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originally posted by: TheRedneck
a reply to: bloodymarvelous
Won't protect you ANd won't let you protect yourself.
I know it wasn't meant that way, but there's actually something inherently wrong with that statement.
"Won't protect you" implies that one's protection is primarily a function of someone else. It isn't; never has been. Protection has always been the venue of the individual themselves. While I do see the role of the police as protective for the people in general (despite what some courts seem to think), their protective role is and always has been secondary to each person's responsibility to protect themselves.
Let's get real here... the police are not everywhere and cannot be everywhere. Each person, however, is always where any threat against them will occur. They are always with themselves. The primary responsibility to protect themselves is theirs.
"Won't let you protect yourself" implies that one needs permission from some higher power to protect themselves. They do not. They never have. We tend to talk about rights as something that is granted by the laws and the Constitution... they're not. Rights exist simply as a result of being... the adjective "God-given" was intended to convey this. Rights can be infringed upon by governments (and have throughout history, including today), but they still exist even when restricted by outside powers. The Constitution was never intended to bestow those rights, only to specify them and prevent the government from infringing upon them.
The right to protect oneself (and one's family/property) is not bestowed by any document or authority. It exists if we exist, as long as we exist. No one has to provide any type of permission, express or implied, to allow this right to exist.
Think about it. If one is walking down the street and encounters someone who wishes to harm them, who has the power to deny them the ability to protect themselves? No one; it is a decision and a series of actions that the person being attacked simply has. They can hide; they can run away; they can use defensive physical techniques (martial arts); they can use deadly force; they can resist physically. No one has the ability, the power, to force anyone to succumb to an attack, except possibly the attacker themselves.
Even if there is a police officer standing right there, watching the incident occur, does one has some sort of inherent requirement to ask their permission before existing? Certainly not! If that is the case, then the police officer themselves are attackers!
All the government can do (and exactly what the government wants to do) is enact laws that punish people for being ready and willing to protect themselves. No one can stop one from defending themselves, and no one can deny anyone "permission" to do so. To deny permission to defend oneself is to become an attacker themselves.
Again, I don't mean to imply that you intended this, but the wording of that statement, like the wording of far too many statements today, does imply a belief that one must have permission to defend themselves. I believe that is a part of the debate: have we come to the point where we have this deeply-held belief, albeit subconscious, that we need the government's permission to protect ourselves? Maybe we should all be contemplating on that.
TheRedneck
originally posted by: Tempter
Another princess struggling to stay alive...
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