(September 16, 2025 at 4:12 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote:

(September 16, 2025 at 12:24 pm)Ivan Denisovich Wrote: Whatever you say sweet cheeks. Speech is free unless it isn't.

George Carlin once said, "If you can take it away, it's not a right, it's a privilege."

This is where we are today here in America.

It would mean that every right is a privilege as any right can be taken away if gov is tyrannical enough.

More as violating your rights. Not taking them away. OFC tyrannical governments violate rights. It's pretty much baked into the adjective.

So, for example. Our government intends to violate our civil rights. It routinely tells us as much. I believe them.

(September 16, 2025 at 10:23 pm)Ivan Denisovich Wrote: It would mean that every right is a privilege as any right can be taken away if gov is tyrannical enough.

Mao was right.

(September 16, 2025 at 10:43 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: More as violating your rights.  Not taking them away.  OFC tyrannical governments violate rights.  It's pretty much baked into the adjective.

So, for example.  Our government intends to violate our civil rights.  It routinely tells us as much.  I believe them.

Implicit in your reply here is that rights exist as objective things. I'd argue instead that 1) "rights" are based upon shared cultural values, instead, and that 2) the equivocation of "violation" with taken away is a distinction without a difference, because if you can't exercise your rights, you don't have them.

(September 16, 2025 at 11:32 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote:

(September 16, 2025 at 10:23 pm)Ivan Denisovich Wrote: It would mean that every right is a privilege as any right can be taken away if gov is tyrannical enough.

Mao was right.

If he ever said that all rights can be taken away then yes he was right.

See if I can lighten the mood with an old joke:

At the height of the Cold War, two diplomats - one Russian, one American - are having a heated argument about free speech.

The American says, 'In my country, I am free to stand in front of the White House and shout, "John Kennedy is a bastard!" without fear of being punished.' The Russian replies, 'Is much the same in Soviet Union. I can stand in front of Kremlin and shout, "John Kennedy is a bastard!" without fear of being punished.

Boru

(September 16, 2025 at 11:32 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote:

(September 16, 2025 at 10:43 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: More as violating your rights.  Not taking them away.  OFC tyrannical governments violate rights.  It's pretty much baked into the adjective.

So, for example.  Our government intends to violate our civil rights.  It routinely tells us as much.  I believe them.

Implicit in your reply here is that rights exist as objective things. I'd argue instead that 1) "rights" are based upon shared cultural values, instead, and that 2) the equivocation of "violation" with taken away is a distinction without a difference, because if you can't exercise your rights, you don't have them.

I don't personally believe that rights are merely cultural conventions, such that, if everyone around you decided you didn't have the right to free speech, that would mean you didn't have such a right.  Or that, were a thief were to steal your property, it means it was never yours.  Just means you're surrounded by assholes.  

In translation, everyone on earth has rights, but not every government recognizes or protects them.  Insomuch as a government refuses to acknowledge them, or takes steps to violate them, they're not just doing culture.  They're wrong. I'm more of an explicit objectivist than an implicit one, lol. I feel like I have to point out that even from the standpoint of conceiving of rights as cultural and/or legal fiction...and in the us legal system.... it's not believed that a person does not have rights when those rights are being violated. That's the theory of litigation underlying the idea of suing for rights violations in the first place. You did have them the whole time they were being violated.

In context, and narratively. If they made it illegal to say the king was mad, I'd still say it. If they fined me for saying it I'd say it from under the bridge. If they sent me to prison for saying it I'd say it in prison. If they cut out my tongue I'd write it on the walls. If they cut off my hands I'd pantomime it. If they cut off my arms and legs I'd furiously think it. If they killed me their actions would speak for me from beyond the grave. At no point will they have been able to rob me of this, we're just talking about the increasingly desperate acts of incompetent people. Coincidentally, proving that this thing they can't take from me was absolutely right the entire time. The king is mad.

(September 16, 2025 at 10:43 pm)The Grand Nudger Wrote: More as violating your rights.  Not taking them away.  OFC tyrannical governments violate rights.  It's pretty much baked into the adjective.

So, for example.  Our government intends to violate our civil rights.  It routinely tells us as much.  I believe them.

I don't agree. To me violation implies acting outside the norm. For your rights to be violated they must be otherwise respected. So tyrannical gov does not violate rights, it simply does not grant them in the first place.

(September 17, 2025 at 8:58 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote:

(September 16, 2025 at 11:32 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Implicit in your reply here is that rights exist as objective things. I'd argue instead that 1) "rights" are based upon shared cultural values, instead, and that 2) the equivocation of "violation" with taken away is a distinction without a difference, because if you can't exercise your rights, you don't have them.

I don't personally believe that rights are merely cultural conventions, such that, if everyone around you decided you didn't have the right to free speech, that would mean you didn't have such a right.  Or that, were a thief were to steal your property, it means it was never yours.  Just means you're surrounded by assholes.  

In translation, everyone on earth has rights, but not every government recognizes or protects them.  Insomuch as a government refuses to acknowledge them, or takes steps to violate them, they're not just doing culture.  They're wrong.  I'm more of an explicit objectivist than an implicit one, lol.  I feel like I have to point out that even from the standpoint of conceiving of rights as cultural and/or legal fiction...and in the us legal system.... it's not believed that a person does not have rights when those rights are being violated.  That's the theory of litigation underlying the idea of suing for rights violations in the first place.  You did have them the whole time they were being violated.

In context, and narratively.  If they made it illegal to say the king was mad, I'd still say it.  If they fined me for saying it I'd say it from under the bridge.  If they sent me to prison for saying it I'd say it in prison.  If they cut out my tongue I'd write it on the walls.  If they cut off my hands I'd pantomime it.  If they cut off my arms and legs I'd furiously think it.  If they killed me their actions would speak for me from beyond the grave.  At no point will they have been able to rob me of this, we're just talking about the increasingly desperate acts of incompetent people.  Coincidentally, proving that this thing they can't take from me was absolutely right the entire time.  The king is mad.

At the same time, a slave is bound exactly because there are undesirable consequences for doing what he wishes. Yes he can leave, on pain of punishment, but he is still bound by that threat.

(September 17, 2025 at 8:58 am)The Grand Nudger Wrote:

(September 16, 2025 at 11:32 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: Implicit in your reply here is that rights exist as objective things. I'd argue instead that 1) "rights" are based upon shared cultural values, instead, and that 2) the equivocation of "violation" with taken away is a distinction without a difference, because if you can't exercise your rights, you don't have them.

I don't personally believe that rights are merely cultural conventions, such that, if everyone around you decided you didn't have the right to free speech, that would mean you didn't have such a right.  Or that, were a thief were to steal your property, it means it was never yours.  Just means you're surrounded by assholes.  

In translation, everyone on earth has rights, but not every government recognizes or protects them.  Insomuch as a government refuses to acknowledge them, or takes steps to violate them, they're not just doing culture.  They're wrong.  I'm more of an explicit objectivist than an implicit one, lol.  I feel like I have to point out that even from the standpoint of conceiving of rights as cultural and/or legal fiction...and in the us legal system.... it's not believed that a person does not have rights when those rights are being violated.  That's the theory of litigation underlying the idea of suing for rights violations in the first place.  You did have them the whole time they were being violated.

In context, and narratively.  If they made it illegal to say the king was mad, I'd still say it.  If they fined me for saying it I'd say it from under the bridge.  If they sent me to prison for saying it I'd say it in prison.  If they cut out my tongue I'd write it on the walls.  If they cut off my hands I'd pantomime it.  If they cut off my arms and legs I'd furiously think it.  If they killed me their actions would speak for me from beyond the grave.  At no point will they have been able to rob me of this, we're just talking about the increasingly desperate acts of incompetent people.  Coincidentally, proving that this thing they can't take from me was absolutely right the entire time.  The king is mad.

Restating your claim with an extra helping of verbiage doesn't make it any more true. Don't confuse rights with ability.

Ofc not, just explaining the difference…both as I see it and as us law is premised… between rights being violated, and not having those rights.

Ability goes along the same route. Not having the ability to exercise a right also should not, and is not, contended to be the absence of its possession as a right.