Land Ownership

anarchyisbliss · Post by **anarchyisbliss** » April 28th, 2008, 7:58 pm

Why should people be able to own land? all it does is caused problems, and it does not even belong to us, it came from the Earth and she was here long before we were. I don't think it makes since that someone can walk into the middle of an empty plain and say...this is my land. Or go on to someone else's plain and say this is my land.

Thoughtless · Post by **Thoughtless** » April 29th, 2008, 3:34 pm

I agree that land can't be owned. However, I'll play Devil's Advocate and present a couple of the arguments for land ownership:

1. I own myself, and therefore my labor. If I mix my labor with some piece of land, how can you separate my labor from the land? I must, therefore, own the land.

I personally believe that the above argument fails to the following line of reasoning: in order to mix your labor with land you must first control it; and in order to control it you must restrict others' access to it, literally or by implication; but to restrict others' access to a thing which you do not own is unjust. Therefore, you can never come to own land.

2. If we don't allow land ownership, land will be wasted or used inefficiently. Therefore, it is best to allow individuals to homestead.

This just isn't true. If land had to be rented, not from "society" but from every other individual, land would be put to more efficient use, because only those who believed that they could do something very productive with the land would be willing to use it, given the cost.

anarchyisbliss · Post by **anarchyisbliss** » April 29th, 2008, 4:20 pm

2. If we don't allow land ownership, land will be wasted or used inefficiently. Therefore, it is best to allow individuals to homestead.

This just isn't true. If land had to be rented, not from "society" but from every other individual, land would be put to more efficient use, because only those who believed that they could do something very productive with the land would be willing to use it, given the cost.

Also, there are other animals and plants who use the land.

Thoughtless · Post by **Thoughtless** » April 30th, 2008, 12:28 pm

anarchyisbliss wrote:
2. If we don't allow land ownership, land will be wasted or used inefficiently. Therefore, it is best to allow individuals to homestead.

This just isn't true. If land had to be rented, not from "society" but from every other individual, land would be put to more efficient use, because only those who believed that they could do something very productive with the land would be willing to use it, given the cost.
Also, there are other animals and plants who use the land.

The problem with granting animals the right to life is that animals can't respect a human's right to life. If we were to consider an animal's territory its "property" and leave it be, its territory would continue to expand until it began infrining on human property rights. Given that this is not something which we can "work out" with the animals, they categorically forfeit their right to life; they exist at our grace.

anarchyisbliss · Post by **anarchyisbliss** » April 30th, 2008, 3:13 pm

The problem with granting animals the right to life is that animals can't respect a human's right to life.

How can you know this? I'm sorry but I hate specism and I'm about to fire off on your comments.

If we were to consider an animal's territory its "property" and leave it be, its territory would continue to expand until it began infringing on human property rights.

Who says we cant live communally with our animal brethren.

Given that this is not something which we can "work out" with the animals, they categorically forfeit their right to life; they exist at our grace.

They do not forfeit their right to life - every animal has a right to life. Maybe black people should have forfeited their rights to life when they were in slavery seeing as they were living " at the white man's grace". I think your stupidity forfeits your right to life. How about that?

Thoughtless · Post by **Thoughtless** » April 30th, 2008, 7:16 pm

Oh dear god, you're insane...

anarchyisbliss · Post by **anarchyisbliss** » May 1st, 2008, 3:24 pm

Thoughtless wrote:Oh dear god, you're insane...

Thank you!, or maybe Im just open minded. Besides as Steven King said the entire world is insane...

Thoughtless · Post by **Thoughtless** » May 2nd, 2008, 6:20 pm

anarchyisbliss wrote:Who says we cant live communally with our animal brethren.

You'd be begging for the genocide of all non-human creatures after a week of living "communally" with our "animal bretheren". Have you ever been attacked by a wild animal?

anarchyisbliss wrote:They do not forfeit their right to life - every animal has a right to life. Maybe black people should have forfeited their rights to life when they were in slavery seeing as they were living " at the white man's grace". I think your stupidity forfeits your right to life. How about that?

You do realize that by trying to make me out to be a racist you just compared black people to animals, right?

Look, an animal can't understand the concept of respecting a human's right to life; therefore, an animal can't itself have a right to life.

anarchyisbliss · Post by **anarchyisbliss** » May 3rd, 2008, 8:57 am

You'd be begging for the genocide of all non-human creatures after a week of living "communally" with our "animal bretheren". Have you ever been attacked by a wild animal?

I have, and obviously if you are being attacked you would leave the area where animals are attacking you. Just don't go live in a crocodile pond or a lion's den. That's common sense.

You do realize that by trying to make me out to be a racist you just compared black people to animals, right?

Yes, black people are animals by the way.

Look, an animal can't understand the concept of respecting a human's right to life; therefore, an animal can't itself have a right to life.

How do you know animals don't respect a human's right to life? To me you're just a closed minded speciest. And as far as I'm concerned human beings don't respect an animals right to life by boarding them up in slaughterhouses or enslaving them into bondage. Human beings even kill other human beings with complete disregard to the right to life.

May 3rd, 2008, 11:24 pm

For those who compare humans to non-human animals in terms of which has which rights, I am interested to see what rights you would offer a human baby or a mentally retarded human in addition to the typical human and non-human animals. What if a certain intelligent monkey or dolphin is smarter and has more social understanding than a certain stupid human?

FYI, I'm not trying to be rhetorical. I genuinely have that curiosity when people compare the alleged rights of humans and non-human animals.

Thanks,
Scott

anarchyisbliss · Post by **anarchyisbliss** » May 4th, 2008, 12:11 pm

Scott wrote:For those who compare humans to non-human animals in terms of which has which rights, I am interested to see what rights you would offer a human baby or a mentally retarded human in addition to the typical human and non-human animals. What if a certain intelligent monkey or dolphin is smarter and has more social understanding than a certain stupid human?

I think all living creatures have the right to equal opportunity in any field, including that of living. I don't think that intelligence has anything to do with it. I think a fern has a just as much a right to live as Albert Einstein did.

Dreamshift · Post by **Dreamshift** » June 25th, 2008, 2:09 am

Let's back this up: the right to own land. If we are indeed equal to other animals, than we also have the right to territory from our own species. A wolf may mark his territory agianst other wolves, and etc. So if this is true, may we not do the same? And we can share the land, as we have and will always do. Although the animals will change, in more Urban areas we might see the pidgeon and the cockroach proliferate in the area while as a rural area might see more deer. We are changing the land we use, but does the Beaver do the same? I will agree though, not nearly to the same degree. We do have good reason to set boundries to our land usage though: the simple POSSIBLITY of an artificial increase of global warming. Concrete and pavement are not great alternatives to grass and woodlands when one is concerned with the gobal weather system. We should find a balance between our usage and our Earthly brethren.