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Comment by Laaw | Hacker News Reader

You don't "have" any personal liberties. You are not born with rights, you are gifted them by a benevolent society. That society can easily lose its benevolence, and take your rights away, and there is absolutely nothing you'd be able to do about it.

You might hold a differing view, but the fact is, reality works as I've described. Delude yourself all you want, but your rights do hinge on the imperfect and subjective manner in which your benevolent rulers have granted them to you.

They have not granted you absolute rights, specifically laid out, but they have done better than, "rights.. and stuff."

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"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. -- That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed"

-- The Declaration of Independence

In an American context, human rights are often thought as coming from a God or Creator. They are either preserved or infringed upon by the state, but aren't granted by the state. As a practical matter, just government is required to safeguard those rights.

That's the Declaration of Independence, which is a purely rhetorical document. The Constitution itself justifies itself very differently:

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

And the Fourth Amendment itself, which enumerates the right at stake, specifically talks about "reasonable":

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

They might talk about "natural" rights in grade school, but that is not the reasoning that the legal system was ever buillt (not even in the 1790s!) to operate on.

>You are not born with rights

This argument is really semantic.

The line always devolve to the tautological "the only rules of the universe are physical rules"

Don't forget Bitcoin. If didn't happen on the block chain it didn't happen.

That's not tautological at all. Also, it's not really true. There are plenty of rules. What I'm saying is the only "unalienable" rules are the laws of the physical universe. Every other rule is a construct of society and people, and as such, is not guaranteed in the way as stated by the previous commenter.

It's just something I believe is worth keeping in mind when talking about your "right to privacy", specifically. There are many prominent public figures who actually don't believe you have that right at all, and when we remember that rights (as we're referring to them) are granted only by the grace of the state, if the members of the state don't believe you have a right, then you simply don't.

The argument here should be more about whether or not it's in the state's best interest to grant the right to privacy to its citizens, and I think there's a pretty strong argument in favor of that, but simply stating "I have a right!" doesn't illuminate that argument very much.

> You don't "have" any personal liberties. You are not born with rights, you are gifted them by a benevolent society. That society can easily lose its benevolence, and take your rights away, and there is absolutely nothing you'd be able to do about it.

Certainly society is a secondary concept to any strictly individual notion (just formatively speaking) - of course one starts at a point where others have already built up what is currently the case, but certainly that's not saying anything about rights being 'gifted' to an individual - only that there is a threat of violence against individuals by society for all matters not included in said 'rights'.

You're free to play with definitions as you want - but it would help if you had rather spent that time on a clear argument then on statements such as these:

> You might hold a differing view, but the fact is, reality works as I've described.

I was (and still am) trying to illustrate the "physical reality" that exists independent of the concept of personal liberty.

It can be argued in many different ways, but the actual, consequential mechanisms regarding a person's "rights" are enforced at a legal level, and are done so at the discretion of the state. Reality does work, therefore, as I've described, regardless of what eloquent points you might make about the innate personal liberties each person is "born with". This is my "clear" argument.

> Reality does work, therefore, as I've described, regardless of

Holy tautological christ, batman!

> "physical reality" that exists independent of the concept of personal liberty

How about gay rights? Or reproductive rights? Or the right to use Uber? To argue ideology does not impact our legal system is frighteningly ignorant.

It seems evident that if enough people feel entitled to something (justly or not) it's possible the state is forced to adapt or not enforce unpopular laws. The state influencing society and society influencing the state are not mutually exclusive.

You're the second person to claim tautology, but you've both been wrong. "Reality works as I've described" is not tautological. "Reality works as reality works" is tautological. "As I've described is as I've described" is tautological. I'm further asserting, beyond the givens, that what I've described presents a difference from alternative conclusions, and what I've described represents the set of physical laws of this universe, rather than the ideological so-called "rules" of society, which are not enforced via the physical laws of this universe.

We're talking about "rights" in the context of "what can and can't be done", and I'm concluding that what some people are claiming as "unalienable" or "innate" aren't actually so.

It doesn't matter how many people "feel entitled" to anything. It does not seem that the state is "forced" to do anything. The state can choose to act and behave a certain way, but "forced" is simply wrong, as a way to describe how the state behaves. "Influence" is more accurate, certainly.

It may feel "wrong" or "bad", the fact that the state maintains absolute control, but it's true. Only through the grace of the state's benevolence does the influence of individuals or groups matter. The state gives you many ways to move through its control, and is generally benevolent, but not because it has to be.

I feel like you're trying to make a point but I'm not sure what it is.

My post made no mention of expectations to rights or liberties. My point was the document intended to place limits on the government isn't very objective. And from one perspective - seemingly useless.

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