Dear Friends,
It seems to me, our natural Rights interconnect, like Ikea furniture. By interconnect, I mean they both support, bind and protect each other. They are like ropes that are so intertwined they create a 3D structure. Remove any rope from the structure… and it collapses. Our Rights are the same, remove any one of them and the others quickly become irrelevant. Eliminate freedom of association and we can be oppressed individually with no one the wiser. Take away the freedom of speech and propaganda makes democracy a rubber stamp. Remove the freedom to keep and bear arms and government will establish a tyranny. Each Right supporting the others, creating a structure that promotes prosperity, civility, health and humanity… a 3D structure that is civilization itself.
There are two kinds of Rights, Natural Rights and government granted rights. Government granted rights insidiously negate Natural Rights. Government granted rights are those that require someone else be forced to participate. Single payer healthcare for example. In a state of nature we are morally obligated to help people who we come upon injured. Just as we would hope a stranger coming upon us would help were we injured. A moral obligation is different from a Right however. To conflate the two is a logical fallacy… or a spurious argument. Moreover, anything granted by a group of people, ie “government,” can be taken away by a group of people. Most importantly… unless there is a group of people to provide that “right,” it does not, indeed, cannot exist.
Natural Rights on the other hand are those that one receives in a state of nature. Presumably, we all agree that the original state of mankind, was that of a hunter gatherer, we lived in a state of nature. In that state of nature we had certain Rights, not voiced or legislated, but inherent in our existence. The right to speak our mind, the right to defend ourselves from lions or raiders, the right to associate with our friends, the right to our stuff, the right to live where we were born. These Rights are inherent, we are born with them, and anything inherent cannot be done away with, anymore than I could do away with my spine. Natural Rights define what it is to be a human being as opposed to a cow, snake or ant. They presuppose self awareness, individuality and agency.
To believe that we have outgrown Natural Rights is to believe we are no longer human. We could no more outgrow Natural Rights than we could, vision, hearing or thought itself. They are intrinsic to being human. To those who secretly think, “I like that the government is oppressing…” Christian white men, blacks, Jews, the English, Republican Irish, Roma, etc… beware who they decide to oppress tomorrow. Because to withhold someone else their Natural Rights is to abdicate one’s own… this is a strand of the 3D structure. Remove it and the structure falls. While we cannot outgrow Natural Rights… we could regress below them. If we become animals… animals don’t have or need Natural Rights. They cannot speak, choose who they associate with, have a conscience or can reckon.
Truly, our Natural Rights are woven into a civilization that while imperfect, is one that has risen far above any that has come before, in health, wealth and knowledge… if not in wisdom. Our Rights interconnect in subtle ways that defy the clumsy machinations of would be oppressors and busybodies. This is why psychopaths must connive ways of hoodwinking people, into acting out of charity, and thus giving up our Natural Rights in the process. Once one Right is fully removed, the rest will fall apart. It is up to us then to protect the Gordian Knot of our Natural Rights. Object when government grants rights that undermine our Natural Rights. In doing so, we protect the structure that will in turn protect our children and grandchildren, from the usurpations of psychopaths in office.
Sincerely,
John Pepin
