Reply to thread

Message

<blockquote data-quote="Umbran" data-source="post: 8034027" data-attributes="member: 177">There are two meanings of the term &quot;right&quot;.1) That thing we believe people ought to be allowed to do, and 2) That which we actually put legal controls around to preserve.What you believe is yours to believe.&nbsp; However, freedom of speech is not a universal human right by the second definition*.&nbsp; It is, in fact, a fairly new invention.&nbsp; For most of the history of human civilization around the globe, people did not have a legally protected right to free speech, and if a government power wanted to shut them up, they could do so without anything we'd consider to be repercussions.* It would be reasonable to argue that there are no universal human rights by the second definition - that all rights only come from what legal controls we put in place and maintain, and without those controls, the concept of &quot;rights&quot; has little meaning.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Umbran, post: 8034027, member: 177"] There are two meanings of the term "right". 1) That thing we [I]believe[/I] people ought to be allowed to do, and 2) That which we actually put legal controls around to preserve. What you believe is yours to believe. However, freedom of speech is not a universal human right by the second definition*. It is, in fact, a fairly new invention. For most of the history of human civilization around the globe, people did not have a legally protected right to free speech, and if a government power wanted to shut them up, they could do so without anything we'd consider to be repercussions. * It would be reasonable to argue that there are no universal human rights by the second definition - that all rights only come from what legal controls we put in place and maintain, and without those controls, the concept of "rights" has little meaning. [/QUOTE]

Verification