I actually disagree with the concept of libertarian principles except for the concept of liberty itself. Not trying to be a smartass either, but I really do.
I know, ethics has a way of forming either directly or indirectly, but I think with libertarianism, ethics should always be indirect with the ultimate goal being the maximum amount of liberty.
For me, libertarianism holds an indirect principle of not having liberty affected by an opposition, hence government, someone busting in and taking my property, et cetera. This principle manifests itself in the form of rules and laws, which I would consider ethics, but ethics (for me, anyway) aren’t the initial focus. Only liberty. The rest naturally solves itself imo.
This is why I cling to the Bill of Rights. Thank God for the anti-federalists’ foresight and sound judgment to remain skeptical even with the government built on the idea of freedom. They knew the government would grow to become tyrannical and that the only thing preventing them from further perverting the new rule of law (otherwise known as the U.S. Constitution) would be a static bill clearly listing the essential freedoms to be upheld by the federal government.
I know we’re lost, but at least we still have a map. Could you imagine America without the Bill of Rights? They’ve already attempted to redifine them 101 times, without them we’d officially be the USSA by now.
I’ve mulled over this problem for a long time, and I have decided that only direct infringement upon property can be considered a crime, emotional distress cannot because of the fact that all emotional distress is is the creation of a state of affairs which the individual does not like to which he has no claim over in terms of property. I don’t like that you are wearing that shirt, I don’t like that you bought the house I wanted, these things bring me emotional distress, but I have no claim over anyone else or what they do with their life, and so their actions are not crimes.
Liberty must be contained in terms of property rights, or they are rights unlimited, and when rights are unlimited (in this case the ability to press charges for things that I don’t like which cause me distress) result in no rights at all. If I don’t get X then I will be distressed so you can’t have it, if you don’t get X you’ll be distressed I can’t have it.
Even in cases were people are distressed into suicide this is still a case where they respond to events based upon their property and their will, they are not forced into anything, and any emotional harm brought to them is simply a case where they interpret events in a certain way that brings them harm, no one is physically doing something to them. Even if you claim that they have control over their own lives and minds the other people still have control over their actions, and so all the above still applies.
Emotional state is encoded in the brain and the brain is part of the body, thus emotional state is an integral part of the body and thus under your ownership. At the end emotional damage is a physical damage. For example a man who was scared by someone so much that he developed a post traumatic stress disorder was hurt emotionally, yet the harm was just as physical. Separating between physical and emotional damage is useful in most cases, but it doesn’t mean these are really separate things, biologically this is definitely not so. In some cases emotional damage if caused by certain immoral actions should be illegal in my opinion.
The argument that once it is possible to sue against emotional damage it means everyone will sue for stupid things such as disliking certain forum posters is preposterous. It doesn’t happen even in today’s statist society, so surely it won’t happen in a libertarian society in which most people believe in weak legal framework.
This isn’t an indirect principle. It is the foundation of libertarianism. All of the lifestyle and other choices associated with libertarianism are window dressing by comparison.
People are applying a reductio ad absurdum to your argument, which is typical in discourse. They are taking your argument to its logical end, and the logical end is that if feelings truly are ownable, then we should be able to act legally on any feeling.
It is up to you as the person claiming feelings are ownable (burden of proof) to support your claim, and explain how and why this is true, and what limits would occur to prevent the absurd conclusion from happening.
This is how people argue intelligently. You should be trying to achieve that level with your arguments.