antagon
The Man
- Dec 6, 2009
- 3,572
- 295
- 48
I challenge the widely held belief that our compendium of rights are granted us by others or the society in which we live. Instead, I argue that we have an innate entitlement to act howsoever we please, and that our societies are crafted to impair our use of our rights for the benefit of a social agenda or determined communal virtue.
While this is similar to many enlightenment-era views on natural rights, my position differs in some crucial ways. Firstly, I challenge the necessary association with God or supernatural altogether as it is proposed in the Declaration of Independence, for example. I attribute these rights to the nature of free will itself. Should the faithful attribute the facts of our existence to God, my argument doesn't obstruct that, however, my contention is that these rights are natural rather than supernatural.
I further challenge the necessary altruism which has been associated with natural rights from as early as Thomas Hobbes. In Leviathan he describes these rights to be exclusive to acts of self preservation. John Locke elaborately augmented the concept with the introduction of a natural system of morality to which natural rights were constrained. I argue that there are no such limitations to these rights within the bounds of self-determined action.
That they could give rise to 'evil' actions or 'good', self-preserving actions or suicidal, is the struggle which I argue our natural authority over our own action - our natural rights - has thrust upon humanity and the social contracts we construct.
While this is similar to many enlightenment-era views on natural rights, my position differs in some crucial ways. Firstly, I challenge the necessary association with God or supernatural altogether as it is proposed in the Declaration of Independence, for example. I attribute these rights to the nature of free will itself. Should the faithful attribute the facts of our existence to God, my argument doesn't obstruct that, however, my contention is that these rights are natural rather than supernatural.
I further challenge the necessary altruism which has been associated with natural rights from as early as Thomas Hobbes. In Leviathan he describes these rights to be exclusive to acts of self preservation. John Locke elaborately augmented the concept with the introduction of a natural system of morality to which natural rights were constrained. I argue that there are no such limitations to these rights within the bounds of self-determined action.
That they could give rise to 'evil' actions or 'good', self-preserving actions or suicidal, is the struggle which I argue our natural authority over our own action - our natural rights - has thrust upon humanity and the social contracts we construct.