Individual Rights

[AugustineJurnior]

Individual Rights.

As the name implies, these rights belong to all individuals, equally, without bias or discrimination of any kind. Where the law does not protect everyone equally, individuals rights are violated as a consequence. Collective rights always violate the rights of individuals. Any system of governance that violates individual rights, is unjust, unfair, and immoral.

Collective rights are legislated "rights", or entitlements, that only apply to certain groups. Such "rights" are said to be necessary for their perceived benefit to the collective. As predicted, the ability to vote themselves largess from government funds has poisoned the public against protecting the Rights of the Individual.

Public and Corporate Welfare, Social Security, food stamps, bailouts, subsidies, interventionist foreign policies, and even public schools, just to name a few. There is probably something there you agree with and something you don't. Most people are conditioned to consider violating the rights of others moral for causes they support, and only immoral when done in the name of causes they do not support.

There was probably something on that short list you're willing to violate the rights of others for... but how many of you are honest enough to admit that about yourself? How many of you are deluded into thinking violating the rights of others, to achieve a common good you agree with, is a worthy and necessary sacrifice?

I'm confident in my ability to defend Individual Rights against all challengers because I have a secret weapon... It's called a dictionary. My super secret weapon... A Thesaurus. If the thought of defining the terms being used in a discussion poses a problem for you, then having a rational, logical, intellectual discussion might not be your cup of tea.

Fairness, equality, bias, discrimination, justice, punishment, freedom... Words have definitions. They also have synonyms (words that have similar meaning), and something called antonyms (these are words with a meaning that is the opposite of the word being used).

So, if anyone is full of piss and vinegar, and would like to feed my 'massive ego' by debating me on this topic, come get some! If not, have a nice day!

You are again cutting-and-pasting as that is not Jefferson's view at all.

Of all the systems of morality, ancient or modern which have come under my observation, none appears to me so pure as that of Jesus....I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus.

Thomas Jefferson

Certainly one of the highest duties of the citizen is a scrupulous obedience to the laws of the nation. But it is not the highest duty.

Most of all the 3rd President knew what his 2 predecessors had said as Founders

In his Farewell Address of September 1796, Washington called religion, as the source of morality, "a necessary spring of popular government," while Adams claimed that statesmen "may plan and speculate for Liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand."