I'm a bit surprised you think that. We build societies, but we have to impose order by force.
No society can stand in the face of overall civil disobedience. The vast majority follow the rules. When they don’t the rules disappear. If no one – NO ONE AT ALL – stopped at stop signs, how would we enforce this? Similarly, if absolutely everyone in a country failed to file and pay taxes, how would we collect them? Voluntary compliance is at the root of society functioning.
And we tend toward Rule of Man and not Rule of Law, with an authority figure largely governing by whim.
You mean like the Queen of England decides green is a bad colour, and everyone in the UK, Canada, Australia and all the other constitutional monarchies whose ultimate ruler is the British monarch stop wearing green? Yes, of course, that happens routinely in modern society – not.
Rule of Law is a concept we had to invent
Rulership and government are concepts we had to invent, so of course the Rule of Law is a concept we had to invent.
Your comments that follow go through an array of permutations, but all come back to the concept that someone owns property, by right (that is, by Law).
Under medieval law, in theory the King owned everything.
Hence, everything is the private property of the King, and he has the right to use it, including to
take back whatever portion of it he desired. The King lent his property to his vassals, but that doesn't mean that they then owned it. Rather than ownership, what the King was granting was usury - the right to use the hold the property but not to have it. The vassal then was to use the property for their own upkeep - this was considered a gracious dispensation that they should be quite grateful for - and the surplus they were to return to the lord.
The King owns the land and the vassals are granted a right to use it. The benefits flowing from working the land are shared between the vassals and the King. This sounds a lot like sharecropping. Those vassals, in turn, grant a “sublease” to their own vassals, allowing them to use the property under a similar arrangement. At each tier, the user of the property pays a portion of the benefits of its use to the person who granted them the right to use the property.
In the absence of private property, those using the property would not be required to share the benefits with the person who granted them the right to use that property, right up to the ultimate owner (the one person who owns this private property).
So while the concept and feeling that property ought to be 'mine' existed, what the law actually said is that this feeling was wrong and indeed criminal, and in fact property was not private.
I suggest rather that while the concept and feeling that property ought not to belong to the King might well have existed, what the law actually said is that this feeling was wrong and indeed criminal, and in fact property was owned by the King, so one could not use it without becoming beholden to its actual owner, the King, whether directly or through a chain of persons who had been granted rights to use the property.
This is actually a very ancient and far from unique theory of property ownership. The same sort of theory pervaded most of the cradle of civilization, where the majority of citizens (even powerful persons of high social standing) were slaves and in theory owned nothing, but had only use of property loaned them by their lord.
Here again, the private property of their lord, which they may use only as he permits. Not communal property that anyone may use as he or she sees fit.
Marxism moves ownership of property to “the state”, and in its purest form would be used communally for the benefit of all. The Hutterites have a similar communal structure, on a much smaller scale. I do not believe there has ever been a true Marxist state. It too is a Lawful state – while it removes “private property”, at least in large part (I think what I take in accordance with my need is my private property – mankind having never succeeded in a long-term pure Marxist state, it’s hard to tell with certainty), the concept of “ownership” remains in the form of the State. However, the difference is real – the King could do what he wishes with the property (at least in theory) where the State is an intangible entity which (again in theory) will always pursue the best interests of the members of the State.
I note, however, that there may be an underlying theme to our disagreement. I find “selfishness” to be a trait associated with Evil (good is altruistic and generous, while Evil pursues its own desires exclusively; Neutrals are in the middle, placing more value on their own desired, but recognizing some lines they will not cross solely for their own gratification).
Well, first of all, Robin Hood is a idealized romantic bandit figure.
Yeah, the first example in a page and a half actually relevant to a game.
And we don't consider Robin Hood evil because he is only stealing back what has already been stolen.
The ability to determine he is only stealing back what has already been stolen presupposes there was a rightful owner of this private property at the start of the chain. To me, however, I don’t care whether it was already stolen. Robin Hood steals from those who would hoard resources so he can distribute those resources to those in dire need of them. This is Good regardless of the source of these resources.
He breaks the law, and lives outside the norms of society, to pursue that Good agenda. One could argue he is Chaotic, choosing this wild life of a rogue, Lawful, forced into exile by those who usurped the power of the rightful King Richard, whose goals he still pursues, or somewhere in between, motivated by people in need, and not capriciousness or loyalty to a usurped King. I have never seen anyone argue he does not fall within the D&D category of Good.
Ali Baba on the other hand is the villain; I'm not sure where you get the idea that he's not evil. He exists in the story to give the hero some treasure he can steal without being evil, since Ali Baba's treasure is itself stolen.
Ali Baba steals from thieves, which either makes him a thief or does not (depending on whether one believes the property belongs to the 40 thieves or not). Really, Ali Baba is a lot like adventurers, working his way into a dungeon in search of treasure. The 40 thieves have a feel reminiscent of the bandits low level adventurers often encounter.
Any legal system where we believe that grant someone the ability to take something which does not belong to them
Presupposes personal ownership of that property by another person, that is the concept of private property.
, typically speaking, systems that allow the rich to take from the poor in order to enrich themselves. Most libertarians in fact believe that most taxation is simply legalized theft, enforced at the point of a gun.
I would classify libertarians , especially the extremists, as Chaotic. In Canada, I am amazed at “de-taxers”, who assert the government lacks any right to tax them, consistently being identified because they file tax returns with no income to claim social benefits.
The purer you get on your stand on individual liberty, the more all state actions seem like a sort of theft.
First, we must remembering that Chaotics prize individual liberty, where Lawfuls value society. However, to classify anything as “theft”, we must start with the belief that someone owns the property. Property cannot be stolen if no one owns it – who is it being stolen from? To have “theft”, we must first have “ownership”.
Please cite any system of laws which lacks a concept of “theft”, or considers one person taking from another to be OK. One cannot have theft without having private property first. In the absence of private property, there is nothing wrong with me walking into your house and raiding the fridge. You don’t own (or have any rights over) the house, the fridge or the food. To me, that’s a pretty Chaotic society, but you would seem to have me accept it is the ultimate expression of pure Lawfulness.
No no no no no. I'm going to great lengths to explain how a person can steal without being evil.
Why? I agree that one can steal without being Evil (D&D).
I'm justifying good people doing things that appear to be theft.
They ARE theft. Stealing is theft. It is not inherently Evil. I can steal a loaf of bread to feed my family. That does not seem evil. I can steal it from a starving man. That seems a lot more evil. My character can steal the Amulet of Undead Mastery from its original creator, Norman the Necromancer, to prevent him from raising a legion of undead warriors and destroying the world. That is stealing - Norman created the amulet himself from thin air. I would not classify it as a Good act. I suspect few would consider stealing the bread baked by a baker, or the armor crafted by the armorsmith a Lawful act, but my Paladin will likely be forgiven for taking a Chaotic action in this instance.
Which reminds me – you never did answer my request for examples of how Paladins would operate on the basis that no one actually owns anything, as private property is a Chaotic concept. Given the idea was to keep this a gaming thread (I blew that a few thousand times over already), maybe we should address the game concepts.
Lawful Evil and Lawful Neutral examples haven't even been brought up, and if you want to explain how private property is lawful concept you need to show its a distinctive and pervasive feature of LN society. I think you'll find that difficult,
Your own example of the slumlord throwing out a tenant and keeping his possessions is a fine one. He is using the law for his own selfish ends, whether coldly and heartlessly, or even maliciously to cause pain to his (former) tenant.
Capitalism is such a loaded term. But, to the extent you mean a Free Market Economy, this is strictly speaking a non-Lawful concept. Even this ought to be obvious by definition, as the extreme end of a Free Market Economy would be laissez-faire - that is free from rules or interference by the state.
Even the ultimate extremes of laissez-faire still required enforcement of contract law.
The worst examples of laissez-faire reflect no real understanding of a free market economy, as such an economy lacks anyone with market power. Labour is a commodity in a pure free market economy (and the worker typically does lack market power), but there are also no barriers to entry in a true free market (so not a small group of employers able to collude in order to fix the price and terms of labour). Much like a pure Marxist economy, there is no pure free market economy.
http://cubahomeforsale.com/ Looks like one can purchase – that is, own – real estate in Cuba.
I do, however, agree that humans are unlikely to ever be purely any alignment descriptor.
But by and large, I find your arguments incoherent on their own terms.
See extensive discussion of how medieval society contemplates everything being owned by a single individual, but having no concept of private property/property ownership.
You want to argue that private property is lawful, and theft therefore chaotic.
The law/chaos axis is where I would place property rights, yes.
But you are also going to argue to me that the basis of good is doing unto others what you'd have done to you, so under what theory is stealing from others not doing things to them you wouldn't have done to you?
That would be the good/evil axis, so it has nothing to do with whether an action is Lawful or Chaotic. Stealing bread to feed a starving man is not an evil act, but it may well be perceived as such by the baker who would rather let that man starve so he can sell the bread to some rich, overfed fat guy and buy a big screen TV. The Baker can achieve his ends Lawfully.
Again no. Strictly speaking, "Valuing what is best for others, not just what is best for oneself", is a neutral concept since it implies that both the self and others have value. Valuing others over the self is the lawful concept
So it is embraced by all the Devils of Hell? I think they value self above others – and well above others to boot, despite being paragons of Law. To me, that selfishness is their Evil side.
Altruism or selflessness is the principle or practice of concern for the welfare of others. It is a traditional virtue in many cultures and a core aspect of various religious traditions and secular worldviews, though the concept of "others" toward whom concern should be directed can vary among cultures and religions.
Remember, "Good" implies altruism, respect for life, and a concern for the dignity of sentient beings.
It's appalling to the idea of Law that how one should behave should be left up to personal interpretation - however Good the intention of that interpretation may be.
Yet Paladins (and everyone else) must make those personal judgements all the time.
No, it doesn't. It depends no altruism at all. It's a pragmatic declaration of the limits of one rights, without which everyone's rights would be trampled by the strong and no one would have them.
A situation of Chaotic Evil, where might makes right, and no one has intrinsic rights (human or otherwise), unfettered by any rules. The acceptance of constraints on my freedom for the benefit of others is a compromise of Chaotic ideals in the interests of Good (or, at a minimum, non-evil). The Wiccan Rede says I should harm no one. It does not suggest I seek to impose that requirement on anyone else, nor that I should take any steps to prevent such harm being done to them.
In my view, the "right to swing my fist" limit is consistent with an interpretation of the Wiccan Rede, under which the avoidance of harm to others is a constraint upon doing whatever I please, and a tendency towards Good rather than Evil. Perhaps not enough of a tendency to move from N to G, but a shift upwards on that Great Wheel away from exactly 3 o'clock.
