The soldiers, you mean? Because I don’t believe one has the right to do evil. One’s government may allow you to do evil. Or, as in my scenario, even to order you to commit an evil act (soldiers searching for and shooting innocent citizens). But I believe the man has the right to defend himself, despite the law and the futility of it, while the soldiers have no right to murder the man.
I take it you disagree. The man has no inherent right to his life, because his very existence is illegal to the state. And the soldiers have the right to shoot him down because they are carrying out the lawful orders of the regime. Understood. Thank you for indulging me.
I believe I have the right to bear arms because I have the right to preserve my life and my freedom. If you’re looking for “when do you march out into the street and rebel” I don’t pretend to have that answer. So long, as the machinery of a representative government is in place, that threshold is extraordinarily high. The only time that right can be taken away is if that right has been used by myself to trespass against others. The government may be able to take the life of the “wrong-colored” man, but I argue that it could not take his right to life. Nor his right to defend it. That they ARE wrong, though they get to write the laws about how being muslim, leftist, or libertarian, or whatever is cause for death…
I accept that you disagree, though. That you believe legality is all there is. I just wanted to see it stated plainly and directly. Thank you for doing so.
I am curious as to what the participants of this debate feel about rights being inherent to us. Such as an inherent right to defend ourselves. Forget futility. I wanted to know if the participants in this debate believed my gentleman had a right, despite what the regime has declared through law, despite the futility of his action, to defend his life with violence.
Of course he does. For a true natural right, it has to be fundamentally untouchable. In your scenario, the man of course has the right to pull that gun and defend himself. He does with his body as he pleases. But society is not forced to acknowledge and respect that right, and thus may ignore and kill him anyways (20 soldiers?).
That’s why the right to arms isn’t a natural right. Because it can be taken from you. The right to attempt to defend yourself, however it’s being defined by the situation, cannot be.
Then the right to defend yourself can also be taken.
Try to defend yourself when shot to death by those soldiers. Just because those arms can be removed doesn’t mean we have no right to keep them. The very ability to attempt to defend your life CAN be removed, after all.
I answered this. I can not infringe upon the rights of others. And there are reasonable avenues to demonstrate one’s innocence. Now, if the cop was arresting you for a camp where you will be gassed simply for existing, as you were trying to get your family out of the country…Yes. But, I take it you would disagree?
Does he have the right or is it simply natural instinct to try and survive? The problem with bringing up the concept of natural rights, and it’s a problem with libertarians, is that somehow the rights people say are natural just happen to be agreeable with them. No one says a right they don’t agree with is natural.
I am basing it off what I’ve quoted you as saying. If you do agree with me, that the rights I propose exist do exist regardless of what an oppressive and evil regime (who is the one writing the laws) may say, feel free to state so.
Yes, the right can be taken away but one’s desire to live cannot be taken away by legislation. I wouldn’t say it’s wrong for a criminal to run from the cops. Why would anyone want to go to jail? I’m not saying it should be legal to run away but it should be a natural desire to not want to get arrested.
Would it be wrong to arrest and return that man to a camp for gassing simply because his people, who are peaceful, are illegal in the eyes of the regime… Because of their look, their beliefs, their lack of beliefs, whatever?
I don’t believe in natural rights since they cannot be scientifically proven. Different people at different times in different places have had different ideas about what natural rights are. If they are truly natural then they should be immutable but they aren’t and in 100 years maybe the rights we think are natural now won’t be thought of that way.