Aurini says it better than I can.
God, I feel old and tired, but the righteous rage still burns. My cranium still throbs.
I don't fancy the coming sadness before the rush wears off.
Edit: Went to the gym, pumped some iron and bashed the punching bag around until my shoulders, knuckles and thighs hurt, and I still don't feel any less wound up. If anything, I feel more wound up for the exercise.
I'm not a paladin, I'm a squire at best. My job is to shine the paladins' armour, sharpen their swords, cook their meals and water their horses, and in return they teach me their way. And yet I can't for the life of me figure this out; it's tying my mind into a gordian knot with no sword in sight.
The point of a right is to prevent evil, isn't it? To maximise freedom and happiness and minimise suffering? In that case, how can someone, after having admitted that pursuing a certain right in a certain fashion not only increases evil, but also reduces happiness and increases suffering, still deny the point of a right and still advocate pursuing said right in that particular blind, unthinking fashion? It would be easy to write off if that person was evil or stupid, but an otherwise intelligent, decent person knowingly advocating evil that fails even a simple pain versus pleasure analysis? When they have conceded every single step of the way?
How can people just accept what they know to be wrong and evil just because a god or idealogy or whatever says so, even after they've conceded all the arguments?
"But I just proved that germs cause sickness!"
"Yeah, but we should still sacrifice a goat to the sky god."
***
"But I just proved that governments can and often do fudge figures!"
"Yeah, but they're the government, I'm sure they did it for a good reason."
ARRRRGGGHHHHH!
Edit 2: the rush finally wore off, now comes the sadness.
It's at times like this when I wish my body would let me stomach alcohol without puking all over the place.
>The point of a right is to prevent evil, isn't it?
ReplyDeleteNo, it isn't.
>To maximise freedom and happiness and minimise suffering?
Well, one out of four isn't bad.
The point of a right is to prevent violence, particularly in the context of compulsion by force, and therefore to maximize freedom. Happiness and minimization of suffering are individual choices.
Rights exist to prevent violent compulsion. They identify limits on the actions of those granted permission by the same social contract to initiate the use of force against others.
Rights don't exist to make you happy or minimize your suffering. They exist to defend people from their own governments.
Hmm, if we're going off the non-aggression principle, equally applicable to both compulsion by other private individuals or governments, then it shouldn't be hard to adjust arguments - such as the one on unlimited franchise to democracy - to show that coercion has increased since then.
ReplyDeleteI suppose it could be arguable that lack of violent compulsion would arguably increase happiness and minimise suffering and evil, but that's neither here nor there.