Healthcare--a right or not?

Discussion in 'Political Opinions & Beliefs' started by WAN, Feb 23, 2017.

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  1. webrockk

    webrockk Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    not other humans. you were endowed rights by your "creator". The US Constitution recognizes those rights and endeavors to protect them.
     
  2. Belch

    Belch Well-Known Member

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    That's not how constitutional governments work.
     
  3. logical1

    logical1 Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    The states can, but not the Fed government. There are only a few things the Feds are allowed to do by the Constitution.
     
  4. Raised Right

    Raised Right Member

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    Your group has the burden of proof. By that logic, you should be able to show me indisputable proof that God does not exist.
     
  5. Belch

    Belch Well-Known Member

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    This is why I qualified it by writing "if it was legal". If there was some law on the books that says I can crash on your sofa if I need a place to sleep, then by your own definition, that would be considered a right.

    So really, you've just re-defined a "right" to be whatever the hell the law says I can do.
     
  6. ARDY

    ARDY Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    This is a human idea
    Prove that it has anything what so ever to do with god

    Yes. And yes. This sense those rights are a product of the human mind
     
  7. JIMV

    JIMV Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    That makes no sense...Our Black Robed Masters didn't discover a right from the ether like they did with Roe, they simply said the funding scheme, being a tax, was legal.
     
  8. JIMV

    JIMV Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
    - C. S. Lewis (1898 - 1963)
     
  9. webrockk

    webrockk Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I'm atheist. so "god" did not bestow me natural rights, nature did....specifically, the natural chemical attraction that brought my mother and father together to ultimately conceive me.

    Did another human 'grant' you the right to offer opinions to where human rights are derived?
     
  10. Mr. Swedish Guy

    Mr. Swedish Guy New Member

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    it's not inconsistent. If I say that society "ought" something, I am of course basing that on my personal morality, not that of society. Those are different things. Everyone has their own opinion on what is good... and society's opinion is the average of the people in that society. Individuals views of what is good may be closer or further away from society's view..

    i'm just saying, that your imaginary natural rights is just as subjective as any other set of rights people can imagine. There's no meaningful way to determine which set of right are better than the other... except if we take the average of what many people think. That's the closest thing we can come to establishing any kind of "objective" good.

    just imagine you live in a society were every has completely different views of what is good than you do. Can you then in any meaningful way claim that your view of what is good, is the "real" standard? No, it doesn't make sense. What would you base it on? your subjective experience, but that's what everyone else bases theirs off also, and the only difference is that you are alone they outnumber you. Think of it like this: if nature doesn't care about what you think is right or wrong.. if society doesn't care... if literally no one but you care... what basis is there, except that you think so?

    You might not like the idea of moral nihilism... and it's not as if i like it either. But wishful thinking for natural rights doesn't them true...
    What is a right... if not what society wrote down on some piece of paper, something you have a right to do? How have I redefined it? I don't understand what else you can think a right is.
     
  11. Mr. Swedish Guy

    Mr. Swedish Guy New Member

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    Nature "bestowed you rights" huh? well, nature gave me an invisble unicorn and a buss ticket.

    this is such nonsense... "nature" gave you rights? Who or what is this "nature"? Can you point to this decision making agent please? A sperm and egg gave you rights? molecules gave you right? this is just ridiculous..

    and how are these rights manifested? if you go out in the forest and meet a bear, will it respect your "rights"? If you are about to die of thirst, will mother nature create some rain for you? No, nature doesn't respect your rights? Only humans respect your rights? well, maybe that means that rights come from humans and not from nature.
     
  12. WAN

    WAN Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    I think what Mr. Swedish Guy is trying to say is that "rights" are a human construct.
     
  13. Mr. Swedish Guy

    Mr. Swedish Guy New Member

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    exactly so. do you agree? I think it's pretty obvious that rights are a human construct, when only humans respect rights of any kind. The concept of rights doesn't make any sense outside of a social context. It's like if you're alone on an empty island: do you have rights? it's a pointless question.
     
  14. Belch

    Belch Well-Known Member

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    If you're interested in knowing what conservatives mean when we say something is a right...
    http://libertyonline.hypermall.com/Locke/second/second-frame.html

    So now, I'm trying to figure out what you mean when you use the word "right". Is it something that can be granted by government? If the government no longer supplies it, is this right no longer a right?
     
  15. Lesh

    Lesh Banned

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    Ummm what else COULD they be?
     
  16. webrockk

    webrockk Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Rights are inherent. Our entire system of government is based on this principle...the US government was not formed to "grant" humans rights....the US government was formed to protect the rights that preexisted it. Man cannot grant rights, man can only infringe upon or revoke them. Man can, however, grant legal privileges.
     
  17. Mr. Swedish Guy

    Mr. Swedish Guy New Member

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    not all conservatives agree with locke... like me.. I certainly don't agree with locke and his natural rights... i'm more of a burkean (iirc) when it comes to rights.

    yes that's pretty much what a right is, yes. now I can ask you: can rights exist outside of a social context, e.g. if one is completely alone on an island? if so, how can you prove this?

    now consider if there are two people on that island. If person A thinks something should be a right but person B doesn't agree, is it a right? Or will something become a right only if both of them agree? This is what I mean with that rights are meaningless outside social context. It only becomes a right when both of them agree that it is a right. And we can actually see how this is a right, because both persons will respect it. Same cannot be said for "natural rights". If people don't agree that natural rights should be followed.. then natural rights don't exist.
     
  18. Belch

    Belch Well-Known Member

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    A desert island is a perfect place to establish what rights people have. Tom Hanks on that island in castaway has every right there is. He can say what he wants, he can fashion a weapon from the resources he manages to find, he can eat what he can find, and he even has the right to free dental care!

    He enjoys every right imaginable right there.
     
  19. Crownline

    Crownline Banned at Members Request

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    To answer the OP, I say you have a right to get off of your dead ass and onto your dying feet and pay for your own health care.
     
  20. WAN

    WAN Well-Known Member Past Donor

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    Did I say I wanted other people to pay for my healthcare costs? Your confrontational attitude is not conducive to having a productive debate. I was just asking questions.
     
  21. Mr. Swedish Guy

    Mr. Swedish Guy New Member

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    but... it doesn't make any sense... who grants these rights? From what possible interference is his rights being protected from?... he just.. is there. the question of rights is completely nonsensical in this context. I think the confusion is that you mix up hanks ability to do thing, with that being a right to do something.
     
  22. Belch

    Belch Well-Known Member

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    Let's just say that it's a very good place to start.

    I don't understand. Why would I have to prove this? It's the definition, just as the definition of a horse with a horn on its forehead is a unicorn. You can't prove that they exist, but it's the definition just the same. If you're on a desert island, you have every right that nature has given to you. In a social context, those rights are still there, so long as your exercise of a right doesn't affect my right. So you cannot claim me as property, but you can claim a chair you whittled as property. The chair has no personal property rights, but we do.

    Yes, with the addition of another person on the island, our rights remain, so long as they do not affect the other person. Some people might disagree, but this does not affect the moral argument that we are born with rights. It just means that people can be immoral.
     
  23. Belch

    Belch Well-Known Member

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    Yes, alone on that island, he has every natural right there is. Recognizing those natural rights is a moral value, and that recognition is a moral value. Genghis Khan did not recognize a few rights, which made him an immoral person.

    Do you understand the distinction? Rights are things we can do all alone. Recognizing those rights is something we ought to do. The former is the right, and the latter provides a moral value to the former.
     
  24. Mr. Swedish Guy

    Mr. Swedish Guy New Member

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    okay, let me try to follow this.. "every right that nature has given you". What does this refer to? You mean i can go fish, cut down a tree, breathe air, and therefore have a "right" to all those things? Basically, because nature allows me to do it, it's a right? okay, but I don't understand why humans occupy such a privileged position in all of this.. If nature allows me to enslave another person, because they are e.g. weaker than me, why is this not a natural right? How is it any different from hunting an animal, or cutting down a tree?

    see, this notion that humans should not be enslaved... there's absolutely no indication at all that this is something nature agrees with. you need explain to me why nature has a special place in its heart for humans in particular... That humans shouldn't be enslaved is something that humans typically believe though, and that's why I think that rights stem from humans.
     
  25. Lesh

    Lesh Banned

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    I repeat...if someone takes something om you and you DIE because of that...that something is a RIGHT
     
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