Where do your rights come from?

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: CitizenZero
It just means you’re born with it. When people say “shake what your momma gave you” they don’t mean their ass was literally handed to them by their mother.

And, if you are born into slavery, those freedoms were never yours.

In the example of slavery, it took society to ensure those rights to not be enslaved, it wasn't a given just because those slave babies were born until that point. Those rights were given to them by men.

Yes, society was needed to enforce abolition, but they did so because they believed in idea of natural rights.

In a time when belief in god was paramount, men came to reason that others are born without chains, were created from the same clay, and were therefor afforded freedom by nature, the creator, or whatever. One doesn’t require a belief in god to continue believing in “natural rights”.

originally posted by: Sookiechacha

Indeed, the world as we know it would fall into disrepair if the mighty didn't rule. That doesn't mean that humanity can't continue to evolve to a more altruistic government that doesn't require poor vs rich to make the world spin round and round.

Could humanity survive without these constant wars and economic manipulation? You bet.

It is interesting how a human could help an old lady or cut her throat for her purse in almost the same instant of thought. What you suggest is to change 2 million years to evolution that made humans the apex predictor of our planet. The big question is would humans still be human anymore. I have put forth the same argument with religion in if you could wipe religion from all humans would they no long be human as to what that would mean.

In the end we are still cavemen fighting other tribes for our food sources and women... Give it another 100,000 years and we might be different, give it 1 million years and humans will no longer be around.

a reply to: CitizenZero

Fair play and thats a nice thought.

Thing there through is that the Bible don't exactly condemn slavery.

Point of fact, Christian Slaveholders, used the book to justify slavery.

time.com...

And that there is by no manner nor means just an American issue.

originally posted by: CitizenZero
Yes, society was needed to enforce abolition, but they did so because they believed in idea of natural rights.

True, but that doesn't mean the idea of natural rights isn't a human invention.

a reply to: TheRedneck

As for the selling of forgiveness, you lack the context to understand what was even happening

Here ya go...context.

The Bible records two instances of Jesus cleansing the temple of money changers and those selling sacrificial animals. Jesus’ first encounter with money changers was at the beginning of His three-year ministry (John 2:14–16). He made a whip of cords and drove them out. The second time He confronted the money changers was the week before His trial and crucifixion. Seeing that the money changers had come back, He again drove them out, saying, ““It is written, ‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers’”” (Matthew 21:13).
...
These same money changers were associated with others who engaged in shady business practices in the temple courts. Some sold sacrificial animals, overcharging people who did not bring their own. Others were in charge of examining the animals to be sacrificed, and it was a simple matter to declare an animal “unapproved” and force the worshiper to buy another animal—at an inflated price—from the temple vendors. Such goings-on, exploiting the poor and the foreigner, angered the Lord Jesus and was strictly forbidden in the Mosaic Law (Exodus 22:21; Leviticus 19:34).

Because Jewish law required a temple tax of a half-shekel (Exodus 30:11–16), Jews and visitors from other nations came pay their taxes when they offered their sacrifices. But foreign coins with the likeness of pagan emperors would not be accepted in God’s temple. So money changers exchanged those foreign coins for Jewish money, but they did so at an exorbitant profit. Rather than provide this service as a business in another part of town, they exploited the religious zeal of the visitors to Jerusalem and did their business on temple grounds. Because they determined their own exchange rate, money changers easily took advantage of the poor and the foreigners pouring into Jerusalem for Passover.
...
The money changers in the temple courts were similar to tax collectors in that they extorted money from their own people. They were more than ordinary businessmen. They were seeking to profit financially from the worship of God. Wherever passion and zeal are found, there will also be those who seek to profit from that zeal.

www.gotquestions.org...

Any church that is selling forgiveness is selling a worthless product.

On one hand you have salvation through repentance, one the other you have judgement according to one's works. It's an ongoing paradigm.

a reply to: daskakik

The argument isn't against that, it is about them being god given and that this somehow makes them inalienable.

"Inaluenable" means no one has the right to remove them. That does not mean there are not men who will try. Someone could walk up to my door and claim he owns my house... doesn't make it true or right, but it can happen.

If you are having trouble with the phrase "God-given," might I suggest you go back to my original answer... the question becomes who or what created you? That is the source of inherent birthrights. If you believe in God, then they are God-given. If you believe we are simply mammals with a brain, then they came from your parents. If you believe we were created by the Earth, then they came from Gaia.

The point is that no man has the right to remove them. That includes governments. If they try, they are in the wrong. Period.

TheRedneck

a reply to: Sookiechacha

Here ya go...context.

Are you a Christian?

If not, you have no context. Might as well go explaining Jamaican customs to a Jamaican. No, wait, that would be racist wouldn't it?

TheRedneck

a reply to: TheRedneck

I was raised Christian, in a Pentecostal household. I went to Bible College for 2 years.

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: CitizenZero
Yes, society was needed to enforce abolition, but they did so because they believed in idea of natural rights.

True, but that doesn't mean the idea of natural rights isn't a human invention.

All ideas are human inventions. Some are meant to describe the real world and justify ethical considerations. Aristotle argued that some men are slaves by nature, as did pro-slavery Christians. Some argued the opposite. I believe the latter and not the former.

originally posted by: TheRedneck
The point is that no man has the right to remove them.

That is just an opinion that society has agreed upon.

Without society someone can certainly violate your right to life and move into your house and not fear any consequences from doing so.

originally posted by: CitizenZero
Some are meant to describe the real world and justify ethical considerations.

And the one we are discussing in this thread doesn't describe the real world, one without society and the structure it provides.

originally posted by: Sookiechacha
a reply to: TheRedneck

I was raised Christian, in a Pentecostal household. I went to Bible College for 2 years.

lol makes sense nao

making up for lost time eh? 🤣

originally posted by: daskakik

originally posted by: CitizenZero
Some are meant to describe the real world and justify ethical considerations.

And the one we are discussing in this thread doesn't describe the real world, one without society and the structure it provides.

Why does one society abolish slavery but another doesn’t? Society doesn’t just come to these principles from thin air.

a reply to: Sookiechacha

I didn't ask how you were raised.

I was raised Southern Baptist. I converted to Christian.

TheRedneck

a reply to: daskakik

That is just an opinion that society has agreed upon.

I would argue that the protection of inalienable rights is the primary reason society exists. Remove those rights and society tends to crumble.

TheRedneck

a reply to: MichiganSwampBuck

Yes it has been both a chalenge and a pleasure to have the opportunity to boil such a nuanced topic of with such a diverse range of view points into what I call clean data sets, or as you put it black and white.

Like many things I find pleasurable it has been both a process of refining my own ideas into more mature forms, and learning how to relate those ideas to others in a way that is readily understood.

The fact that this hypothesis of mine touches on what would consider to be two out of three big taboo issues for public discussions among friends/associates as they were related to me by somone I trusted and respected at the time.


One should never discuss religion, relations, or politics in pleasent company.

So ya I knocked 2 down right off the bat, and yet many of my fellow brave ats'ers actually responded. So many of you in fact that I have been up over 24 hours straight of which about 12- 14 hours have been actively posting on this thread idk how many exactly I'm sure my gf could tell us though.

So I am this wonderfull mix of overwhelmed but envigorated all at the same time.

Thank goodness my mental activity or focus is much more determinative of my sleep schedual than the suns absence or presance.

I should have been a submariner as I lack any sign of circadian rhythm lol

I beg for data best I can without trying to force a square peg into a round hole, and hope to garner usable data sets that may or may not support my hypothesis.

Parrrrrty and you all joined riiight?

This is why I love ats.

So no data set from you and maybe that is just how it will be.

But thanks goes out to all who donated their time and energy to either proving it disproving this hypothesis as only ats can, in true ats style.

originally posted by: TheRedneck
a reply to: Sookiechacha

I didn't ask how you were raised.

I was raised Southern Baptist. I converted to Christian.

TheRedneck

You asked...

Are you a Christian?

Then you stated...

If not, you have no context. Might as well go explaining Jamaican customs to a Jamaican. No, wait, that would be racist wouldn't it?

I gave you context.

Having moved out of the ghetto doesn't mean one forgets what ghetto live is like.

a reply to: TheRedneck

"Order out of chaos" or more accurately, "out of chaos, order".

Would seem to be the colour of societies day.

But, aye, take away the warning labels, and remove the safety nets, and that's pretty much hell on Earth.

Even i get that and i hate authority. LoL

a reply to: Sookiechacha

You know what's really a shame, Sookie? We had a great discussion going, until you decided to tell me all about my religion.

Oh, well... getting to expect something like that. Carry on.

TheRedneck

originally posted by: TheRedneck
I would argue that the protection of inalienable rights is the primary reason society exists.

Why not just rights that a group thinks are important to have?

Adding flowery adjectives to them leads to things like this thread. Some people believing that these things exist outside of society when in reality it was just a group of people sitting down and agreeing to live a certain way.