Can you enforce property rights when it tramples someone else's rights?

[TheEvilDetector]

By not allowing a drowning person to board you murdered them.

Could also be seen as a justifiable homicide or just bad luck depending on circumstances surrounding the event such as the capacity to assist (food, water, equipment, living space and related knowledge) and threat level from the individuals overboard.

 

[MelissaWV]

You can only morally and legally kill someone when its done in self defence (against serious physical harm) of your person or others.

Further, you cannot be forced to provide privately owned sustenance to another human being if such a provision can be reasonably seen to put your own life at serious risk.

This is not complicated.

So as long as it doesn't put your own life at risk, you can be forced to give your property? Sounds like an awesome argument for taxation It's being used to save lives, after all.

 

[Seraphim]

It is immoral for not helping. The moment you THREW HER OFF, it becomes illegal. NECESSARY FORCE is the issue to me. Is it necessary to shoot someone in your home who is not there to harm (AKA a BURDEN, not a THREAT). Why not save her life and then pull over to the side of the river and say "GTFO my property"?

If she is drowning and you pass her by and let her die with the attitude of "not my problem", it is immoral and total inhumanity. Illegal? I don't think so. But if there is a god allowing/disallowing people into Heaven I think that kind of (in)action would result in a "WHAT THE FUCK WERE YOU THINKING YOU PRICK!?...PERGATORY FOR 10 YEARS JUST FOR THAT...ASSHOLE".

 

[BlackTerrel]

So if you see someone on the ground not breathing, and refuse to give CPR, did you murder them too?

It's sickening to leave someone to die but I'm appalled you can call that murder.....how can you murder someone if you didn't do anything?

That's a different situation:

1. Did you know the person needed CPR?

2. Do you know how to give CPR?

3. Were you struck by panic? Etc....

I think in most such situations there would be enough issues like this where it could never be proved. But dealing in the hypothetical where we know for a fact you kicked her off the boat and left her to drown just because you felt like it - yeah that's murder in my eyes.

Could also be seen as a justifiable homicide or just bad luck depending on circumstances surrounding the event such as the capacity to assist (food, water, equipment, living space and related knowledge) and threat level from the individuals overboard.

Agree. In a real situation there would be other variables.

 

[Kregisen]

So as long as it doesn't put your own life at risk, you can be forced to give your property? Sounds like an awesome argument for taxation It's being used to save lives, after all.

Melissa is 1000000% correct here.

Everyone arguing that choosing not to save someone who's drowning HAS to also agree to universal healthcare, otherwise we'd be murdering thousands of people who die because of no healthcare each year.

You can't have it both ways.

And nobody has refuted her point that "if someone else's life is in danger, you HAVE to give up your property to save them". That's the point all of you are making, and that's the exact opposite of libertarianism, because then there are no longer property rights.

 

[WaltM]

Melissa is 1000000% correct here.

Everyone arguing that choosing not to save someone who's drowning HAS to also agree to universal healthcare, otherwise we'd be murdering thousands of people who die because of no healthcare each year.

You can't have it both ways.

And nobody has refuted her point that "if someone else's life is in danger, you HAVE to give up your property to save them". That's the point all of you are making, and that's the exact opposite of libertarianism, because then there are no longer property rights.

I'm with both of you here.

The logical extension of property, ownership and choice, is the freedom to knowing and intentionally allow a person to die (and tell yourself that passive is more acceptable than active)

You CANNOT have it both ways. Thanks for the honest people here who admit where their morality starts.

 

[WaltM]

The reasoning necessary to solve a hypothetical like this is also used in day to day life to make moral decisions.

Similar problems can arise in the hypothetical as what might arise in real life. For instance, can one determine proper action with a strict formula? Discussion of the hypothetical can aid in answering such questions.

it's a simple question :

What right is greater, life or property?

If both are equal, is flipping a coin to decide wrong?

 

[WaltM]

This. Unequivocally so.

The reality is in most such situations there will never be enough evidence to be definitive.

But being that we are speaking in hypotheticals. If we had a situation where we knew for a fact what you described happened - then yes that person is 100% guilty of murder. I really do not understand the argument against that.

The argument against that is :

My right to property is above her right to life.
Why aren't you for taxation if you believe property is less important than lives?
Don't you know how many lives you can save if you stole, robbed and taxed?

The people who argued in favor of property here, is why libertarians never win support.
They essentially have to admit that other people starving dead isn't their fault or concern.
And the idea "if government didn't tax and just let us give on our own will, we'd take care of poor people fine" is exposed here.

 

[WaltM]

So if you see someone on the ground not breathing, and refuse to give CPR, did you murder them too?

It's sickening to leave someone to die but I'm appalled you can call that murder.....how can you murder someone if you didn't do anything?

I personally think murder and killing, active and passive or simply semantical differences and some varying degrees.

the real difference is whether you knowingly and intentionally made the choice to act/not act. Not whether you put more energy or less energy.

If a person's life support tube is accidentally broken or pulled out, CHOOSING NOT TO FIX IT WHEN YOU CAN, is no different than PULLING AND BREAKING IT YOURSELF.

Not knowing how to fix it, trying to call for help and nobody came to assist, and not knowing that was life support which would kill a person, are excusable (based on knowing and intention).

 

[Elwar]

The real morality is protecting your property and defending yourself from her trespass in any way you see fit.

The Indians were morally justified in attacking the colonists, even after they were on their land.

Sure, it would have been nice for them to let them stay until they could get back on their boats and head back to where they came with enough supplies to survive.

But they were morally justified in attacking them and protecting their land.