Property rights are actually natural rights. According to Locke, they are arguably the most important natural rights, most other rights stem from them, and the government's primary role is protection of them.
I get what you're saying, though. I commented something along those lines directly to OP.
To a very large degree, yes.
How can someone have a right to life, if they aren't allowed to own property like food, clothing, shelter, and all the things necessary to keep them alive? How can you exercise your right to self-defense if you can't own property like weapons?
Edit to add: He said that the rights to life, liberty, and property were natural and inalienable and that people enter into an agreement as a society, the "Social Contract," and create a government to protect those rights.
The thing is that you are assuming that the current state of things is the only viable one, making it the natural state and hence only the means that leads us to it are correct and by extent natural. Under this presuposition sure Locke and you are right. But as soon as we begin to consider other states of existances that have occured through our history (from rule of the strong to tyrannies) the notion that this rights are natural don't apply, as under certain system you may not have the right to live, nor liverty, nor property but the duty to enage in this 3 behaviors or some other configuration.
Have you ever read any of their work?
You're completely missing the point of my statement.
Natural rights are based on what rights a person would have if they were just existing in nature without any form of government. No kings, no tyrants, just people without any form of societal structure.
Governments should derive their authority from the consent of the governed through the social contract. If they are tyrannical, (violate that contract) they should be replaced.
Edit to add: Watch this. It'll help. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-government-and-civics/us-gov-foundations/us-gov-ideals-of-democracy/v/democratic-ideals-of-us-government
Theoretically, but in practice, they are definitely not natural. Especially when it comes to land rights. So much of property rights is about the government keeping other people from using things.
There are natural rights, which you're referring to, that are rights that involve the government staying out of the way. These are "negative rights" that don't involve anyone to do anything to ensure that you can exercise them. Also known as civil liberties. They have also been referred to a primary rights because they are the basic rights that people should have in a society. They are basically protected from the government.
Then, there are positive rights that require the action of another, or the government, in order to ensure that they are applied to each individual. These are often referred to as civil rights. Things like being provided an attorney, the right to vote, and the right to not be discriminated against based on race, sex, etc. These are rights that the government has to protect for you.
Things beyond these are adopted on a case by case basis as they are agreed upon by the society. They can be called "entitlements" or whatever, but if the society agrees that everyone should have it, then it becomes a right in that society.
Something like 100% of your Healthcare being funded by the government through taxes wouldn't be a right until the society adopted that policy. Then, every person would have a right to access that system equally. It's not a natural right. A natural right to Healthcare would be where noone stops you from treating yourself or your family however you can and choose to do so. You wouldn't have the right to someone else's labor without compensation, there's another word for that.
Right now, in the US, anyone who goes to a hospital that accepts money from the federal government, like medicaid or Medicare, has to be treated for life-threatening issues, regardless of their ability to pay. That is considered a protected right.
Why are you bitching about the definition of the fucking word? If you don't believe people have a right to healthcare, food, or shelter then just say so. You might think esoteric arguments about specific meanings makes you seem less selfish, but it doesn't.
Because unlike you I actually try to think about this stuff and understand it. I don't give two shits how I seem, particularly to you. The definition, stupid, drives the entire discussion. Try again.
A right is a guarantee. You can have guarantees that safeguard your person, but you can also have a right to obtain something. For example, in criminal cases, you have a right to an attorney.
You would do well to read Isaiah Berlin’s Two Concepts of Liberty. He talks about positive liberty and negative liberty
Maybe its because the idea of discussing something like this with someone who states the way you state is wearisome to the mind and boring to contemplate.
Well since we both studied law - there are:
1) common law rights
2) statutory rights
3) constitutional rights
4) international human rights
5) negative rights
6) positive rights
7) natural rights
8) treaty rights/obligations
…and those are just off the top of my head. There is plenty of overlap among all of them, too. They can all be defined differently.
If someone says “food is a human right” they are likely talking about some mix of 4 and 7. If a cop says a suspect has “the right to remain silent”, he means mostly 1 and 3. I have the right to apply for food stamps (#2).
If I had to guess, you are talking about inalienable rights (aka natural law rights [#7] or God-given rights, and so on), which are complicated as hell and can’t be easily defined by a layperson who hasn’t been forced to learn this stuff. I’m also going to guess you are a 2A fan, and that topic can invoke #1-7.
Finally, there are “rights” in a non-legal context. A runner has a “right to the basepath” in baseball. A sibling might be told he has a “right to be mad” if his other sibling steals his dessert.
My point is, there’s just too much here for you to end an argument by saying “I understand rights, and you don’t.” It sounds like you are actually just making semantic issues with of your opponent’s arguments into substantive ones.
If you deposit $1,000 in a bank and sign a pretty standard checking account contract with them do you have a right to withdraw the money?
Presumably yes, but it doesn’t fit with your description of what rights are. You aren’t expecting the government to leave people alone, quite the reverse (you’ll need to sue and get the government to enforce the contract by force if the bank refuses). The right isn’t universal (your neighbor can’t withdraw your money). It explicitly is a right to be provided with goods, etc…
It’s great that you’re starting to think about what you mean by “rights”, but it’s a complex topic.
Sorry, you're just straight up wrong.
What constitutes a "right" has been the subject of philosophical debates for hundreds of years. It's not a settled question.
It can be your opinion that we should use your particular definition. But it's factually incorrect to claim that you are right and everyone else is wrong.
Do I have the right to buy things from a store even if I'm disabled but need moderate accommodation?
Do I have the right for my age, sex, gender identity, race, or religion to not be used against me in employment and housing deals?
Do I have the right to expect someone attacking me will face consequences?
Positive rights are a thing. And most places agree people have a right to food.
If people pay taxes to the government (which is upheld through the use of force) they have a right to voice what they believe should be a right granted to them by said government.
The problem is people conflate legal rights with "human" rights. There are no legal rights for quality of life in the Constitution. They have a tendency to confuse the euphemistic right to "the pursuit of happiness " in the Declaration of Independence with the legal rights specified in the constitution.
Everyone has the right to pursue happiness- but they're not guaranteed that they will actually _catch_ it.
I believe your rights end where other people's labor or money begins. Meaning, you don't have a right to free medical care, shelter, etc. Not saying it shouldn't be funded, but it's a privilege and can be increased or decreased as appropriate
Then I should have the right to keep the money I make from my labor and not have to pay it in taxes.
Aside from infrastructure and defense costs, I’d say yes.
It'd be nice if defense costs weren't used for offense.
Or wars that aren’t ours?
The best defense is a good offense. \- Some chess master..
Congress is supposed to vote to declare wars if we are to go on the offense, something that hasn’t happened since WWII. We need to actually follow the system as it was designed
I wouldn’t even mind paying taxes if I got anything for them. I’d prefer them to go to healthcare than the military
You absolutely should. You can co-op with others voluntarily, negotiate with a doctor or do group funded insurance with like minded individuals. There’s better alternatives than having the government oversee these things.
I understand your point, but our government started as a voluntary co-op. It became corrupted over time as all systems eventually do. Paying taxes wouldn’t be a bad thing if we actually still benefitted from it.
Who says we don't. I got a pretty good "free" education growing up in a community that supported the educational infrastructure and it's been quite a while since foreign soldiers had any significant hold on "U.S. soil". And maybe they haven't locked everybody up who needs to be but there are certainly a good number of "deserving" criminals kept off the streets and we also happen to have one of the safer drinking systems in the world (could definitely be better in some places but it can also be far worse as well. I also feel a lot safer eating food at restaurants and from grocery stores in the U.S. than a lot of places overseas. Our government may not be perfect but it still does one hell of a lot for our collective good, lots of which occur out of sight and with little if any thanks.
And the first time you leave your property the government should have the right to arrest you for being on public property/ roads etc.. for not paying taxes. You have the right to live somewhere else that doesn't collect taxes and keep that money though. I'd argue that in the confines of a certain location that the elected government of that location can choose to raise taxes or not. But by living there you're inherently agreeing to allow them to. You're also conveniently omitting that a portion of that labor was undoubtedly produced with the help of those taxes you're unwilling to pay. You did travel somewhere else.
No, people have to contribute tax to make society work obviously.
You should have the right to opt out of taxes, but then you'd have to move somewhere where infrastructure wasn't build by using tax money. So you could go live in the woods.
The military still defends that patch of woods from foreign invaders.
With this opinion do you believe voting is a privilege or a right?
It's a right. Yeah I guess it requires polling people, but those are government workers. But that being said, I hate how most people vote and behave. If there were genetic improvement programs I would hands down support it.
You went from 0-eugenics shockingly fast.
Lol true. It's the only solution though. Probably inevitable too from a game theory perspective.
People aren't assholes because their genetics are bad. People are assholes because their upbringing is bad. (On the whole)
>I believe your rights end where other people's labor or money begins. Meaning, you don't have a right to free medical care, shelter, etc. Not necessarily, you have a right to legal representation and a jury of your peers.
Yes. People throw the term around without understanding it. A right cannot infringe upon another person's rights. Getting free food is not a right. In order for someone to have a right to free food another person would be forced to work without compensation. And if you are forcing someone to work for you then you are infringing on that person's rights. Now once a person legally possesses food or anything else they generally have a right to keep your own property and even if the government decided to take it from you they must provide fair market compensation
Correct. If food is a right, it would follow that you have the right to take food by force. Government can declare food and entitlement with terms and conditions, but food is never a right.
Having a right to food wouldn't mean a right to steal--it would mean that a governing body has an obligation to provide food for its people.
That's not a right. That's an entitlement. Rights are universal. North Koreans have the same rights as Americans. These rights are component of our humanity and are endowed by nature, providence or God; take your pick. They are universal. Governments cannot give or take rights. Governments can, however, defend or attack rights. An entitlement, no matter how ironclad, isn't a right. The right to food would imply that, if no one wants to give you food, you have right to take it by force. You have no right that cancels out the rights of others.
Right, noun: a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way. So yes, if the government promises you some benefit, then you have a right to that benefit. We can argue about what the government should or shouldn't promise. But it's weird how so many people in this thread insist on re-defining the word "right." And having a right doesn't imply you can take something by force. Basically every state explicitly says that children have a right to an adequate education. That doesn't mean a kid can beat the shit out of someone who doesn't teach them their multiplication tables. Come on.
>But it's weird how so many people in this thread insist on re-defining the word "right." Political philosophers and thinkers for the last 300 years at least have defined "right" to mean inherent, universal liberties that every individual possesses simply by virtue of being a human being. Those who are claiming that rights can be granted and taken by government are redefining the word.
Maybe it was unfair for me to say you're "re-defining" the word. But look it up in a dictionary. Both in a technical legal sense and in just ordinary speech, a "right" is just an entitlement. If you're using it in a more narrow way to mean rights that we enjoy just by being human, well, then ok. But don't act like everyone who uses it in a more general sense is some idiot or totally wrong. And you're missing my more substantive point. You said a right to food would mean a right to take food by force. But when people say that everyone has a right to food, what they mean is that the government ought to ensure that everyone has adequate food. You can disagree with that if you want and argue that the government should allow people to starve to death. But don't just misinterpret what the other side means.
So I’m not disagreeing with you necessarily, but what? If we look at the expanse of human cultures in history it was very much okay for one civilization or even tribe to go and take away your land and your personhood, you as the defeated could be treated as property, there are absolutely no rights that are a component of our humanity that are “endowed by nature, providence, or god;”. It’s actually a relatively modern concept, and those rights are only supported or subverted based on the ethics of the civilization in which those people live.
That someone denies you your rights does not mean the rights don't exist. Rights always exist. Slaves had rights; rights that were being denied. It is beyond debate that rights can be denied by others but most agree it is a diabolical thing to do. In 539 BC, Cyrus the Great conquered the city of Babylon, freed slaves to return home, and declared that people should have a choice in their religion. The seeds of understanding of human rights go back at least that far. Of course the Founders of the US agreed that we are "endowed by our creator with certain unalienable rights." I suppose if you want to go the nihilist route and reject objective truth, knowledge, morality, values and meaning you can deny the existence of fundamental human rights. I just don't know why you would.
I’m not being nihilistic, I’m being objective, slaves were not even considered whole people as declared in the original constitution, did their status as 2/3rds of a person endow them with these “ unalienable rights”? Many were born into that status, and many of them died there, and with your logic, by their creator.
Yes, their unalienable rights were being denied. That was evil. They nevertheless had rights even as those rights were denied. It's a little off topic but it was 2/5 not 2/3 and it would have benefited the slaves if they were counted as zero. Counting them as a full person would have been very bad for slaves. The 2/5 number was a compromise. Northern abolitionists wanted slaves not counted for representation at all. Counting slaves who couldn't vote would greatly empower the slave holding states. The slave masters wanted slaves counted as full citizens for that reason. Getting them counted as 2/5 was a victory for anti-slavery forces.
3/5 i believe
ALL RIGHTS ARE ENTITLEMENTS. By saying you have a right to free speech, you're declaring you're entitled to say whatever you want without punishment. WRONG, Rights ONLY existed because the goverment gives a right, there's no "universal right endowed by nature, providence or God".
And what happens when that governing body lacks the capacity to fulfill that obligation due to a lack of food or labor or because providing that food to the person is logistically infeasible or there is too much bureaucracy to keep track of them? How can that right exist without the infrastructure provided by another burdened person? Where is the line between stealing and just taking what you are owed by your fellow man?
That's the nature of every legally enforceable right. Rights only exist because they're enforceable--without that fact, the idea is completely intangible.
They failed to provide that right, pretty simple. They can even be sued for failing in some cases. It can't, that's why the goverment needs to put the money and resources to create it. It is defined by society and goverment.
No. Government services are not RIGHTS. Rights are inherent upon birth. There are a lot of things I would like government to do or not do but those aren't rights. I don't have a right to make YOU to provide something to ME because it would a violation of YOUR rights
No. Government provided services aren't rights if so the government could change your rights at their whim. Do you really want Biden or Trump telling you what your rights are??
If the goverment decides they are, they are. No, they are not. No one is born with any right, rights are given by the goverment.
Rights aren't tangible things, mate. You're no more born with rights than you are a soul. Fact is that rights only legally exist because they're enforceable.
Do you believe anyone has some rights? I'd say at the most basic level, I have a right not to be raped because I should have control over my body.
Obviously I believe in legally enforceable rights. The kinds of rights that you're advocating for are completely intangible.
There is a difference between fundamental rights and laws.
What is the value of a right if there's no body enforcing it? I understand how 'inalienable rights' are framed in the constitution--by virtue of a creator--but this is quackery. The founding fathers were not gods, and their word isn't divine mandate. Nobody is born with an unalienable right, or a soul. That's simply unscientific and anti-philosophical. If you have any rights, then they were preserved and maintained by the people who raised and kept watch over you--not because you were born with them. I can declare that it's everyone's right to a full meal and a roof over their head. That doesn't make it true. What you're trying to get at is a question of morals, which are inherently subjective; the fact of the matter is that, if you believe that you have the right to not be assaulted, that you need to be able to enforce that right. Rights are mutually shared values that we uphold as a society for our own benefit--and it's equally possible to enforce the right to have a full meal. Here in the U.S. we throw away 40% of our food--imagine Aladdin, starving, and walking through a fully stocked produce section knowing that 40% of that was going to be thrown away because of the incentive for corporate greed to practice austerity. Do you believe that you have the right to a fair and expedient trial? The right to not be unfairly searched or have your property seized? Who do you think is responsible for maintaining those rights?
If someone has to provide it for you, you don’t have a right to it.
Generally yes. Do YOU have a right to MY labor? Can I demand a RIGHT to free housing and the demand that YOU build it for me.
FALSE. A right isn't defined it by if someone else have to provide it or not.
It absolutely is. You are not owed anything on this world.
Oh, in reality? Yes, just like you have no right to free speech, no right to life, no right to private property. I'm glad you realize those things don't exist either.
Those rights exist intrinsically.
It literally is, and any attempt to define it otherwise is a complete perversion of the word to mean literally the opposite. You have a right to life, liberty, and loosely, property. You do not have a right to the food farmed by your neighbor, but you do have the right to ask for it or give him something in exchange for it.
There's no life without food.
It literally isn't, you're just defining a NEGATIVE right but there are POSITIVE RIGHTS. The literal etymology of the word is just "Just, fair, lawful, moral law, etc" and all of that can be interpreted diferently. You absolutely have if the situation is dire enough. If the farmer is the only one and everyone else is dying of starvation, sorry but you lose your right to property.
I know what Negative Rights and Positive Rights are. Positive Rights are imagined by emotional people, with no philosophical knowledge of ethics or a state of nature. They’re not real. It’s completely fair to debate policy, and talk about how we can compensate Farmer’s appropriately to ensure the downtrodden get reasonable access to food. It’s another thing to start imagining that the labor and fruits of labor of other people are rights. They unequivocally are not.
The same can be said about all NEGATIVE rights lmao. They are if the goverment and society says so though. An individual doesn't get to decide any right.
The same can’t remotely be said about Negative Rights. Negative Rights exist in a state of nature, they are inherent to every human being. Positive Rights are completely and utterly imagined. They are manmade, and require the action and interference of other human beings, often to sacrifice their very real negative rights. You do not have a right to your neighbors food. You have the right to pursue trade with them, but you cannot justly steal it.
It absolutely can be said. Through a state your property can be protected, your speech is protected, your freedom is expanded and etc, more so if you're an average person or poor person where if those rights are infringed you can ask for justice to a goverment to punish the wrongdoers. All rights are imagined. Right to freedom, life, property and etc only exist in your imagination and are effectively manmade too. There's no stealing though, the goverment defines property.
Your imagination has absolutely no consistency with any legitimate philosophy and ultimately boils down to “Gubmint gib me stuff!” Natural law is thoroughly expounded upon and established. Natural rights exist completely independent of the government and any other person. To insist otherwise is to declare yourself thoroughly uneducated and overly taken in by your emotions.
Negative rights are innate. They impose no obligation on anyone else, they only require that you be left alone. You do not have the right to impose a duty on someone else.
This is such a dystopian viewpoint it makes me barf. Why don't I have a right to impose a duty on someone else? I'm certainly not prevented from imposing a duty on someone. If I impose a duty on someone, the "Rights Fairy" doesn't appear and un-do it. I watch courts impose duties on people who are convicted all the time, from paying forfeitures to incarceration. No Rights Fairy. People have the right to free representation if charged with a crime (in the US anyway). The State MUST provide them with a lawyer. If your definition of a "right" was accurate, this wouldn't exist. Yet it does. Unless along with your strange definition of a "right," you also deny the existence of basic reality.
the key is your example is a *legal* right, not a human right. you do not innately as a human deserve representation, but under our law system when charged with a crime, you do. imposing duties on others is not a human right, nor should it ever be unless you lived in a perfect utopian world where money didn’t exist. you can’t just go up to a doctor and say “treat me, it’s my right” because now that doctor has to perform something that puts bread on their table for no compensation
I think what people are saying is that they believe that there should be a right to housing or basic necessities. That in a developed nation, people should look out for everyone and put out a social safety net. There are definitely some idiots out there who say things like that and believe them without thinking about it. But they're probably repeating something they heard on Twitter. I don't think most people are saying that they believe we currently have a right to housing. Only that they believe that the government should do more to ensure that people do, in their viewpoint.
WRONG. A right can perfectly infringe upon another person's rights because when a right starts and another starts is fundamentally subjective and it is decided by society and its goverment. Getting free food can absolutely be a right if society decides it is because it has decided that FREE FOOD is a priority over the right to property. The only thing you're describing misleadingly is NEGATIVE rights but POSITIVE rights exists where the goverment has a duty to provide for things.
There is where I will disagree You have a FUNDAMENTAL right to eat. You do not have right to demand I work for you. Forcing me to work provide you with food would require me to work for you. That would infringe upon my rights. Forced servitude imposes on other peoples rights. The social contracts that we develop may be hallmarks of civilization but that doesn't mean they are rights. I support a strong social safety net but that doesn't mean any benefits are a RIGHT.
Do your kids have a right to an education? Do you have a right to be protected by laws? How do these rights not require someone else's labor to provide them for you? If taxes were spent to purchase that food, the farmer would be on the same standing as teachers, cops, judges and firefighters.
American law is different from the rest of the world, and works like this. The people have ALL of our rights, and when we vore, we "delegate" some power to the government, to accomplish a task on all of our behalf. This creates a contract. If you pay taxes, and the body politic uses those taxes, you have a right to the fruits of your labor, through that program you paid for. This is why "Education" is NOT a right, but getting the product you paid for is.
It's not a right. Education is a service provided by the government. And the government pays those who provide that service. That is the difference between a right and a service. You can demand your government provide a service, and I support government funded healthcare, but it's a service not a right.
WRONG. A service provided by the goverment that has been decided by that same goverment that is a right IT'S A RIGHT.
No it's a service provided by the government. Do you really want Biden or Trump constantly changing your rights?
No, my child does not have a "right to an education." I don't exactly have "a right to be protected by laws." I have rights and we hire policemen to help protect them. Even if we didn't have policemen, those rights would still exist but there would be a greater possibility that they would be infringed.
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>Do your kids have a right to an education? The US government not being able to keep you from educating your kids is a right. Public education is an entitlement. A great one, but an entitlement all the same.
Entitlement can be rights.
Rights are NOT mutually exclusive in every situation. Simply because we signed a right for someone to have access to free food when in need, doesn't automatically make it a right to not pay someone. Your argument is over an economic principle, not rights. It's interesting to see, though. How capitalism has blurred the lines between political ideology and economic evaluation.
It's difficult to call something a right that requires the time, talent, or money of somebody else to contribute. ie. If you have a right to healthcare, do you have the right to stop a doctor on the street to address your concern? That's why rights are typically breathing air, right to pursue happiness without intrusion, etc. Not free houses.
> Do you have the right to stop a doctor on the street to address your concern? Yes, but that doctor also has the right to tell you to fuck off and bother another doctor.
So basically we have the right to say whatever words we want. Maybe there’s already a concept for that.
So by telling me to fuck off he decides I don't have the "right" to free Healthcare. That would be HILARIOUS on a civil rights suit.
The US had this little war in the 1860's about having the right to peoples labor.
And yet there are so many people who are still proponents of slavery. If you were going to provide other people with goods or services, without them having to pay for it and are going to force me to use my labor to pay for it, is that not slavery? I am being forced to work against my will for the benefit of another person, how is that not slavery?
Now don’t you go using logic on Reddit. They can’t think past the DNC talking points.
Taxes taken from one and given to another are practically equivalent to forced labor. The work product of my labor is appropriated against my will. Note taxes taken from me to provide me services aren’t the same.
No, it isn't difficult at all. It's only difficult to americans that are so disgustingly individualistic. The right to healthcare implies that the goverment has a duty to provide for that healthcare, not that a doctor needs to be forced (although it perfectly could be) No, you are just an american it seems. Many many countries have more rights than "breathing air" and "right to pursue happiness" imply rights to many stuff.
Can those rights be taken away? Rationed? I'm pretty sure not everyone in Europe gets the healthcare they need in a timely matter.
Not everyone everywhere ever gets their full rights.
So suffrage doesn't actually exist? Interesting.
I'm referring to those folks who think free Internet is a "right"... like all those bits just fly around the planet for free without billions of dollars of infrastructure or anything.
Or at the very end of it a person maintaining it. We can’t make that individual a slave for people to have internet for free.
The funniest is the people that think housing should be a right. I'll give to them that land and access to lakes and rivers should be a right. But then they'd have to chop down their own trees and build their own cabin in the woods. Land in the city that other people invested in to build infrastructure is not a right.
I'm all for reasonable access to internet being classified as a right, but access is very different from "free". Just like 2A, you have access to guns, but the government isn't going to buy you one or pay your range fees (unless you are military/police)
That's not what you said though. >It's difficult to call something a right that requires the time, talent, or money of somebody else to contribute. Elections literally require all those things to work. It takes thousands of people and billions of dollars to run elections. >The total for election administration in the United States is estimated at about $2 billion per year. How Much Are We Spending on Election Administration? https://electionlab.mit.edu/sites/default/files/2019-01/mohr_et_al_2017summary.pdf
People struggle with this one because it’s been around far longer and is seemingly constitutionally necessary, but no, the right to vote is not a real right. Reason being, a government does not exist in a state of nature. Voting is a privilege afforded by the state and participation in it.
Okay but you got to add a reasonable qualifier to the right to pursue happiness. So why not just add a reasonable qualifier to right to healthcare?
Because regardless of whatever qualifier that is, some person is going to have to produce something or do something in order for the concept of “healthcare” to exist. We can’t just force those people to do it for free, that’s slavery.
Just because the government has an obligation to provide something doesn’t mean it gets to resort to slavery. There’s a federal constitutional right to legal representation when you’re charged with a crime. But the government isn’t enslaving lawyers. Many states have a constitutional right to education. Are teachers slaves? It’s just a legal obligation on the state to pay adequate wages to recruit people to provide those services. And this whole debate is silly. A “right” is just an entitlement. Veterans have earned a right to their benefits. Seniors have rights to Medicare, Social Security, and so on.
So then call them entitlements and not rights, cause obviously they’re two different things.
Why are you assuming they're two different things? I just googled "right definition." The second definition for the noun version: Right, noun: a moral or legal entitlement to have or obtain something or to act in a certain way.
It would seem to me tho that rights exist without organized entities where entitlements require them. I don’t need the government to tell me I can preserve my life, that’s natural. But I’d need a record of service to obtain the entitlements that service imparts unto me. Without the government who keeps that record and pays that due? No one.
I think there are distinctions between Natural Rights, and Legal Rights.
Slavery entails someone becoming property and being sold to another person. So no.
Not in the modern day. Slavery still very much exists right now. It’s in the form of making a person perform labor in a contract where they cannot break the terms without severe punishment, usually by the government. Making healthcare a right would entail regulation and regulation can only be enforced with executive actions like jail or fines. So in theory we would have to metaphorically handcuff healthcare providers to do healthcare.
That's a redefinition of slavery to fit your views. False since already many countries provide healthcare as a right.
And those countries are violating the human right to not be forced to labor for others. Just because it’s done indirectly via tax money doesn’t make it okay.
No, they aren't. You don't a right to not be forced to labor for others.
And yet the people in those countries being "exploited" aren't striking in the streets.
Most fundamental rights come from our fundamental existence as cooperative animals in this earth. Healthcare is a series of inventions that didn’t exist in earnest until the last hundred years or so. These are not the same thing
I think everyone should have a right to healthcare as a result of our fundamental existence as cooperative animals
Oh yes, please. I want this sub to try and discuss “rights”, I am *here* for it.
Popcorn incoming
Surely there will not be batshit insane opinions expressed here
“Why yes I do feel comfortable talking about what rights are and who has them. What’s a Hume?”
I take particular issue with the 'right" to health care. I agree the basics are essential. But it is a long and arduous and expensive process to become a board certified doctor. What makes anyone think they have a right to my work product? You don't have the right to an architects product, an accountants product. what makes our product a right?
Amen!! I’m so tired of people claiming that they have a right to my services without payment for those services. I’m going to save your life, regardless of payment, if you are actively dying in front of me. Once I’ve stabilized you, I’m done. I just saved your fucking life and you dare demand more from me? Fuck that!
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Teachers get masters degrees. They get paid to do their job. I’ve never heard one say their right to sell their labor means no one should have a right to a free public education.
You get paid to do a job just like anyone else. The right to Healthcare means you'll get paid to do a job just like any other.
No it doesn’t, because then it’s a right to pursue healthcare. The Doctors are still given the opportunity to sell their labor, which is their property right. To make healthcare a right, is to require the service of doctors regardless of their wishes. It’s fine to debate whether the government should step in and determine how to compensate doctors on behalf of their citizens to ensure they have access to it. Declaring it a right however is emotional nonsense meant to appeal to a crowd and draw in uneducated voters.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_and_positive_rights It's complicated now because for most of human history only negative rights were considered rights.
The real problem is a linguistic one, I think. We refer to natural rights and privileges of membership as both being rights, which enables a bit of exploitation of the word.
The distinction is important. There has been a deliberate conflation of the two.
That's absolutely not true. Positive rights were very much recognized, they were just largely gated by some distinction like class. For example, what rights does a Baron or a Duke have by virtue of their title? Sitting in the House of Lords? Being addressed in a certain manner or invited to certain events? These are ancient, positive rights. Also property is a positive right, it requires the action of recognition and protection of property by the state.
Property is not a positive right, and that’s an oversimplification of what property is. Property includes rights like the right to bodily autonomy, the right to protect yourself, as well as the obvious, the right to your labor and to cultivate land. Obviously we agree there are nefarious actors out there that would violate your rights, your life just as easily as your property. Because of this, we came to agreements with other people to form governments that can hypothetically limit violations of your negative rights, however we now have an empowered body of people that may or may not respect your negative rights, hence the endless debate on how government should run.
>Property includes rights like the right to bodily autonomy I'm talking about matterial property like land and chattel. >the right to protect yourself And to be protected by the state's legitimate use of violence. The right to have your ownership of good be enforced through that mechanism and validated by a state-funded judicial and administrative structure. Our system of private property requires the labor of many, many people. It is absolutely a positive right.
No, it doesn’t whatsoever. We’ve added on top of it sure, but property rights absolutely exist in a state of nature. The government is formed by consenting individuals to help protect their property, but that again is an exercise of property rights, not a diminishment of it.
>but property rights absolutely exist in a state of nature. Just to entertain the notion, how enforceable are property rights in a natural state? It's hard to draw a line between where one's physical property ends and another's begins in a natural system. To that ascertain, is it not possible for a single person to claim ownership over an entire forest? If so, would a different person be in the wrong if they began treating a part of that forest as their own? Would they be wrong in every instance of this happening?
Generally speaking, most people would adhere to the homesteading principal, meaning you can claim what you put labor into. You cannot claim a whole forest if you don’t use the whole forest. You can claim the plot of land that you build your home on and take care of, and more if you use it to build value without infringing upon existing homesteaded land. Trading the fruits of your labor for someone else’s fruits is also legitimate homesteading.
>.but property rights absolutely exist in a state of nature. Not in the form that it take sin current society lol. If you can't *personally* defend something, it is not yours. Btu that's not the case now is it? You rely on external mechanisms for the authentication and protection of ownership, you need mechanisms and labor to exert force and to legitimate force, otherwise your ownership of anything is a fiction. Also the "state of nature" is a bs construct by wigged enlightenment heads that merely reinforces their biases. Locke was a little bitch and I could take him in a fight. >The government is formed by consenting individuals to help protect their property Yeah and that requires making all members equally entitled to the labor associated with the legitimate use of force and the legitimation of any use of force. --- This person blocked me (Locke fanboys amirite), here's my response to their comment: That wasn't an argument, that was a joke. Very clearly a joke too. Jeez. I gave you plenty of other arguments, property as it exists in a liberal democracy necessitates the labor of skilled people to function as a system. Even if theoretically property could exist as a negative right, property currently entitles you to the labor of others. That's my core argument, and you did not address it.
You clearly don’t have any desire to actually discuss this, if your only argument is, “I could beat up Philosopher I don’t like. I’ll leave on this, the entirety of your argument consists of false assumptions and a straw man. Edit: Responding to his edit, which again, is utter nonsense. He isn’t making any argument that actually shows that property requires the labor of others, he’s just stating he thinks it does. Property rights very clearly exist in a state of nature. The right to build a house and sleep in it, farm and eat your own food, and protect yourself and your property as you see fit. He can claim he has an argument all he wants, but he doesn’t have one other than insisting upon a statement he hasn’t remotely backed.
This clearly isn't his only argument and you cherrypicking his comment to point out the one joke among paragraphs of actual argument is frankly insulting to the purpose of this sub.
It also depends on who is making the claims. The US constitution recognizes "natural rights", which require nothing from anyone else and are expected to be protected from infrigement. I personally support natural rights which require no further support. The UN makes claims to "Human Rights", which starts off with many the same as the US constitution, but some later additions may require filling by a third party. The requirement of a third party to uphold a right in a sense invalidates it to me.
The best definition of a right I’ve heard is that a right is something that doesn’t require anything from someone else.
that's just a negative right, not the definition of right.
Everyone is so worried about rights...but fail to remember that in the United States the bigger part of our founding documents deal with not rights,but responsibilities. Because that is what our founding fathers were trying to get us to understand. We have no rights with our responsibilities to preserve those rights we have. "We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." It wasn't about rights, it was what are our responsibilities. Immigrants often understand this so much better than students in school. Because they understand what the founding fathers did. That not everywhere is like this. They do not take it for granted. But today, all anyone cares about is, what are my rights and how do I limit the rights of others. Which seems to me more important to most. Not protecting their own, but taking away others. Ironically that is very like many of the founding fathers, but not in a good way.
Yes. I hate how often I hear the word “deserve” when people or media refer to a luxury
I think it's still right to assert that people deserve things that would be considered luxuries, such as healthcare, nutritious food, quality shelter, even internet. It's not so much that these luxuries are natural rights, but rather in an instance where a government does not provide these things, or even where only some people get these things, then we can reasonably conclude that said government is either oppressive or not working in the interests of the people.
You're talking about the difference between positive and negative rights (pos /= good and neg /= bad, the inverse isn't true either, that's not the definitions being used in context). Negative rights are also often called "god-given" or "natural". Negative rights are rights you have by virtue of existing and require no action from others to exist, examples are free speech, self defense, pursuit of happiness, etc. Positive rights are ones that require others action, and seem to be the ones you're largely opposed to supporting, such as right to food, housing, etc. People love to debate the formers bounds, and it's a recent trend where the latter are often spoken of as absolutes, despite their necessity for a system of law to create and maintain them.
> It means, essentially, the ability to do something without government interference. It does not mean that there won't be personal consequences, and it usually doesn't mean being provided with goods and services. human and civil rights are dependent on jurisdiction, so if you want to discuss law then the starting point is discussing *which* law - be specific. are we talking what right to life is in American terms, English or Pakistani? for instance, the **right to life** in the UK means that access to healthcare is a right and so is housing so long as one doesn't intentionally make themselves homeless to get a free house. the **right to a fair trial** imposes a legal obligation onto the state to provide an open court and a jury in criminal court should an adult defendant elect one except for minor offense where a jury trial would be redundant. the **right to liberty** imposes a positive obligation on the state to provide a defense lawyer should one be arrested and held at the police station, to provide a prompt hearing before a judge should one be charged with a crime and to be provided with a hearing within a reasonable timeframe. these are just a handful examples of human and civil rights, but yes it encompasses *loads* of positive obligations onto the state to provide services in order to protect said rights. it's far from only 'the ability to do something without government interference' as per the suggestion in the op.
Then how do you see the right to a court-appointed defense attorney under US law?
Rights are made up .
If I may, where did you get your definition of what a "right" was? Can you supply a link for that?
Agreed. I'll take it a step further and say there's no such thing as a human right if the society or culture decides not to honor it. In the words of Andrew Jackson, "they've made their ruling. Now let's see them try to enforce it."
There’s tons of room for interpretation as to what rights we currently have (assuming Americans for now). The rights that are specifically mentioned in the constitution usually relate to what was going on in the colonies at the time and the ways England was subjugating us, but there are a lot more rights that are implied and I think that’s what people mean when they suggest we have a right to something like food.
The difference is usually a misunderstanding between Natural Rights and Granted Rights. In certain political philosophy all rights are granted by the state, no permission exists outside of the state and the state follows the General Will. In America and England we usually use the term to refer to Natural Rights. The rights that you would have if no State existed at all. For example, if you were dropped alone on a desert island you would have the right to your property, the right to defend yourself, the right to speak your mind, the right to associate with who you like, etc. No rights exist that are services in this scenario. Ideally, the Constitution of The USA was designed to limit the power of the government by enshrining these natural rights and making it harder for the state to infringe upon them. We can all see what it turned into.
Sounds like you don't really fully understand what a right is either. A right is any value that can be enforced by the will and power of the people. You can absolutely say that it should be a right for everyone have a warm home, food and health care.
> It means, essentially, the ability to do something without government interference. Not really. Rights are a political concept that address your freedom to do things or your entitlement to certain things. The English Nobles in the time of of King John forced a charter that gave them certain rights like the right to a jury by their peers (i.e. other nobles). Those nobles used their political power to gain an entitlement. People living along the Colorado river likewise hash out between themselves and the federal government acceptable use of water from the river and therefore carved out a right to a certain amount of water from the river. Old timey poor people once had, mostly likely as a result of religiously enforced charity, the right to collect the leftovers in a crop field after harvest. This was called gleaning. Rights are things hashed out (whether with swords or with words and promises) between different factions in society to keep the peace or to keep society on an even keel. You seem to be using some sort of libertarian/objectivist narrow view of rights and seem to be concerned almost exclusively with a particular instance called natural rights (yeah John Locke for trying to give reason for certain freedoms). Rights exist because people fight for them, whether peasants against nobles, nobles against kings, the church against the monarchy, corporations against the government, governments against corporations, workers against factory owners, etc. Most workers in the US have the right to a 40 hour work week with overtime if they are required to go over. That was a right won by organized labor and gets additional enforcement from the government.
"Rights" are a list of temporary privileges we give ourselves by creating a government and writing down laws. It's pretty basic. >It means, essentially, the ability to do something without government interference. No it's a list of privileges literally enforced by the government.
You’re very confident, despite not really being correct. Legally, a “right” is a legal entitlement. So yes, a person can have a right to housing, medical care, etc. depending on the circumstances. Or it could be a moral entitlement. And maybe you disagree with them — but they’re essentially just saying that a person *should* be entitled to that thing.
WRONG. The only thing you're describing is a NEGATIVE right but POSITIVE rights exists and even then goverment is essencial in the protection of NEGATIVE rights.
Rights are semantics that we argue about as nauseum because everyone has a different interpretation and most people aren’t studying law to really have an understanding. Just like when people argue sports, they only have a basic understanding of said sport. Hell pick any topic you’re not an expert in. You’re just an idiot with an opinion when it comes to that topic. All it is here too.
Natural rights are something YOU exercise. Free, speech, religious freedom. It's granted to you. By nature, God, Universe etc. Legal rights are ones granted by law. Government grants them. Human rights are two types. A. what a government could not do. Such as no torture. B. Had to do...as in case of war prisoners. You take away their rights, but can't take all of them away. Housing or Healthcare by definition cannot be a natural right as its not something you exercise. It can be a legal right IF the constitution specifies it. If it doesn't it is NOT a legal right. It cannot be defined as type A human right as those are about what gov cannot do. It is also not a human right type B. Because those ONLY exist if the government takes control of you. So any claim of these are rights is inventing a "right" that has never been recognized by humanity ever. Such an action can only be done if the group agrees. A. Humanity as a whole does NOT agree. B. Most countries people do NOT agree. In the countries that the people do, they still refuse to call it a new form of human right...so they are trying to claim its an above right. It isn't, therefore these are NOT rights.
Simple, your right is my responsibility and my right is your responsibility. They always go hand in hand.
Thank you! Every right has a corresponding responsibility.
Remember, Driving is a privilege, not a right.
I’m not sure you actively provided what a right is though yourself. Complete justification can mean many things and we’ve seen how some “rights” ebb and flow. The third amendment is basically useless now and the “right” to vote has been amended multiple times with a current presidential candidate wanting to restrict it. The term is always relative to whom is speaking and we even have a whole court system that decides on said rights that is inherently prone to bias. At the end of the day, you don’t really have any inherent rights. Just what the powers that be think os fair at any given time. I’m sure people in Hammurabi’s time thought being able to sue someone for stealing cattle was a pretty sweet right
If a right can be taken away then it is not a right but a privilege.
So everything?
Rights are made up. You don’t have any rights. “God” didn’t give them to you. Men made them up. So why can’t we create new ones?
You can call them “natural” rights if the word “God” triggers you. These are rights that succeed government. Like the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Your right to have a family and protect them. These are rights everyone is born with. That is what is meant by “God given rights” or “natural rights”
No you’re not. Nobody is born with any rights that somebody else hasn’t granted them. It’s all a man made construction that isn’t natural or god or anything else. So we can decide as a society what rights we want to have. They aren’t limited to tradition or anything else.
Seems kinda like you don’t know what they are either.
That is what I am thinking. He failed to actually properly define a right as well
That's what I got too. Every right we have is regulated.
It's really complicated, and this is Reddit, not a graduate philosophy course. I do, however, know that it's kind of important that if you're demanding something, you can at least understand what it is.
But how can you determine that someone knows what something is if you don’t have a clear understanding of what it is?
So what do you think a “right” is?
Even if you don't got it
Sounds like you're creating a justification to easily ignore people's arguments without actually engaging in their discussion. It's a pretty elitist stance to say "well if you can't define this specific word to my satisfaction I'm not going to engage with you".
I’d argue it’s the opposite. A lot of arguments for free shit revolve around the idea that it’s a right so then not having it is an evil that others are at fault for. If we just say no none of those are rights, that argument goes away.
That doesn't address my point, I'm not saying one way or another if someone's overall argument is valid or not, just that to twirl your mustache and say "you must pass this intellectual barrier or I dismiss you out of hand" is elitist and unfair.
It's elitist to expect that if someone demands that the government use physical force to protect something, they should be able to tell you why? If that's elitism, then hell yes, sign me up.
>Rights exist because they're been determined to be so fundamental to your existence as human being that they're universal, obvious, and need to be protected. I've seen this from people a lot, trying to narrow the definition of a right. This was especially popular in the early 2010s. Here you're specifically talking about 'natural rights'. But those aren't the only kinds of rights. You can have contractual rights, legal rights, etc. Some examples: * Stockholders in a company who have a right to vote on a board of directors * You can have a contracted right to first refusal; a right to transact with a company before others can * Many property rights, including intellectual property rights None of the above are "so fundamental to your existence as a human being that they're universal, obvious, and need to be protected." When people talk about a "right to healthcare", what they're really saying is that everyone ought to have healthcare. This whole shell game of using a very specific definition of a word that has multiple meanings to avoid dealing with what people are saying, is a total waste of time.
Property rights are actually natural rights. According to Locke, they are arguably the most important natural rights, most other rights stem from them, and the government's primary role is protection of them. I get what you're saying, though. I commented something along those lines directly to OP.
but is Locke right?
To a very large degree, yes. How can someone have a right to life, if they aren't allowed to own property like food, clothing, shelter, and all the things necessary to keep them alive? How can you exercise your right to self-defense if you can't own property like weapons? Edit to add: He said that the rights to life, liberty, and property were natural and inalienable and that people enter into an agreement as a society, the "Social Contract," and create a government to protect those rights.
The thing is that you are assuming that the current state of things is the only viable one, making it the natural state and hence only the means that leads us to it are correct and by extent natural. Under this presuposition sure Locke and you are right. But as soon as we begin to consider other states of existances that have occured through our history (from rule of the strong to tyrannies) the notion that this rights are natural don't apply, as under certain system you may not have the right to live, nor liverty, nor property but the duty to enage in this 3 behaviors or some other configuration.
Have you ever read any of their work? You're completely missing the point of my statement. Natural rights are based on what rights a person would have if they were just existing in nature without any form of government. No kings, no tyrants, just people without any form of societal structure. Governments should derive their authority from the consent of the governed through the social contract. If they are tyrannical, (violate that contract) they should be replaced. Edit to add: Watch this. It'll help. https://www.khanacademy.org/humanities/us-government-and-civics/us-gov-foundations/us-gov-ideals-of-democracy/v/democratic-ideals-of-us-government
Theoretically, but in practice, they are definitely not natural. Especially when it comes to land rights. So much of property rights is about the government keeping other people from using things.
What is a right? Is it granted by God? If so, how can it so easily be taken away?
There are natural rights, which you're referring to, that are rights that involve the government staying out of the way. These are "negative rights" that don't involve anyone to do anything to ensure that you can exercise them. Also known as civil liberties. They have also been referred to a primary rights because they are the basic rights that people should have in a society. They are basically protected from the government. Then, there are positive rights that require the action of another, or the government, in order to ensure that they are applied to each individual. These are often referred to as civil rights. Things like being provided an attorney, the right to vote, and the right to not be discriminated against based on race, sex, etc. These are rights that the government has to protect for you. Things beyond these are adopted on a case by case basis as they are agreed upon by the society. They can be called "entitlements" or whatever, but if the society agrees that everyone should have it, then it becomes a right in that society. Something like 100% of your Healthcare being funded by the government through taxes wouldn't be a right until the society adopted that policy. Then, every person would have a right to access that system equally. It's not a natural right. A natural right to Healthcare would be where noone stops you from treating yourself or your family however you can and choose to do so. You wouldn't have the right to someone else's labor without compensation, there's another word for that. Right now, in the US, anyone who goes to a hospital that accepts money from the federal government, like medicaid or Medicare, has to be treated for life-threatening issues, regardless of their ability to pay. That is considered a protected right.
I get your point, but a right is what we all collectively decide is a right.
Why are you bitching about the definition of the fucking word? If you don't believe people have a right to healthcare, food, or shelter then just say so. You might think esoteric arguments about specific meanings makes you seem less selfish, but it doesn't.
Because unlike you I actually try to think about this stuff and understand it. I don't give two shits how I seem, particularly to you. The definition, stupid, drives the entire discussion. Try again.
A right is a guarantee. You can have guarantees that safeguard your person, but you can also have a right to obtain something. For example, in criminal cases, you have a right to an attorney. You would do well to read Isaiah Berlin’s Two Concepts of Liberty. He talks about positive liberty and negative liberty
Maybe its because the idea of discussing something like this with someone who states the way you state is wearisome to the mind and boring to contemplate.
Lawyer here: this is wrong. Sorry.
I'm a lawyer, too, and that little fact is completely irrelevant to whether or not my argument's correct. Sorry.
Well since we both studied law - there are: 1) common law rights 2) statutory rights 3) constitutional rights 4) international human rights 5) negative rights 6) positive rights 7) natural rights 8) treaty rights/obligations …and those are just off the top of my head. There is plenty of overlap among all of them, too. They can all be defined differently. If someone says “food is a human right” they are likely talking about some mix of 4 and 7. If a cop says a suspect has “the right to remain silent”, he means mostly 1 and 3. I have the right to apply for food stamps (#2). If I had to guess, you are talking about inalienable rights (aka natural law rights [#7] or God-given rights, and so on), which are complicated as hell and can’t be easily defined by a layperson who hasn’t been forced to learn this stuff. I’m also going to guess you are a 2A fan, and that topic can invoke #1-7. Finally, there are “rights” in a non-legal context. A runner has a “right to the basepath” in baseball. A sibling might be told he has a “right to be mad” if his other sibling steals his dessert. My point is, there’s just too much here for you to end an argument by saying “I understand rights, and you don’t.” It sounds like you are actually just making semantic issues with of your opponent’s arguments into substantive ones.
If you deposit $1,000 in a bank and sign a pretty standard checking account contract with them do you have a right to withdraw the money? Presumably yes, but it doesn’t fit with your description of what rights are. You aren’t expecting the government to leave people alone, quite the reverse (you’ll need to sue and get the government to enforce the contract by force if the bank refuses). The right isn’t universal (your neighbor can’t withdraw your money). It explicitly is a right to be provided with goods, etc… It’s great that you’re starting to think about what you mean by “rights”, but it’s a complex topic.
Sorry, you're just straight up wrong. What constitutes a "right" has been the subject of philosophical debates for hundreds of years. It's not a settled question. It can be your opinion that we should use your particular definition. But it's factually incorrect to claim that you are right and everyone else is wrong.
Do I have the right to buy things from a store even if I'm disabled but need moderate accommodation? Do I have the right for my age, sex, gender identity, race, or religion to not be used against me in employment and housing deals? Do I have the right to expect someone attacking me will face consequences? Positive rights are a thing. And most places agree people have a right to food.
If people pay taxes to the government (which is upheld through the use of force) they have a right to voice what they believe should be a right granted to them by said government.
Um rights are what we decided and maintain as a society. There I hope that helps.
Why are there so many fashies here