debate topic of the week - states of emergency and individual human rights

[CaptainCrunch]

So I thought I would start something as an experiment. I think its pretty clear that I'm a political junky on a federal level. But I enjoy all kinds of different topics. So I thought maybe, we can have weekly debates, usually from Monday to Friday, because we all want to not think about things like this over the weekend.

So I here's the introduction. There are some rules

1) Keep it civil - I don't want it to devolve to pissing matches with an insult fest, it goes against the civil rules of any debate. If you want to address someones point, maybe think about starting it with the term "I understand what your saying but . . . " or something like that.
2) citations should be required if your bringing up a point that based in facts that you've seen or read. That way we're not pulling out vapor to support our points and forcing people to scramble to google to make sure that your facts are accurate.
3) This is meant to be fun, its not life and death, we're not formulating policy.
4) I'd hope that this is kept non-partisan, if you want to debate a position from the opposite side of your instincts, to be a devils advocate go for it, maybe even state it in your response or post.

5) If this is somewhat popular, and you guys like this, I'll post a new topic every Monday, it could be politics, religion, sports, current events. Whatever.

So this weeks topic is focused around the effects of emergencies on individual human rights and for example the Consitutions of various countries. This topic comes from the current Covid situation. It also is a topic that I've been interested in since reading the Tom Clancy novel where the US is infected by Ebola, and the President orders the shut down of travel to contain the virus and is attacked for trying to take away basic human rights as guaranteed in the US Constitution. The line in the fictional court is that the Constitution is not a suicide pact.

So the question is.

In the event of a national emergency, ie (Virus, terrorist attack excetera), should individual rights be allowed to be suspended for the duration of the emergency. Or do guaranteed human rights over right the ability to respond to an emergency? If individual human rights are suspended what is the role of the supreme court of Canada and the US when dealing with challenges to the emergency measures?


At the end of this topic, I wonder if we should put up a poll to see if we can get a consensus of the result of the debate?


I hope I phrased this properly, and people decide to participate.

Happy debating.

[PeteMoss]

I guess my question would be what do you mean by human rights being taken away?

Are we talking what happened in Canada where travel shutdown, quarantines and certain places closed or China where they will go to extreme measures to keep you home.

[Cecil Terwilliger]

With Charter rights and provincial human rights tribunals this can get tricky. Also, several complaints over "rights" with regards to covid are not violations at all, so I think defining what rights specifically are suspended.

[CaptainCrunch]

Originally Posted by PeteMoss

I guess my question would be what do you mean by human rights being taken away?

Are we talking what happened in Canada where travel shutdown, quarantines and certain places closed or China where they will go to extreme measures to keep you home.

Fair question. I don't know how properly I can answer that.


In terms of for vaccinations, we get the debate of "my body my choice".
In terms of travel the guarantee to be able to freely travel across for example provincial and state lines.
In terms of vaccination passports, the question of segregating segments of the population from participating in goods and services.


These are examples, I hop this helps.

[Matata]

One should always be suspicious, it's a lot easier to give up freedoms than get them back. The Patriot act has stopped 0 acts of terror, has cost billions and really only exists so US intelligence agencies can do things that were previously illegal, and there's no sign of it ever going away.

[Cuz]

In Canada, it is important to remember that section 1 of the Charter, aka the reasonable limits clause, could be used to justify many of the restrictions implemented during the pandemic.

[_Q_]

What's that saying? If you're willing to give up your rights during an emergency, then the government will always create an emergency to take away your rights.

While I think, unfortunately, some level of government control is inevitable during an emergency, I think we need to, as a society, more clearly define an emergency and the emergency needs to be short lived. With covid, for example, there are no metrics on when all this will end and it feels as though the goalposts keep shifting. I think it's highly problematic and sets a dangerous precident.

[gasman]

Originally Posted by Matata

One should always be suspicious, it's a lot easier to give up freedoms than get them back. The Patriot act has stopped 0 acts of terror, has cost billions and really only exists so US intelligence agencies can do things that were previously illegal, and there's no sign of it ever going away.

How would you know if the Patriot act has stopped 0 acts of terror??? They generally don't report on things that don't happen.

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by CaptainCrunch

Fair question. I don't know how properly I can answer that.


In terms of for vaccinations, we get the debate of "my body my choice".
In terms of travel the guarantee to be able to freely travel across for example provincial and state lines.
In terms of vaccination passports, the question of segregating segments of the population from participating in goods and services.


These are examples, I hop this helps.

My general take is we should be careful with taking away rights but that there are costs to living as a part of society. If you want the benefits of society (infrastructure, medical services, etc), you have to pay taxes and follow rules that are put in place to aid that society.

[Mathgod]

Your right to do whatever you want doesn't apply when the thing you're doing causes demonstrable harm to others.

[peter12]

All liberal political systems involve a trade-off between private good and public good. There hasn't been much cause in the past several decades that has required mass sacrifice, so socially we have continued down the road of more and more personal autonomy - mostly for the best.

Now, with the pandemic, we are remembering the other side of the equation, and that is hard for some people.

[81MC]

Fundamental human rights cease to be fundamental if they can be dispelled at authority’s behest.

You can debate what these are I suppose. But once defined, the suspension of them is the greater risk than the emergency.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by 81MC

Fundamental human rights cease to be fundamental if they can be dispelled at authority’s behest.

You can debate what these are I suppose. But once defined, the suspension of them is the greater risk than the emergency.

I think that depends on the emergency.

[octothorp]

The nature of the charter here in Canada means that these two things - individual rights and freedoms vs. societal needs - are constantly weighed against each other on a case-by-case basis. Personally, I strongly support that approach, but it's also pointless for discussing things on an abstract, high-level perspective like this, because it's the details of that individual case that are important: what is the personal right and how does it relate to the emergency, and how significant are the effects of the emergency?

And I do trust our courts to exercise more judicial independence in charter rights than, for example, our neighbours to the south. I can't point to a charter rights case where I think the courts absolutely got it wrong, but I can point to a lot where the courts got it right (and a lot of cases where I'm just glad I'm not the one who has to navigate a really difficult balance). But that doesn't mean we should relax and just assume that we're always in good hands. I think any effective attack on democracy in Canada would begin with court appointments, and so far I don't think we know if our institutions can effectively safeguard against that.

So yeah, in summary I do think the government should have the power to limit personal freedoms for the common good, both in times of emergency or not, but those restrictions still need to be tested in the courts. Personally I don't have a problem with someone 'testing' pandemic restrictions in the courts (even if I strongly disagree with their claims) as giving the courts an opportunity to weigh in on that balance is not a bad thing.

[_Q_]

I think what I have an issue with is manufacturing emergencies to limit rights and freedoms of citizens. It happens in most tyrannical regimes. Take Syria for example.
"You have rights and freedoms, just like everywhere else. They're just suspended right now, because we've been at war with Israel since 1948. Once that state of war is lifted, you can have those freedoms back."
We just need to ensure these emergencies truly are emergencies and that they are very short lived.

[Makarov]

I like this idea for a recurring threat (especially the commitment to civility), but this particular question is almost impossible to debate in the hypothetical or abstract. I think the vast majority of people agree that fundamental rights must be subject, as the Charter puts it, "to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society."

Now, there is plenty of room to debate and reasonably disagree on whether a particular limit is reasonable, prescribed by law, or can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society. However, those questions are very, very specific to the proposed limits and the circumstances being relied on to justify them, etc.

[burn_this_city]

Considering we had forced conscription at various times in the 20th century, I find the arguments about masks and vaccine coercion to be absurd. Narcissism wrapped in fake patriotism barking about freedom but accepting no obligation or responsibility.

[Slava]

I'll admit that the "philosophy" surrounding vaccine passports is a little troubling to me. I don't like the idea that you need to present your "papers" in order to do things or go certain places. I also find it worrisome that today it's being fully vaccinated that you need to prove, and maybe next year it will be proving that you've had 2-3 boosters or whatever. I don't think that's far-fetched and that's no exactly comforting.

At the same time, I'm fully vaccinated and totally fine with the passport to encourage others to follow that protocol. So, I guess I'm somewhat hypocritical and maybe my position isn't as set as I would think.

[Lubicon]

Suspension of certain rights is acceptable to me at times but there must be a clear time limit for these suspensions, it cannot be open ended. In other words by law these suspensions will automatically end and it would require a new vote/measure by the government in order to extend them for another set period of time.

[NuclearFart]

I think alot of people in these debates do not recognize or understand that:

1) There is a difference between a right and a privilege.

2) Rights can conflict with other rights, sometimes necessitating violation of a right to uphold the other.