Your Rights

Or, do they?

I've gotten complaints by saying this before, but I'll say it again.

You have no natural rights. You have no God given rights (that matter anyway, except to you and your God).

The only natural rights you have are what you can enforce yourself.

Our rights are what we as a society agree are our rights to the degree that they are enforced. If you're fortunate, you have such rights.

Now, I'm not saying our rights come from the government. In a place like America, its people (its representatives anyway) made our list of rights. In more tyrannical places, they're whatever you're allowed to have (or take by force). Of course, people in America who voted for the losing person/issue often claim its tyranny whenever they were outvoted.

In a world without society or governments, your only rights are what you can enforce yourself. Sure, you can claim you have a right to life or freedom, but your philosophical argument won't stop the roving brigands from killing or enslaving you. Your "rights" have no power. They mean spit. In such a world, might makes right (or rights). Anyone can claim any rights they want to claim. It doesn't make them anymore true than the superpowers you claim to have (unless you actually have superpowers).

Don't let Libertarians or Conservatives take your rights away with their goal of shrinking government and removing its protections for people such as yourself.

It is truly vital that we make sure everybody has equal freedoms and protections at the highest levels of governments. Basic civil freedoms such as not being enslaved or being able to marry aren't matters that should be decided at the state level. We should have lots of rights and freedoms, but we must fight for them. We must accept no conciliation prize, such as letting states oppress us and calling it a state's rights issue. People's rights are more important than states' rights.

What some people call "Natural Rights," I instead call, "The Way Things Should Be." We must to put forth effort to make sure that's the way things are.