If you vote your personal morals are you voting against personal freedom

[loseyourname]

I was trying to find a common moral value that we could all agree about. The idea of universal personal freedom was the one that seemed glaringly obvious to me. I think it was the focal and main ideal that was used by the framers when they wrote the constitution.

Ethically speaking, that position is known as libertarianism. It does seem to provide the basis for the Bill of Rights. There is another major influence in the US Constitution, though, that can be at odds with libertarianism. That is the whole 'social contract' idea, that a given regime governs with the consent of its citizenry and can basically do whatever the citizenry will allow. In principle, the social contract theory would take precendence, in that even the Bill of Rights can be amended or even abolished. It would, of course, never happen because the citizenry would never consent to it. This does raise an interesting question, though: Do really hold so tightly to these liberal ideals because they actually constitute the best form of governmental ethics or simply because we are Americans and have been socialized into holding liberal ideals?

For that matter, how did libertarians come to be considered conservative?

 

[honestrosewater]

Every law I can think of at this moment tells us what we cannot do, derivative on the idea that we should not do these things.

What about procedural or technical types or elements of laws, i.e., where the goal has been determined by morals and the law just sets out the best way to achieve that goal? For instance, if it's decided that people shouldn't make disturbing noise, you must still determine when a noise qualifies as disturbing. Meh, just a side note.
Or a better example: People shouldn't drive drunk. When is a person 'drunk'? How will their drunkenness be tested? Under what circumstances must a person submit to a test? And so on.

 

[Skyhunter]

For that matter, how did libertarians come to be considered conservative?

I know some young republicans from the Reagon era. They tried to convince me that Libertarian values were the same as conservative values. I argued the difference is that conservative republicans want personal freedom for corporations. And you cannot have universal personal freedom and be able to shirk the personal responsibility by forming a corporation.

Libertarians are not corporatists. Modern republicans are.

 

[Smurf]

For that matter, how did libertarians come to be considered conservative?

I think that happened with the rise of neo-liberalism, which is pretty much synonymous with republican conservatism these days.

 

[outsider]

I'm not too sure what you mean by any of this. I never meant to give the impression that I thought this discussion was pointless. It's just that the way it is framed is based on a misnomer. Let's face it: we all want the same thing. We all want the world to be governed according to our own personal conception of morality. In some cases, that personal conception is that one should be free to do anything that doesn't infringe upon the freedom of another. In other cases, that conception is that one should be restricted by the laws laid down in sacred scripture. There are many conceptions that lie somewhere in between these two. Then we have the US Constitutional conception of morality: we have all of the rights enumerated to us as citizens in the first ten amendments, except where they place others in direct and imminent danger. Anything else is potentially subject to legislation.

It was my error to conclude from your post that since laws were based on morals that as long as there is law, there is no real freedom. And as I said before, I do agree with you. However, such a society will not likely ever exist (at least I hope not) and so we have to try to try to work with what we and discuss what that entails and what would be a fair direction for all. Not that it matters, but I always enjoy reading your perspective.

Is there really such a thing as existentialist ethics, by the way? People from Kierkegaard to Sartre were all considered existentialists, but varied wildly in their moral outlooks.

I have only read briefly (one book and I don't recall the title) on existentialism and IMO don't feel it is healthy for progress... and as far as I understand, everything is game/not game from an existentialists perspective. I would be interested in hearing your insight on this topic if it can somehow tie into the thread (i don't want to send it off track).

 

[Nomy-the wanderer]

Existentialists are bohemians, they 've all been contracdicted and all beein trying to explain something they couldn't explain in the end..

 

[outsider]

Existentialists are bohemians, they 've all been contracdicted and all beein trying to explain something they couldn't explain in the end..

so what's your take on morals and freedoms?

 

[outsider]

morals are freedom killers... so you will need to scrap your morals and trade it in for freedom. Basic morals are referenced in most religions as far as not killing and stealing and wanting other peoples property... (sounds like capitalism is a sin against basic morals)... so we should all be able to agree on a similar set of basic morals and work on the freedoms from there on on... please feel free to take reference to the Moral Freedoms Act previously posted... I will be away from PF for a few days... enjoy.