squatting

[Lex]

I guess the guy gets my stuff.

What if your friends are understandably upset with this person? How would you like them to express their anger regarding your situation?

[Russell Kanning]

galactic force

[Caleb]

I guess the guy gets my stuff.

Haven't you heard? A man's life comes from the things he owns.

[Caleb]

galactic force

We will restore ... order ... to the galaxy.

[Pat K]

galactic force

[J’raxis 270145]

This thread is going in the same direction as the last debate over property rights that I remember. Someone even, again, brought up the ludicrous example of trying to claim ownership of a lake by mixing soup into it.

The last thing I'm going to say about the "propertarianism" and "easement" debate is that it's arguments like this that make people feel they need to enforce exclusive claims to large pieces of land, and do so obsessively with postings and fences. Before I got into this debate I said that I wouldn't mind a person wandering across open land that I owned. But when I hear people trying to make an argument that such a wanderer has some entitlement to be able to do so, and furthermore that he has a right to use force if I "aggress" against him in trying to remove him, it makes me want to fence off and post 100% of whatever I own, just to keep myself safe.

It's these veiled communitarian arguments that make people paranoid and go overboard in how they go about protecting themselves and what's theirs.



So I'm going to bow out of rehashing the same stuff that's been said. But there's one thing that I feel needs to be countered specifically:—

I think you're smart enough to get this, I just don't think you want to... But, I'll say it again. You always and everywhere only have those rights that you afford others, and that they in turn respect your exercise of. Period. A right is not a thing in space or list in D.C. It only exists in the context of your interactions with others in your community.

This is absolutely, 100% backwards.

Imagine a human being completely alone in the wilderness. No community. No other people, period. What rights does he have? He has complete freedom of thought: No one can tell him what he must or must not believe. He has complete freedom of speech: No one can tell him what he can or cannot say. He has complete self-ownership: If he chooses to pick an herb and ingest it, he may do so unhindered. He can behave in any manner he chooses, unhindered. If he so chooses, he can commit suicide, unhindered. He has complete property rights: He can, if he so chooses, claim the entirety of the empty land surrounding him, unhindered.

What joining a community does is restrict these rights.

[Russell Kanning]

Before I got into this debate I said that I wouldn't mind a person wandering across open land that I owned. But when I hear people trying to make an argument that such a wanderer has some entitlement to be able to do so, and furthermore that he has a right to use force if I "aggress" against him in trying to remove him, it makes me want to fence off and post 100% of whatever I own, just to keep myself safe.

these crazy debates don't have to change your original reasonable stand.

if everyone enforces their "property rights" and the government controls all the roads and such ... how will the slaves escape to The Shire and how will our Underground work?

[Dylboz]

This thread is going in the same direction as the last debate over property rights that I remember. Someone even, again, brought up the ludicrous example of trying to claim ownership of a lake by mixing soup into it.

The last thing I'm going to say about the "propertarianism" and "easement" debate is that it's arguments like this that make people feel they need to enforce exclusive claims to large pieces of land, and do so obsessively with postings and fences. Before I got into this debate I said that I wouldn't mind a person wandering across open land that I owned. But when I hear people trying to make an argument that such a wanderer has some entitlement to be able to do so, and furthermore that he has a right to use force if I "aggress" against him in trying to remove him, it makes me want to fence off and post 100% of whatever I own, just to keep myself safe.

It's these veiled communitarian arguments that make people paranoid and go overboard in how they go about protecting themselves and what's theirs.



So I'm going to bow out of rehashing the same stuff that's been said. But there's one thing that I feel needs to be countered specifically:—

I think you're smart enough to get this, I just don't think you want to... But, I'll say it again. You always and everywhere only have those rights that you afford others, and that they in turn respect your exercise of. Period. A right is not a thing in space or list in D.C. It only exists in the context of your interactions with others in your community.

This is absolutely, 100% backwards.

Imagine a human being completely alone in the wilderness. No community. No other people, period. What rights does he have? He has complete freedom of thought: No one can tell him what he must or must not believe. He has complete freedom of speech: No one can tell him what he can or cannot say. He has complete self-ownership: If he chooses to pick an herb and ingest it, he may do so unhindered. He can behave in any manner he chooses, unhindered. If he so chooses, he can commit suicide, unhindered. He has complete property rights: He can, if he so chooses, claim the entirety of the empty land surrounding him, unhindered.

What joining a community does is restrict these rights.

While your last paragraph is mostly true, it is meaningless to say that the guy has rights, but yes, he is obviously free to do what he wants unhindered. It would be even more absurd to say he "owns" the wilderness, even though he can dispose of objects in it as he sees fit, and the reason is that ownership is a social construct about the relationship between you, an item and others. It is the recognition by others that you are the sole and rightful claimant to exclusive control of it. The concept of rights is now and always has been about human relationships. It is simultaneously a declaration of our intent to act towards others in a certain way, and our expectation that they will reciprocate.

If you want to wall off your property just because your are so terrified someone might say something to you about what you're up to or use something before you get to it, you'll have a miserable life. Humans are social creatures, and require communities to survive, for the division of labor and for commerce. You are going to have to interact with people, and they will want to have certain consistent expectations about how you will behave. If you shoot people who walk across your land, they will not be very happy with you. On that score, I think you have me a bit confused. What I think people are entitled to is their lives. Easement ought to be our default for a lot of reasons, peace chief among them, but if you have some compelling reason that you must have absolutely no one else on the property in question, then I think you do not have the right to shoot first and ask questions later, but rather, because a person's right to his life is more important than your claim to property, you have an obligation to ask them to leave first.

Freedom to travel is one of the first things the state restricts. I think a free society can do better, much better. Easement is a means to that end.

Lastly, I don't think that my comments are "veiled," I am coming right out and saying that humans require community for maximum happiness, economic utility and the division of labor, and ignoring this simple fact in your construction of property rights alienates a lot of people who might otherwise be amenable to libertarian philosophy. I find myself bemused, though. I am always an advocate individual rights, freedom and peace. Yet here, I am regarded by some as an enemy of the same. It is because I reject the notion that your claim to property gives you the right to dispose of another human being at your discretion (essentially making them your property) and you reject my claim that an individual's right to life supersedes your property claim.

[John Edward Mercier]

I guess the guy gets my stuff.

Haven't you heard? A man's life comes from the things he owns.

Actually the things he owns comes from his life... in the form of labor, thought, and skill.

Before I got into this debate I said that I wouldn't mind a person wandering across open land that I owned. But when I hear people trying to make an argument that such a wanderer has some entitlement to be able to do so, and furthermore that he has a right to use force if I "aggress" against him in trying to remove him, it makes me want to fence off and post 100% of whatever I own, just to keep myself safe.

these crazy debates don't have to change your original reasonable stand.

if everyone enforces their "property rights" and the government controls all the roads and such ... how will the slaves escape to The Shire and how will our Underground work?

Not all roads in NH are gov't owned. And those that are privately owned, many times may be travelled upon... with the blessing and restrictions that the owner has placed upon them.

[Barterer]

This thread is going in the same direction as the last debate over property rights that I remember. Someone even, again, brought up the ludicrous example of trying to claim ownership of a lake by mixing soup into it.

That was a joke about homeopathic remedies. Just ignore me if my posts are such eye-rolling crap to you.