Rights vs. Right.

There seems to be a lot of confusion in Internet arguments between things you have a right to do, and things you ought to do. It may be true that your right to swing your fist ends at my face--but come on, do you really want to be the kind of fucknut who walks around swinging his fist everywhere?

In other words, our only obligation is to avoid harming others' person or property, but that alone doesn't make you a good person. You do that bare minimum and I won't harm your person or property--but I won't like you. Just because someone is within their rights doesn't mean I have to approve or shut up.

I was reading a discussion about a woman with Nazi tattoos, and one of the moderators of the forum said:

If someone is a sexist, racist, every other -ist they are still a person and especially if these are only the person's THOUGHTS and the person isn't actually acting on them (ie raping and attacking people because they are female, or black, or white, etc). It's perfectly legal for her to believe in her white supremacist crap. As much as I disagree with her beliefs (ie IF they even are her beliefs since none of us actually know her) I'm still not going to put her down.

What the hell is that crap? Because something is legal, you aren't allowed to even say anything bad about it? Yes, she's still a person, but she's a really bad person. I agree that the woman shouldn't be arrested or anything for being an asshole, but you're allowed to--in fact I think you should--freaking talk bad about her, Jesus.



In a free society, you have the right to be a tremendous jerk. It's merely my strong recommendation that you do not exercise this right.