The Right to Keep and Bear Arms

John Howard wrote:

There cannot be a right to establish unequal rights. Therefore, either everyone has a right to own nuclear weapons, or no one does (hint: no one does).

Sounds great! Now could you tell the rest of the world's governments to please get rid of their nuclear stockpiles? Then let me know how that works out.

You are framing the debate incorrectly. It wouldn't be "unequal" rights to not allow any individual to own a nuclear weapon while let government or a duly authorized regulated body handle nuclear weapons, it's a matter of self-preservation and making sure there is a transparent process to making sure lunatics are not in charge of handling nukes while letting a nation have a defense against other nuclear armed nations.

Would you say it would be "unequal" rights if we don't let children vote? Is it "unequal" rights if we don't allow violent convicted felons to own a gun? Is it "unequal" rights to say you have to have a license, i.e. proof that you can drive a motor vehicle?

Post 61

Wednesday, July 9, 2008 - 1:05am

There are often an arguments made for anarchy that goes something like this,

"Justice would be more effectively provided by the free market rather than by a government which by its nature holds some form of monopoly."

Or,

"To have a truely free market, there can be no government, because by its nature, it enforces a monopoly on rules."

"Free" in this context doesn't mean free to violate another's rights - "Free" means free of initiated force, fraud or theft - and for a good reason: Real freedom is free to choose. A market is made of free choices. You can't make free choices in the face of violence.

That is where those two arguments are flawed. You cannot have a "free" market (i.e., a market protected from the initiation of force, fraud, and theft) until you have something that does what a government does. It establishes the rules against the initiation of force, fraud and theft - only then could you have "free" competition (whether it is between "defense agencies", "mediators", or anything else).

That government with its monopoly on the rules for its geographical area, and the closeness to which the rules describe our ethical rights, and the government's effectiveness at enforcing just those rules (and no more), will be what create that "free" market. Those are the factors that determine the degree of freedom. Nothing else can - no matter what you name it.

John Howard says, "What is required is good, consistent, permanent law, not monopolistic enforcers with the open-ended power of legislation." Agreed!

But then he says, "Good law merely requires the general acceptance" and no monopoly of enforcement. Well, if general acceptance were available on the shelf of a local store, or growing on the tree outside my door, why would we even be having this discussion?

Good law, without enforcement isn't law, it's just make-believe. If the law isn't monopolistically administered to whoever does the enforcing you are left hat-in-hand, hoping that everyone has found this mythical "general acceptance" while in reality, lack of agreement escalates into violent chaos and the marketplace is no longer free.

Post 62

Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 6:11am

Responding to post 60 (John Armaos)

John Armaos opens his post with snide sarcasm, and then moves quickly on to promoting mass murder of the innocent (just as long as the perps are rhetorically baptized as a "duly authorized regulated body"). He bases his enthusiasm for holocaust on the implicit premise that only mass-murder of the innocent can defend against or deter mass-murder of the innocent, and he concludes by confusing punishment of the guilty with coercively limiting the liberty of the innocent, apparently wondering if 'equal rights' means the elimination of justice.

Post 63

Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 6:14am

Responding to post 61 (Steve Wolfer)

Steve Wolfer's entire post is devoted to implying that rule enforcement must be a coercive monopoly because if it isn't a coercive monopoly, then it isn't rule enforcement. This makes no sense. A coercive monopoly on the right to enforce rules and rule enforcement itself are not the same thing and are not necessarily linked. When confronted with the notion that enforcement need not be monopolized, he responds with a lecture on the obvious point that rules must be enforced, as if enforcement, and not monopoly of enforcement, was the issue.

Why, if a set of rules is good enough to enforce, would anyone (aside from power-lusters) want to limit and restrict the enforcement of those rules to a privileged ruling class?

Post 64

Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 11:50am

John,

Question #1: Suppose that enemy combatants, embedded among innocent civilians, are launching an attack against you, and the only way you can defend yourself is by killing the innocent civilians along with the armed combatants. Is it your position that you should allow yourself to be killed rather than kill the innocent civilians?

Question #2: Should everyone have an equal right to fly a plane, including those who have no knowledge of how to fly one, or should that right be restricted to people who do possess that knowledge?

- Bill

Post 65

Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 12:36pm

Bill if I can add a question to John Howard:

Question #3: If you think no one should have the right to own nuclear weapons, what would you have proposed the United States do in response to a nuclear armed Soviet Union? And what would you suggest a nation like Israel do if say Iran, who its leaders has said repeatedly will exterminate the nation of Israel while pursuing nuclear arms technology?

It seems your argument is no different than: "No one has the right to own guns because they kill innocent people" without acknowledging people who want to murder will not pay attention to this moral edict of yours by abandoning their guns, just as historically nations like the Soviet Union, and nations today like North Korea and Iran, will not pay attention to your edict that no one should have the right to own nuclear weapons. So really all you accomplish by this moral edict of yours is the request that innocent people be stripped of their ability to fight aggression, thereby leading your philosophy to be one of pacifism.

Is that less snide for you?

Post 66

Saturday, July 12, 2008 - 3:50pm

John Howard (the real) was a pro-American pro-Western Prime Minister of Australia. JOHN HOWARD is a screaming troll who's avatar might as well have the name RONALD REAGAN with a picture of a Hitler Youth. I am sure dissent would be good enough for this being.

Post 67

Sunday, July 13, 2008 - 4:26am

John Howard in post #63 says,

Steve Wolfer's entire post is devoted to implying that rule enforcement must be a coercive monopoly...

That is wrong. The first two thirds of my post discussed a fallacy made in a great many anarchist arguments. Mr. Howard chooses to ignore that part of my post. I wonder why?

Second, I did NOT say that the enforcers of the rules had to hold a monopoly, or even that they should. I, like any Objectivist, in supporting a limited government agree that security companies can and should arise as the free market dictates. I'm including private police forces, body guards, what-ever. BUT they must all fall under the same set of rules. It is ludicrus beyond imagination to think that anyone can enforce any rule made up by anyone at anytime - that some thug can decide to do murder for hire and it would be legal because there is no ONE set of laws. A proper society is one which does its best to implement the structures that protect ethical rights of the individual through a code of law that is singular - applies to all.

Competing sets of laws are no laws - no laws means no free market - no freedom.

Mr. Howard, you are damn right that I call for a monoply of rules (and the call is always about a very specific kind of rules - those defining and protecting individual rights). And whatever minimal force is needed to address thugs (dressed up as defence agencies or just creeping-in-the-dark thieves) from violating individual rights is the simple realism that initiatory force may arise, and then may require force to combat it. Good intentions alone make a weak defense against common thugs, much less against aggressive totalitarian states.

You did not answer my question where I asked:

But then he (Mr. Howard) says, "Good law merely requires the general acceptance" and no monopoly of enforcement. Well, if general acceptance were available on the shelf of a local store, or growing on the tree outside my door, why would we even be having this discussion?

You haven't explained where "the general acceptance" comes from or what to do in its absence. Since that is the heart of the arguments being made - you leave an impression of someone living in fantasy land.

If you choose to put the word "coercive" in front of "monopoly" when talking about the alternative to anything-goes-in-the-use-of- force, then your views are clear to me and I want no part of them. If your 4 year old boy starts setting fire to your home, do you use "coersive" force and actually take the matches from him against his will? Or, do you allow competing rules set to hold sway - one set says it is okay to experiment with setting the drapes on fire, the other says you can not destroy the property of others.

Mr. Howard said,

Why, if a set of rules is good enough to enforce, would anyone (aside from power-lusters) want to limit and restrict the enforcement of those rules to a privileged ruling class?

Critical thinking might encourage a person to ask questions like this:

           "...a set of rules..." What does he mean by this? Is he talking about having more than one set of rules for a geographical or jurisdictional boundry? You know, just make up your own.

           Or, more than one set of rules that conflict and contradict in many ways, like those in Saudi Arabia versus those in America? Does he want that kind mixture to occur in all places? Some places? Do you get to pick your set? Then wouldn't it just be the most brutal or those able to hire the most brutal that were able to enforce their rules over the protests of everyone else?

          "...good enough to enforce..." What does that mean? Good by what standard? Stalin and Hitler thought their rules good enough to enforce.

          "...why... limit and restrict the enforcement of those rule..." Well, maybe the limits and restrictions would just be this: Enforcement of the law requires a single set of rules and no others because we want to enforce only those that are good enough to meet Objective standards? That's why I call for one set of rules that enforcers need to stay with-in.

        "...privileged ruling class" How does Marxist rhetoric fit in here?

(Edited by Steve Wolfer on 7/13, 4:31am)

Post 68

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 11:35am

Responding to Post 64 (Bill Dwyer)

Example #1 requires knowledge which is impossible to acquire - the knowledge of what everyone is about to do next, and knowledge of the whole range of possible solutions. So the answer is no, I do not agree that I have the right to kill the innocent simply because I am afraid of what I guess might happen next.

Example #2 also depends on pretending to know what others know, or are capable of, so the answer is again no.

It is not valid to argue by using conveniently constructed examples in which you, like a novelist, peer magically into the minds of others and into the future - knowing what they know and what they will do. Back in the real world, you can never know enough to justify murdering the innocent simply because you are frightened of a danger and uncreative at finding a solution. Cowardice and a lack of inventiveness is not a justification for murder, nor for forcing others to seek your permission before they act.

For many years, people who did not know how to fly airplanes, built them, climbed aboard, and learned to fly them - all without anyone's permission or instruction. The proper way to deal with those who endanger others is a jury trial where the jury decides that a particular action (not mental content) has been dangerous to others and the perp needs punishment. The principle should be "do not act dangerously toward others", not "do not act without permission". Punitive law is proper. Preventive law is immoral, and an initiation of force.

An unlicensed ten-year-old is capable of flying to his voting booth wearing a gun without harming anyone.

Post 69

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 11:38am

Responding to post 65 (John Armaos)

The claim that my "moral edict" strips the innocent of their ability to fight aggression implies that the only way the innocent can effectively fight aggression is by the immoral means of murdering other innocents. Obviously that is not true. My moral edict says simply that nuclear weapons should not be countered by nuclear weapons. I have not said or implied, as John Armaos keeps hinting, that I believe that nuclear weapons should only be countered by passive rhetoric.

Nuclear weapons are not a legitimate means of self-defense, because - if rights are equal, and derive from human nature - the right to self-defense cannot include the right to commit the mass murder of other innocent humans.

As for what to do, I don't care what is done to eliminate nuclear weapons from the world, as long as the job gets done and with no harm to the innocent - there are plenty of perps to harm in the process. The game of assuming that mass murder is the proper default solution to mass murder and cynically dismissing the possibility of moral solutions as inadequate and impractical is invalid. The wars in Viet Nam, Afghanistan, and Iraq are all fine examples of the simple truth that the might of the weapons has little to do with the outcome of the battles.

BTW, as far as I know, the leaders of Iran have not said they will exterminate Israel and have not said they will develop nuclear weapons. I wonder what is the source for that story.

Post 70

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 11:40am

Responding to post 67 (Steve Wolfer)

If I understand what Steve Wolfer is saying, it is that, within a given territory, there must be one correct set of rules, but there need not be only one set of enforcers as long as all enforcers enforce that one correct set of rules.

I agree completely and that is what I have been saying.

However, I do not refer to this one set of correct rules as a "monopoly", as Steve Wolfer does, because I don't think it is a correct use of that term. 'Monopoly' refers to an exclusive right of certain individuals, excluding other individuals , not to an exclusive set of rules excluding other sets of rules. I think this difference in usage has been creating the illusion of disagreement.

Monopoly (n): exclusive control by one group of the means of producing or selling a commodity or service.

I certainly believe in one set of correct rules being in force over a given territory and not in competing sets of rules, but I believe that every individual in that territory has the right to enforce (and the obligation to obey) those correct rules, whether for free or for pay.

As for my reference to "general acceptance", which Steve Wolfer doubts the existence of, I am referring only to the general acceptance that supports the present system. The most totalitarian dictatorship requires it. It is the reason the Objectivist/Libertarian revolution hasn't yet occurred. I have never said or implied that the rules need not be enforced and that they require general acceptance only.

As for what Steve refers to as "Marxist Rhetoric" , the phrase "privileged ruling class" is appropriate if we are referring to a gang that has a monopoly on the enforcement of rules (let alone a monopoly on the making and changing of the rules). I repeat from my earlier post: any such monopoly is, itself, an initiation of force and a violation of the principal of equal rights.

(Edited by JOHN HOWARD on 7/14, 11:57am)

Post 71

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 3:26pm

Responding to Post 68, JOHN HOWARD (all caps for arrogant emphasis) writes,

Example #1 requires knowledge which is impossible to acquire - the knowledge of what everyone is about to do next, and knowledge of the whole range of possible solutions. So the answer is no, I do not agree that I have the right to kill the innocent simply because I am afraid of what I guess might happen next.

Oh, give me a break, John! Are you seriously suggesting that we can never know if someone is going to attack us -- that we have to wait until the person actually launches the attack before retaliating? If you're in a war with an enemy combatant, you know the enemy is going to attack you, given the opportunity.

Example #2 also depends on pretending to know what others know, or are capable of, so the answer is again no.

As the old saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. We need to make sure that a person knows what he's doing if he's going to put other people's lives at risk. It doesn't make sense to allow just anyone to drive a car or fly a plane without the requisite knowledge and experience. More to the point, it doesn't make sense to allow just anyone to own a nuclear weapon. We need to make sure that the owner understands the proper safeguards for keeping it contained, and that his deployment of it is justified only by a sufficiently grave threat. Otherwise, we are needlessly endangering people's lives.

- Bill

Post 72

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 4:44pm

Bill,

My delayed response: I agree with your post 49.

Jordan

Post 73

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 5:22pm

John Howard:

My moral edict says simply that nuclear weapons should not be countered by nuclear weapons.

But that is the only way to counter a threat of nuclear weapons attack, is to have them yourself as a deterrence. I mean think this through for half a second. If you know there are murderers out there with weapons that they won't hesitate to use against the unarmed, what is the only recourse for the unarmed to protect themselves? Answer: to arm themselves.

As for what to do, I don't care what is done to eliminate nuclear weapons from the world, as long as the job gets done and with no harm to the innocent - there are plenty of perps to harm in the process.

You mean you don't care to think how it could be possible to disarm nations of their nuclear weapons. You don't want to be bothered with actually thinking through your thoughts. You just want someone else to magically carry out your moral edicts.

BTW, as far as I know, the leaders of Iran have not said they will exterminate Israel and have not said they will develop nuclear weapons. I wonder what is the source for that story.

LOL!

Are you living in a cave? No no, you are obviously posting on the internet. How could it be you were unaware Iran has threatened to exterminate Israel?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4378948.stm

And Iran said they are not developing nuclear weapons? I'm sure they said that. If you believe that, I'd like to interest you in buying this:

(Edited by John Armaos on 7/14, 5:23pm)

Post 74

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 7:08pm

Speaking of cave dwellers and bridges, John, please remember:

(Edited by Ted Keer on 7/14, 7:10pm)

Post 75

Monday, July 14, 2008 - 7:32pm

Eh, it's fun to do sometimes.

Post 76

Tuesday, July 15, 2008 - 12:57am

I've known John Howard since the 60's, when he was attending the Nathaniel Branden Institute lecture series. Granted, he has some ideas that I strongly disagree with, but he's not a troll. Trust me, he's not.

I also think it's a mistake to label anyone who takes issue with certain aspects of Objectivism as a "troll." Obviously, trolls do exist, but one has to be careful not to accuse just any dissenter of being a troll. One of the nice things about this forum is that it allows room for dissent, unlike other Objectivist forums that do not.

- Bill

Post 77

Tuesday, July 15, 2008 - 2:25am

Responding to John Howard's post #70

Mr. Howard is correct when he says I called for a 'monopoly' in the law. I don't think I was unclear in the context, but I will agree with him to the extent that the law isn't a commonly understood referent of the term. There should have been no difficulty understanding me - I stated, in other words, just what I meant by that - Only one set of laws for a given jurisdiction. Mr. Howard himself makes use of the term "monopoly" in the very same post when he says,

...the phrase "privileged ruling class" is appropriate if we are referring to a gang that has a monopoly on the enforcement of rules (let alone a monopoly on the making and changing of the rules). I repeat from my earlier post: any such monopoly is, itself, an initiation of force and a violation of the principal of equal rights. (Bolded emphasis mine, SW)

That is in the same post where he makes such a fuss over my using the word "monopoly" that he supplied a definition! So you can't use the term "monopoly" in referring to the law, but you can use it when referring to the "making and changing of the rules"? Is the word "rules" being use used in some way that is significantly different than the word "law"? If so, we should know.

--------------

But I really get confused when I see that Mr. Howard says this in post #59 :

"Good law merely requires the general acceptance" and no monopoly of enforcement.

We had agreed that there was no need for monopoly of enforcement - there can be self-defense, cops, body guards, military, defense agencies, private police forces, etc - as long as they confined their actions to within the law. And we agree on a single set of laws (from post #70):

I certainly believe in one set of correct rules being in force over a given territory and not in competing sets of rules, but I believe that every individual in that territory has the right to enforce (and the obligation to obey) those correct rules

I had asked him in post #61, where does this "general acceptance" come from? Because we should go there and get it. He makes this statement in post #70

As for my reference to "general acceptance", which Steve Wolfer doubts the existence of, I am referring only to the general acceptance that supports the present system. The most totalitarian dictatorship requires it. It is the reason the Objectivist/Libertarian revolution hasn't yet occurred. I have never said or implied that the rules need not be enforced and that they require general acceptance only.

Is anyone other than me confused? These bullet points are what I'm trying to make sense of:

If you have "general acceptance" and no monopoly of enforcement, you get good law, according to Mr. Howard.
We have no monopoly of enforcement, and we have general acceptance of the current system, yet we have lots of bad law.
Totalitarian dictatorships have general acceptance (according to Mr. Howard), so evidently their bad laws are due to a monopoly on enforcement.
Every individual has an obligation to obey correct rules, according to Mr. Howard.
Every inividual has a right to enforce correct rules according to Mr. Howard.
But how do we get those correct rules, as per his theory, if it requires "general acceptence" (and no monopoly on enforcement).

All that I can think is that the "correct rules" have to materialize magically, or "general acceptance" has to change (but that takes me right back to what I asked in the first place, "Where do we get that?") or Mr. Howard is saying that if people don't obey incorrect rules, and instead enforce only what they believe to be 'correct rules' even though those rules aren't codified.... No, that doesn't work because it would mean two rules in the same jursidiction. Is he saying that if we all come to believe in utopia of type x to the degree that we are in "general agreement" (and don't have a monopoly on enforcement) that will generate the correct rules and we will then obey and enforce these correct rules and be happy forever?

Okay, we agree there should only be one set of laws in a jurisdiction. We both agree that is okay to have private forms of enforcement. We both agree that correct rules should be obeyed. Does that mean the government agencies (e.g., police get to exist in your system, Mr. Howard, and that they too get to enforce those laws as well as a person acting in self-defense, body guard, etc.?

This isn't a subject that should be this difficult to resolve to a clearer state of agreement or disagreement.

Post 78

Tuesday, July 15, 2008 - 10:11am

Responding to post 76 (Bill Dwyer)

Thanks Bill. And I agree with your policy of courteous debate, even with so-called trolls, whatever they are.

Post 79

Tuesday, July 15, 2008 - 5:00pm