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To: freedomcrusader
You don't have top exercise your rights to have them in the first place. Just because some gov't doesn't recognize one of my rights doesn't mean I don't have it. Governments guarantee/violate rights, they don't give/take them.

I beg to differ.
In the real world (not academia or metaphysics) people have only those rights that they are able and willing to assert and hence enjoy. All else is sophistry.

119 posted on 10/18/2001 2:19:29 PM PDT by Publius6961
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To: Publius6961
All I can say is that we differ in the philosophy we hold. Certainly my view is in agreement with the founders.
120 posted on 10/18/2001 2:20:43 PM PDT by freedomcrusader
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To: Publius6961
I would also modify your statement:

people enjoy only those rights that they are able and willing to assert

In other words, I say you have them and enjoy only those you are willing and able to assert, whereas you would say that you only have those you are willing and able to assert.

Regardless, we both agree that you can enjoy only those rights you are willing and able to assert.

121 posted on 10/18/2001 2:25:24 PM PDT by freedomcrusader
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To: Publius6961
In the real world (not academia or metaphysics) people have only those rights that they are able and willing to assert and hence enjoy.

Then they are not natural at all and are the inventions of folly. Either rights are as real as your television set, or they are wishfull thinking.

123 posted on 10/18/2001 2:37:59 PM PDT by Demidog
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To: Publius6961
In the real world (not academia or metaphysics) people have only those rights that they are able and willing to assert and hence enjoy. All else is sophistry.

Lets follow your premise to its logical.

Sample case: by means of force, coersion, or otherwise, you are detained and forced to conduct hard labor. Your property is simply taken from you. You are brutally beaten if you speak, or pray, or on the whim of your guards. The party enslaving you has more than enough guards and money to keep you in this state perpetually unless an outside force intervenes.

The result of this situation is that you are unable to assert and hence enjoy any right to freedom: to be free from detention without accusation of a crime, to be secure in your person, house, paper, and effect, etc.

Therefore, by your definition of rights, even though this entire scenario occurs within the US, you have no rights.

ergo, your definition of rights is false.

132 posted on 10/18/2001 3:53:39 PM PDT by Razz
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