Rights vs Obligations

[CycloWizard]

In the last thread I started, I questioned the current trend by our government to declare something a right when that "right" was really an imposition on individuals to provide a good or service for everyone else. I have been thinking about the cognitive framework surrounding such assertions for some time now. I think I now see the fundamental disconnect between this worldview and my own.

Such a framework is completely upside-down for me because it posits that rights are something granted by government to citizens. This implies that actions are prohibited unless specifically permitted. However, this is precisely the opposite view on which our nation (indeed, all just governments) was founded: "unalienable rights" are intrinsic and governments exist to protect them. In this view, actions are permitted unless specifically prohibited. Further, rights do not require action on the part of another (though upholding them may require inaction - e.g. killing, enslaving, or stealing must not be done as they would infringe rights to life, liberty, and property). Not so for the "new rights" of guaranteed pensions, healthcare, and higher education. Any time your "right" obligates another to give you his time or talent, he is your slave.

We are transforming from a nation based on rights to one based on obligations. It's been a gradual transition over decades. "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country" should set off alarms for anyone under the impression that we live in a free, rights-based society. Government creep is very real and occurring at an accelerated rate. Indeed, it was for this very reason that Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence's list of grievances, "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance." The level of government bureaucracy and invasiveness to which we are subject today dwarfs that experienced in the 1700's. Each added government worker is an imposition on the rights of citizens and further imbalances the equation which should govern the federal budget. The longer it takes everyone to realize that the shoe is on the wrong foot the deeper the hole will be.

 

[diesbudt]

In the last thread I started, I questioned the current trend by our government to declare something a right when that "right" was really an imposition on individuals to provide a good or service for everyone else. I have been thinking about the cognitive framework surrounding such assertions for some time now. I think I now see the fundamental disconnect between this worldview and my own.

Such a framework is completely upside-down for me because it posits that rights are something granted by government to citizens. This implies that actions are prohibited unless specifically permitted. However, this is precisely the opposite view on which our nation (indeed, all just governments) was founded: "unalienable rights" are intrinsic and governments exist to protect them. In this view, actions are permitted unless specifically prohibited. Further, rights do not require action on the part of another (though upholding them may require inaction - e.g. killing, enslaving, or stealing must not be done as they would infringe rights to life, liberty, and property). Not so for the "new rights" of guaranteed pensions, healthcare, and higher education. Any time your "right" obligates another to give you his time or talent, he is your slave.

We are transforming from a nation based on rights to one based on obligations. It's been a gradual transition over decades. "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country" should set off alarms for anyone under the impression that we live in a free, rights-based society. Government creep is very real and occurring at an accelerated rate. Indeed, it was for this very reason that Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence's list of grievances, "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance." The level of government bureaucracy and invasiveness to which we are subject today dwarfs that experienced in the 1700's. Each added government worker is an imposition on the rights of citizens and further imbalances the equation which should govern the federal budget. The longer it takes everyone to realize that the shoe is on the wrong foot the deeper the hole will be.

Actually it is too late. Technology has grown to such proportions that now even if we wanted to change the government, wanted to overthrow a corrupt first world country government, unless we the people get backing from other first world countries, we just do not have the technology available (as a civilian) to get out of this hole.

200 years ago when guns were basically it for warfare, it just came down to strategy, resolve, and head count, This no longer matters with all the "super weapons" we have concocted over the past few decades.

 

[exdeath]

Its all about body count. 100,000 citizens with small arms can easily swarm and overpower a small unprepared base and acquire heavier weapons. Zerg rush basically.

 

[cwjerome]

This is something the federalists and anti-federalists wrestled with, and this philosophical contrast between the two endures today, as the compromises between the two continue to be played out. Federalists generally believed you write power against a backdrop of liberty and therefore should specifically enumerate the powers of government and everything left over is a right... basically the Constitution. Anti-Federalists generally believed rights are written against a backdrop of power and therefore you specifically stipulate rights... basically the Bill of Rights.

I tend to believe this paradox is a good thing and the tension between the two exists to our benefit.

EDIT: I think I misunderstood the OP and replied too fast, disregard

 

[Acanthus]

http://youtu.be/hWiBt-pqp0E?t=4m21s

Rights.

 

[MooseNSquirrel]

In the last thread I started, I questioned the current trend by our government to declare something a right when that "right" was really an imposition on individuals to provide a good or service for everyone else. I have been thinking about the cognitive framework surrounding such assertions for some time now. I think I now see the fundamental disconnect between this worldview and my own.

Such a framework is completely upside-down for me because it posits that rights are something granted by government to citizens. This implies that actions are prohibited unless specifically permitted. However, this is precisely the opposite view on which our nation (indeed, all just governments) was founded: "unalienable rights" are intrinsic and governments exist to protect them. In this view, actions are permitted unless specifically prohibited. Further, rights do not require action on the part of another (though upholding them may require inaction - e.g. killing, enslaving, or stealing must not be done as they would infringe rights to life, liberty, and property). Not so for the "new rights" of guaranteed pensions, healthcare, and higher education. Any time your "right" obligates another to give you his time or talent, he is your slave.

We are transforming from a nation based on rights to one based on obligations. It's been a gradual transition over decades. "Ask not what your country can do for you but what you can do for your country" should set off alarms for anyone under the impression that we live in a free, rights-based society. Government creep is very real and occurring at an accelerated rate. Indeed, it was for this very reason that Thomas Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence's list of grievances, "He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance." The level of government bureaucracy and invasiveness to which we are subject today dwarfs that experienced in the 1700's. Each added government worker is an imposition on the rights of citizens and further imbalances the equation which should govern the federal budget. The longer it takes everyone to realize that the shoe is on the wrong foot the deeper the hole will be.

Hooray for comparing 18th century struggles against an Imperialist power with our modern world.

The more advanced your civilization, the bigger your government will be. That is the way it has been since the Romans conquered and brought roads and running water to everyone 2000 years ago.

Just be glad that today you partipate in a Democracy where you have some small part in the decision making process. however small that part is.

 

[CycloWizard]

Hooray for comparing 18th century struggles against an Imperialist power with our modern world.

The more advanced your civilization, the bigger your government will be. That is the way it has been since the Romans conquered and brought roads and running water to everyone 2000 years ago.

Just be glad that today you partipate in a Democracy where you have some small part in the decision making process. however small that part is.

Yes, you're right: I should just shut up and accept that my rights are increasingly infringed because I live in a democratic nation. That's exactly the opposite of what anyone in a democratic nation should do. The Romans provided roads and running water by literally enslaving people they conquered and conscripting every male. Your thinking is exactly the type of thinking that created the downfall of the Roman Empire and present downward spiral of the US: you blindly accept that government will always grow. Maybe instead you should look at your own example and realize what happened to that empire as a result of big government.

 

[schneiderguy]

Good thread, OP.

The more advanced your civilization, the bigger your government will be.

No. This is demonstrably false.

 

[s0me0nesmind1]

Actually it is too late. Technology has grown to such proportions that now even if we wanted to change the government, wanted to overthrow a corrupt first world country government, unless we the people get backing from other first world countries, we just do not have the technology available (as a civilian) to get out of this hole.

200 years ago when guns were basically it for warfare, it just came down to strategy, resolve, and head count, This no longer matters with all the "super weapons" we have concocted over the past few decades.

Animal Farm is the best description you can get as to what you just described.

 

[DominionSeraph]

However, this is precisely the opposite view on which our nation (indeed, all just governments) was founded: "unalienable rights" are intrinsic and governments exist to protect them.

There's no such thing as an intrinsic right, unless you're talking about physical laws like your right as a massive body to be attracted to other massive bodies and for your energy to be conserved. Intrinsic rights don't need a government to protect them -- that's, you know, the definition of "intrinsic."

Sure is grade school in here.

 

[werepossum]

Hooray for comparing 18th century struggles against an Imperialist power with our modern world.

The more advanced your civilization, the bigger your government will be. That is the way it has been since the Romans conquered and brought roads and running water to everyone 2000 years ago.

Just be glad that today you partipate in a Democracy where you have some small part in the decision making process. however small that part is.

You totally missed his point. It isn't just the size of government that is changing, it's the nature of what we want government to do. Our Bill of Rights lists just that - rights, privileges granted by G-d to all free men. These are opportunities, freedoms from artificial constraints imposed by man or government. As such they cost no one anything to provide, although they may cost to defend. (And as blacks discovered for a century,it may be a struggle to convince government to live up to its own charter.) Now however the left has succeeded in transmuting the concept of a right into an entitlement, what Barack Obama calls "positive rights" - not what the government cannot do to you, but what the government must do for you. Another word would be entitlement.

Now we run into two issues. First, government has zero resources it does not take away from someone else. Second, we're all someone else to everyone else. Therefore for government to do something FOR you, it needs must do something TO someone else. In order for government to give something to you, it must take something from someone else. The more entitlements or "positive rights" we have, the more obligations we have to meet to enable government to fulfill those "positive rights" and thus, the less free are we as a nation. It's the new feudalism; government in the form of lord agrees to provide us certain protections, we as serfs agree to labor two days a week for government's behalf. And of course, there's the flip side. The more we become accustomed to seeing rights as something granted by government, the more we accept that our dusty old "negative rights" must be infringed to allow government to provide these shiny new "positive rights" to others. Government cheese is now greater than freedom to a majority of voters.

Great post Cyclo.

 

[DominionSeraph]

Government cheese is now greater than freedom to a majority of voters.

When economic imbalances means "Freedom" means the 1% is free to enrich themselves to the detriment of the 99%, is it any wonder that the 99% isn't too keen on relaxing control?

 

[cwjerome]

There's no such thing as an intrinsic right, unless you're talking about physical laws like your right as a massive body to be attracted to other massive bodies and for your energy to be conserved. Intrinsic rights don't need a government to protect them -- that's, you know, the definition of "intrinsic."

Sure is grade school in here.

You are obviously much smarter than the great thinkers of the Enlightenment who forged the modern world we live in.

You are an example of 1) a cynical, arrogant, and demeaning piece of shit whose posts consist of a couple sentences that 99% of the time is nothing more than an insult (you really need to get laid), and 2) a person who thinks she knows something about science and applies that little knowledge in a simplistic, concrete-bound manner towards political philosophy and theory.

At least this was one of the extremely rare times you didn't use the infantile term "conservatard." Bravo

 

[BoberFett]

When economic imbalances means "Freedom" means the 1% is free to enrich themselves to the detriment of the 99%, is it any wonder that the 99% isn't too keen on relaxing control?

And how exactly was that accomplished? Did the 1% not provide something to the 99% in a transaction between two willing parties? Did the 99% not give the 1% their hard earned money for shiny trinkets imported from overseas? Did the 99% not agree to finance outrageous home prices over the next 30 years despite very obvious evidence of a looming crash?

In those instances where it was not a willing transaction, I guarantee that government was involved in forcing said transaction.

The 1% doesn't enrich themselves without the willingness of the 99% or the power of big government.

Hence, this thread.

 

[OneOfTheseDays]

What this thread shows me is that NO conservative on this forum has any clue whatsoever how government needs to be run to effectively manage a modern first world society. You keep clamoring for the bygone days of a world that frankly does not exist anymore. Thankfully your population is dying off fast as is your significance as a voting block in this country.

The country has changed. Get over it white people.

 

[DominionSeraph]

You are obviously much smarter than the great thinkers of the Enlightenment who forged the modern world we live in.

And you are obviously well below them if you can't even follow something so basic and have to fall back on such a heuristic.

Conservatards get their name for a reason.

And how exactly was that accomplished? Did the 1% not provide something to the 99% in a transaction between two willing parties? Did the 99% not give the 1% their hard earned money for shiny trinkets imported from overseas? Did the 99% not agree to finance outrageous home prices over the next 30 years despite very obvious evidence of a looming crash?

In those instances where it was not a willing transaction, I guarantee that government was involved in forcing said transaction.

The 1% doesn't enrich themselves without the willingness of the 99% or the power of big government.

Hence, this thread.

You've thrown a bunch of words together and said nothing. Try forming a conclusion.

 

[CycloWizard]

There's no such thing as an intrinsic right, unless you're talking about physical laws like your right as a massive body to be attracted to other massive bodies and for your energy to be conserved. Intrinsic rights don't need a government to protect them -- that's, you know, the definition of "intrinsic."

Sure is grade school in here.

Thomas Jefferson is here with my on the playground:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men

That bit there about being "endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights" affirms that these rights are intrinsic since, according to Merriam-Webster, intrinsic is defined as "belonging to the essential nature or constitution of a thing."

 

[DominionSeraph]

Thomas Jefferson is here with my on the playground:

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Another fucking dimwit.

 

[CycloWizard]

What this thread shows me is that NO conservative on this forum has any clue whatsoever how government needs to be run to effectively manage a modern first world society. You keep clamoring for the bygone days of a world that frankly does not exist anymore. Thankfully your population is dying off fast as is your significance as a voting block in this country.

The country has changed. Get over it white people.

This is an excellent argument which has profoundly changed my views. Thank you for opening my eyes to the reality that people like you use government as a tool to take the rights of others rather than secure your own. You have no interest in equality of opportunity or living in a free society because you see government as your only way to get where you want to be. You are exactly the problem I was addressing in the OP. Your myopia means you do not see the long-term effects of handing this much power to government just as every progressive society has done throughout history. Tell me, how did it end for them? What happens when the interests of that very powerful government no longer align with your own? You will weep when you realize that building a government which takes rights has resulted in you losing all of yours. This has happened plenty of times throughout history and is utterly predictable. You and your ilk have damned us all simply by virtue of there being more of you. That is the inherent flaw of democracy.

 

[BladeVenom]

The more advanced your civilization, the bigger your government will be. That is the way it has been since the Romans conquered and brought roads and running water to everyone 2000 years ago.

I think we are almost advanced enough that we can start replacing bureaucrats with computers.

 

[CycloWizard]

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

Another fucking dimwit.

And another brilliant argument from this forum's most eminent pseudointellectual. The humiliation meted out to you by Thomas Jefferson in a proper debate would be mind-boggling to all but you because you lack the faculties to realize the inanity of your position.

 

[OneOfTheseDays]

This is an excellent argument which has profoundly changed my views. Thank you for opening my eyes to the reality that people like you use government as a tool to take the rights of others rather than secure your own. You have no interest in equality of opportunity or living in a free society because you see government as your only way to get where you want to be. You are exactly the problem I was addressing in the OP. Your myopia means you do not see the long-term effects of handing this much power to government just as every progressive society has done throughout history. Tell me, how did it end for them? What happens when the interests of that very powerful government no longer align with your own? You will weep when you realize that building a government which takes rights has resulted in you losing all of yours. This has happened plenty of times throughout history and is utterly predictable. You and your ilk have damned us all simply by virtue of there being more of you. That is the inherent flaw of democracy.

By all measures you have more freedoms now than you have ever had at any point in American history.

You speak of freedoms yet you vote for a party that is actively trying to disenfranchise minorities from voting. Go figure.

As I said before, get over it white people.

 

[CycloWizard]

By all measures you have more freedoms now than you have ever had at any point in American history.

You speak of freedoms yet you vote for a party that is actively trying to disenfranchise minorities from voting. Go figure.

As I said before, get over it white people.

Your entire post is rubbish. I'm hardly freer now than if I had lived 100 years ago. Which party is it you think I vote for, exactly? My guess is that you're a Democrat (based on your anti-white racism and supposition regarding my alleged support of disenfranchisement of minority voters) and that your brain can only comprehend that I might be a Republican because I don't espouse your racist ideals. Sorry to burst your bubble but I have never been a Republican (or a Democrat for that matter).

 

[DominionSeraph]

And another brilliant argument from this forum's most eminent pseudointellectual.

You can't even convert from subject to object orientation, prescription to description. As of now, you only speak, "Stupid," and teaching you how to think is not a project I'm willing to take on.

Fucking grade schoolers.

 

[BoberFett]

You've thrown a bunch of words together and said nothing. Try forming a conclusion.

I formed a conclusion about you long ago. It's not very flattering, so I won't express it here.