[__blockcipher__]

Most people take your view, but I would be very careful to claim that it's actually impossible to not have limits on freedoms. There are some who believe that the state should not exist at all; those types would not concede the ground that there exist any reasonable restrictions on fundamental natural rights.

Whereas a statist (i.e. someone who is not an anarchist) would basically always concede that there are limits on rights. To use US jurisprudence as an example, even the very pro-2A supreme court justices have ruled that the state has a compelling interest in reducing gun violence and thus is allowed to take guns away from violent felons, etc.

Personally, I take the former position; I think it's better to have a society where property rights (which includes the right of self-ownership i.e. owning your own body) and other natural rights (speech, self defense [technically these are just derived from property rights but I digress]) cannot be infringed upon for any reason. I am very heavily in the minority with that position, and I'm aware of that fact.

---

Anyway, switching back to the original topic of censorship of supposed "disinfo", if you don't buy a natural rights argument at all, then from a utilitarian perspective I think it's still a bad idea. In places like Saudi Arabia or Iran, the idea that women should be able to choose what clothing to wear or not wear would be considered harmful to society and worthy of censorship. In Turkey the idea that the Armenian genocide occurred could be considered worthy of censorship. In America the notion that we should not have warrantless wiretapping of all communications between private citizens could be considered dangerous to society, etc etc.

It always starts with a "good" reason. It never ends with one.

[mkolodny]

> I think it's better to have a society where property rights (which includes the right of self-ownership i.e. owning your own body) and other natural rights (speech, self defense [technically these are just derived from property rights but I digress]) cannot be infringed upon for any reason

In this YouTube situation, property rights and freedom of speech are mutually exclusive. Either the owners of YouTube have the right to censor whatever they want on their platform/property, or people have freedom of speech and YouTube can't remove speech from their platform/property. In this situation, you can't protect both property rights and freedom of speech - you can only protect one.

[tux1968]

If enough people demanded it though, we could make it socially unacceptable for Youtube to use their property rights in the pursuit of censorship. The problem really isn't the law, it's public opinion. We've lost sight of how important freedom of speech is, and we are by and large cheering on censorship where it hurts those we disagree with. It's short sighted and will ultimately cost us a lot more than it gains us... but it feels good for now.

[AndrewUnmuted]

Ultimately, if people didn't accept these draconian measures, advertisers would complain because there would be notable data showing a decline in consumer engagement.

I actually like that YouTube is announcing all of this stuff up-front, because it makes it far more clear and crystal that if you have an alternative viewpoint from the mainstream, you will have to build your own infrastructure to support your message. It's best that people learn this sooner, than later. Enough people have suffered by being too trusting of brands like YouTube.

[tux1968]

I think you're missing the forest for all the trees. This isn't a tactical debate, it's a philosophical and foundational one. Until we all defend the right of people we despise to voice their opinion, everything else is playing at the margin.

People have forgotten that it's not just good for the people we detest, it's good for us to be able to listen to bad ideas and form rational and compelling counterarguments and defences against them. And since none of us is perfect, there will be times when it is _us_ that is espousing the bad idea, and it will be damn good for everyone that people are able to speak up and correct us.

There are indeed growing pains as the world comes online and starts being able to talk to each other. We're really in our adolescence as it pertains to life online. But we're making the most naive and expedient appraisals and supposed remedies to the discomfort its causing. My hope is that we're able to turn a corner and wrest control away from the reactionaries who currently control the narrative and the agenda.

[AndrewUnmuted]

> it's good for us to be able to listen to bad ideas and form rational and compelling counterarguments and defences against them.

I agree, and it's quite obvious that if you want this, then you should not go to YouTube.

> But we're making the most naive and expedient appraisals and supposed remedies to the discomfort its causing.

The only naivety being expressed here, is the idea that YouTube is the be-all-end-all online UGC video provider. Why are you placing YouTube on such a high pedestal, assigning such a non-deterministic fate to its decisions and outcomes? They're not even a little important to the dissemination of free ideas - perhaps they once were, but that ship sailed long ago.

Why are you so in love with YouTube? You clearly despise their choices; abandon the platform and don't look back.

> This isn't a tactical debate, it's a philosophical and foundational one.

I agree; you need to change your philosophy. Stop relying on YouTube to be the heroic service that you want it to be, and start realizing that it will never do what you want it to do.

[AgentME]

YouTube is a specific company and they run an engine for recommending videos to people. YouTube doesn't prevent people from finding other hosting for their own videos and linking people to those videos. Do people have any more right to YouTube's megaphone than they do to any specific newspaper or TV channel's reach?

I despise people pushing anti-vaccination misinformation. Would it be good for us to fight for their right to have their message to be uncritically broadcast on say NBC? I might care if the government made a law that was ambiguously too broad that happened to make it so antivaxers couldn't possibly be broadcast on TV at all, and it was clear that antivaxers winning that fight against that overly-broad law would open things up for other groups I thought the law was too strict against, but if it's just the case that every TV station decided of their own will and probably specific reasons to not broadcast them, then even if I thought all the TV stations were generally too strict, I'd pick something I actually liked that they were being too strict against to support to convince the stations to change their opinions.

[betwixthewires]

Nobody is suing YouTube over this though, they are just sharing the information about it so that people can decide whether to keep using YouTube to host their content, and encouraging people to stop using the service.

Also we are discussing the ethical issues surrounding this decision.

[lopmotr]

The bigger conversation isn't really about YouTube, it's that some people want these ideas suppressed from everywhere and some people don't. Youtube just happens to be more flexible than the government, but don't think for a second they're all going to draw the line if the government passes a law prohibiting saying those things. Legally enforced censorship is what many of them ultimately want.

On the other side of the coin, the anti-censorship people also want the government to prohit Youtube/FB/etc. from censoring their ideas. That's just as anti-freedom.

[AgentME]

Why would YouTube want legally-enforced censorship? The existence of that would make more work for them and would open them up to liability.

YouTube is specifically pushing back at propaganda coming from the government here, so I don't know how it makes any sense to assert that it's evidence they really want to allow government propaganda.

[kyralis]

Property rights inherently derive from the state. Unless you subscribe to "might makes right", the idea of property rights is inherently a social construct which the state is a formalization of.

Limitations on rights is precisely the foundation of any society. To claim otherwise is just the semantic game of "oh, I don't mean those rights".

[martindale]

Property rights are intrinsic to our natural self-sovereignty (and agency). The State cannot grant rights.

[kyralis]

Oh? I have an intrinsic right to the land that I currently own, the car in my driveway, and the computer I'm typing this on? How did that intrinsic right derive? And why don't I have an intrinsic right to, say, the land of the entire continent of North America?

Property rights are entirely a social construct. They are not intrinsic; they are created and granted solely via the formalizations of that social contract in the form of the state.

[chordalkeyboard]

> Property rights inherently derive from the state.

This is not true, property rights are the human incarnation of territoriality which is exhibited by many species.

> Unless you subscribe to "might makes right", the idea of property rights is inherently a social construct which the state is a formalization of.

The state is a formalization of a particular social construct that is not identical to property rights.

> Limitations on rights is precisely the foundation of any society.

Do you have any support for this statement? It seems to contradict your earlier assertions and despite that I'm not sure how it would be true on its own.

> To claim otherwise is just the semantic game of "oh, I don't mean those rights".

Well, I don't think its a meaningless semantic argument for people to discuss what specifically is referred to by "rights." If you think people have a right to steal food out of other people's homes then I can see why you would think the government was a necessary limitation on that "right." But I think its a reasonable response to say "there is no right to steal food from other people" and then we can discuss what is and is not a right, which is much closer to a necessary conversation than a game (when conducted by sincere interlocutors).

[Volundr]

> This is not true, property rights are the human incarnation of territoriality which is exhibited by many species.

And those species lose their territory as soon as a bigger, meaner creature wants it. Their "right" to their territory is only as strong as their personal ability to protect it. No one else will help them.

Unless that's what your advocating for when you talk about property rights, then rights absolutely do come from the state. Most of us think property rights mean what's mine is mine no matter who wants it, not that I lose it as soon as someone takes it from me or hires someone to do so.

[chordalkeyboard]

> And those species lose their territory as soon as a bigger, meaner creature wants it. Their "right" to their territory is only as strong as their personal ability to protect it. No one else will help them.

Indeed, and the same for the state.

> Unless that's what your advocating for when you talk about property rights,

I'm not advocating for anything, just correcting some misconceptions.

> then rights absolutely do come from the state.

No, they do not. Rights are a social fiction that arises from mutual cooperation and are continued through repetition and intentional performance. It is true that actors whose actions are colored by state power can participate disproportionately in this process of evolving norms.

> Most of us think property rights mean what's mine is mine no matter who wants it, not that I lose it as soon as someone takes it from me or hires someone to do so.

Yes because the norm of property requires that theft, robbery, and things of that nature are violations of that norm.

[kyralis]

> Rights are a social fiction that arises from mutual cooperation

aka, the state. The formalization of the social fiction.

[chordalkeyboard]

> aka, the state. The formalization of the social fiction.

No, rights. the state is distinguishable from rights. They are both social fictions but they are not the same social fiction.

[cycomanic]

> > Property rights inherently derive from the state.

> This is not true, property rights are the human incarnation of territoriality which is exhibited by many species.

Do you have proof for that? I mean that is a pretty sweeping statement, and I can think of a lot of counter examples.

> > Unless you subscribe to "might makes right", the idea of property rights is inherently a social construct which the state is a formalization of.

> The state is a formalization of a particular social construct that is not identical to property rights.

Sure but that isn't a contradiction to what the OP said. He did not say the state is identical to property rights.

> > Limitations on rights is precisely the foundation of any society.

> Do you have any support for this statement? It seems to contradict your earlier assertions and despite that I'm not sure how it would be true on its own.

> > To claim otherwise is just the semantic game of "oh, I don't mean those rights".

> Well, I don't think its a meaningless semantic argument for people to discuss what specifically is referred to by "rights." If you think people have a right to steal food out of other people's homes then I can see why you would think the government was a necessary limitation on that "right." But I think its a reasonable response to say "there is no right to steal food from other people" and then we can discuss what is and is not a right, which is much closer to a necessary conversation than a game (when conducted by sincere interlocutors).

But you don't specify what a right is either. In fact you earlier said it's incarnation of territoriality. How can that be a right? I mean maybe a desire, but a desire is very different to a right.

[chordalkeyboard]

> Do you have proof for that? I mean that is a pretty sweeping statement, and I can think of a lot of counter examples.

I'm not sure what proof (or evidence really) would be required. You can observe animal territoriality in the wild, or you can trust animal behaviorists to report on it accurately. They have areas they defend against other members of the same species. Behavior varies widely, solitary species don't like any other members of their species (except for sexual partners), social species have different arrangements. Sometimes an elder male will have several females and young that are permitted and when the young get big enough they either leave or fight. Sometimes the males will have a hierarchy and defend the territory against other members of the species who are not part of their group. Sometimes they even make war on another group for their territory. If you let me know what kind of evidence you're looking for I might be able to supply it.

> Sure but that isn't a contradiction to what the OP said. He did not say the state is identical to property rights.

He said that state is a formalization of the social construct of property rights. I'm saying the state is not a formalization of the social construct of property rights, but a social construct of nation and government; and that the two have relation but exist independently of each other.

> But you don't specify what a right is either. In fact you earlier said it's incarnation of territoriality. How can that be a right? I mean maybe a desire, but a desire is very different to a right.

Excellent question, thanks for asking. Rights are a social construct that emerges from mutual cooperation, essentially a social technology that allows people to co-exist and pursue their own interests and desires without needing to establish the same agreements with every individual and without generating unnecessary conflict. This is to say that rights are emergent and arise from individuals agreeing to respect each other.

Perhaps an example would help: I don't like to be the victim of violence. Neither do you. At some point we agree not to do violence to each other. A third person shows up and attacks me to steal my food. You make the rational choice to help me defend myself because if he kills me for my food he may do the same to you. Being that he is outnumbered he stops and we explain "don't do violence on people." He says "you contradicted yourself, you say you're against violence but you used violence to stop me." We say "You're correct, it must be the initiation of violence that is bad, and it would be ok to use violence on someone who has used violence on you." He says "ok that may be the case but you used violence on that gazelle I was trying to take from you." We eventually conclude that rights are a social arrangement between humans as a result of our preference for cooperation with humans and do not apply to inter-species relations.

> you earlier said it's incarnation of territoriality. How can that be a right?

Property is a human expression of territoriality. Property rights are a social arrangement where people customarily or by agreement avoid violating each other's territory. Rights are a social arrangement that allow people to minimize the amount of violence in a community.

This is already kind of long but let me know if you have more questions and thank you for the opportunity to discuss these issues.

[cycomanic]

First let me say I appreciate your non-confrontational arguments (you have been admittedly much better than myself) in a thread which is really quite a "sh*tshow".

>> Do you have proof for that? I mean that is a pretty sweeping statement, and I can think of a lot of counter examples.

>I'm not sure what proof (or evidence really) would be required. You can observe animal territoriality in the wild, or you can trust animal behaviorists to report on it accurately. They have areas they defend against other members of the same species. Behavior varies widely, solitary species don't like any other members of their species (except for sexual partners), social species have different arrangements. Sometimes an elder male will have several females and young that are permitted and when the young get big enough they either leave or fight. Sometimes the males will have a hierarchy and defend the territory against other members of the species who are not part of their group. Sometimes they even make war on another group for their territory. If you let me know what kind of evidence you're looking for I might be able to supply it.

I agree that we can territoriality in the animal kingdom and I'm can also admit that we see territoriality in humans (at least some of the time). However, you claimed that property rights are an incarnation of the territoriality, which is a quite a leap from territoriality exists in humans. Maybe this is related to the discussion of what is a right. Just a side-note I do think it's drawing parallels and conclusions from behaviour in the animal kingdom is fraught with problems. Just one example, I think based on this principle one could make clear arguments that people are inherently egoistic or altruistic.

>> Sure but that isn't a contradiction to what the OP said. He did not say the state is identical to property rights.

>He said that state is a formalization of the social construct of property rights. I'm saying the state is not a formalization of the social construct of property rights, but a social construct of nation and government; and that the two have relation but exist independently of each other.

I somewhat disagree with you here, however I admit we are starting to discuss semantics. But I would argue (and this is how I understood the OP, that the state is a social construct/formalisation of our social interactions, which does guarantee property rights (and others). So property rights do not exist without a social organisational construct such as the state. Now, the argument becomes a bit of a question of how broadly do we define state. I would also argue btw, that the concept of nation is much more closely linked territoriality than the state.

>> But you don't specify what a right is either. In fact you earlier said it's incarnation of territoriality. How can that be a right? I mean maybe a desire, but a desire is very different to a right.

>Excellent question, thanks for asking. Rights are a social construct that emerges from mutual cooperation, essentially a social technology that allows people to co-exist and pursue their own interests and desires without needing to establish the same agreements with every individual and without generating unnecessary conflict. This is to say that rights are emergent and arise from individuals agreeing to respect each other.

>Perhaps an example would help: I don't like to be the victim of violence. Neither do you. At some point we agree not to do violence to each other. A third person shows up and attacks me to steal my food. You make the rational choice to help me defend myself because if he kills me for my food he may do the same to you. Being that he is outnumbered he stops and we explain "don't do violence on people." He says "you contradicted yourself, you say you're against violence but you used violence to stop me." We say "You're correct, it must be the initiation of violence that is bad, and it would be ok to use violence on someone who has used violence on you." He says "ok that may be the case but you used violence on that gazelle I was trying to take from you." We eventually conclude that rights are a social arrangement between humans as a result of our preference for cooperation with humans and do not apply to inter-species relations.

I quite like your definition and largely agree with it. But would you not agree that we need some sort of social organisation to guarantee these rights? If not rights are largely meaningless or one could argue non-existent, because there is not social entity/organisation to construct them. So this is how I understood the OP, when he said (paraphrasing) property rights derive their existence from the state.

>> you earlier said it's incarnation of territoriality. How can that be a right?

>Property is a human expression of territoriality. Property rights are a social arrangement where people customarily or by agreement avoid violating each other's territory. Rights are a social arrangement that allow people to minimize the amount of violence in a community.

So the way I understand this, is that territoriality might be the reason for forming/formalising property rights in society (I still don't fully agree on this, but that's a different argument), however to me that is very different to saying that property rights are an incarnation of territoriality. Maybe a formalisation of territoriality is a better word?

>This is already kind of long but let me know if you have more questions and thank you for the opportunity to discuss these issues.

I thank you, this is definitely an interesting discussion.

[chordalkeyboard]

> I agree that we can territoriality in the animal kingdom and I'm can also admit that we see territoriality in humans (at least some of the time). However, you claimed that property rights are an incarnation of the territoriality, which is a quite a leap from territoriality exists in humans.

Perhaps I was unclear. Property is the human incarnation of territory. This is an observation based on their similarities, treating humans as animals. When one animal claims an area and reacts with hostility to the conduct of other members of the same species in that area, it is said that the animal defends a territory. Property rights are a social norm that some humans use as a means of defending their territory. Rights are merely norms that allocate to individuals certain activities, behaviors, or other social goods. The territory (or property) exists because an animal believes that it exists and acts as though it exists. Of course this can be violated, its just an idea in someone's mind that manifests as territorial behavior. Property rights are a social arrangement where people respect each other's property.

Please note that I'm not assigning any moral weight to this notion. I'm merely describing human behavior in these terms and letting the reader come to their own conclusions. Rights (and property rights) take different forms in different communities. Thats because norms are social constructs and therefore intersubjective.

> Just a side-note I do think it's drawing parallels and conclusions from behaviour in the animal kingdom is fraught with problems.

Perhaps so. I think it can be problematic to consider humans as separate from the animal kingdom. Probably both perspectives have strengths and weaknesses.

> But I would argue (and this is how I understood the OP, that the state is a social construct/formalisation of our social interactions, which does guarantee property rights (and others). So property rights do not exist without a social organisational construct such as the state. Now, the argument becomes a bit of a question of how broadly do we define state. I would also argue btw, that the concept of nation is much more closely linked territoriality than the state.

This is conflating norms with the state that enforces them. Norms exist in all communities, most of them are not state-enforced. Frequently communities have norms that conflict with the formal statutes. In fact, the idea that there are agents of the state who you "are supposed" to obey is itself a social norm. Sometimes those social norms change but the people with the guns still attempt to enforce statutes.

Just as a side note, I find formulations of the type "the state guarantees property rights" to be problematic. The state may enforce some laws and fail to enforce others. The state may enforce some norms and fail to enforce others. The state may engage in widespread and long-standing violations of property rights (civil asset forfeiture). People can resolve this by considering those rights to be "whatever the state says they are" but this equivocation leaves us with no basis on which to criticize state actions related to rights.

> So property rights do not exist without a social organisational construct such as the state.

Property rights do not require an organization to enforce them. They (can) exist as community norms. Organizations enable large-scale coordination of actions that can shape those norms.

> I would also argue btw, that the concept of nation is much more closely linked territoriality than the state.

I agree but this also depends on how one defines terms. Some scholars use "state" and "government" differently as well.

> But would you not agree that we need some sort of social organisation to guarantee these rights?

No I don't agree that is necessary in all cases. In some cases its clear that an organization would be necessary to enforce the norms that I prefer. Perhaps a criminal organization seeks to expropriate all the left-handed redheads in an area. But then how would someone respond logically if we considered the organization that seeks to expropriate as the government? They're enforcing a concept of rights, just not the one I like. If rights are just what the government says they are, and we have people ready to enforce a particular concept of rights, how are we justified in determining who is the government and who is the criminal? It does us no good in this case to define rights with respect to the rights-enforcers because we have no basis to criticize the rights-enforcers for enforcing a different concept of rights. It must be that norms exist independently of the enforcement organization.

> So this is how I understood the OP, when he said (paraphrasing) property rights derive their existence from the state.

Couldn't we equally consider the state to have been derived from property rights, if we imagine the state to have arisen in order to enforce those rights?

> So the way I understand this, is that territoriality might be the reason for forming/formalising property rights in society

Territoriality is human nature, the purpose of formalizing it and enforcing it is to enable large scale coordination and minimize the amount of violence. People are going to have territory and they are going to have territorial conflicts. Rights are a social construct that enables people to have similar theories of acceptable conduct without having to know each other or agree as individuals on everything. Property rights allow people to have their territory and then settle territorial disputes in a way that creates (non-binding) precedents. This allows people to live in greater densities and avoid coming to violence over trespasses.

> property rights are an incarnation of territoriality. Maybe a formalisation of territoriality is a better word?

Territoriality just means that people are built to have an idea that something belongs to them. The specific property norms of a society are what determines what specifically they consider to be property. Property rights are just the rights surrounding places and things. Rights are social arrangements that allow people to live inc lose proximity and make arrangements with a reasonable security and reasonable expectation without having to get everyone to agree to everything all the time. Someone has the right to life, that means if someone deprives them of their life we already know it was wrong, we don't have to wonder if they had some verbal agreement that made it ok or if it was ok for Arthur to kill Bradley because Bradley was "in the way." Many norms are tacit and not formal. We could say the body of law is a formalization of the social norms.

> I thank you, this is definitely an interesting discussion.

Likewise, thank you for replying.

> First let me say I appreciate your non-confrontational arguments (you have been admittedly much better than myself) in a thread which is really quite a "sh*tshow".

LOL no kidding, but thanks for your non-confrontational approach as well. The world may burn around us but if we can keep our heads perhaps we can set an example for the lost and hopeless.

[timmytokyo]

>I think it's better to have a society where property rights and other natural rights cannot be infringed upon for any reason.

So hypothetically, it should be your right to own nuclear weapons? (I realize this is not a practical concern today, but I'm trying to find out if anyone truly believes there are no lines to be drawn on property rights.)

[waterhouse]

That is a difficult issue. One potential resolution I see is to say that if you see someone making his own nuclear weapons without telling anyone about it, this is strong enough evidence that he's going to try to do something terrible (i.e. it looks like a crime in progress) that you would be justified in using force to stop him.

How does this generalize and fit into the framework of property rights in general? What makes, say, manufacturing guns not strong enough evidence of trying to do something terrible? Is it mere history, or is it the defensive uses of guns, or does the magnitude of the terribleness matter, or something else? (In practice, I think purifying U-235 takes huge facilities and no one can do it in their backyard—it's probably a few orders of magnitude more expensive and complex.) Also, if it's 100% established that this one guy making the nukes is a trustworthy pacifist who won't use them, but the problem is he won't keep them in a particularly secure location, can one defensibly call his actions illegal? ("Planning to be neglectful"? How about someone who will guard them as heavily as he can, but that's just not heavily enough?) There would be a lot to explore there, but I think it may be possible to resolve the issue of nuclear weapons while keeping a pure system of property rights.

[confidantlake]

>One potential resolution I see is to say that if you see someone making his own nuclear weapons without telling anyone about it, this is strong enough evidence that he's going to try to do something terrible (i.e. it looks like a crime in progress) that you would be justified in using force to stop him.

Only 2 nuclear weapons out of the 10,000s made have ever been used. Almost no one announces they are building a nuclear weapon, it is usually done in secret. So this argument does not really hold.

What I think most people do is they see from a practical standpoint that having unrestricted access to nuclear weapons is extremely dangerous and work backwards to justify why it fits their ideological framework.

[waterhouse]

> Only 2 nuclear weapons out of the 10,000s made have ever been used. Almost no one announces they are building a nuclear weapon, it is usually done in secret. So this argument does not really hold.

The entities that have, so far, made nuclear weapons are nation-states. I think most people would agree with the following statements on that: (a) it's hard to prevent nation-states from making them (not for lack of trying), (b) many of them already made them long ago (U.S., Russia, France, China, etc.) and we're not trying to say that was illegal, (c) the concept of "illegal" at the level of nation-state actors is ... to say the least, very different in implementation, and possibly in concept, from that of "illegal" at the level of individuals. Many people think that nations making more nukes is bad, and some are in favor of disarmament treaties, but I don't think they believe international law either does or should mandate disarmament for all nations. Some would say it's hypocritical for the nuclear club to try to prevent other nations from developing nukes; I suspect others agree it's hypocritical but also don't want those nations to develop nukes.

The question in this case was, "So, hypothetically, it should be your right to own nuclear weapons [personally]?" It would be impractically difficult for one person to make nuclear weapons by himself, without essentially buying or stealing all the important stuff from elsewhere. And if it were easy for one person to make nukes, then probably no ideological system could resolve that easily. There might be some middle ground of possible scenarios that's important to resolve—e.g. if a company wants to make a nuke to use for, I dunno, their own Project Orion or mining a mountain or doing an interesting underwater experiment, then should that be illegal?

We may end up facing the "one madman can create a superweapon" scenario with biotech. Perhaps, by that time, everyone will have their own hazmat suits and their houses will have UV decontamination chambers to fight off SARS-COV-5 or whatever.

> What I think most people do is they see from a practical standpoint that having unrestricted access to nuclear weapons is extremely dangerous and work backwards to justify why it fits their ideological framework.

Yep, I cheerfully admit this is what I'm doing. At least I stated it as "I think it may be possible to resolve the issue" after mentioning problems with my proposal, instead of asserting "my ideological framework resolves this easily". Though I probably should have made the "how would an individual get access to nukes anyway, and if that were easy, then what would any legal system be able to do about that?" point first.

[confidantlake]

This sounds sensible and I agree with it. When we circle back to

> Property rights and other natural rights cannot be infringed upon for any reason

I am not squaring the circle. If we don't allow someone to build a nuke with materials they purchased, we are infringing on their property rights. If we say you can build a nuke only for mining a mountain we are infringing on their property rights. Which in my mind is a good thing. Property rights are not absolute, we just are just arguing about where to set that line. But as long as we decide to not let individual's own nukes I am fine with pretending property rights are absolute.

[chordalkeyboard]

Nuclear weapons present a threat to other people and a threat of violating their property rights, and threats are illegal.

[aaron-santos]

By what measure do you put nuclear weapons on one side and other weapons on the other?

[chordalkeyboard]

The scope of the effects. Firearms can be pointed, explosives have a damage/kill radius. It is not permissible to arrange so that a person is brought within the range of effects of a weapon without their consent.

In the case of explosives, that means you need enough property to contain the effects. In the case of nuclear weapons, it basically requires an entire planet.

[nvusuvu]

We may have the freedom of speech, but that doesn't mean that Youtube has to give you a megaphone?

[disgrunt]

Why should YouTube have a megaphone to give in the first place? Last I checked, there are still laws on the books to handle companies with >90% market shares. [0]

[0]: https://www.statista.com/topics/2019/youtube/

[uoaei]

Good, so we agree that this is not an anti-censorship issue but an anti-trust issue.

Private entities can't censor anything, anyhow. Independently and freely choosing which sentiments to platform on a private service is not censorship, no matter how far anyone tries to stretch the definition of the term.

[throwaway201103]

I just checked a couple of definitions in case my memory was failing me, but I don't see any definition of censorship that limits it to governmental action. YouTube can and does censor content on their platform, I don't understand why so many people seem have trouble with that word. All it means is (quoting Webster) "to examine in order to suppress ... or delete anything considered objectionable"

[uoaei]

The way it's being used in public discourse is not necessarily the dictionary definition of the term. You have to meet people where they are when it comes to rhetoric, not try to force them to follow your version of what means what.

[throwaway201103]

To repeat, it's not my version of what censorship means, it's the normative definition of what it means. YouTube censors content.

[makomk]

The way "censorship" is being used in public discourse, in practice, seems to be that it's not censorship when it's applied to views the people driving the public discourse disagree with. Remember the controversy over LGBT content supposedly being removed or demonitised on YouTube - pretty mucn none of the mainstream discourse agreed with the idea that it wasn't censorship because YouTube was a private company, let alone the idea that - as I've seen pushed in other areas - that pressuring YouTube not to do it was actually the real attack on their free speech rights.

[disgrunt]

We must have different dictionaries?

1. the suppression or prohibition of any parts of books, films, news, etc. that are considered obscene, politically unacceptable, or a threat to security. 2. (in ancient Rome) the office or position of censor.

[HarryHirsch]

Yes, but back then we had the party organ of the American Nazi Party and the party organ of the International Workers of the World, and a couple more in between. You could buy them, and you know what you would get. Now you just have Youtube. That is a problem.

[iphorde]

It does if it uses public resources.

[coldtea]

It very much should mean that.

Modern capitalism has replaced the public square and a huge number of face-to-face communication opportunities with communication mediated by private corporations, and it uses those (and they take liberties themselves to for their own purposes) to outsource censorship and stiffle public discussion...

The idea of restricting freedom of speech to the state is an antiquated idea, belonging to pre-internet times, when a huge part of social interaction didn't happen through social media...

[munchbunny]

Most people take your view, but I would be very careful to claim that it's actually impossible to not have limits on freedoms. There are some who believe that the state should not exist at all; those types would not concede the ground that there exist any reasonable restrictions on fundamental natural rights.

How are you defining "freedoms" and "fundamental natural rights"? This sounds good in theory, but once you start enumerating what they are for the purposes of encoding them in law, or if not a law, then some form of social contract other than "might makes right", the counterexamples immediately flood in, and for good reason.

[aaroninsf]

Anarcho-Libertarianism does not as far as I know have an answer to a basic real-world problem:

Humans are social and always form affinity groups.

Groups have more power (by any definition) than individuals.

Absent enforcement, groups will invariably infringe at will on the rights of individuals or minorities.

QED a defining purpose of any "state" is to defend individuals' liberties, on their behalf, against such actors.

There are many mechanisms and descriptions of this activity, but, the bottom line is always the same. This is as true for the "free market" as it is for the "free market of ideas" or the contemporary ordering of law and punishment.

The state has to be the ultimate authority, to prevent smaller aggregations from stripping minorities and individuals of their own liberty.

No proposed alternative system has so far demonstrated stable viability.

That the examples we live within are terrible does not mean they are not also the least bad viable alternatives.

Personally I may think this is a shame, but, oh well.

Heinlein loved to portray rationalist societies in which ad hoc aggregations formed just long enough to enforce a purported majority-recognized rational moral order, without need for formal constitutional law or persistent institutions with formal institutional memory.

When I was 15 I thought this was how things should be.

At 50 I am certain that it shall never be so, not with the limitations of our actual evolved embodiment.

[chordalkeyboard]

> QED a defining purpose of any "state" is to defend individuals' liberties, on their behalf, against such actors.

Not actually demonstrated. you should say "QED a state is a group organized to infringe at will on the rights of individuals and minorities."