Worthiness, and the Common Good.

I just ran into this, which dovetails nicely with the core moral principle Razorfist was discussing regarding intellectual property:

I’m not a fan of the word “deserve”.

In many contexts, these days, it conveys (or breeds) a sense of entitlement, ingratitude and possibly selfishness.

Instead, I’ve adopted the term “worthy”.

I don’t deserve nice things.

However, I am worthy of them.

Whether it be time spent at the gym, a better pair of shoes, a cleaner home, et al, I don’t deserve it.

I am worthy of it.

Should, of course, I put forth the effort to acquire such.

In brief, it’s a concept I discussed in my book The Holistic Guide to Suicide:

A person is worthy of investment in themselves.

All too often in the modern world, men believe (via subtext or inculcation) they’re inherently unworthy of pretty much everything but the scraps offered them.

This is extremely destructive and – to my mind – a tremendous cause of self-loathing and depression.

In fact, it prevents them from any type of significant improvement – mental, spiritual or physical.

It’s one thing to think oneself undeserving.

It’s another entirely to imagine oneself unworthy of the fruit of one’s own efforts.

What you build with your blood, sweat and tears is yours, my friends.

Let no one tell you otherwise.

Your efforts crafted your creations and your worthiness, both.

I think it's a good point. Reframing from "deserve" - one commenter noted how it's "you deserve this" abuse in marketing circles had rendered it sickening - to "worthy" may seem like a semantics game, but the baggage they carry is different. Deserve has been overmarketed to the point it comes across as "entitled". Even in an earlier age, "worthy" carried a greater subtext of being earned. As he points out - "It’s another entirely to imagine oneself unworthy of the fruit of one’s own efforts. What you build with your blood, sweat and tears is yours, my friends. Let no one tell you otherwise. Your efforts crafted your creations and your worthiness, both."

Meanwhile, at Kairos, Brian notes that society is not a social construct.

Freedom detached from any grounding in the good has no limiting principle. That's the slippery slope the West has slid down from yeoman farmers defending private property to pink-haired witches demanding that everyone pretend they're female ungulates. If freedom is absolute, then any boundaries placed on individual self-expression--even the truth--must be a tyrannical imposition.

Libertarians tend to rely on the non-agression-principle as a good that is supposed to be achieved or worked toward, to justify violence in self-defense, and so on. Much like the old joke about a woman who, after accepting an offer to sleep with a man for $1,000,000 who is offended at an offer of $100 - we've established she's a whore, now it's just negotiation - we've established that laws / expected and enforced behaviors are there to serve "good", it's just a matter of negotiating what is "good."

In the end, laws should be limited. The more laws that exist, the more ways someone can break them without trying, the easier it is for officialdom to harass the innocent and assist accomplices under color of law. The larger the scope of power, the more damage an official can do. From a moral standpoint, it's one thing if there's a law that aknowledges murder is wrong, reasonably defines murder, and lays out the relevant punishments, it's another if people are prevented from peacefully assembling because they may embarrass the powers that be.

In short, good laws protect good action and punish evil ones, yet can be abused. Bad laws strip away moral choice over petty things or prevent people from doing good or speaking truth, or simply further evil action.

Looking back, much like the left tries to claim that all government is socialism, the moe radical libertarians try to claim all laws are tyranny.

Also - again at Walker's Retreat -  a look at the motte and bailey debating technique in the wild.