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Rights/Privilege..DWS ? Anyone ?

Highball
A bit of masochism has struck me.

I want a disertation on "If Rights don't come from God..Where EXACTLY do they spring from ?"
Given that there is no God..then are Rights merely man-made..and subject to revision at the whim of the strongest man around ?

I wish no argument of God/no God..just an attempt to grasp understanding of the issue.
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66 comments

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  • Permanently deleted user
    quote:Originally posted by ECC
    quote:You have hit upon the problem: perception. YOU (and other people who are "pro-life") see abortion as murder, while others do not. SOME see gun control, to the point of a total ban on gun ownership, as not only good but necessary. You and I would strongly disagree with that notion. Who is right? Who gets their way? How do we decide? You don't seem to like the current system of living by the rule of law so what's your suggestion?

    When you call for eliminating all gun laws, others may follow your lead and call for the elimination of laws THEY don't like. What if YOU happen to favor those laws they want removed? Then what? Or do you support eliminating all laws?


    SP...the Constitution is right...and all law is subject to the Constitution. The Constitution speaks directly to any law with regards to the right to bear arms...so we know who's right and how to decide the matter (with regards to firearm ownership). The other issues you speak of are probably not covered directly by the Constitution...those matters would be open for debate.

    BTW...I think we could cut out 99% of the 144,000+ pages of federal law and be 110% better off b/c of it.


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  • Doc
    And WHO decides what the Constitution says and what it means?

    Hint: Not you or me.

    Just because WE think something is plainly stated in the Bill of Rights is absolutely no guarantee whatsoever that it's gonna be that way. This is what I have been trying to say.

    Like I said before, WE think the 2nd protects an individual right to bear arms but many, including up until now every Supreme Court to hear a gun ownership case, have seen it otherwise. The courts decide what is lawful; judges decide what rights we have and unless you are willing to overthrow our current system it will remain that way.

    And if you overthrow the current system there's no guarantee you will like what replaces it. I strongly feel that judges have WAY too much power and often thwart the will of the people. I'm just not sure if I'm ready to overturn the whole thing.

    Not quite yet, anyway...
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  • buschmaster
    ON THE NATURAL STATE OF MAN

    To understand political power correctly, and derive it from its origins, we must consider what state all men are naturally in: a state of perfect freedom to order their actions and dispose of their possessions and persons as they think fit, within the bounds of the law of nature, without asking permission or depending on the will of any other man.

    A state also of equality, wherein all the power and jurisdiction is mutual, no one having more than another; there being nothing more evident than that creatures of the same species, born to all the same advantages of nature and the use of the same faculties, should also be equal one among another without subordinatin or subjection; unless the Lord and Master of them all should, by an open declaration of His will, set one above another, and confer on him by an evident and clear appointment an undoubted right to rule over others.

    But though this be a state of liberty, yet it is not a state of license; though man in that state has an unrestricted liberty to dispose of his person or possessions, yet he has not liberty to destroy himself, or any creature under his control. The state of nature has a law of nature to govern it which obliges every one; and reason, which is that law, teaches all mankind who will but consult it that, being all equal and independent, no one ought harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions.

    Since men are the creation of one omnipotent and infinitely wise Maker, are all the servants of one sovereign Master, sent into the world by His order, and doing His work; they are His property, made to live for His, not another's pleasure; and being furnished with like facilities, sharing all in one community of nature, there cannot be supposed any such subordination among us that may authorize us to destroy another- as if we were made for another's uses as the inferior ranks of creatures are for ours. Every one, as he is bound to preserve himself, so by the like reason, when his own preservation is not in jeopardy, ought, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind. He may not, unless it be to do justice to an offender, take away or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of life: the liberty, health, limb or goods of another.

    And that all men may be restrained from invading another's rights and from doing hurt to one another, and the law of nature be observed which wills the peace and preservation of all mankind, the execution of the law of nature is, in that state, put into every man's hands, whereby every one has a right to punish the breakers of that law to such a degree as may hinder its violation. For the laws of nature would, as all other laws that concern men in this world, be in vain, if there were nobody that in the state of nature had a power to execute that law and thereby preserve the innocent and restrain the offenders. and if any one in the state of nature may punish another for any evil he has done, every one may do so; for in that state of perfect equality, where naturally there is no superiority or jurisdiction over one another, what any may do in prosecution of that law, every one must have a right to do.

    And thus in the state of nature one man takes power over another; but yet no absolute or arbitrary power to abuse a criminal, when he has got him in his hands, according to the intensity of anger or whims of his own will; but only to punish him, so far as calm reason and conscience dictate, according to his crime. In breaking the law of nature, the offender declares himself to live by another rule than that of reason and justice, which is that measure God has set to the actions of men for their mutual security; and so he becomes dangerous to mankind, the tie which is to secure them from injury and violence being slighted and broken by him. Which being a trespass against the whole species and the peace and safety of it provided for by the law of nature, every man upon this reason, by the right he has to preserve mankind in general, may restrain, or, where it necessary, destroy things harmful to them. He thus may bring evil on any one who has broken that law, in order to make him repent the doing of it and thereby deter him, and by his example of others, from doing the like harm. And in this case, and upon this ground, every man has a right to punish the offender and be executioner of the law of nature.



    ON THE ENDS OF POLITICAL SOCIETY AND GOVERNMENT

    If man in the state of nature be so free, as has been said, if he be absolute lord of his own person and possessions, equal to the greatest, and subject to nobody, why will he part with his freedom, why will he give up his independence and subject himself to the rule and control of any other power? to which it is obvious to answer that though in the state of nature he has such a right, yet the enjoyment of it is very uncertain and constantly exposed to the attacks of others; for all being kings as much as he, every man his equal, and the greater part no strict observers of equity and justice, the enjoyment of the property he has in this state is very unsafe, very insecure. This makes him willing to give up a condition which, however free, is full of fears and continual dangers; and it is not without reason that he seeks out and is willing to join in society with others, who are already united, or have a mind to unite, for the mutual preservation of their lives, liberties, and property.

    The great chief end, therefore, of men's uniting into commonwealths and putting themselves under government, is that preservation. To which in the state of nature there are many things lacking:

    First, there lacks an established, settled, known law, received and allowed by common consent to be the standard of right and wrong and the common measure to decide all controversies between them; for though the law of nature be plain and intelligible to all rational creatures, yet men, being biased by their own interests as well as ignorant for lack of studying it, are not apt to allow it as a law binding to them in the application of it to their particular cases.

    Secondly, in the state of nature there lacks a known and impartial judge with authority to determine all the differences according to the established law; for every one in that state being both a judge and executioner of the law of nature, men being partial to themselves, passion and revenge is very apt to carry them too far and with too much intensity of feeling in their own cases, as well as negligence and unconcernedness to make them too remiss on other men's.

    Thirdly, in the state of nature, there often lacks the power to back and support the sentence when right, and to give it due execution. And they who by any injustice offend will seldom fail, where they are able, by force, to make good their injustice; such resistance many times makes their punishment dangerous and frequently destructive to those who attempt it.

    Thus mankind, not withstanding all the privileges of the state of nature, being but in an ill condition while they remain in it, are quickly driven into society. Hence it comes to pass that we seldom find any number of men to live any time together in this state. The inconveniences that they are therein exposed to by the irregular and uncertain exercise of the power every man has of punishing the transgressions of others make them take protection under the established laws of government and therein seek their own preservation. It is this that makes every one of them so willing to give up his single power of punishing, to be exercised by such alone as shall be appointed; and by such rules as the community, or those authorized by them for that purpose, shall agree on. And in this we have the origin of the right of both the legislative and executive power, as well as of the governments and societies themselves.
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  • whiteclouder
    quote:Originally posted by SaxonPig
    Eric- You and I may argue that the Constitution in not ambiguous on the right to own arms, but obviously not everyone agrees otherwise we wouldn't have all the laws that we do. So far the SCOTUS have never ruled in favor of the 2nd being an individual right protecting the citizen's ability to own and carry the arms of his choice despite that being OUR interpretation of the meaning of the 2nd.

    I maintain that all rights are established via negotiation and as yet we have failed to convince the opposition.


    On the docket for the upcoming session. My bet is, we lose.

    Clouder..
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  • Oklahoma223
    quote:Originally posted by Old Fool


    God is created by men in order to explain what man cannot explain due to a lack of knowledge.

    Your statement that God was created by man is like saying that you have all knowledge of all things past, present, and future. You know the history of the universe, origin of man and state of man before and after death. No man will ever gain this knowledge because mans finite mind cannot comprehend the awesomeness of God and his eternal existence. My belief in God may seem foolish to you but your unbelief is unfathomable to me. God still loves you though.
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  • Oklahoma223
    Buschmaster, you are back. I thought you took your toys and went home.[:)] You couldn't resist a thread about the awesomeness of almighty God could you?
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