Religion does not put rejection of our rights "off limits". It makes rights impossible to defend. Anyone can have faith in anything he wants if that is the way he thinks. And they do, from the Catholic left's liberation theology to the Islamo Fascists, with all factions hysterically fighting each other for millennia of mutual religious persecution.

Faith doesn't defend rights on some absolute terms, it doesn't intellectually defend anything. It leaves everything up for grabs with no intellectual standards to decide, only perpetual force as each faction loudly pronounces its own faith as beyond challenge and beyond discussion as it tries to assert its own beliefs into an impregnable position supposedly intrinsic under its supernaturalism. It pronounces supposedly intrinsic values as an excuse to forcibly impose them, with no argument necessary or possible. That is how faith inevitably leads to force and the wholesale violation of rights, and is why religious faith is not and cannot be a defense of the rights of the individual.

But the religious conservatives do further damage. As they invoke religious faith as the alleged defense of arbitrary assertions of rights with no definition and no explanation beyond mystic pronouncements, they loudly exclude and denounce a rational defense of rights objectively identified as abstract moral principles based on our requirements to live on earth.

This anti-intellectual battle between the left and the religious right is the false alternative of the openly subjective versus the mystically intrinsic. Those on one side demand government can do anything they feel like to coercively grant "rights" as entitlements on behalf of the collective, based on faith in altruistic sacrifice as the standard of morality. The other side rejects government and any role for man and his intellect in identifying and logically establishing what rights are and where they come from, denouncing what it calls "relativism" (while ignoring that it's own duty ethics of altruistic sacrifice contradicts the right to life, liberty and pursuit of one's happiness, as well as the rights of the individual).

Omitted is the objective identification of natural rights as abstract principles based on the nature of man and his requirements to live as a rational being as the source of properly formulated civil rights codified and enforced by government.

Or to put it more philosophically as a central principle: we are given the false alternative of the "intrinsic" versus the "subjective" with no regard for what Ayn Rand identified as the "objective-subjective-instrinsic trichotomy" -- in this case pertaining to abstract principles in our conceptual means of knowing based on the facts of reality. Knowledge, including abstract principles of moral values, is a relation between both reality and consciousness, as a grasp of reality by a conceptual consciousness. It is neither "intrinsic" apart from man's means of knowledge as in the Plato-Augustine axis, nor subjective apart from the facts of reality. Ayn Rand rejected both.

Rights, like all knowledge, must be initiated, formulated and defended by man, based on the facts of reality, i.e., man's nature and requirements to live. There is no abstract knowledge or principles inherent in reality, only the facts themselves, which we observe through our senses and employ as a perceptual base for conceptual abstractions as our form of comprehending.

This false alternative as formulated by religious conservatives was illustrated again last month by one of the religious right's most prominent spokesmen today, Mark Levin, in discussing the recent controversy between CNN morning Anchor Chris Cuomo and Alabama Judge Roy Moore (widely known for his unsuccessful attempt to prominently display the ten commandments in a court house several years ago).

Moore stated: "Our rights, contained in the bill of rights, do not come from the Constitution they come from God".

Cuomo: "Our laws do not come from God, your honor, and you know that, they come from man... Our rights do not come from God. That's your faith, that's my faith, but that's not our country. Our laws come from collective agreement and compromise."

So you see both the intrinsic and the subjective asserted in the false alternative.

In his February 12, 2015 radio show Mark Levin left no room for doubt on the conservatives' anti-reason position in explicitly philosophical terms:

"Where do these unalienable rights come from? These inviolable rights, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? They don't come from man, they don't come from the collection of men we call government. These are rights, you're born with these rights. They don't come from reason. They don't come from logic. They are. Period."

With the religious conservatives intellectually dominating the supposed defense of individual rights as based on faith in the "intrinsic" and an attempt to rely on "the large number of people [who] have some degree of belief/faith in someone/something supernatural", while rejecting reason and logic in the identification, formulation and codification of rights as "relativist", it should be no surprise why the country is helplessly sinking before the collectivists' onslaught ranging from rabid Islam to Obama's "fundamental change".

This is why Ayn Rand repeatedly stated that this is primarily an intellectual battle.

I understand all positions as well. Personally, I have always lived my life being "good" and I'm not a zealot, but I'm a semi-practicing Catholic (more than Easter & Christmas). I did have a near-death experience once though, and my experience frames my thinking in the belief that I'm not on the wrong track. Assuming many of the rest of the belief system are somewhat accurate, the alternative is pretty horrific.

That being said, my belief is also that similar non-obsessed Christian/Jewish religious people like myself do not take advantage of others, respect others, respect and embrace the freedoms our nation and culture are founded on, and do not try to change the lives or beliefs of others.

Simply put, I believe the rights of someone else end where they infringe on mine. We have a dope here in my adopted hometown (Sacramento) living in Elk Grove, CA that likes to sue everyone and everything for having the word "God" on it, tried suing the school to stop his daughter from saying the pledge of the allegiance (and stopping it altogether for everyone) and even that stopped because she didn't mind saying it and regularly went to church & Sunday School with her mom (dad is no longer in the picture) and the Supreme Court ruled that he "had no standing to object".

The framers intended our rights and liberties to be granted from above, so they could not be revoked by any 'man'. Unfortunately, we have ceded much of that ourselves, and its my belief that we need to retake those liberties.

Before I draw any flaming remarks from anti-Catholics... I'll also add that my belief is in the higher power, and the teachings of Jesus (which do not in any way conflict with American beliefs, values and the American experience). I do not necessarily value or place a higher moral authority on any institution created by humans and managed by humans. (I believe many church organizations themselves are somewhat corrupt to varying degrees). All people are fallible.

Minor, I won't say something stupid like "I defy you to show me one.." but I will say that I've been looking for an example of a candidate who supports economic freedom WITHOUT opposing 'personal freedoms' that fall under the umbrella of gay/abortion/religious non-intervention by governments.

Haven't seen anyone who comes close. The ones who have focused on economic freedom have been silent on personal 'freedoms' .... until they're elected.

Please... help me find one!

and AJ, as I've read many of the comments above here, I could not help but be reminded that the folks who object to 'putting the source above Man' so's to put it out of reach of our meddling with it... often talk about "Natural Rights" instead... as if The Source of Those Rights are also 'beyond our reach of meddling,' but somehow can't/don't specify Where They Came From Either!

And they don't seem to see the contradiction in that. Very puzzling to me.

well absolutely man defines his rights. He acknowledges yours.that is A is A. His Ethics are based in morality whether he believes in God or not. that' s major point of the article.

Morality *is* nothing more than taste -- each person defines his own. This doesn't mean no one should bother having one; it means we all should choose carefully, since your moral code determines how far (and by whom) you can be trusted -- and even if there is neither hell nor karma, there is reputation.

The philosophy of liberty implies assuming that other people are adults, who know this and can each handle its consequences for themselves. Christianity (and other western faiths), while they superficially seem to support similar moral views, assumes that we are all not adults but sheep, who need a shepherd to lead us. I find that view absolutely abhorrent.

I had considered this topic when first writing the post, but didn't want to go into it at more length unless someone brought it up, and I'm glad you did to continue it further.

For all his evils, Obama is still not the overt, sadistic mass murderer of a Stalin or Mao. If he were to follow out his own premises consistently in time he would become that, and put into power in a system more degenerate than ours -- which still serves as some restraint -- he would no doubt act worse than he does even now (as he has admitted he would like to), but so would any statist if he lived long enough.

I was comparing them as the men that they are/were, not what else Obama could ultimately become. There are still in fact differences among politicians even though they are corrupt, and that still makes a difference to our lives. In the case of Obama, you have to look pretty far out to find a difference -- like to Mao or Stalin -- which is how they got into the initial comparison.

it is a difficult moral issue. I do NOT want the fed govt deciding this we need to educate women.

I have witnessed a late term abortion, and it did make an impression on me. The federal government has no business dictating this or anything else.

Ewv, I thought your comment about rights was thoughtful and brilliant. Nice to meet you as per khalling....

You're right. I wasn't clear, and I even knew it. What I was thinking was that a physician delivers babies, sees miscarriages and abortions. It has to color one's thinking to some extent, but I agree that there is more to it.