Are rights possible without some authoritarian body to bestow and protect them? Can any supposed right, say free speech, exist as a practical reality without some governing body enabling its exercise?
I tend to think rights are human inventions, and so the concept of them is largely fanciful in the absence of an established authority. Nobody has a right to anything unless someone with more power than them says so.
So i also think unless you believe in a specific kind of deity, you basically have to admit that things like “human rights” and “property rights” really only exist within the framework of a state. Or at the barrel of a gun. Or both.
What about going back to the concept of “right” to begin with? I mean, what does a right entail? Is it, for example, something written down or agreed upon -, or and this is what I think, it is a space for a certain kind of activity (could be “living”, or anything more specific) created in the mind of a subject.
“Might makes right” is truth, for there is no other medium by which right can be enforced.
But might is not military, necessarily. It can also be power of conviction, capacity to arouse sympathy, etc.
The idea of a right will most of the time arise in a situation where the activity permitted by that right is challenged. In that sense, the barrel of the gun is appropriate, and so is any force coming from within the subjects perspective to solidity the aim of that perspective, to make sure the perspective can move in the direction it is inclined.
From this it can be made probable that all humans should have the right to move about, to pursue the object of their own will, if one doesn’t insist that absolutely irreducible, “hard” truths (such as might makes right) are the only valid truths. The idea that everyone wants this particular right of being allowed to grow and increase and pursue some kind of happiness, reasonably gave rise to the idea to embed that right in a constitution.
Within this system, might makes right still goes. It is only a more conditioned domain where might may be expressed.
I would say you are absolutely 100% correct on that.
As for individuals the reason those in authority are so apt to protect them is because they are far more useful alive working at walmarts, factories, convenience stores, and the occasional fast food restaurant.
Of course those in authority are going to fight for the rights of their human livestock workers that toil and labor for them in making them money. Your going to want to protect your human livestock making sure they are blissfully happy, ignorant, sheltered, and well fed. You want to protect the health of your cattle as the acting rancher.
It’s kinda cute how the authorities pretend to actually hold sympathy for the plight of those at the lower end of the socio hierarchy in life but, don’t be fooled.
Ever notice how those at the higher end have more rights than those at the lower? It just amazes me that this system of deception has gone on like this for so long in history. I personally hope that the bottom falls out. I desire a social collapse and upheaval. I want disorder.
basically, yeah. since we rely on those with more power to enable the free exercise of our supposed rights, it’s largely about what those with more power are willing to grant to us.
Think of it as a table where those in power feast where once in awhile to appease the starving masses they will give them crumbs every so often just to keep the illusion that they as the establishment care about the plight of those lower then themselves.
Give just enough so that the masses can keep on deluding themselves into believing they are “free” but keep back just enough so you can reign in control of them and direct them like the puppet livestock they really are.
This is the basis of politics, law, and supposed existing rights.
If you think about it rights have more to do with the upper classes than it does the lower ones.
If you pacify the masses in enforced cooperation their passivity is more than likely going to keep them from turning on you making it all the more easier to herd them up and direct their lives from a comfortable distance of control.
There’s definitely an element of that to it, but it’s more than that - people benefit from having rights - the alternative is no rights, after all.
exactly - the more you are worth, the more effectively you can exercise your rights.
well, what you do is you take away someone’s comfort and well-being by requiring them to work shitty jobs, then sell a substitute sense of comfort and well-being back to them at a tidy profit in the form of consumer goods. it’s a kindler, gentler form of slavery wherein we all end up owing our souls to the metaphorical company-store.
I think rights are somewhat, but not completely, fundamental - and it’s not necessary to believe in a deity to say so. Think of the wolf attacking the deer. In a sense, the wolf feels that he has the right to eat the deer - his conscience is clear. As conceived by humans, human rights are a kind of abstraction of this same urge. In democracies we often claim that we have the right to do what we want, unless it infringes on another’s rights. Further, I think there’s a natural tendency to think of certain supposedly “neutral” states as states we have a right to. I have the right to a certain level of silence, I have the right to fresh air. These feelings and ideas run pretty deep, probably because these things are like a matrix that allows communities to flourish - and flourishing communites are often what allow individuals to flourish.
Maybe it makes sense to think of rights as what we feel entitled to, with a truly (no faking!) clear conscience. Conceived of in this way, they aren’t inventions. Only the kind of specific rights that are written into laws are inventions.
Don’t forget also the money element as well where those with more money can afford more rights than others.
Also income, money, and a wage is what we use to enslave today’s modern slaves.
There is no need of a physical slave master anymore since money has become the new physical presence of other people’s enslavement.
Today people are enslaved by a low wage or income which in turn symbolically oppresses them by forcing a valuation of worth onto them within society from which they can’t escape.
see, when i look at nature i see no system of rights at all - the wolf attacks the deer and either the deer dies or the wolf fails and goes hungry - but there’s nothing saying that the deer has a right to life or that the wolf has a right to kill and eat the deer. As for silence and fresh air, they are all well and good, but where there is no silence or fresh air to be had it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense or difference to claim a natural right to them.
this much is insightful and true - insofar as we have a vision of what “flourishing” entails, we build communities with systems of rights which enable that vision to become reality.
while i see what your saying, conscience seems an unreliable guide. i agree that rights are entitlements, but do entitlements exist except as human social constructs? is the wolf entitled to eat the deer? is the deer entitled to wander the forest free and unmolested?
Well I started my response with, “I think rights are somewhat, but not completely, fundamental”. I also stated, “These feelings and ideas run pretty deep”.
I do think the wolf feels entitled to eat the deer. If someone tells him he can’t eat the deer (yes, I realize I’m turning this into an Aesop’s Fable), he will ignore that input in order to go about his business of eating the deer. Entitlement, in a legal sense, is “an individual’s right to receive a value or benefit provided by law”. The human aspect here is the “provided by [human] law” part. But I think that everything about that definition is deeply embedded in all sentient beings’ psyches.
Rights in the sense you’re discussing - i.e. the right to free speech etc. are aspects of this neutral matrix I brought up. Is there really such a matrix, and is it really neutral? I wouldn’t go that far. But can the attitudes, postures, and codes that make all communities work really be considered just inventions (understood as fundamentally in opposition to what is natural)? The wolf pack has its own codes which help the community to flourish. For instance, according to this site, wolf pack behavior can be described as a mix of rules which regulate behavior (i.e. monogamy and hierarchy) and more dominant individuals with more freedom to break those rules. Isn’t this just like human society, with its rights and privileges based on rank?
Further, Wikipedia adds a couple relevent tidbits:
and
Rights and authority are definitely intertwined, just as you have posited. It is impossible to enjoy your perceived rights if the power structure doesn’t allow that. But you’ve gone further and stated that “the concept of them is largely fanciful in the absence of an established authority. Nobody has a right to anything unless someone with more power than them says so”. I think you’ve greatly exaggerated in saying that the concept of them is “largely fanciful”.
also, the more stuff you have, the more rights you need to protect and enjoy all of it - which goes back to your point about how rights have more to do with the upper classes.
yes, wage slavery is how the wealthy generate capital, tho they would have you believe it’s ingenuity and talent that made them rich - which, of course, perpetuates the (usually false) impression that low-earners have less because they LACK ingenuity and talent. this is the persistent myth of meritocracy which the wealthy (though they know its bullshit) use to justify and gloss over the failures of the modern capitalist system (and boost their own egos while their at it). economics, FOX news style.
insofar as all sentient beings are self-aware and self-interested yeah - but rights and entitlements themselves are still just human social construsts reflecting that self-interest - in any case, there is a difference between hunger and a sense of entitlement - i don’t think the wolf has a sense of entitlement to the deer, it’s just hungry.
yes, but i would point out all those descriptions are human ones. i also wouldn’t consider inventions of the sort we are talking about to be “fundamentally in opposition to what is natural” - where there is a society, i think it’s perfectly natural for hierarchical systems (or systems understandable as such to humans) to emerge.
we can agree to disagree on whether rights are “largely fanciful” in the absence of an established authority. again, i don’t think wolves have a sense of entitlement, they simply behave in ways that are reflective of them being social yet self-interested creatures, like us.
Right is probably another word/concept that is used by needy people to assert and deceive oneself and others so that they share and maintain common delusion in which something is justified/good/natural/granted/logical/legal/etc among participants of the delusion.
The (delusion, imagination) of higher authority can be used to boost the effectiveness, I guess.
But I think it’s naive to think that there is physical or solid and dependable higher authority.
The concept of “right” and its effect will be there without any authority if people share the delusion that someone/something may enforce the imaginary rule (or punishment).
I guess it’s strongly related to “moral”/“ethic”, in our emotional world view, and I tend to think of it as another trick to boost certainty of emotional nature and bring it into pseudo/fake logic (in the sense of reasoning and justification).
I don’t think of it, talk of it, often, and I do think we can live without any notion of "right’. When we want/need something, we can simply say so and negotiate with others if necessary.
I can understand that a notion like this might be important for people who can’t settle conflicts regarding what they want/need in reasonable manner, though. Maybe we can see this as a tool to avoid physical fight so that things are settled in the battle ground of concepts and notions. However, it can be used for justifying physical violence, too.
i wouldn’t call it “delusion”, Nah. i simply don’t agree that there is anything delusional about power, or the authority it enables.
i agree that the concepts of morals and ethics have their roots in sentiment, but i don’t agree that that makes them “another trick”
rights are simply negotiating tools for the things we want, i agree.
i don’t think there’s anything unreasonable about using the notion of rights to settle a conflict, tho you are correct that the notion of rights can be used to justify physical violence.
I think the “power and authority” might come with the “right” is a psychological one.
I mean, it’s a bit like a “threat”. And to prove the point, people who use “right” may bring something, like gun or legal canon or anything that can damage others, and demonstrate how it can be, time to time.
But it’s to enforce and maintain the effectiveness of such threat, I would say.
And if everyone ignored the “right” and “authority”, they will exhaust their resources to make effective demonstration, quickly.
Also, this type of threat doesn’t work for some of crazy people, some of suicidal people, and so on and it shows it’s in our head. And thinking something in our head as if it’s physical is delusion to me.
It’s just for my personal taste. I don’t think relying on a notion which we don’t need to bring in, and which I consider as superficial, is really “smooth” thing. It doesn’t mean we can’t/shouldn’t employ it, though. It may work very well for some (or even most) people.
It just amazes me that this system of deception has gone on like this for so long in history. I personally hope that the bottom falls out. I desire a social collapse and upheaval. I want disorder.