Regulation: The Systemic Dismantling of Our Inalienable Rights

According to the declaration of independence life, liberty,and the pursuit of happiness are inalienable rights. The fact that they are rights means they are supposed to be guaranteed; however, regulations have systemically revoked theses rights and turned them into paid privileges. Consequently, our rights have been usurped under the guise of protecting them.

To live a person needs food, water, shelter, and clothing. This sounds simple until it is considered that to get food one has to hunt, gather, or fish and these are regulated. To hunt and fish a license is required; therefore unless everyone becomes vegetarian there no longer exists a right to food. However, the state is proprietor of all property not privately owned and that makes all unauthorized occupants trespassers and anyone gathering fruits and vegetables thieves, which means being a vegetarian is no longer a right either.

As far as shelter goes, people need building permits, inspections, etc. So shelter is no longer about acquiring the needed materials and building. Shelter is about zoning, inspector approval, building codes, and the ability to pay property taxes. Therefore shelter is no longer a right, it is a privilege people pay for. The fact that taxes have to be paid on property means that only two entities can own property: governments and non-profit organizations. Ownership is the legal right of possessing something, therefore if a person has to pay to maintain possession of something they are renting it, not possessing it. The result is shelter is not only no longer a right, it is no longer an option. We will pay for our “right” to shelter our entire lives or end up homeless.

Let’s say a person wants to pursue happiness in another country, but doesn’t want to get a passport. That person will not be allowed to pursue their happiness. Although this is an international regulation, it still holds that our government has revoked the right for its people to freely travel. If passports had existed in times of exploration, there would be no new world. The king would have simply revoked the passport of everyone he did not trust to uphold and enforce his interests.

I know I am addressing regulations in a different form than the video, but the principal is the same. Regulations have been put in place, and so have regulatory bodies to monitor them. The cost of maintaining the regulations and regulators are then passed down to the people that both were created to protect. The result is now rights have become paid privileges and some people can’t afford to exercise their rights because they can’t pay the fees being charged by the people who were hired to ensure their rights. Consequently capitalism has become our economic premise and our primary political system. And as seen with our right to a free public education and the current educational system, when the economic belt gets tightened the only rights that will be guaranteed are the ones we can pay for.