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To: Arkinsaw

And again you are totally ignoring the equal liberty of folks in their homes who are assaulted by these audio systems. Don't they have any rights worth protecting, or is it only the most obnoxious people who have rights?

I have the right to bear arms (theoretically, anyway) but if I use a firearm in the commission of a crime, it would be pretty disingenuous to demand to keep the firearm afterwards.

The abortion clinic analogy isn't accurate, so please stop trying to convince me with it. Abortion protestors are on public property exercising legitimate rights of free speech. Boom-box bruthas are violating private property with their audio assaults and aren't engaged in anything that can be construed as free speech.

At a certain wattage, these speaker systems can literally be used as a weapon, and with such power comes responsibility. You can't have liberty without responsibility, and there's nothing virtuous in claiming so.


166 posted on 01/29/2006 8:05:26 PM PST by thoughtomator
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To: thoughtomator
And again you are totally ignoring the equal liberty of folks in their homes who are assaulted by these audio systems. Don't they have any rights worth protecting, or is it only the most obnoxious people who have rights?

Sigh. You are acting as if its a zero-sum game...that if these people's cars are not seized its somehow a violation of the liberty of the listeners. Thats a fallacy. These people's rights can be protected by a response OTHER than violating someone else's property rights. You are acting as if we MUST give the government a power it WAS NOT granted under the constitution to end this nuisance and that it cannot be ended without doing so. Thats untrue and fallacious thinking.

I have the right to bear arms (theoretically, anyway) but if I use a firearm in the commission of a crime, it would be pretty disingenuous to demand to keep the firearm afterwards.

You are equating a criminal with a deadly weapon with a criminal with a boombox? ANY crime allows the government to seize property? Loud boombox. High grass. Trash too close to the curb?

The right to seize property does exist. But it is VERY, VERY, limited. The concept is that we limit government very strictly on this, not just open it up and let it go wild. We are supposed to be jealous of our liberties. Your attitude is very cavalier with them.

The abortion clinic analogy isn't accurate, so please stop trying to convince me with it. Abortion protestors are on public property exercising legitimate rights of free speech. Boom-box bruthas are violating private property with their audio assaults and aren't engaged in anything that can be construed as free speech.

My analogy regarded the distance limits set on abortion clinic protestors. They cannot approach within a certain distance. If a protestor steps one foot over that line then, under your loose interpretation of property rights, the government could seize the car that brought the protestor to the clinic. My analogy is valid. The protestor would have violated a law, by one foot. The car would have been used in the commission of a crime, just like your boombox fellow. It works both ways. Not just for the guy you don't like.

At a certain wattage, these speaker systems can literally be used as a weapon, and with such power comes responsibility. You can't have liberty without responsibility, and there's nothing virtuous in claiming so.

I don't like them either. But allowing the government to seize private property so cavalierly is not a nuisance, its a danger to what the country was founded on.
168 posted on 01/29/2006 8:21:56 PM PST by Arkinsaw
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