it is unedited and unpolished, but in need of criticism
The purpose of this short essay is simply to redundantly question threats to the point of obscurity.
Threat seems like an empty concept
The proposition of defining threat is so completely arbitrary that it may as well be immaterial. Usually you can trace an argument as follows. A clown costume may cause a feeling of fear (as could a Ku Klux Klan robe), yet, since there is no immediate danger associated with the costume there is no true threat. Thus, the costume or robe may be worn by the individual as long as they reserve the right to wear such clothing by the property owner from which they reside.
For most libertarian circles, all is well in the previous example. Now, if you replace the costume with a gun, things (supposedly) become different. It is assumed that a gun carries with it a larger probability of harm and thus is more threatening than a costume.
Yet again this level of threat is completely subjective. Let us take for example the fact that a gun must, by definition, point at something. The mere fact that it points at the individual is as much a function of the individuals’ position as the guns position. Given a direct line of site at any point within a three-dimensional sphere there are only but so many ways the gun’s line of sight may direct. For a thought experiment, let us imagine a room of a many individuals, one of who is particularly over weight. If we imagine a gun within the room also, of the finite ways upon which to point the gun, the overweight individuals is proportionally more likely to have the gun pointed at them, yet are they more threatened by the gun? Would they have more recourse to restitution given this increased threat-probability?
The typical libertarian response to situations of arbitrary threats is to place the decision into the hands of an arbitration company. I believe this is wise response given the fact that such arbitration companies would specialize in equity as well as justice. Yet, like all businesses, arbitration companies cannot simply be initially outsourced such decisions; consumers must choose to proceed with arbitration.
Initially, the property owner, if they indeed own their property absolutely, is the ultimate authority to rule on actions within the realm of their property boundaries. Of course it is within the interests of the property owner to use arbitration companies and thus relinquish their absolute authority over their personal property. From the reference point of this article we may simply assume that an individual feels threatened, but their perpetrator owns the property from which they threaten them. The question then becomes who empowers the arbitration company to overrule of the absolute owner of property but the absolute owner? If the property owner and perpetrator of threats hasn’t empowered the arbitration company to make such decision then they may not simply assume such power.
Even if the individual who feels threatened calls their arbitration company to sue or imprison the property owner for the discomfort they caused, they have no power to do so unless the property owner had previously relinquished such power (for example, the home insurance company required the home owner to deal with an arbitration company in all cases of restitution/threats).
In fact, what is it about these little bundles of threat-probabilities that give an arbitration company the right to rule in favor of one party? If we unpack the threat of a gun pointing at someone, for example, what would we find in terms of probabilities? I’m sure we would find quite a heavy function from which we could run regressions with.
Threat = f( D, Wi, V, M, Me, A, O, Me, S, Sw)
D = distance between gunman and victim
Wi = Wind
V = volume of the target
M = Make of gun and bullet
Me= Probability of Mechanical failure
A = ability of shooter
O = objects obstructing line of sight
Me = mental health of gun holder
S = Chemical Substances within the gun holder
SW= Self-worth of the potential victim
Yet, none of what’s listed above (and the infinite amount of variables that are left out) gives any legitimacy to the pretense of an action.
A threatening voice, or threats made by voice are also irrelevant. When dealing with sound we have a few scenarios
- Intensity (the distance between waves and proximity to the ear)
- Pitch/timbre (those characteristics of sound which allow the ear to distinguish sounds which have the same pitch and loudness in communication and perception)
- Lack of Sound
Obviously a lack of sound can’t be a cause of aggression since there is no positive obligation to initiate sound.
So what of the issue where someone uses silence as a weapon of mental abuse? The silent treatment, often employed by wives, carries with it a slew of injury. Think of the situation where a parent refuses to speak to a child thus rendering the child incompetent in speech. Are we to claim the use of positive rights?
Intensity of sound is a harder concept since it is both a function of distance between the two parties as well as the intensity of sound wave frequency. Yet again, the speaking distance between two parties can only be decided by the property owner. For example, the issue where someone uses the pitch of sound to physically hurt another individual, as in the case of screaming in someone’s ear, etc. Even still, this is not a scenario of word interpretation as much as it is a scenario of volume. Thus an individual may speak sweet flattery in ones ear but still cause as much physical (or even less) harm as someone who speaks threats. It is volume not interpretation that is of issue, but again volume is ultimately decided by the property owner–unless the property owner willfully relinquishes that power or the sound waves begin polluting another individual’s property (note: since absolute ownership cannot be partitioned, the individual whom is on your property is subject to the owners authority unless the owner has contracted away that authority).
Finally, how is one to speak of pitch/timbreas cause of threat when they are subject to interpretation? Think of an attempt to translate a joke from one language to another. It is nearly impossible to translate without losing portions of the humor. Thus, the initiator of sound chooses from various pitches among languages with formal and informal slang, and anticipate that the receiver of such sound fully understands and acts appropriately. Think of the words for, fore or four within a sentence and ask how easily such context could be confused. For such reasons it is beyond me why someone would wish to subscribe to the notion that a word, be it spoken or written, can serve to be responsible as a medium for causation of aggressive acts or threat in need of restitution.