Should we repeal the 2nd Amendment?

[Lothian]

Exactly.

Rights, if they exist at all, exist before they're codified or recognized by any government. The 2nd Amendment simultaneously affirms this view, and recognizes the right to bear arms. I guess maybe Lothian disagrees with something here, but he's coming at it so obliquely, from my perspective, that I can't tell if he's leading up to an argument, or thinks his argument is already made.

I am not making an argument. I am trying to understand one. I am trying to understand where the right to bear arms comes from. I understand the argument that you make that the 2nd amendment didn't create the right rather that the right existed.
So where did that right first arise? Who granted people that right, when and how?

 

[theprestige]

I am not making an argument. I am trying to understand one. I am trying to understand where the right to bear arms comes from. I understand the argument that you make that the 2nd amendment didn't create the right rather that the right existed.
So where did that right first arise? Who granted people that right, when and how?

This has already been addressed. Rights come from you. You know what rights you believe in, and wish for governments to recognize. You know what rights you don't believe in, and wish for governments to not recognize. Everything else is just an exercise in getting together with people who share your beliefs, and imposing them on society in whatever way you deem proper.

That's the argument. Do you understand it now?

 

[Thermal]

I am not making an argument. I am trying to understand one. I am trying to understand where the right to bear arms comes from. I understand the argument that you make that the 2nd amendment didn't create the right rather that the right existed.
So where did that right first arise? Who granted people that right, when and how?

This guy Tommy J opined that we hold these truths to be self evident, and the people are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among these are the right to cap a bitch.

 

[Trausti]

I am not making an argument. I am trying to understand one. I am trying to understand where the right to bear arms comes from. I understand the argument that you make that the 2nd amendment didn't create the right rather that the right existed.
So where did that right first arise? Who granted people that right, when and how?

The framers of the Constitution and Bill of Rights were students of the Enlightment. In the natural order, everyone has a right to self-defense. "Endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights." They understood through history and experience that tyrants always seek to disarm the people.

 

[Lothian]

This has already been addressed. Rights come from you. You know what rights you believe in, and wish for governments to recognize. You know what rights you don't believe in, and wish for governments to not recognize. Everything else is just an exercise in getting together with people who share your beliefs, and imposing them on society in whatever way you deem proper.

That's the argument. Do you understand it now?

No, because everyone has different wishes. Is there a right to discriminate on race? I don't know how there can be a right without a consensus or as you put it "getting together with people who share your beliefs, and imposing them on society in whatever way you deem proper".
When did that happen allowing the 2nd amendment writers to recognise that the right existed.

 

[Lothian]

The framers of the Constitution and Bill of Rights were students of the Enlightment. In the natural order, everyone has a right to self-defense. "Endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights." They understood through history and experience that tyrants always seek to disarm the people.

I realise many Americans believe that God wants them to have guns. I wasn't expecting that argument here however.

 

[Trausti]

No, because everyone has different wishes. Is there a right to discriminate on race? I don't know how there can be a right without a consensus or as you put it "getting together with people who share your beliefs, and imposing them on society in whatever way you deem proper".
When did that happen allowing the 2nd amendment writers to recognise that the right existed.

Does it suprise you that revolutionaries who won independence from a distant King who sought to confiscate their guns would enshrine that right in their founding documents?

 

[Thermal]

No, because everyone has different wishes. Is there a right to discriminate on race? I don't know how there can be a right without a consensus or as you put it "getting together with people who share your beliefs, and imposing them on society in whatever way you deem proper".
When did that happen allowing the 2nd amendment writers to recognise that the right existed.

Its a natural extension from the Rights of Life and Liberty. What's the point of a right to life if you can't defend yourself from Redcoats? Are you going to whimper that they can't shoot you because it violated your rights?

 

[Trausti]

I realise many Americans believe that God wants them to have guns. I wasn't expecting that argument here however.

Whether or not you believe in God is irrelevant. Governments are created by men. Men can be tyrannical. The check on that is what? The natural right of other men to self-defense.

 

[Lothian]

Does it suprise you that revolutionaries who won independence from a distant King who sought to confiscate their guns would enshrine that right in their founding documents?

Not at all, that is the type of thing I would expect a declaration of rights to say if they wanted to enact such a right, but I am told they didn't do that. Apparently they already had that right.

 

[Aridas]

When did that happen allowing the 2nd amendment writers to recognise that the right existed.

Long before the 2nd Amendment. For example, 1689. It goes back much further than that, though, on a quick look.

To an extent, the 2nd Amendment can also be related to British actions in 1774-5 as they acted to try to ban firearms and gunpowder. That's slightly different than the specific question asked, though.

 

[Trausti]

Not at all, that is the type of thing I would expect a declaration of rights to say if they wanted to enact such a right, but I am told they didn't do that. Apparently they already had that right.

Of course they did. It's a natural right of all that existed before this new govenment was formed by men. Perhaps it's due to the passage of time, but commentators contemporary with the Bill of Rights had no difficulty understanding this.

 

[Lothian]

Its a natural extension from the Rights of Life and Liberty. What's the point of a right to life if you can't defend yourself from Redcoats? Are you going to whimper that they can't shoot you because it violated your rights?

Hey !! We were the good guys! You attacked us!

 

[Lothian]

Long before the 2nd Amendment. For example, 1689. It goes back much further than that, though, on a quick look.
.

Thanks that partly answers my question.I note that bill says

Protestants may have arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law;

A start.

 

[Trausti]

Thanks that partly answers my question.I note that bill says

Protestants may have arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law;

A start.

Vermont Constitution, 1777.

XV. That the people have a right to bear arms for the defence of themselves and the State

 

[theprestige]

No, because everyone has different wishes. Is there a right to discriminate on race? I don't know how there can be a right without a consensus or as you put it "getting together with people who share your beliefs, and imposing them on society in whatever way you deem proper".
When did that happen allowing the 2nd amendment writers to recognise that the right existed.

So you do understand my argument. You just don't agree with it. And it's a disagreement from belief. I believe rights originate in the beliefs of an individual. You believe rights originate in the authority of the collective.

I think you're mistaken in your belief, by the way. I think a close examination would reveal to you that you believe certain truths about human rights to be self-evident, regardless of how many people disagree with you, and regardless of how much power they have to enforce their disagreement against you.

 

[Thermal]

Do we have a right to have sex? I don't see that formally codified anywhere. Nationwide celibacy declared till this gets cleared up.

 

[JoeMorgue]

Throw man in the ocean and tell him to explain to the water that he has a right to not drown. It won't matter how good his argument is.

"Rights" that aren't about human beings interacted with human beings might as well be angels dancing on the head of a pin.

 

[Trausti]

Throw man in the ocean and tell him to explain to the water that he has a right to not drown. It won't matter how good his argument is.

He can swim, can't he?

"Rights" that aren't about human beings interacted with human beings might as well be angels dancing on the head of a pin.

And governments are all fictions created by human beings.

 

[arthwollipot]

It doesn't need to be a separate specialized thing. It fits within #2 in your quote box, along with the phrase "regularly scheduled".

Also, the third paragraph of the Wikipedia article on the general idea of an "army" contrasts regular and irregular forces, anything you can read anywhere about the "Minutemen" of the American Revolution will describe them as an alternative/contrast to the "regular army" or "regulars", and a famous (in America) case in which people quickly spread the word that the British army was on its way so they could prepare to face them featured the often-repeated phrase "the Regulars are coming" (although modern people unfamiliar with that usage often misquote it as "the British are coming"), because a well organized & disciplined & trained & equipped unit would be known as the "regulars" and part of the Americans' challenge during that war was the question how to regularize themselves and how to fight enemy regulars with a mix of your own regular and irregular units.

This usage of "regular" I am familiar with, and with that context, it now makes more sense. Thank you.