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"If it hurts people I hate I accept"

- Every endorsement of authoritarian rule ever



Reminds me of this quote attributed to a past Peruvian president and general, Benavides:

“For my friends, everything; for my enemies, the law.”


Feels pretty legit though. My freedom-from is impacted by other people's freedom-to: by curtailing their freedom, mine is expanded. Sure they won't like it - but I don't like it the other way round either.


I'd argue that if we want to support individual growth and creativity, freedom-to should have higher priority than freedom-from, which consciously or not has seems to be the traditional default in the US perhaps due to its culture of supporting innovation and its break-away past. I believe some refer to these as positive and negative freedoms, respectfully.


This is also why a number of people truly revolt against the idea of higher density living. If the only way to have your freedom-from is to be free from other people, then you move away from other people.

I've watched it play out on my mother-in-law's street. What was once a quiet dead end street is now a noisy, heavily trafficked road because a large apartment building was put up at the end.

The number of freedom-to people have significantly decreased her quality of life blasting music as they walk or drive by at all hours, along with a litany of other complaints that range from anti-social to outright illegal behavior. Even setting aside the illegal stuff, she is significantly less happy living where she is now.


This doesn't add up. At best your overall freedom remains the same. You gain quiet, you lose the freedom to make noise yourself. Seems like a net-negative to me.

Consider how little freedom you would have if laws were enforced to the lowest common denominator of what people find acceptable.


I can go into the countryside and make noise all day. I don't see that there's a pre-existing freedom to inflict loud noises on my neighbors for no useful purpose.


You most definitely cannot disturb wildlife or rural communities with noise.


Don't be pedantic, I specifically said my intention was not to inflict unwanted noise on my neighbors.


Don't be daft. There is no vacuum where you can go be a massive tool and not face any consequences.


You're missing the point that the freedom from and freedom to may be weighted differently for each individual.

For instance I lose almost nothing by not having the freedom to carry a weapon (UK) as I have no desire to do so, while gaining a lot from having the freedom to not risk my child being murdered at school.

It's an extreme example but applies to a lesser degree for other freedoms, and I've personally found I often benefit more from freedoms-from than freedoms-to.

I'd love it if no vehicle could exceed 30 mph in town as I gain almost no benefit from being able to do so, while taking on significant risk from others being able to.


Effectively enforcing laws we agreed to is hardly authoritarian.


You'd disagree about 10 seconds after they did...

If suddenly you could be effectively found and prosecuted for every single law that existed it is near a 100% probability that you'd burn the government to the ground in a week.

There are so many laws no one can even tell you how many you are subject to at any given time at any given location.


Automatically enforcing all the laws is vastly different from the "effective enforcement of laws "we agreed to".

The full body of legislation is riddled with contradiction, inconsistency, ambiguity and the pretense that "legislated upon = fair" is at best a schoolroom fantasy.


False equivalence. GP complained about a specific behavior, not about specific people.


Yes it's always some reasonably specific behavior that justifies the harsh new rules.


Save your rhetorical contortions.


Stop throwing logical wrong logical evaluations around and you won't hear people retorts, saving the need for you to whine about it.




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