Hard to argue against this one:
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Tag: liberty
bookmark_borderYour rights are inherent
An important thing to remember at all times. The greatest minority in the world is, indeed, the individual.
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bookmark_borderPassing the responsibility of your health onto others is selfish
An old post that I came across recently, but the philosophical arguments that it makes are still relevant and likely always will be:
I see a whole lot of this: ‘People who don’t wear masks are selfish and putting everyone else in danger.’
Just no. Stop.
Do you know what’s selfish? Passing off responsibility for YOUR health to everyone else around you. It doesn’t work that way.
Read the post in its entirety here.
bookmark_border“Our Out-of-Control Federal Law Enforcement Agencies” by Ryan Cleckner
The latest issue of Imprimis, a publication by Hillsdale College, was so disturbing that I feel the need to share it. It’s not the viewpoint expressed by lawyer and firearms industry executive Ryan Cleckner that is disturbing – that is both eloquently expressed and completely correct – but rather the actions of federal law enforcement agencies that he describes.
Cleckner describes how federal agencies such as the ATF and FBI murdered people, destroyed their homes, obliterated their fundamental rights and dignity, and overall acted like thugs.
In one case, the ATF determined that airport executive Bryan Malinowski was required to have a license, which he didn’t have, for his gun collecting hobby. Instead of informing him of this, they decided to violate his privacy rights by placing a GPS tracker on his car, and then to conduct a pre-dawn raid on his home, during which they brought ten vehicles filled with agents in SWAT gear, cut the power to his house, and killed him.
In another instance, a volunteer at an abortion clinic, Bruce Love, began to profanely harass a 12-year-old pro-life protestor. An argument took place during which the boy’s father, Mark Houck, pushed Love to the ground. Love pressed charges against Houck, despite the fact that Love is the one who deserves to have charges filed against him, because he initiated the conflict. Love’s bogus case was dismissed, but federal prosecutors subsequently decided to charge Houck with violating the FACE Act (prohibiting blocking access to abortion clinics). Two dozen FBI agents conducted a pre-dawn raid on his home, armed with SWAT gear and battering rams. Houck was arrested and chained to a table for 6 hours, despite the fact that Love is the person who deserves to be punished in this situation.
After reading this piece, I believe that law enforcement agencies should not be allowed to conduct pre-dawn raids, ever, for any reason. I also believe that all of the agents, prosecutors, and officials involved in the incidents that Cleckner describes should get the death penalty. (At the absolute least, they should be fired.) Their actions are truly, truly despicable. The incidents that Cleckner described make it clear, if anyone still had any doubts, that we live in a totalitarian country. And this should not be acceptable to anyone.
As Cleckner notes, the agencies responsible for these atrocities respond to criticism by pointing out that their actions are “by the book.” If this is the case, then we need a new book.
You can read Cleckner’s full article here.
bookmark_borderWe don’t need to justify why we should be allowed to do something…
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Exactly.
I once was sitting with my co-workers and eating lunch, when one co-worker remarked that guns cause so many problems that she didn’t understand why they were allowed. Um, maybe because it violates people’s fundamental rights for them not to be allowed?
Enough with the argument that, “No one needs an AR-15.” So? I don’t need to need something in order to be allowed to do it. If you think that AR-15s (or anything, for that matter) should be banned, it is your responsibility to prove that they need to be banned. The burden of proof must always be placed on those who wish to control the actions of others, as opposed to those who wish merely to be left alone to live in a way that suits their preferences.
People have the right to do anything that they want, as long as it does not violate the rights of anyone else. If you are arguing that I should not be allowed to do something, I do not have to justify why I should be allowed to do it; you have to justify why I should be prohibited.
bookmark_borderMarriage is not “the very definition of freedom and liberty”
Rep. Nancy Mace recently wrote an opinion piece for Fox News in which she argued in favor of the Respect for Marriage Act. “The right to marry the person you love is the very definition of freedom and liberty,” Mace wrote.
I strongly disagree with this claim. There are numerous rights that are far more basic and fundamental than the ability to marry. To give a few examples:
- The right to purchase, carry, own, and possess firearms and other weapons
- The right to decide whether or not to get a medical procedure
- The right to consume whatever substances one wishes, in whatever amounts one wishes
- The right to spend one’s time the way one wishes
- The right to move about freely
- The right to keep one’s own money
- The right to be free from searches of one’s person, possessions, and property
- The right to privacy of one’s medical information
- The right to privacy of one’s internet browsing activity
- The right to privacy, period.
The very definition of freedom and liberty is the ability to live your life as you please. The activities most central to freedom and liberty are individual activities, not social ones or communal ones. In other words, the activities most central to freedom and liberty are activities that people do alone, or at least activities that do not require the involvement of other people in order to be meaningful or to make sense. And that is what the activities listed above have in common. The definition of freedom and liberty is the ability to do what one wishes to do, without interference from others.
There is definitely an argument to be made that people have a right to enter into whatever types of relationships they wish with other people. Items in this category include marriage, as well as freedom of association and freedom of assembly. But these types of freedoms are not as fundamental as the right to be free from interference, aggression, pressure, or coercion. Individual rights are the very definition of freedom and liberty.
It is angering that many on the left-hand side of the political spectrum (I place Rep. Mace into this category even though she is technically a Republican) place such a large degree of importance on freedoms that are related to sex, without seeming to place any importance whatsoever on other types of freedoms. People who subscribe to this way of thinking go on and on about abortion, contraception, marriage, and the ability to express oneself sexually and have one’s sexual identity respected. Ad nauseam, they insult and vilify Republicans for allegedly threatening to take away “our rights and freedoms.” Yet with regard to non-sex-related freedoms, the left is either apathetic or actively hostile (gun rights, the right to decline medical intervention, the right to move about freely, the right to keep one’s own money, and the right to medical privacy, to name just a few freedoms that the left has recently been crusading passionately against). To many politicians, it is apparently perfectly fine for people to be able to do whatever they want sex-wise, while at the same time having absolutely no freedom in any other areas of their lives. This obsession with sex is illogical and hypocritical. Sex is not the only aspect of life that matters – and for some people sex is not part of their lives at all! – so it is important that all freedoms and liberties be protected, and not only sex-related ones.
It is shameful that Congress is spending time and energy protecting the “right” to marry the person you love, while actual rights are under assault. The heart and soul of liberty – its very definition – consists of freedom from interference by other people. Until that most fundamental form of freedom is universally respected, unanimously agreed upon, and secured for everyone beyond the shadow of a doubt, it is hurtful and wrong to focus on the freedom to marry.
bookmark_borderBiden’s moral bankruptcy on gun rights
“The way we still allow semi-automatic weapons to be purchased is sick. It’s just sick. It has no social redeeming values. Zero. None. Not a single, solitary rationale for it except profit for the gun manufacturer.”
On Thanksgiving, Joe Biden, the President of the United States, uttered these disgraceful words.
To echo Biden’s word choice, the fact that the President of the United States would say this is truly sick. These words are so deeply wrong and demonstrate such complete moral bankruptcy that it’s difficult to even explain why. But I will attempt to, anyways, because it would be unacceptable to let such an egregious statement go unrebutted.
First of all, it’s bizarre that Biden would call it “sick” that something is allowed to be purchased. The default state of existence is for all things to be allowed. The burden of proof always must rest on those who wish to ban something, not on those who wish for it to continue to be allowed. In other words, in order for something to be banned, there must be good reason for banning it. Regardless of whether or not you think semi-automatic weapons should be banned, it is not “sick” for them to be allowed; it is simply the default. Only the active commission of bad deeds can accurately be characterized as sick. Omitting an action, such as the action of banning semi-automatic weapons, cannot accurately be characterized as sick, no matter how strongly you feel the action should be done.
And then there is the fact that actually, semi-automatic weapons should not be banned, because doing so violates everyone’s rights. People have a right to do anything that they want, as long as that thing does not harm anyone else. Purchasing, owning, and possessing semi-automatic weapons does not harm anyone. Only shooting people with them does. Therefore, it is morally wrong to ban semi-automatic weapons. Biden is literally calling the failure to violate people’s rights “sick.”
Even more appalling than Biden’s claim that the failure to violate people’s fundamental rights is “sick” is his claim that respect for people’s fundamental rights has no value. It’s disturbing that this even needs to be stated, but individual liberty is valuable for its own sake. People’s ability to make their own choices and to do the things that they like is valuable for its own sake.
Some people like semi-automatic weapons. Therefore, it is inherently valuable for people to be allowed to purchase semi-automatic weapons, because this enables the people who like semi-automatic weapons to purchase something that they like. If semi-automatic weapons were banned, then people who like semi-automatic weapons would be deprived of something that they like. Their well-being and happiness would decrease. Their lives would be made worse.
Contrary to Biden’s claim, the rationale for allowing semi-automatic weapons to be purchased does not lie solely, or even primarily, in the profit made by the gun manufacturer. It lies in the benefit to the gun purchaser. When a person purchases something, both the buyer and the seller benefit from the transaction; otherwise the person wouldn’t have chosen to purchase the item in the first place. The rationale for allowing semi-automatic weapons to be purchased is the inherent benefit to people in being allowed to purchase something that they like.
A fundamental and obvious truth is that it is inherently beneficial for people to be able to do something that they like. And it is inherently harmful for people to be banned from doing something that they like. The fact that the President of the United States does not recognize this is disturbing beyond belief.
It is one thing to argue that the common good outweighs the benefits to individual people of being able to do what they like. But that is not what Biden is arguing. Biden is arguing that the ability of individual people to do what they like does not matter at all.
It is one thing to argue that the importance of safety outweighs the importance of individual rights, liberty, and freedom. But that is not what Biden is arguing. Biden is arguing that neither individual rights nor liberty nor freedom has any value at all.
It is one thing to argue that the harm done by shootings outweighs the harm done to individual people by banning them from doing the things that they want to do, and therefore that it is worth it to harm people in this way because doing so prevents even worse harm. But that is not what Biden is arguing. Biden is denying that harming individual people is at all bad. He is arguing that the happiness and well-being of individual people does not matter at all.
Individual rights. Liberty. Freedom. The ability to make choices. The ability to do the things that one likes. The ability to live in a way that matches up with one’s preferences. Happiness.
When you think about it, these are all different ways of phrasing the same thing. And Joe Biden, the President of the United States, is claiming that these things have “no social redeeming values. Zero. None” He is claiming that these things have “not a single, solitary rationale.” To be clear, Biden is not claiming that the value of these things is outweighed by the value of something else, or that these things ought to be sacrificed for the sake of something that is even more important. He is claiming that these things have no value whatsoever.
In reality, not only do these things have value, but they are the only things that do. Without them, there is no reason to live at all.
We now live in a nation whose president is unable to see any value whatsoever in the things that make life worth living. Now that is just sick.
bookmark_borderYou don’t need to understand people’s decisions in order to respect them
One of the moral principles that I strongly believe in, and that I frequently write about on this blog, is the idea that people have the right to do anything they want, as long as it does not violate the rights of anyone else. (This idea is known as the non-aggression principle.)
Unfortunately, many people have the idea that unless they personally understand and agree with another person’s actions and decisions, those actions and decisions are not legitimate. I strongly disagree with this way of thinking. As long as someone’s actions are not directly harming you, they are not required to justify those actions to you, or to anyone else. People have a right to do whatever they believe is best for them. It doesn’t matter if their reasoning does not make sense to you, because their reasoning is none of your business.
Second Amendment rights provide a great example of this. More times than I can count, I have heard the claim, “No one needs an AR-15” (as well as an almost infinite number of variations of this claim with regard to different types of weapons, ammunition, etc.). People who make this claim are completely disregarding the non-aggression principle. One doesn’t need to prove a need for something in order to be allowed to have it. The only thing that matters is the fact that having an AR-15 does not, in itself, harm anyone. Therefore, people have the right to own and carry AR-15s for any reason, or for no reason at all.
This meme from the National Association for Gun Rights sums it up perfectly:
Another decision that people are frequently expected to justify is the decision not to receive the Covid vaccine. Once I was arguing with someone on Twitter who claimed that if a person chooses not to follow the advice of public health experts, then of course it makes sense that the person would not be allowed to just wander around in public. This line of reasoning took my breath away, not just because of its blatant and unabashed authoritarianism, but more subtly because of its disturbing presumption that people are required to justify their medical decisions. This person seemed to be presuming that people are obligated to provide some sort of medical justification for disobeying the advice of medical experts, and if they fail to do so, then it is okay for them to be punished by having their freedoms taken away. In other words, it is one thing if someone has medical contraindications to getting the vaccine, but absent that, everyone should get the vaccine. Consistent with this way of thinking, the person then proceeded to interrogate me about what reasons a person could possibly have for declining the vaccine. But this way of thinking is wrong, and this line of questioning completely misses the point. Other people’s medical decisions, and the reasons for them, are none of his business and none of my business, either. The right to decline medical procedures is fundamental, and no one is required to provide medical justification, or any justification at all, for exercising it. “I don’t want to” is a perfectly good and complete reason for declining the vaccine.
Analogous situations frequently arise in everyday life as well. Society often expects people to provide a reason if they say no to an invitation, or leave a social event before it is over. These expectations are problematic for me, because I don’t particularly enjoy socializing, and I’m not able to tolerate it for as large amounts of time as most people are. Once when I told a friend that I was having a busy week and therefore wouldn’t be able to go to a particular event with her, she insisted that I explain exactly what I was doing and why that made it impossible for me to attend the event. I have been advised, when a social event is lasting longer than I want to stay, that I should make an excuse such as saying that I have a headache or have to get up early the next day. This has always seemed not quite right to me. Why should I have to make an excuse for staying for what I perceive to be a normal amount of time? My decision to leave a social event would be perfectly legitimate even if my only reason for doing so was preferring to play video games, sit on my couch, or watch paint dry. Just like with medical decisions or gun ownership decisions, people should not have to justify to others their decisions about how to spend their time and energy.
bookmark_borderOn safety versus the right to do whatever you want
“Those people think that rights mean they can just do whatever they want.”
“You are saying that people’s freedom to do whatever they want trumps people’s freedom not to catch a deadly disease.”
“You value the right to do whatever you want more than other people’s safety.”
Statements like these have been repeated ad nauseam since the beginning of the covid pandemic. Those who express these views apparently consider the ability to do whatever one wants unimportant. In other words, people have essentially been “pooh-poohing” the concept of being able to do what one wants. Anyone who does value this freedom is attacked as selfish, entitled, and/or irresponsible.
In my opinion, this way of thinking is incorrect. The ability to do whatever one wants is extraordinarily important. Without it, in fact, life would not be worth living at all.
In order to appreciate the importance of being able to do what one wants, it is necessary to distinguish between two different concepts.
First, I agree that there is a sense in which it is not realistic or reasonable to simply do whatever the heck one wants. For example, if you have 10 dollars, and an item that you want costs 15 dollars, then you cannot buy it. You will need to either save up more money, buy a cheaper item, or go without. Similarly, you cannot steal from people, and you cannot go up to someone and punch them in the face. These are things that pretty much anyone would agree with. Additionally, there are numerous situations in which people have to do things that they don’t exactly want to do, but which they choose to do because they are necessary in order to achieve the person’s goals. For example, if you have a job, you need to show up for your shift, do the duties that you are assigned, and wear the uniform or follow the dress code. If you want to become, say, a pilot, you will need to learn how to fly a plane. You can’t just decide that it would be fun to be a pilot and start serving as a pilot without actually learning how to do so. If you want to lose weight, you will likely need to exercise. Everyone should accept that they cannot violate the rights of others, and that they might have to do things that are unpleasant in the pursuit of their goals.
But there is a second sense of not being able to do what one wants, or having to do things that one doesn’t want, that quite frankly no one should accept. This concept includes things that you don’t want to do, and in your judgment don’t make sense for you to do, but you are being made to do them by someone else. For example, say you bought a house in which the previous owner had set up an illegal apartment, with a second kitchen. You have no intention of allowing anyone other than yourself to live in the house, and have no intention of using the second kitchen, but it’s not hurting anyone by existing, and you’d rather not spend the money to have it taken out. But the city tells you that you must have the second kitchen ripped out, because its existence violates the local building codes. That is an example of being forced to do something which you don’t want to do and which doesn’t make sense for you to do. In my opinion, this is something that you shouldn’t have to do. The city is violating your rights.
By requiring people to undergo medical procedures – namely covid vaccination and/or covid testing – as a condition of being allowed to work, go to school, or enter public spaces, governments and institutions are similarly violating people’s rights.
When you are a child, you generally have no say in what medical procedures you do or do not get. When you go to a doctor’s appointment, the doctor might say that you need to get three shots today, or they might say you don’t have to get any. You don’t think of the shots as something that you are choosing, or as something that is beneficial to you; you just view them as an unwelcome intrusion into your life that you have no control over. When the shots are done, you leave the appointment knowing that at least that is behind you for now, and you don’t have to worry about it for another year.
The whole point of becoming an adult is that you never have to think of medical procedures – or any other activity, for that matter – in that way again. You might choose to get medical procedures that are unpleasant or even painful, because you determine that the benefits are worth it. But you should never get a medical procedure because someone else told you that you have to. That defeats the purpose of being an adult. The only time that you should get a medical procedure, or do any other activity, is when you think that it makes sense for you.
Unfortunately, many people who hold political power in today’s society believe that it is completely fine for people to be deprived of their freedom to do whatever they want. These people think that it is right to place safety above people’s rights to make their own decisions, and they think that anyone who disagrees with them is selfish. But this is false. People who deny others the ability to do what they want are treating adults like children. They are taking us all back to the days when, as little kids, we were subjected to whatever medical procedures the doctor decided were appropriate. That was a way of existing which, upon turning 18, I assumed I would never again need to experience, and which no adult should ever need to experience.
Today’s politicians may be creating a society with less risk of catching deadly diseases, but in doing so they are creating a society in which the very thing that makes life worth living is gone. Without the ability to set one’s own goals, to choose one’s own priorities, to weigh risks and benefits, to make tradeoffs, to determine what makes sense for oneself, and yes, to do whatever one wants, then life is not worth living at all.
bookmark_border“Pro-death”
“Pro-death.”
While glancing at Twitter this morning, I came across this term in a response to a tweet by Congressman Thomas Massie, in which Massie discussed the possibility of Covid vaccine booster shots. This is far from the first time I’ve heard such sentiments expressed. Earlier this year, the hashtag “Deathsantis” was trending after Florida governor Ron DeSantis prohibited businesses from requiring proof of vaccination.
In this blog post, I’d like to address the common argument that people who prioritize individual rights over stopping the spread of Covid are “pro-death.”
In any policy decision, there are various factors that need to be weighed, and different people will have different opinions about how to weigh them. When it comes to the Covid pandemic in particular, people have very different answers to the question: to what extent, if any, should individual liberty be sacrificed in order to fight the virus? Some people subscribe to the ideology of utilitarianism, and believe that it is okay for liberty to be restricted if doing so saves lives. Other people, including myself, believe that individual rights come first, and that it is never okay to take away rights no matter how many lives would be saved by doing so.
To say that someone is pro-death is to say that he/she is actually seeking to cause as many deaths as possible, which is, to put it bluntly, ridiculous. Public figures such as Massie, DeSantis, Rand Paul, Ron Paul, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and others accused of being “pro-death” are not actually causing deaths, let alone doing so intentionally. They are prioritizing respect for individual rights over saving lives, which is exactly what they should be doing. Individual rights, by their very definition, must always come first. And in a world where prioritizing individual rights is increasingly viewed as reckless and “pro-death,” it is courageous and heroic to do so.
People have a fundamental right to move about freely, to decide which activities to participate in, to decide what to put into their bodies, and to decide which medical procedures (if any) to undergo, to give just a few examples. Through policies such as stay-at-home orders, limits on gatherings and events, vaccine requirements, and Covid testing requirements, these rights have all been violated to various degrees over the past year and a half. Objecting to such policies does not make someone “pro-death;” it makes someone pro-liberty, pro-freedom, and pro-individual-rights. It may very well be true that many lives were saved due to these violations of people’s rights, but that does not make the violations okay, let alone obligatory.
To sum up, violating people’s rights is never okay, regardless of how many lives will be saved by doing so. Failing to save lives is not the same thing as causing deaths, particularly when saving lives would require the violation of people’s rights, and therefore would be morally impermissible. It is simply not true that anyone who does not use every measure within his/her power to save lives must be pro-death. This argument ignores the entire concept of individual rights, and anyone who makes it is demonstrating sloppy thinking and a lack of logic.