Blind groper wrote:Seth wrote:
If your neighbor is about to set fire to your house or rape your daughter, why then you DO have a right to kill him, don't you? The right does not appear because your neighbor does something or because society grants it to you, it exists as a function of your nature as a human being.
Actually no.
A behavior that is punished by society (or by the courts) is not a right.
Wrong. Shooting someone who is about to commit first degree arson of an occupied dwelling or is engaged in raping a young girl may be killed not because he's being punished, but as an act of self defense (which includes defending others whose lives are in jeopardy) intended to prevent the crime. If they guy has already raped your daughter and is running away, you can't shoot him. Likewise, if he's already set the fire and is standing there watching it, you can't shoot him. But if he's pouring the kerosene and preparing to light the match, you can shoot him, as a matter of self defense to prevent the arson from occurring.
By definition, it is a crime.
And lawful self defense is to prevent or stop a crime in progress where your life, or the life of another is in imminent jeopardy of death or serious bodily harm. It's not a form of justice.
If I kill my neighbor for reasons that seem good to me, the laws of the land may still define that killing as murder, and the courts may act to lock me up for life.
True enough.
The kind of situation that would permit me to kill my neighbor without legal sanctions would be very limited, and very closely restricted by law.
Exactly correct, and it is. As I've explicated to you perhaps a hundred times, all of which you simply ignore.
Simply because I think it right does not make it so.
Wrong. The right to self defense is inherent, natural and unalienable. Government does not grant that right, it merely regulates the exercise of it. The right is natural because it's universal behavior that every living organism engages in as a matter of evolutionary survival. And it's unalienable, meaning the government cannot declare that you do not have a right to self defense by legislative fiat.
But it is regulable, as you have said, and the situations under which it's lawful to use the right, and to what extent, are very narrowly defined. But that's regulation of the right, not a granting or taking away of the right.
In the case above, if I have a good alternative to stop my neighbor setting fire to my house and raping my daughter, then I am obliged to use that alternative rather than committing a killing.
Yup. Regulation of the exercise of the right, that's all. The right however preexists and is utterly independent of government.
Rights are, in essence, no different to laws.
Yes, they are. They are the body of human freedoms and liberties that laws are created to protect, regulate and adjudicate.
They are things written down by the legislature.
Nope. My right to life is not written down anywhere. It's inherent. I possess it purely by virtue of being a living human being. No government has the authority to say to this or that individual, "you are deemed not to have the right live." Governments DO this with some frequency, but such despotic acts are not "laws" they are outside the pale of rational and acceptable human behavior and any person faced with such a declaration is ipso facto in deadly danger and should immediately kill anyone who makes such a statement in self defense.
They can be, and are, changed when they are no longer appropriate.
No they can't. But the exercise of a right may be regulated from time to time.
Like laws, rights can be good or bad.
Nope. All rights are inherently good. There are no bad rights.
A right giving me freedom of speech is (IMHO) good.
You still don't get it. Nobody "gives" you a right, it exists as a natural function of your existence, it's neither granted nor taken away by anyone.
A right giving me freedom to drive while intoxicated is bad, because it results in innocent people being killed.
Wrong. You have the right to drive intoxicated if you have the capacity and ability to do so. However, that right may be regulated by the government in the public interest to prevent you from infringing on the superior rights of others.
A person's right to life is superior, in the hierarchy of rights, to your right to drive drunk, so the government has the authority to adjudicate the potential conflict in the exercise of rights and determine which rights take precedence over others.
In the crowded theater example, you right to falsely shout "fire" is subsumed by the right of everyone else not to be panicked into a stampede that will cause injury. But you do have the right to shout "fire" in a crowded theater. It's a natural and unalienable right, and you can exercise it any time there is actually a fire in the theater. You aren't "issued" the right to shout "fire" just because a fire happens to begin in the theater, you have the right to exercise free speech that pre-exists both the fire and the authority of government. Government may regulate WHEN and WHERE, and HOW you express yourself (time, place, manner) but it cannot say "You have no right to shout "fire" in a crowded theater no matter what, even if there is a fire."
So, you have the right to drive while intoxicated, but not under circumstances where doing so presents a risk of death or injury to yourself or others. That's how Adam Savage was able to get drunk and drive around a test track for an episode of Mythbusters. He just had to set up the proper precautions prior to exercising that right.
The right to bear arms also results in innocent people being killed, and is bad for exactly the same reason.
No it doesn't, in all but the very smallest number of circumstances. My right to bear arms has never resulted in anyone being killed, and therefore my right cannot be infringed merely because someone else misbehaved with their gun.
I'll say it again, and you'll no doubt just ignore it again, your rationale is precisely the same as saying that all cars must be banned because some small number of people hurt others while driving drunk. That's asinine, as anyone with an iota of brain power knows full well.
So, how do you justify your position on guns while not also taking the position that all cars, and kitchen knives, and swimming pools, and five-gallon buckets, and ladders and every other object that has ever been used to deliberately or accidentally hurt or kill someone must also be banned.
Go right a head and explain your reasoning on that point. I'd love to see how you try to squirm out of the cleft stick you've put your nuts in.
"Seth is Grandmaster Zen Troll who trains his victims to troll themselves every time they think of him" Robert_S
"All that is required for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing." Edmund Burke
"Those who support denying anyone the right to keep and bear arms for personal defense are fully complicit in every crime that might have been prevented had the victim been effectively armed." Seth
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