Re: ownership

[Chuck Prime <prime@winternet.com>]

On Wed, 8 Oct 1997 PWSPARKS@aol.com wrote:

> Hi Gang
> 
> This will be a flame raiser but what the hell.

No flames in this post. Just a mere fraction of the things you ought to
consider when objectively judging your proposal.


> I submit that certain fossils
> (and other material) should be national treasures whether it is found on
> public or private land.

Individual rights and freedom are more important than fossils. Just
because you and I happen to _like_ fossils does not give us the right to
steal them from their rightful owners. If I was considering breaking into
your house or apartment to steal your fossils--nevermind my rationale for
pretending that I have the right to do that, just assume that I have any
any rationale you like--I would expect to be staring down the wrong end of
something very lethal while awaiting the police to arrive, cuff me, and
hold me for trial.

Of course, any person who owns the land, or otherwise properly trades for
that fossil with the land owner, _is_ the rightful owner of it. Surely
_you_ are not, until you meet one of those conditions. Just because you
can see something doesn't make it yours. Just because you want something
doesn't give you the right to take it by force.

We're supposed to be adults here, decades beyond the childish squalling of
"I want it, gimme it! Mom!!! He won't gimme!"

Being adults, of course, we might consider the merits of _paying_ _for_
the things we want people to give us, and we might remember that our
rights stop at other people's noses.

Even if we don't want them to.


> There is considerable precedence for this approach.

The USSR, Hitler's Germany, Castro's Cuba, Red China, and all other
dictatorships, the existence of which is always rationalized to be for a
"higher good" than mere individual lives, freedoms, activities and
happiness. After all, of what importance are those when compared to the
desires of a political oligarchy? Or a scientific one?

We on this list have no more rights than anybody else. And we have to live
with that.


> For example it used to be illegal for a private person in this country to own
> gold. That was changed only a couple of decades ago when we went off the gold
> standard.

Just because something is a law doesn't make it right, rational, or
practical. I trust you can come up with even more examples of this on your
own.

BTW: It was unforgiveable that this country went off the gold standard at
all, which was early in the century. The private holding of gold was made
illegal _after_ that, so that politicians and social engineers could issue
worthless un-backed paper money without competition from anything such as
backing, without limits, and without even a pretense at fiscal 
responsibility. And look at the results. _How_ much money has our
government spent that it doesn't have? _How_ much inflation have we had
since the Federal Reserve Act of 1913? Hmm? I can't hear you.


> It is illegal to own a spotted owl, etc etc. It is illegal to own
> ivory that is less than 120 years old or registered when every thing was
> grandfathered a few years ago.

Yes, you can cite myriads of irrational laws which morally justify armed
resistance against the enforcers of them. (Anyone who would forcibly
sacrifice a _human_ to an evolutionary failure of an owl deserves to be
treated like the dangerous, nihilist and misanthropic thug that he is.)

But what you need to do is show that your proposal is _moral_, not just
that others have done it before. None of us have time, on this list or
elsewhere, to begin citing examples of horrible things which others have 
done before with full sanction of the law.

Now, you and others here will likely protest that you aren't advocating
slavery or witch-burning or genocide. "What's this guy getting so riled up
about?" Yadda yadda yadda.

But do you realize that all the horrors of history and the present came
about by _one_ simple thing, and that they have it in common with what you
propose?

That thing is the initiation of physical force--the _starting_ of the use
of force--against innocent people.

For you to enforce your proposal, you would have to initiate force against
landowners who have never hurt anyone. You would become just another
carjacker, only of fossils; you would be just another armed robber, only
of homes instead of convenience stores; you would be just another Paul,
who wants to be paid by the robbing of Peter, and has a gang of
brownshirts or SS to do the actual thieving on your behalf.

Oh yes, _that_ will surely make America a better place.

Our national treasures in this country are individual rights and freedom.
Any and all attempts to make a concrete item a national treasure must
necessarily be an attempt to usurp the rights of man for the petty
materialistic desires of men. _Someone_ has to create an item, or
_someone_ has to discover it. It is those people whom you would
unleash your force upon.

All because you see something and decide that you want it, no matter how
many innocent people you hurt.

If you can prove the morality of that to me, rather than just asserting
it on your say-so, or asserting its "precedence" on the bloody orthodoxy
of history, I will abide by your restrictions should they come to pass.

Until then, steal _my_ fossils at your own risk.


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