HARMLESS FREEDOM IS AN OXYMORON | 2001-03-17
According to modern liberal and respectable conservative theory, all the slaves were actually free. Slaves had the right to do what they wanted to, as long as what they wanted did not infringe their master's rights. Liberals say we should have freedom only if it does not harm or inconvenience anybody else.
That sort of freedom is meaningless. Liberals want hate laws, because they say you should have freedom to speak as long as no one on the left is offended. We could be official slaves and have that many rights.
JOSEPH STALIN'S 1936 Constitution of the USSR gave Russians "freedom of speech." It said they could use it if it did not harm the Soviet State. They also had a death penalty for saying anything anti-Semitic.
Any meaningful freedom, any freedom above that of a slave, can be used to harm others. You must make a BALANCE between real freedom and the harm a person can do.
Respectable conservatives tacitly agree with liberals that people should be allowed to have guns only if guns are harmless. But the freedom to own and carry weapons for self-defense should be stipulated, no matter what the statistics say.