Registered: Sep 2000
Location: Kansas City
Posts: 7504

NCFL Nationals Topic:

Resolved: A nation's citizens' rights ought to take precedence over its security.

Discuss. It's a value question rather than a policy question, so analysis related to political philosophy would be particularly useful.

Phil in particular: does your position on rights being non-natural in origin have any major exponents other than Hobbes and Bentham? Obviously it's a highly useful position on the negative, and I'll want my kids to do some reading on it.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
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Now I see why we should read the posts in order rather than volume 5 before volume 4. Value vs Policy distinguishes theory from practice, or why we should do things vs what we should do. Is that accurate?

As for the resolved statement, I don't know if an unequivocable answer is possible. Since the fate of the nation depends on both issues, decisions must be placed in a context that recognizes the balance between them. Doing nothing to improve security could result in the destruction of the nation, yet doing everything in the name of security can fundamental alter the substance of the nation that ends up, while preserving it in name, signals the death of the nation as it once was. To illustrate my latter point, if the United States were to become an Islamic theocracy, it would (for the sake of illustration) become totally secure vis a vis terrorist threats, but the nation that we know and love would have ceased to exist.

Thus I guess I'm trying to say that the statement cannot be discussed without moving to an examination of exactly "what" the nation is and looking at how changes in rights and security would affect that "what" substance, followed by an informed discussion and ultimately a decision about the desirability or acceptability of likely outcomes of changes in rights and security policy.

It is also imperative to evaluate the actual security implications of changes in security policy. Sometimes things look like they improve security (like ID cards) when in fact they don't, and even reduce security sometimes.

To take a concrete and relevant example, in my mind, the United States' identity and raison d' etre (however you spell it) is its balance of power within the government and between the people and the government, ie rights. To change those is to destroy the country. Security improvements are nice, needed, and at times necessary, but if they alter our fundamental substrate of rights, we have sacrificed our most sacred tenets and essentially conceded defeat to those we are trying to secure ourselves against. Win the battle but lose the war kind of thing.

Furthermore, I believe that many of our security adjustments treat symptoms and not causes. These sorts of symptom focused changes are more likley to impact our rights and thus are more dangerous. Changes in security policy that seek to make us more secure by removing the threat at its roots rather than relying on interdiction and defense (treat the disease, not the symptoms) do not have the same sort of risks. What I'm trying to say is that if we worked harder at building a world where people don't choose to become terrorists rather than focusing on fighting peole once they have become terrorists, we'd put our national substrate of rights at lesser risk.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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quote:

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Originally posted by CHiPsJr
Phil in particular: does your position on rights being non-natural in origin have any major exponents other than Hobbes and Bentham?

Obviously it's a highly useful position on the negative, and I'll want my kids to do some reading on it.

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Last edited by philjit on 05-15-2004 at 04:30 AM

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Registered: Oct 2001
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Hey, phil! I looked it up, and it looks to be a good read. Of course I skimmed to the end and picked this up:

quote:

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Whenever you are about to be oppressecl, you have a right to resist oppression: whenever you conceive yourself to be oppressed, conceive yourself to have a right to make resistance, and act accordingly. In proportion as a law of any kind -- any act of power, supreme or subordinate, legislative, administrative, or judicial, is unpleasant to a man, especially if, in consideration of such its unpleasantness, his opinion is, that such act of power ought not to have been exercised, he of course looks upon it as oppression: as often as anything of this sort happens to a man -- as often as anything happens to a man to inflame his passions, -- this article, for fear his passions should not be sufficiently inflamed of themseves, sets itself to work to blow the flame, and urges him to resistance. Submit not to any decree or other act of power, of the justice of which you are not yourself perfectly convinced. If a constable call upon you to serve in the militia, shoot the constable and not the enemy; -- if the commander of a press-gang trouble you, push him into the sea -- if a bailiff, throw him out of the window. If a judge sentences you to be imprisoned or put to death, have a dagger ready, and take a stroke first at the judge.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: Kansas City
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quote:

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Originally posted by Nutrimentia
Now I see why we should read the posts in order rather than volume 5 before volume 4. Value vs Policy distinguishes theory from practice, or why we should do things vs what we should do. Is that accurate?

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
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quote:

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Originally posted by Mugtoe
Hey, phil! I looked it up, and it looks to be a good read. Of course I skimmed to the end and picked this up:

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