More evidence that rights-based ethical systems have flawed foundations.

[richardhutnik]

badgenome said:

richardhutnik said:

If the foundation of negative rights is to be left alone, then not being offended, or being impacted by others, would fit into this.  For example, by following what you are saying, the Westboro Baptist Church is in the right, for saying homosexuals are going Hell outside of a funeral.

Again, there's a difference between having a right and being ethically right. The WBC are not in the right here, as they're awful, vile people. But despite the recent law against it, they are certainly within their rights to do so so long as they're not interfering with the funeral itself. And since the Roberts court has already ruled 8-1 for Westboro in Snyder v. Phelps, I can't see them upholding this law.

Again, this goes back to the issue of an ethics system being rights based.  Whe dealing with an ethical system, there is either being ethical right or being ethically wrong (of course, there is also the undefined ethically).  If you base a system on rights, where do you tell that WBC is not in the right here, when they are in fully keeping with their said rights.  If you want to now argue that thereis more to an ethical system than rights, then you move out of a rights-based framework into something that brings other things in.  In doing this, you end up showing that a rights-based ethics system is flawed foundationally.

Do move beyond just rights, one can look to other systems of ethics based around other things besides rights:

http://voices.yahoo.com/an-overview-ethic-theories-systems-6450186.html?cat=7