Everytime I see Blankfist making a serious post, in my head I say "Awww! He thinks he's people!"

liberal

ADJECTIVE:

1a. broad: showing or characterized by broad-mindedness; "a broad political stance"; "generous and broad sympathies"; "a liberal newspaper"; "tolerant ...
b. having political or social views favoring reform and progress
c. tolerant of change; not bound by authoritarianism, orthodoxy, or tradition
d. a person who favors a political philosophy of progress and reform and the protection of civil liberties

la·bi·um
n. pl. la·bi·a

1. Anatomy Any of four folds of tissue of the female external genitalia

To pull a Homer

1. To succeed despite idiocy.

These blog posts are resembling pinky's "who likes abortion?" posts where she asks a stupid question to get everyone to respond, but she vanishes from the thread.

Everyone agrees with the concept of liberty, but it means different things to different people.

Conservatives want liberty for the unborn, liberty to own guns, liberty from the influence of secularism and foreign culture....

Liberals want liberty from prejudice, liberty from labor abuse, liberty from violence and war...

Libertarians want economic liberty, liberty from taxes, liberty from government rules and regulations....

The problem is that liberty to one group is oppression to another.

It would be interesting to do another post on liberty and ask sifters to explain what liberty means to them.

I disagree, DFT. Liberty means one thing only: liberty. Not liberty with conditions, and certainly not oppression for another. To be individually free is not to oppress others. Please explain.

'Liberty from prejudice' isn't liberty at all; it sounds like your definition requires rules and restrictions, therefore it's the opposite of liberty. 'Liberty for the unborn' doesn't sound like a very apt distinction of liberty, either.

Liberty is individual freedom and independence without outside coercion and rule.

I think your faux-liberty comes with rules, restrictions and most importantly violence to ensure "liberty" is maintained.

The definition you gave means liberty also includes the freedom to murder people.

Unless you're going to restrict that liberty with "rules and restrictions"?

If so, that's the opposite of liberty, and you're a faux-libertarian who would be willing to allow violence to impose your rules and restrictions on those liberty-loving murderers.

To get from the dictionary definition of the word "liberty" to your desired political structure, you need to add more assertions, including the ones that excuse the use of violence to protect that structure.

Netrunner: "The definition you gave means liberty also includes the freedom to murder people."

Sigh. Why is it you always bring up extreme examples? No group of people will allow unjustified murder.

Go back, reread your comment. It's silly. Extreme. Baseless.

Liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse.

*dark

Adding post to channels (Dark) - requested by schmawy.

DFT! Break it down!

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
Liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
Liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse.


Interspecies feeding is your example? That's a bit of a stretch, no? Try to stay where rights can be understood and exist: among the human species.

Cliff notes version:

Liberty for [those who are powerful] is tyranny for [those who are not].

What dft is saying here is that an American-styled-social-Darwinianist Libertarian government would only transform the perceived 'tyranny' of a citizen run government into a very real tyranny at the hands of a few powerful elites. People with mass amounts of wealth, control over jobs and resources would have a stranglehold over the populace. Without strong representative government, citizens would have no means of addressing grievances or bargaining with the power elite.

dft is not suggesting that blankfist would support this type economic authoritarianism, he is just pointing out that, like most idealistic utopias, this one might not turn out as planned.

^Cute. But, although it was a creative effort, it's flawed because it's inaccurate. I've never advocated the abolishment of a representative government; to the contrary I'd like to see us have more individual power by using the Constitution as the means of limited governance.

I would ask what you mean by a "strong" representative government? What is "strong" supposed to mean? Well funded? Lots of guns? Major world influence? More laws? A mightier military to step on those brown people abroad? Spreading hegemony? A massive police force with tasers and a fuzzy notion of human rights? More legislation in favor of rich corporatists and also some for the working class to, you know, "even" everything out?

It's preposterous and flimsy to suggest by giving us more individual liberty we'd slip into a tyrannical system of serfdom or, how did you put it? Oh yes, economic authoritarianism. Nice euphemism.

Thanks to our current "strong" government we all are forced to pay into a system that gives a very tiny percentage back to us. The majority of money goes to big business, corporatists and the prison and military industrialists, where it's used to further the rich elite's stranglehold on the rest of us... and you call that Capitalism. Ridiculous.

Power comes from the government's might. That's a far more dangerous tool in the hands of the elite rich than individual liberty is in all of our's.

^Cute, but inaccurate, because I am omnipotent and you are not omnipotent. I can precisely predict the outcome of any and all hypotheticals, including but not limited to blankfistianfuturestoday, paststomorrow (always a day away) or todaysyesterday (such and easy game to play). What does all this mean in layman's terms? It means that I am 100% right and you are 100% wrong. Sorry my friend, but this is checkmate.

Just kidding. Maybe your utopia would work out great. Maybe it wouldn't. I have my doubts, but we'll prolly never know.

^It's not utopian to believe in limited government and more individual liberty, it's how our nation was founded and run for a long, long time. No one is saying the system is perfect, by any means. Freedom is dangerous.

It is utopian to believe, however, that a monolithic government taking more-and-more from our income will take care of us without corruption. Animal farm, anyone?

^I see your Animal Farm and raise you a Lord of the Flies.

(Trivia fun fact: George Orwell was a socialist.)

^ I love Lord of the Flies! Great story. It uses fear quite well to demonstrate human nature is willed toward control and authority in a democracy. I wonder if Simon would still be alive if he had a gun to protect himself instead of relying on the power of the group to do so? Probably so seeing how it was the group that killed him during their ritual rites that everyone was forced to partake in (force is democracy in action).

Also, a good Constitutional Republic would've helped those poor boys out. A nice writ of law (If only Ralph was Madison!) to protect individual rights to life and property, but also one that is limited enough where democracy (51% telling the other 49% what to do) cannot affect it.

But, I suppose that wasn't the point of the story, was it? Thanks for the Libertarian example.

(Fun fact: George Orwell was also a Tory-Anarchist where the term 'tory' is synonymous with Conservative.)

^ I re-raise you both The Plague.

^Who let the downer existentialist in the room?

I call your existentialism and raise you nihilism and technophilia.

Economic liberty != laissez-faire. Scammers, slavemongers, false advertisers, and employers who pay just enough for survival but not enough for mobility, must be dealt with. The "infringement" of liberty by having higher income taxes on people who make more than a million dollars a year is utterly insignificant compared to the enhancement of the liberty of the poor people who benefit from the services thus financed.

Under capitalism, individual liberty consists in having enough money to be able to completely determine what one does with one's time.

>> ^blankfist:
Sigh. Why is it you always bring up extreme examples?

I don't. You do. Go back and re-read your comment that I was replying to. It's silly. Extreme. Baseless.

No group of people will allow unjustified murder.

I thought this was all supposed to be about individuals being free of constraint? Fucking authoritarian statist with your tyranny of the majority.

If it's unjustified murder that bothers you, what do I need to do to perform justified ones? Do I have to get a license to kill? If so, you're an authoritarian statist. I demand liberty to give death to whoever I see fit.


To just outright state my subtext, you're the one who constantly argues that all of governance can be boiled down to simple concepts that are clear cut. I vehemently disagree, and I'm happy to remind you of the messes that exist in the real world; like people who think murder is fun.

Lately you've become fond of insinuating that anyone who thinks the state should address societal ills is advocating violence. I believe most laws are there to protect people, and if you can provide a 100% non-violent alternative to our system that doesn't involve a state using violence to enforce a code of law that's created by some type of democratic process, then perhaps the accusation would make a lick of sense.

Until then, find some way to restrain your urge to throw rocks from within your glass house.

The truth is, I think you misunderstand what people like me and dft want. Those things you listed about what a "strong" government might be are mostly things that liberals are trying to fight.

Your quibble with us is mostly over economics, not over individual rights or inappropriate uses of violence.

>> ^dystopianfuturetoday:
Liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse.


The problem with walking into this thread, is like the problem of walking into church after reading origin of species, it all just sounds so god damn stupid.

>> ^imstellar28:
>>The problem with walking into this thread, is like the problem of walking into church after reading origin of species, it all just sounds so god damn stupid.


I missed the part in Origin of Species where it conclusively and scientifically proved there is no God.

I thought it was about a theory of how and why speciation occurs.

Between the two of us, I think clearly you're a lot closer to being a believer than a scientist:

• You have a holy text, which you think others have misinterpreted.
  
• You believe that most problems today stem from the perversion of the holy text.
  
• You believe if everyone adopted your interpretation of the text, there would be incomparable benefits to mankind.
  
• You believe that people who interpret the holy text differently, or worse disagree with parts of the holy text are heathens worthy of contempt.
  
• You believe when you tell people about your interpretation of the holy text that it is Truth, and that when others hear it, they will become immediate converts, or prove that they are incapable of understanding the Truth (and thus worthy of contempt).
  
• You respond to any evidence that the prescriptions in the holy text might not deliver on your promises by either saying "you didn't follow the text properly", or "because you followed the text properly, what you describe must be a good outcome".
  

^NetRunner
Essentially, you follow the stereotypical model of a believer to a higher degree than any religious person I've met.


^except for that pesky rationality part.

I didn't say origin of species conclusively proved god does not exist, I said it makes church sermons sound stupid. Kind of like how the germ theory of disease makes the evil spirits theory of disease sound stupid.

How you get from A to C is a mystery to me, but I'm sure its very fun for you.

I think if you're comparing the Origin of Species and church sermons, you're not understanding either one very well. Perhaps if you were talking about the book of Genesis instead of sermons, maybe the comparison might fly.

This is part of why my first inclination was to just respond to you with "What rationality?"

If something good happens to a believer, it's proof that God loves them, and if something bad happens to them, it's a lesson, a punishment, or part of a mysterious plan to help someone else find their way.

When talking about libertarians, that means that if you decrease regulation and good things happen, it's vindication of your beliefs that self-interest always leads to positive societal outcomes. If bad things happen, it's because you didn't decrease regulation enough to make self-interest really work, or the bad things are deemed appropriate (hardship for people isn't a bug, it's a feature).

I doubt there's an economic crisis anywhere in history that you wouldn't say was either a) caused by government or b) perfectly normal market responses (and therefore not an issue).

That should bother you, if you're rational.

To turn that around, how would I ever prove to you that government meddling, like the Fed controlling interest rates, reduced the number and size of the recessions we've had?

>> ^NetRunner:
I think if you're comparing the Origin of Species and church sermons, you're not understanding either one very well. Perhaps if you were talking about the book of Genesis instead of sermons, maybe the comparison might fly.


Origin of species explains the origin of complex life, not the origin of the first organism, nor the creation of the universe or the planets (as does genesis) - so your (literal) interpretation of my comparison is incorrect.

Mysticism sounds great until you hear the scientific explanation (yes/no)? That is all I am saying. I'm not literally comparing origin of species to any particular Christian belief, I'm using it as an example to illustrate the above statement about mysticism.

How is that relevant here?

"Liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse" is mystical BS, as are half the comments in this thread. That quote doesn't even make sense, but it sounds good just like "The rain is God crying" sounded good when you were 8 years old.

Its a bunch of crap, and it sounds really stupid once you have a rational understanding of the world we live in. What would you think if someone came in here with a straight face and starting talking as if it was complete fact that the rain was actually Gods tears? Now imagine that half the people in here started agreeing with them.

That is what this thread looks like from my perspective, and that is what I was trying to convey with my comment.

Two things. One, metaphor and mysticism are wholly different concepts. Second, you don't have a rational understanding of the world you're in, especially if "liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse" sounds like "the rain is God crying" to you.

dft explained his metaphor, though it took way more words to explain it prosaically than it did through a little metaphoric verse.

Let me put that metaphor into terminology from your religion. Liberty of the sort you often espouse includes the freedom to voluntarily surrender much of your freedom through contract. The smart can use this to usurp much from the trusting and clueless, legally.

In your mind, who is at fault with the subprime lending? The banks who knowingly gave loans to people who they knew wouldn't be able to afford it, or the home buyer who thought they were able to afford it, despite their circumstances? Who is at fault for misunderstanding ARM loans, the lender who failed to explain it clearly, or the home buyer who trusted what they were told verbally, and signed the contract not understanding it?

In other words, when a cat eats a mouse, do you smile to yourself and think "that was rightful and just, the mouse had it coming", or do you feel sad because the mouse never had a chance, and wonder what gives the cat the right to take the life of the mouse?

I understand how and why cats became what they are, and why mice are the way they are, but I think it's one of the everyday horrors that come from the true freedom of Darwinian evolution.

I'd rather not enshrine the predator-prey relationship in human society.

^When I see a cat eating a mouse, I think the same thing as when I see a human eating at KFC.

DFT's explanation makes exactly as much sense as his original metaphor (none). The fundamental problem with your line of reasoning is that you are assuming that you understand liberty, which you clearly do not.

DFT's metaphor/explanation:

"Liberty for the cat is tyranny for the mouse", or "Liberty for [those who are powerful] is tyranny for [those who are not]."

Are both incorrect and irrelevant. I don't want to make it more complicated for you, so I will merely show you why it is irrelevant. The above statement, for one, assumes that different groups have different rights. Where in any discussion have blankfist, myself, or any other pro-liberty poster on this website ever said that we want liberty for only a certain group of people (only cats or only mice)?

We have been arguing ad nauseum for liberty for all people, of all classes, all genders, all races, all religions, all sexual orientations.

So tell me, if the mouse has liberty how can the cat be tyrannous?

Tyranny against any group is a tyrannical system. We are arguing for the complete absence of tyranny, aka, a system of complete liberty. If you open your counter-argument with any mention of tyranny, you are speaking nonsense - why is that so hard to comprehend?

The concept of liberty only allows one logical metaphor: "liberty for the cat is liberty for the mouse"

>> ^imstellar28:
^When I see a cat eating a mouse, I think the same thing as when I see a human eating at KFC.

That's either coldblooded, or you're a vegetarian. Or you're full of it.

So tell me, if the mouse has liberty how can the cat be tyrannous?
Tyranny against any group is a tyrannical system. We are arguing for the complete absence of tyranny, aka, a system of complete liberty.

Okay, I think we're in agreement about this. If we have a system where liberty for the cat doesn't mean tyranny for the mouse, we're in a good place.

But how do we give liberty to the mouse without imposing tyranny on the cat?

Your answer has to do with innate human mammalian rights; again, so would mine.

Suppose both wanted to live in the same house, and had the homeowner's blessing to do so.

The cat knows that he has to respect the mouse's right to life, so eating the mouse is out. However, he does get to enforce property rights, and let's say the cat's parents were rich, so he claims all the floorspace in the house except for the basement. He thereby orders the mouse off his property, and threatens to use violence in defense of his land.

If the mouse wants to live in the nicer spaces of the house, he has to agree to terms of the cat's choosing, and since the cat thinks the mouse is a lesser being, he's never going to agree to a fair deal. At best, he might grant a couple square feet to the mouse in exchange for 30 years of service...at worst, he'll come up with a contract that allows him to demand the service up-front, and add years of service for transgressions (which are entirely within the purview of the cat to asses). Then he can just trump up unfair reasons to add service (he looked at me funny!), and keep the mouse enslaved forever, probably servicing the house's furnace with dangerous, unpleasant tasks.

See, liberty for everyone! The cat gets access to all the livable space, and the mouse has to live in crawlspaces and the basement, or possibly work in service of the cat. If the mouse steps foot onto the cat's property, he becomes dinner (like KFC).

I suppose the mouse could ask the human for help, but that would probably lead down the path of terrible, terrible socialism. The human might redistribute the wealth by forcing the cat to give a pittance to the mouse...and that would be slavery, unlike the glorious voluntary liberty the mouse had before.

To turn my metaphor into prose, I think the bottom line is that "liberty" includes one's access to the resources of the world, and under your system there's no counterweight of any kind to massive inequality of wealth, which can wind up looking pretty tyrannical.

All I really differ from you on with most things is that I think there should be a floor on how far people can fall to because of their lack of economic utility, and that there are many ways to structure our world that are or should be illegal or proactively regulated since they can lead to harm to society (like the problems OSHA, EPA, SEC, FCC, etc. were created to prevent).

I suppose I should echo your insult back at you; you don't seem to understand that to get liberty for all, people's actions need to be constrained in equal ways, not that they need to be free to constrain each other in whatever ways they can get away with.

^Are you suggesting that there is no such thing as liberty? Or that if there is, it is only under terrible, undesirable circumstances? If that is true, how can humans ever live in anything other than tyranny or misery?

Actually, given the definition of the word, yes. Liberty is like the mathematical definition of a circle. You can approximate one through a lot of rigorous work, but circles themselves don't really exist in the real world.

There's a natural tension between freedom from constraint, and the constraints that people naturally will impose on one another, even if it's just by drawing from the same pool of resources.

I guess what I'm really saying is that liberty is an inherently paradoxical concept. Within liberty there is a seed of tyranny, and within tyranny there is a seed of liberty.

By owning property, by definition I deprive someone else from having owned that item (a seed of tyranny). Even in a total dictatorship, the dictator himself experiences liberty beyond what most of us could (or should) imagine.

These aren't black and white concepts, and the world isn't so simple that we already have discovered the penultimate order for society that balances the two. I think we've come a long way, but I think there's a long way to go still.

You ask how we can live without misery while under tyranny; I think you're being grandiose. I too could adopt this conceit and say "my way of doing things is the One True Freedom, and any deviation from that is Tyranny", but I think that type of thinking leads to tyranny.

At some point, you have to recognize that no matter what, your actions are going to be constrained by others who are more powerful than you. Be they government, or be they corporations, or just your mom, they're going to exert power over you. Enticement with money is just a more subtle manipulation than a gun, or a motherly guilt trip, but it can be coercion just the same.

Sometimes that's okay, sometimes it's not. I think the complexity of law has developed as we work out what guidelines we think there should be for when it's okay, and when it isn't.

The concept of individual rights is a good guide to that, but there's also a reason why none of those rights are absolute.

^
Actually, given the definition of the word, yes. Liberty is like the mathematical definition of a circle. You can approximate one through a lot of rigorous work, but circles themselves don't really exist in the real world.

If that is true, then no counter-example exists, correct?

One definition of liberty, as given above, is "the condition of being physically and legally free from confinement, servitude, or forced labor." Are you telling me such a condition has never existed anytime in modern human existence, nor could it ever exist in the future?

There are thousands of people "living off the grid" have you heard of it? What do you make of such people, who live in remote areas either alone, with families, or in small communities and are completely self-sufficient? I cannot see any way that they experience confinement, servitude, or forced labor, and as such, I believe they constitute a firm counter-example to your assertion.

Just to reconfirm, your position is that it is impossible for human beings to live in the absence of both tyranny and misery?

>> ^imstellar28:
Just to reconfirm, your position is that it is impossible for human beings to live in the absence of both tyranny and misery?


No, my position is that it's impossible to create a situation where all people experience liberty's primary meaning: freedom from constraint.

As far as confinement, servitude, or forced labor, I think it's possible for a government to enact policy that forbids it in many ways, but just like government enforcing property rights, there will always be people who are going to break the law in ways that are both overt and covert.

Generally speaking this whole idea of gaining and acquiring capital rearranges your decisions from being chiefly about what you want to do, to what you must do in order to earn the freedom to do what you want to do. It's not "servitude" per se, but it does mean the bulk of your work efforts are being directed to serve another person's design or demands, and not your own. I think that's necessary, but I don't think the benefits that come from that work should go disproportionately to the person who merely brought the worker to the work.

Trespassing laws close off vast portions of the world from being freely entered. I'm not sure I'd call that "confinement", but you are constrained in where you may go by property laws. In Finland, the land is considered available to all, and people are allowed to hike through open land, or camp there if they choose. "Trespassers will be shot" signs don't exist there.

People aren't forced at gunpoint to work, but certainly our society allows tremendous hardship to befall people who cannot work for one reason or another. I don't think a person's worth begins and ends with how much money they can earn working a trade, and find the idea that people think "liberty" includes having the choice to let people like that suffer have misunderstood what role "liberty" should play in our lives.

To me, our system is neither liberty nor tyranny. I don't see betterment in a system that focuses on "liberty" to the exclusion of all else, especially if it doesn't realize that property and liberty are in direct conflict as concepts.

As for misery, I don't know any way to guarantee freedom from feeling miserable, including giving people freedom.

Living off the grid doesn't change much, other than it cuts off much of your interaction with the outside world. People who do that aren't free from the laws of the nation whose land they're in, and they still need to pay relevant taxes (property taxes if nothing else). They do free themselves from a lot of the trappings that rampant modern capitalism imposes on you, which is why a lot of the really far-left people like to create communes where they grow their own food, generate their own electricity, eschew mass media (TV mostly), and focus on higher pursuits (like smoking dope and having orgies).

Usually though, that takes a lot of money to set up, and most are doing it for spiritualistic reasons (focus on becoming more connected to nature, family, God, etc.).

Far-right people do the same thing for some of those same reasons, though a lot seem to presume to think they are also free of laws and taxes, and stockpile weapons, and do the whole thing out of fear of the encroachment of tyrannical socialism...

^This:

>> ^NetRunner
No, my position is that it's impossible to create a situation where all people experience liberty's primary meaning: freedom from constraint.

and this:

Actually, given the definition of the word, yes. Liberty is like the mathematical definition of a circle. You can approximate one through a lot of rigorous work, but circles themselves don't really exist in the real world.

are two entirely different arguments, which one are you claiming is true? From what I can tell, you started off arguing the later, but modified it slightly as we started talking about it.

Liberty undoubtedly exists, as proved in my example of people living off the grid. You can't use "paying taxes is illegal" as relevant to someone living in the forest 100 miles from the nearest road, because law does not exist unless there is someone there to enforce it - in exactly the same way that tyranny does not exist unless someone is there to be a tyrant.

As far as I can reason, liberty is the natural state of the world. Everyone has liberty until someone choses to violate it by becoming a tyrant just like the world is lawless until someone choses to enforce a law.

If you view liberty as the "absence of tyranny" rather than the "presence of complete freedom" I think it will make a lot more sense.

As far as real-world application, if you make tyranny illegal, and enforce it through law, you will have guaranteed liberty for all - don't you think?

>> ^imstellar28:
If you view liberty as the "absence of tyranny" rather than the "presence of complete freedom" I think it will make a lot more sense.
As far as real-world application, if you make tyranny illegal, and enforce it through law, you will have guaranteed liberty for all - don't you think?


I agree completely with the above. I'd dare say that's what I advocate for when it comes to government policy.

Perhaps our semantic battle is really over the definition of tyranny.

As far as I can reason, liberty is the natural state of the world. Everyone has liberty until someone choses to violate it by becoming a tyrant just like the world is lawless until someone choses to enforce a law.

I suppose it's a question of whether you choose to see the glass as half-free, or half-tyrannized. I think the natural state of the world is such that small groups are able to fall back on tribalism, and find that the problems created by large-scale human society fall away.

It probably makes people frustrated with large-scale society happier, but I think they stop operating on principles like law or capitalism, and just interact with one another as humans.

I'd love to scale that up to the global level, but we have a tendency to dehumanize people we don't know personally. We've gotten pretty good with laws and social programs at getting most people to act in mostly acceptable ways, but there's still a long way to go before people treat each other properly when they don't know the people their actions are affecting.

But back to the analysis of definitions; what's your definition of tyranny?

^I don't see how we would have different definitions of tyranny. Tyranny is oppression by physical violence or coercion.

Not to be pedantic, but what's your definition of oppression?

Can coercion be done with means other than threats of violence? For example, is bribery, or taking advantage of ignorance coercive?

To skip ahead a bit with my side of the debate, I think you'll find tyranny is in the eye of the beholder.

^I'm using the commonly-accepted definitions for all the words we are discussing.

Why do you think tyranny is in the eye of the beholder? If you use physical violence to affect (manipulate, oppress, influence) another persons life, then you are acting as a tyrant - I cannot see any way in which that would be subjective.

If you have an example of subjective tyranny, please share.

To be really particular about your answer, all law requires violence to manipulate people's lives.

It seems to me that the proposition that there should be law that's enforced means that sometimes using violence to manipulate people's lives is okay.

What makes it okay? Presumably we differ on which things are okay, and which aren't. That's subjective.

^Are you suggesting that the only two systems human beings can live under are anarchy and tyranny?

I think you're too hung up on dichotomies. I'm suggesting that there's no clear-cut way to create a system that makes everyone feel free simultaneously.

I guess what I'm really trying to say is that utopia doesn't exist. I have my doubts whether such a thing could exist, at least without changing human nature or the nature of our world.

You (and to a lesser extent blankfist), put forth this idea that the recipe for utopia is already known, and that it's simple, and to some degree it was carved in stone tablets and given to Moses by God written in the Constitution and Federalist papers by Jefferson and the other founding fathers, and that all evil comes from not having stuck to that recipe...

Perhaps that's a strawman, but that's how it comes across to me when you take what I say to mean that tyranny is the only alternative to what you propose, when usually I'm just trying to point out flaws in what you propose so that we could move on to a new proposal. Or at least dispense with the accusations of tyranny, or being opposed to liberty, or a promoter of violence, etc.

In my opinion, being supportive of the idea of income taxes doesn't make me a tyrant or promoter of violence any more than someone who is willing to concede that there is a role for a state to enforce laws and have the authority to use violence to enforce those laws, at least as a last resort.

Once we're over that hurdle, it's a matter of figuring out what constrains our freedom more, a democratic government itself, or amoral people acting in whatever way they can get away with to increase their own wealth, including subverting a democratic government?

I'm for the former, against the latter, and I don't think taking away the ability for government to affect the latter makes any sense as a solution.

^How do you view income taxes as not tyrannical, yet insist that all laws, including those prohibiting murder, are?

I don't see how that position is congruent.

Moreso, if you are going to equate violence used against non-violent citizens with violence used to apprehend violent criminals, I think you need to further justify that position.

Okay, I seem to have been unclear. I'm asking you to explain why taxes would be tyrannical, while laws prohibiting murder aren't. Those positions don't seem congruent. Laws are laws, aren't they?

Your second statement implies that you think only violent crimes warrant violence. Fair enough, but what about resisting arrest? Isn't that a violent crime?

Perhaps part of the confusion is that my definition of violence is pretty broad; I think grabbing someone, and forcing their hands behind their back and putting handcuffs on them is a violent act. I also think it's justified and reasonable more often than not, and I don't defend "excessive" violence, though what's excessive will obviously vary on a case by case basis.

Just to make it really clear, I'm perfectly okay with enforcing tax evasion laws and murder laws. Personally I'd love to not need to use violence to enforce laws generally, but I think it's necessary. There are always going to be people who feel entitled to the liberty to do whatever they want, including resisting lawful arrest by officers of the law.

To me, tyranny would be having no recourse to challenge the legality of your arrest, and to have had no opportunity to shape the law in the first place.

^I would say any law forbidding a "crime" which doesn't involve a victim, is tyrannical. Murder has a victim, failing to pay taxes does not.

I don't have a problem with using violence to enforce the law, because how else could you possibly enforce it?

>> ^NetRunner:
Okay, I seem to have been unclear. I'm asking you to explain why taxes would be tyrannical, while laws prohibiting murder aren't.

Are speeding tickets tyrannical, then?

How about tickets for running stop lights?

Driving on the wrong side of the road?

Driving drunk?

Should those all be legal, so long as you manage to do it without damaging someone else or someone else's property?

To swerve back to taxation, the state builds roads, and does national defense, at least. Isn't refusing to pay for those stealing?

It's not like the Air Force can be selective about who receives their services.

^Taxation, one could argue, so I'm willing to concede it. Others, like probhibiting marijuana possession or gay marriage are clearly tyrannical. Using my criteria, it is easy to see why (neither have victims).

What criteria do you use to determine which policies are tyrannical and which aren't?

Speeding, running a red light, driving on the wrong side of a road, and driving drunk can all potentially involve victims, so I can see why people are tempted to make them illegal. But can you identify a victim in all instances of the above actions? Take for instance, someone doing any of the above on a stretch of road through Nebraska, where there are no cars or people for 50 miles. There are no possible victims, so how can those laws be anything other than tyrannical?

Now, speed, run a red light, drive on the wrong side of the road, or drive drunk in the middle of rush hour in a congested city, and you might be able to identify a victim. If you could, the crime would be reckless endangerment, or worse. Reckless endangerment is like murder or theft, it always has a victim no matter what the circumstance. You can't say that about any of the four actions you mentioned above.

So, why make speeding, running a red light, driving on the wrong side of the road, or driving drunk illegal when all you really need to prohibit is reckless endangerment? If you prohibit the former four, you open up the potential for tyranny. If instead, you prohibit reckless endangerment, which always has a victim, then you have solved a safety problem without tyranny.

I'd argue there are stupid things that people do that always constitute reckless endangerment, like driving drunk, that should be illegal outright because people have lousy judgment (especially when drunk).

If someone runs a red light or a stop sign, or speeds in the middle of nowhere, chances are the penalties are going to be minor, if the law gets enforced at all.

Connecting with an actual victim, while doing something clearly proscribed by law, has harsh penalties. Connecting with a victim, when you were obeying all the right laws, and did your best to avoid the accident, but failed, carries a small penalty, or possibly no penalty at all depending on circumstances.

Part of having law exist in cases like this are to help decide who's the victim when things occur (was it the guy who ran the red light while drunk at fault, or the person obeying the signal?), and some of it to avoid the damage done when people misjudge their abilities (initially lowering the speed limits from 65 to 55 made a large reduction in highway fatalities). I also think limiting the amount of toxins you can legally put into foodstuffs is also fair game for the same reasons.

I don't think laws prohibiting recreational drugs, or gay marriage are tyrannical; ineffective and prejudicial perhaps, but not tyrannical.

As for whether a law is tyrannical or not, I don't think there's a simple set of criteria. To me, I usually define tyranny more along the lines of how the laws are made than on what the law itself is.

Dictators are tyrannical because they alone create the law, and are free to modify it at whim, and cannot have their proclamations challenged. The United States' government isn't tyrannical, because when it's working properly, the law is created by elected representatives, approved by an executive, and if necessary clarified or overturned by the courts.

I've often pondered whether it's appropriate to call George W. Bush a tyrant or not. He had a congress that followed his every whim (the slim Democratic majority from 2006-2008 approved most of his whims, but not every), a supreme court that first installed him to the Presidency, then upheld almost every single one of his extra-constitutional actions, and he listened to no one, and felt himself unconstrained by law or constitution when he thought he was right (and he often felt quite sure of himself).

As of right now, I think it's inconclusive as to whether he fully acted as a tyrant, or merely set up a legal precedent for ignoring the conventions that are supposed to prevent tyranny from breaking out.

I think we need investigations, and ultimately a post-administrative judgment made decrying what he did and reaffirming that law and the Constitution trumps a President's powers, even in extremes, and even if he hires lawyers who write him a note saying he has the authority to do whatever he damn well likes in the name of "national security".

"We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing. With some the word liberty may mean for each man to do as he pleases with himself, and the product of his labor; while with others, the same word may mean for some men to do as they please with other men, and the product of other men's labor. Here are two, not only different, but incompatible things, called by the same name - liberty. And it follows that each of the things is, by the respective parties, called by two different and incompatible names - liberty and tyranny."

-- The Collected Works of Abraham Lincoln edited by Roy P. Basler, Volume VII, "Address at Sanitary Fair, Baltimore, Maryland" (April 18, 1864), p. 301-302.

The issue with that is that these days "do as he pleases with...the product of his labor" usually really means "do as they please with...the product of other men's labor [that they have unwittingly surrendered voluntarily]".

Attempts to correct the situation is called slavery by the slavemasters (and their unwitting chattel). The thing those comments are directed at what would more accurately be called reparations for the slavery that's already been enacted.

Freeing the slaves required telling men they had to give up the rights to do as they pleased with what they considered their own property.

I'm sure the same southern plantation owners towing this line today were making the same case then; that liberty did indeed mean they had a right to do as they pleased with their property. Later they claimed the right to refuse service or employment to their former property which had so crassly been "redistributed".

Now they realize the best way to defuse demands of equal pay for equal work is to just cut everyone's pay to slave wages, and call anyone who got out of line "uppity" or "socialist", for wanting some sense of equality with their masters.

The statists' "choice" when confronted with libertarian principles is a claim that anything outside the padded walls of nanny state socialism/soft tyranny is "anarchy". Rubbish!

It's not a stretch to say (elected) American leftists circa 2009 have completely abandoned the Constitution in favor of mob rule and a single cult of personality who has no clue what he's doing. There's no rule of law behind any of The One's decisions, and his actions do not represent a leader concerned with individual freedom, God-given rights (to humor you atheists, no matter where you say natural rights come from it's never from government) or the time-proven strategies leading to economic recovery instead of crushing debt.

Elected Repubicans may not be much better in following the Constitution than liberals, but the difference is enough to matter. Compared to Bush, NOBODY trusts or believes this government, except the libmedia.

Freedom: 1776--2008.

2009 and beyond: total crap shoot.

*quality

Awarding blankfist with one star point for this contribution to Sift Talk - declared quality by quantumushroom.

>> ^NetRunner
To me, I usually define tyranny more along the lines of how the laws are made than on what the law itself is.

You are confusing "tyranny" with "dictatorship." Tyranny is a state of being, not a system of government, thus it is wholly possible to have a tyrannical dictator, a benevolent dictator, a tyrannical democracy, a benevolent democracy, etc.

Life is not only about the means, but about the ends - and vice versa. Sometimes one may be more important than the other, but you must always consider both.

While there are clear downsides to dictatorships, (such as the transition between rulers, and the differences in successors) I would chose a benevolent dictator over a tyrannical democracy any day.

Dictators are tyrannical because they alone create the law, and are free to modify it at whim, and cannot have their proclamations challenged.

Dictator is not synonymous with tyranny; thus, to correct your statement:

"Dictators are dictators because they alone create the law, and are free to modify it at whim, and cannot have their proclamations challenged."

I'll concede the semantic distinction you're drawing with tyranny and dictatorship.

I still don't see any reason to think of prophylactic legislation as tyrannical.

Part of the problem with couching everything in reckless endangerment is that it's highly subjective.

Is it reckless endangerment to sell cigarettes intentionally designed to addict people? To sell toys that you haven't checked for lead paint? Food with salmonella? To sell cars that don't have seatbelts? To give subprime loans to people without verifying their income?

I'm sure all the companies involved would bring their massive financial resources to bear on arguing the case that none of those constitute reckless endangerment.

They certainly do when it comes time to write legislation that might explicitly declare that those things are the seller's responsibility.

I also don't see the utility in telling people that traffic signals are optional if they think they can prove in court that they weren't recklessly endangering people by ignoring them. Seems a bit more logical to just say "obey the signal", and if people think an intersection with a light shouldn't have a light, go ahead and petition their city government to have the intersection changed.

Liberty is something you beg for from your merciful government.

"Please sir, can I have some more?"
"Nooo!" says the state as it whips its thralls in their gray little lives.

You don't have it, you won't get it - freedom is an illusion: you have the choice between American Gladiators and Fox News, that's your freedom. Rebellion is quelled, free thought is stifled. Lives snuffed out in the interest of order. You are a slave to the system you are in, just as your parents were and as your children will be. High ideals are only talked about, never executed. They call them libertarianism, socialism, capitalism in the end it's always a big gray mass that ends up doing nothing but maintaining the status quo. The system rules, and the system wants to keep its power. We choose to be slaves to this, we are only slaves of our own will. Humans or ants, does not make much of a difference, just scale.

And it will never change.

^ Dude, you need to go do some body shots off of some strippers, or something.

It's not that bad, even if it feels like it sometimes.

Oh what was that? I was too busy sniffing cocaine out of the ass-crack of - what was your name darling? And your sister? - Candie and Cindie to read what you wrote.

Suffice it to say, I take it all back. We have endless freedoms. With nothing controlling is, we can do what we please - hedonism and anarchy runs wild, binge and purge!

>> ^NetRunner
Part of the problem with couching everything in reckless endangerment is that it's highly subjective.

As opposed to making practically every possible action illegal, and putting everything in the hands of the arresting officer, prosecutor, or local judge? How does adding multiple human elements make the law more objective? As it stands, when you are arrested the officer can either let you off with a warning or physically beat you and using his close ties to prosecutors to send you into jail for several decades.

Seems a bit more logical to just say "obey the signal", and if people think an intersection with a light shouldn't have a light, go ahead and petition their city government to have the intersection changed.

You could make the same argument to forbid, say, islam, couldn't you?

The problem, perhaps ironically, with what you are proposing is that it is entirely subjective and arbitrary. If you can give me a single, objective algorithm with which to separate laws into "just" and "unjust" I will retract my assessment. I have already given mine - laws forbidding crimes with victims are just, those without victims are unjust. The process in which laws are created (the means) has no bearing on the justness (ends) of the law.

>> ^imstellar28:
Murder has a victim, failing to pay taxes does not.

Perhaps assault has a victim, murder removes the victim from the field of play. The murderer is dealt with because he presumably constitutes a threat to those still living, otherwise why bother, the dead will not rise again if vindicated.

In effect the violent censure of murder is a prophylactic use of violence, it is to make sure that others don't get murdered by somebody who is clearly willing to kill, and to threaten those who are considering killing.

If you accept that all these uses of law/violence to enforce social norms are compromises, which we settle on because they seem better than the alternative, then you would see why someone might support them pragmatically.

If you instead insist on a pure and perfect liberty even if not pragmatic, then I can see where you might object. And you can understand where I would argue that the imposition of a property system, or any government at all, is a clear breach of this purity in the name of pragmatism.

We are all being pragmatic, and are not really arguing motivation, only desired outcome. You state your desired outcome as though it is idealistic, but it's no more or less ideologically pure than bold pragmatism.

>> ^imstellar28:
As opposed to making practically every possible action illegal, and putting everything in the hands of the arresting officer, prosecutor, or local judge?

On the contrary, it takes it out of the hands of people and puts it into written law.

It's still dependent on people enforcing and obeying it, and you're right that the people who've gone to the trouble to earn the right to enforce the law have some leeway on how it's enforced. But there's a difference between deciding to let someone go from a speeding ticket, and cops being able to charge whoever they choose when two cars collide.

You could make the same argument to forbid, say, islam, couldn't you?
The problem, perhaps ironically, with what you are proposing is that it is entirely subjective and arbitrary. If you can give me a single, objective algorithm with which to separate laws into "just" and "unjust" I will retract my assessment. I have already given mine - laws forbidding crimes with victims are just, those without victims are unjust. The process in which laws are created (the means) has no bearing on the justness (ends) of the law.


I don't think I've ever tried to create a deterministic series of formal logic to describe my views. Even if I could I would argue that there is no single algorithm that everyone could agree with, and I lack the arrogance required to believe that my particular views define the highest possible moral standard, so I don't feel that anything I disagree with is tyrannical by definition.

To differentiate laws banning the practice of Islam from banning running red lights, there are many arguments I could use for explaining why the former is wrong, while the latter is not. First and foremost, freedom of religion is expressly protected by the Constitution, and the very history of our nation began when people who'd been persecuted for their religion decided to strike out into the world and make a place where they'd have the freedom to do so.

Second, I'd argue that the freedom to worship Islam places no one at any kind of risk in and of itself, and is considered to be a central part of one's personal identity. Running red lights is both dangerous to the offender and others, and no argument can be made about the importance of someone not having to wait for a traffic signal.

A tougher conundrum for me would be something like a ban on eating meat. I suspect that truly would be a higher moral standard, and also likely better for people on a practical basis (both for the environment and personal health), but I sure do love to eat it.

If such a thing passed congress, and was popular amongst the populace, I'd probably just try to learn to enjoy a new diet rather than protest the ban as tyrannically limiting my freedom.

I think the big difference between your moral reasoning and mine is that you see all limits on personal freedom as being abhorrent, no matter how good intentioned, whereas I place a higher value on the aggregate good for all of society. I'd prefer to have both, but I think it's perfectly okay to learn from our mistakes, and outlaw behavior that we've learned causes damage to society as a whole, especially when it's difficult to see how it materially affects their freedom beyond their freedom to act in an irresponsible manner (as is the case with drunk driving).

I disagree, because your position is making a fatal assumption: that all actions are "gateway actions" . This logic could be used to send anyone to life in jail, for any offense. A person smoking pot once would become an dangerous addict. A person driving home drunk once, would become a raging car of death driving drunk every day. A person who speeds once would become a reckless danger to everyone around them by going 100 mph every day.

>> ^dgandhi:
Perhaps assault has a victim, murder removes the victim from the field of play. The murderer is dealt with because he presumably constitutes a threat to those still living

^NetRunner:
On the contrary, it takes it out of the hands of people and puts it into written law.

Who enforces the written law? I've never been arrested by a piece of paper but I was almost arrested and jailed by a person yesterday.

Here is a clear, real-world example of what I am talking about it and happened to me on my way to work yesterday. You think that all of this is "idealism" but its not - the tyranny in this country affects my life every day. Maybe you are lucky to not have to deal with it to the same extent I do, or maybe you live in a secluded bubble where none of the 50,000 laws of this country affect you.

I was driving to work on my motorcycle, as I have every day for the last 3 years, wearing a collared shirt. The collar was up and flying around everywhere in the wind so I reached up and pulled it down. As I did this, I happened to be driving right by an intersection where a motorcycle cop was sitting - he saw me and pulled me over.

"Did I see you adjust your shirt?" Said the officer.

"Yes Sir" I replied.

"Did you know that driving with no hands is reckless driving, and the minimum sentence is 5 days in jail?"

"...."

Luckily he gave me a warning, but your "written law" could easily have been interpreted differently if he didn't like my attitude, or I was mexican, or he had just spilled coffee in his lap, or his wife just left him...etc.

Warning....or five days in jail - and you are telling me the law is not subjective?

When you drive your car, do you ever use one hand on the wheel, or perhaps even none while on a stretch of highway? Did you feel reckless? Well thats a minimum jail sentence in some states. How are you going to explain that you will be missing a week of work during a critical project because you have to report to Jail?

THAT is tyranny, and that is exactly what I am talking about.

>> ^imstellar28:
I disagree, because your position is making a fatal assumption: that all actions are "gateway actions"

Are you arguing that a dead person has something to gain from the punishment of their killer? If not what is the basis for punishment? Nobody can claim DIRECT harm, because the only person directly harmed is dead. Can others, such as family and friends, claim indirect harm? If so how would you determine what constitutes indirect harm? How would that be different from what we do now?

My assertion, that murderers are punished for the supposed benefit of the living, does not require a broad "gateway" hypothesis. We can certainly argue about what the proper response to murder is, but saying "it has a victim" when no victim can bring a charge, seems to be a significant implementation issue for your system.

So you were adjusting your shirt while driving your motorcycle through a city intersection, and then got pulled over and given a warning?

Sounds like the system's working just fine to me.

Out of curiosity, what did you think should have happened?

Also, why do you think the officer pulled you over?

I guess I'm blind or numb to it, but I don't really think too much about laws when I'm not having a political debate. I follow traffic laws because they a) make my life safer and b) are the law, though if I think it's safer to "violate" a law (e.g. lean out over the double line if someone is walking on the shoulder), I do. I speed, but I don't do it when I think it'd be unsafe, and I won't gripe about the consequences if I get pulled over.

Working in the financial sector, law comes up at work from time to time, but mostly that governs accounting practices, notifications, privacy, etc. All of those seem like they're geared towards ensuring we don't lie, cheat and steal from ordinary people so I don't have any issue with it.

Now, internal corporate policy is a whole other matter. Those people are fucking tyrants.

^I wasn't driving it through a city intersection, I was driving it on a straight through road, and a motorcycle cop was sitting on a side street at a stop sign. Either way whats the difference? You can't excuse the fact that the punishment is far in excess of the crime.

The whole point is that it is tyranny because the punishment is harsh, severe, and unwarranted. You think five days in jail (minimum - the maximum is 1 year) is appropriate for driving a vehicle with no hands? The only reason the officer was able to pull me over is because my hands were in plan view -- unlike a car. My bike did not change its course in any where versus having my hands on the handlebars, so how is that possibly worth 5-365 days in jail?

I'm pretty sure the law states that you have to have both hands on the wheel of a car at all times, or you are guilty of reckless driving. Maybe its not regularly enforced, or maybe its not been enforced on you, but its a perfect example of real-world, everyday tyranny.

Maybe you agree with it, like you might agree with punishing shoplifting by cutting peoples hands off, but its tyranny all the same.

>> ^imstellar28:
Maybe you agree with it, like you might agree with punishing shoplifting by cutting peoples hands off, but its tyranny all the same.


I'm more of a cut their tongue out for lying kinda guy.

But seriously, why do you think you were pulled over if you'd done absolutely nothing wrong?

Don't you think the cop thought you were doing something that might qualify as reckless endangerment, but that the circumstances were such that it didn't warrant any punishment because at that moment no one was at risk?

We're not talking about a cop busting you for drug possession with planted drugs, or tapping your phone without a warrant, or holding you for 7 years without trial.

We're talking about a cop who's job is to enforce traffic laws pulling you over to say "hey, what you were doing wasn't safe" and tell you some scare story about the law.

I don't know motorcycle law, but I'm certain the law doesn't say you must have both hands on the wheel of a car or you go to jail for 5 years. It might say driving with no hands on the wheel is punishable with jail time, but that's different.

If you had to have both hands on the wheel at all times, cup holders, manual transmissions, and non-automatic wipers and headlights would be illegal, unless the controls were all mounted so they could be operated without ever pulling your palm off the wheel.

I could easily see there being laws about motorcycles requiring both hands on the bars at all times, but my quick google tells me the cop lied to you. There are laws against carrying a package that prevents you from being able to have both hands on the bars at all times, and possibly if you were needing to constantly keep one hand on your shirt in order to see, that might have qualified.

If the cop had arrested you, it would've been delightfully murky as far as the law was concerned, and the court would've had a chance to set precedent, so the next time it happens there's a little objective clarity about that particular situation.

^I was pulled over because I violated the arbitrary opinion of a group of tyrannical leaders. I'm not blaming the cop, per se, as hes just doing his job (although hes certainly a complacent accomplice), I'm condemning the system we live under.

Thats what tyranny is, a group of people oppressing others by forcing their opinions on them via the threat of harsh punishments.

The fact that you happen to agree with some of the opinions they happen to enforce, really doesn't make it any less tyrannous.

>> ^imstellar28:
Thats what tyranny is, a group of people oppressing others by forcing their opinions on them via the threat of harsh punishments.

Hey, I hear you have a motorcycle. I think I'll take it for a spin.

You think that you have a right to deny that to me? Don't force your group opinion on me with the threat of harsh punishments!

Just because you agree with it doesn't mean it's not horribly tyrannical!

Seriously, all these concepts are about finding a way to live together harmoniously in groups.

Part of that includes giving up the right to do whatever the hell you want at all times, especially if you want to travel using a heavy vehicle made of metal that moves faster than a cheetah in proximity to where other people or other people's property is.

It's not like motorcycles are new, and it's not as if we haven't had to deal with millions, if not billions, of asshats who confidently feel that they are the safest or simply best driver in the world, and therefore don't have to pay attention to safety laws, because they're meant for less skilled or -- let's face it -- dumber people.

I'm guilty of that kind of thinking on occasion, but it's always a threat to myself and others when I fall into that kind of egotism while behind the wheel.

The cop did what he was supposed to do by reminding you that you're not a god, and that sometimes overconfidence will not only get you killed, it could get innocent people killed too.

He had every right to do that, whether you think he did or not.

If he beat the crap out of you, or spit in your face, or took your bike, or something actually egregious and unwarranted, and when you tried to get justice the cops "protected their own", and made sure you lost the case due to a biased judge, and that was upheld by appellate and supreme courts...then maybe you'd have a case for a tyrannical system (see Guantanamo).

Getting issued a warning by a traffic cop isn't tyrannical or oppressive, it's just annoying and embarrassing.

If there was a law forbidding you to wear red pants - regardless of how harsh or lenient the penalty was, do you agree that would be tyranny?

>> ^NetRunner:
Hey, I hear you have a motorcycle. I think I'll take it for a spin.
You think that you have a right to deny that to me? Don't force your group opinion on me with the threat of harsh punishments!

>> ^imstellar28:
If there was a law forbidding you to wear red pants - regardless of how harsh or lenient the penalty was, do you agree that would be tyranny?

I'm not sure I'd call it tyranny. Unconstitutional, incomprehensible, and inadvisable, but not necessarily tyrannical.

If people wearing red pants were being hunted down like dogs and shot, yes. If it just meant you needed to pay a fine, and was scarcely enforced, I'd have trouble calling it tyranny.

Looking at the Webster definition of tyranny again, it's "oppressive use of power (usually by government)." Oppressive in turn is defined as "unreasonably burdensome or severe," which makes tyranny "unreasonably burdensome or severe use of power (usually by government)."

I think we just disagree on what's reasonable.

Here's a counterexample in the same vein from my point of view:

If there was a law forbidding companies from being able to read their employees' company-provided e-mail, would that be tyrannical?

^You don't think someone telling you what clothes you can or can't wear is oppressive? If I started following you around and taking money out of your wallet whenever you wore red pants, you wouldn't consider that oppressive? Why is it different when the government does it?

And yes of course I think a law forbidding companies from being able to read their employees' company-provided e-mail would that be tyrannical. Who is the victim? There is no victim, so its tyranny.

We have uniforms, don't we? My work has a dress code, and we hardly ever have in-person interactions with our customers.

I'll gladly say that being told to dress a certain way or lose your job is terribly oppressive.

Having a law against a specific type of clothing that's not really enforced wouldn't be. For example, if the enforcement model was like seat belt laws used to be; they could add a red pants violation when arresting someone for breaking some other law, but they wouldn't stop you for that on its own.

As for the e-mail question, don't you think invasion of the employee's privacy counts?

To ramp up the example, do you think a landlord has the right to set up cameras in the leased apartments to make sure they don't do anything untoward to their property? Add in that the cameras would be hidden and the renter wouldn't be told they're there, and you have a pretty good analog to the e-mail question.

Would a law that forbids that be tyrannical?

^Come on NetRunner, I know you can draw a distinction between wearing red pants in your own home, and wearing red pants in someone elses home. The same applies to a workplace - its private property. To use a more clear example, you can wear shoes in your house in or public, but someone can ask you to take your shoes off before entering their home.

The email/camera monitoring occurs on private property - they can do whatever they want, but both things would have to be noted in your corporate contract/rental contract. Its practically universal company policy that work email/work internet is only supposed to be used for work purposes.

To flip it around, what would you think about a law forbidding you to use corporate internet for anything other than work-related business? Its called the 2009 United States Productivity Recovery Act.

Okay, but we're back to just talking about your belief here. You think what would be tyranny if the government did it is perfectly okay if it's being done by a private company.

I don't really make much distinction, because the real relationship our government has with us is that it owns everything here. Sure, they let people "buy" parts of it, but just like buying a condo, you're still beholden to the building's rules, and to the other residents.

I would even make the argument that there is no innate right to property, simply a concept called property rights that's established by government.

I also don't think of the government as being a "they" or "them", because I am a component of it myself. Not because I work for the government, but because I pay attention to it, speak my voice, vote, and encourage others to do the same. I may not always agree with what comes out of the process, but that's not tyranny, it's just losing the argument.

Employment at a company on the other hand imports almost no control whatsoever. Owning shares might, if you bought the right kind and had enough that they'd bother soliciting your opinion, but at the moment the company I work for is privately owned, so I can't even do that.

Theoretically I could petition my manager to push on his manager, to push on his manager to possibly change a policy I find overly constraining, but more likely than not my direct manager will just tell me to piss off.

I could organize a union, and hold a strike, I suppose, but there's so much anti-union propaganda and legislation right now such a thing would be impossible unless there was both broad and deep discontent with conditions (and it's not that bad).

So according to your philosophy, whatever it is that gives me the right to wear red pants when I choose is clearly not something our society thinks is part of the human condition of liberty, it's just the condition of whether I can afford to purchase enough land in the world to be able to wear red pants.

To put it more succinctly, what if it were universal that all rental properties required people to accept cameras in their rooms, as it is with dress codes and e-mail surveillance?

The rules apply equally to both, but the situation is entirely different - a private person acting on their own property versus a government official acting on someone else's property.

If I throw away my old dresser, thats fine. If someone else throws it away thats oppressive. Why are you trying to blindly apply the concept to all situations, when that is clearly not appropriate?

Regards to company policy - you could quit and work elsewhere. If the company policy was universal, just as the case with all rentals having cameras, well I'd say its about time for a revolution. Which is exactly what I'm saying with regards to the government!

The policy sucks, just the corporate policy of spying on your employees, or the landlord policy of putting in cameras - and with the government, there is no viable alternative, I can't just quit like the company and find a new job, or wait till my lease is up and find a new landlord, there is no option with the government which is why blankfist, myself, etc. are so pissed about it.

>> ^NetRunner:
You think what would be tyranny if the government did it is perfectly okay if it's being done by a private company.

>> ^imstellar28:
Why are you trying to blindly apply the concept to all situations, when that is clearly not appropriate?

Usually you're the one who's arguing in favor of blind applicability of concepts to all situations. Personally, I don't see the difference. Either I have a right to wear the clothes I choose because of some innate right to free self-expression, or I don't.

I'm curious, what other individual freedoms do you think corporations can disregard?

It's apparently okay for coalitions of companies to take away my freedom to wear the clothes I like, and to monitor my communications made using their equipment. They also have the right to keep me under constant surveillance as well.

Since I'm "in their house", I suppose they have the right to do anything they choose with me, so long as I can quit, right?

If the company policy was universal, just as the case with all rentals having cameras, well I'd say its about time for a revolution.

What would your moral basis be for using violence? I have no right to tell others what to do with their property. I can only enforce what's been contractually agreed to.

What would you set up after the revolution to fix the camera-in-rental-property issue? A government that meddled in the private affairs of people's contracts?

Egads, authoritarian! Statist!

I parody by way of trying to make my point of view clear. I have respect for the whole series of basic assertions of libertarians. I just say to most of them "with some exceptions".

People have a right to what they produce...with some exceptions. People have to abide by voluntary contracts...with some exceptions.

My exceptions are because I see how property rights and contract enforcement can be used as a cudgel to inflict tyranny on people who don't have the material resources or the education to escape it. I'm not talking about people who are poor and stupid, I'm talking about people like you and me, since I think it's probably a safe bet that neither of us are multi-millionaires nor top-notch lawyers.

Changing jobs works some of the time, but there are a huge array of things that are standard practices amongst all companies that just shouldn't be happening at all.

Perhaps starting my own company would be a cure, but I don't have enough wealth to wager on it, and I'm unwilling to threaten my family's livelihood just because I'm chafing at the tyranny I'm subjected to at work.

So instead I run my yap and try to convince people to engage in some political activism to get our employers owners to treat us like we're people entitled to certain rights as human beings, beyond merely the right to get suckered by the wealthy and crafty.

Why do you think the government is the only solution, or even a viable one? If all landlords are doing something reprehensible (cameras in apartments) then if you boycott them they will all go out of business and new landlords who don't put cameras in apartments will gain the market share. You have your revolution, and then you try to maintain that culture. If it slips back to what it was before...well I guess its time for another revolution.

There are political problems, and then there are cultural problems. Can you accept that? It seems as if you view all problems as political, with only governmental solutions.

>> ^NetRunner:
What would you set up after the revolution to fix the camera-in-rental-property issue? A government that meddled in the private affairs of people's contracts?
Egads, authoritarian! Statist!

How can you not distinguish between your right to do as you please with your own body, or your own property - and the right of others to have their body, and their property respected by you?

>> ^imstellar28:
Why do you think the government is the only solution, or even a viable one?

<snip>

There are political problems, and then there are cultural problems. Can you accept that? It seems as if you view all problems as political, with only governmental solutions.

Not true, I just see a wide spectrum of issues facing society, and don't see a particular reason to take government action off the table.

For example, with regard to gay rights, it's indisputably going to require passing laws that explicitly protect their right to get married and be protected from discrimination for them to truly come up to par with heterosexuals. Whether that's "less" government or "more" isn't really a question that matters to me in the slightest. Republicans say that's some sort of gross government overreach like desegregation was. You're inclined to say it's government butting out of people's business. I (and other progressives) would say it's government fulfilling its role in establishing and providing the defense of a human right that had not been available to homosexuals heretofore because of the adherence to the right of people to discriminate, based largely on the property rights you champion.

In the case of a boycott, do you really think I could get one where even a significant percentage of people to go homeless in order to support it? People can be terribly weak, and will go along to get along, and not make a fuss, especially if putting up a fight will pose a significant threat to their lifestyle. After all, you just get used to the camera after a while...

Why did we ever need a 13th, 14th, and 15th amendment? Why didn't the abolitionists just drive the slave owners of the south out of business, or buy up all the slaves?

It can be much easier to rally people to vote for an action they would find too risky to do themselves. I wish people were different, but they are not.

In the case of something like slavery or the environment, there just aren't enough resources amongst the people leading the cause to do something like buy up all the oil fields or all the slave hands in the fields. Sometimes the rights of the people outweigh the need to be subservient to an individual's right to property (my rephrasing of the Trekian "the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few").

I also think your view boils down to "people only deserve the rights they can defend", which for most people isn't going to amount to much.

How can you not distinguish between your right to do as you please with your own body, or your own property - and the right of others to have their body, and their property respected by you?

I do distinguish between them, I think I just draw the borders differently from you. Most of the difference I have probably has a lot to do with the shell games corporations play with property so that they rob essentially all of their employees and customers blind, largely for the benefit of people who've really done nothing to create wealth, and along the way empower people who trample on all sorts of individual freedoms that we used to think were sacred.

I'm not big on absolutes in any case. All of our rights have limitations and exceptions. When it comes to conflicts between the various fundamental rights, I think property should be the least important, not the most.

I'm sure the South squealed like stuck pigs about how freeing their slaves would hurt business, and was some sort of terrible government theft. Ditto for desegregation.

Now they say public health care would be terrible for the insurance and pharmaceutical companies. Personally, I won't shed a tear about that if it means actually delivering health care to those who need it, no matter what their income level is.

You are saying that corporate boycotts are too difficult. You think changing governmental policy is less so?

Cultural changes don't happen overnight, they happen over years, decades or even centuries. Unfortunate for those living during that time period, but thats the reality of societal evolution.

However, when the government is in the way, cultural evolution grinds to a halt. How can you evolve if you are jailed for doing so?

I'm not saying people only deserve they rights they can defend, I'm saying all people deserve the same rights. Start there, and let the culture catch up.

Governmental policy does not drive culture, nor has it ever - its the other way around. Why do you think I'm talking to you instead of my state representative?

>> ^imstellar28:
You are saying that corporate boycotts are too difficult. You think changing governmental policy is less so?

Actually yes. I also think it can be more fine grained. Boycotting car companies that charge extra for seat belts won't make them standard equipment, ever. Ask lots of people "should seat belts be required equipment on cars?", and you'll get an overwhelming vote in the affirmative.

Also, since it's law, there's no backsliding. No making them optional in bad economic times, no new companies who have some unproven alternative that's cheaper, etc. If a superior safety device comes along, there's a whole series of regulatory agencies who can test it, review it, and approve it.

Perhaps there's an argument to be made saying seat belts and airbags shouldn't be specifically required, but instead earning a 4+ star rating from an IIHS crash test, but I don't see operating only by boycott as being a superior method for improving car safety.

Cultural changes don't happen overnight, they happen over years, decades or even centuries. Unfortunate for those living during that time period, but thats the reality of societal evolution.
However, when the government is in the way, cultural evolution grinds to a halt. How can you evolve if you are jailed for doing so?

I agree that it takes time, and that government can be in the way. On social issues, I'm already essentially a libertarian though. I'm a touch different in that I'd rather have government give positive affirmation of rights (gay marriage recognized nationally as legal, as opposed to government not recognizing marriage at all, just civil unions), but that's essentially just a semantic difference.

When it comes to more economic matters, I'm happy to call myself conservative in the sense that I'm okay with evolution being slowed down a bit. Not that I'm afraid of progress generically, but I think we should be careful about what we do, and make sure we've tested things thoroughly, and thought through all the implications before we go wild with a new technology.

For example, I'm in favor of bans on human cloning...for now. However, my reason for a ban would be so we have time to prepare a legal and ethical framework for the people created through such a process. I think the people who pushed that kind of a ban through had religion on their brains, and intend for it to last forever though. I doubt we'll see many bioethicists pushing for legislation covering guardianship, clone creation consent, etc. anytime soon.

I also hope someone is paying close attention to robotics, artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, etc. I'd hate for the first big breakthrough in self-replicating machines result in an unstoppable mechanical pest or virus.

Turns out I was looking too far ahead, I should've been worried about Credit Default Swaps to the same degree.

I'm not saying people only deserve they rights they can defend, I'm saying all people deserve the same rights. Start there, and let the culture catch up.
Governmental policy does not drive culture, nor has it ever - its the other way around. Why do you think I'm talking to you instead of my state representative?

On this we agree completely. I think we just disagree on where people's equal rights end.

Remember this video? I got to the end without disagreeing with anything they said. You're right that they left off the right to life, though that can be situationally controversial (abortion, euthanasia, capital punishment, etc.) and it was supposed to be a happy feel good sort of presentation.

I think a right to life also includes the right to medical care, and access to preventative medicine, affordable healthy food, etc. I think paying for that is an issue, but I think we have a moral imperative to find a way to pay for it, in the same way we had a moral imperative to find a way to pay for manual labor once slavery was abolished.