Community Standards vs. National Standards: Civil Liberties

community standards
Pro's
1) More voter involvement and voter impact - less voter apathy
2) More rights - example: gay marraige in massachussets and legal marijuana in Alaska

Con's
1) Individual Rights may not be protected: 10 commandments would probably stay in courthouse because it is a community standard. Civil rights movement in south would not have been successful had community standards been supported
2) Makes the country less unified and would eventually lead to more and more polarized communities. Examples: mormon utah, left coast, and massachussets - increasing numbers of the population would move to areas that have the same values.

Here are the results of a brainstorm I had this morning.

Civil Liberties are different from civil rights.

Civil Liberties - Fundamental individual rights, such as freedom of speech and religion, protected by law against unwarranted governmental or other interference.

Civil Rights - The rights belonging to an individual by virtue of citizenship, especially the fundamental freedoms and privileges guaranteed by the 13th and 14th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution and by subsequent acts of Congress, including civil liberties, due process, equal protection of the laws, and freedom from discrimination.

Pro community standards

1. Every community is different, different needs, different liberties

2. State laws affect people in the state, not other states - that's already promoting community standards

3. Def. of civil liberties states that they are protected also from unwarranted govt.

4. Interference... thus they would be better protected by the community? needs to be seperate from

5. What it's being protected from... but then if it's protected by the LAW and the LAW is the federal law (as in U.S. bill of rights... is that even possible?

Pro national standards

1. Uniformity, equality

2. National standards are always a little higher up than community standards, 'oversee' the community standards

3. For small countries - commuties like small towns would have too much independence... weakening of national unity.

4. National law has an obligation to review state laws for constitutionality, thus having the final say

5. Because they're civil 'liberties' doesn't that mean freedoms and equality? everyone having the same liberties, so everyone is equal? thus, natl standards would create an equal plate for everyone.

6. National standards such as the bill of rights protects civil liberties

7. If community standards had precedence, then the country would be inefficient and disorganized, putting too much power in the states or communities.

I think an important question is: what would 'protecting' civil liberties entail? I'm going to ponder that over lunch, and I'd appreciate any comments or ideas!

One of the advantages of granting prioity to "community rights and standards" is that if the individual disagrees he can move to a different community that shares his standards. One of the disadvantages is that communities (including states) are more easily taken over by powerful interest groups who come to dominate--to exploit and impose its perspective (as ideology)--on the community.
An advantage of giving priority to the national "community" is that its more globally accepted standards can eclipse those of localities where the standards are "deviant" (e.g., polygamous communities), and serve to restrain the ambitions of the locally powerful.
But the issue is unmanagibly complex and must be broken down into different natural categories, e.g., economics, social values, religion, etc.

It has to be a delicate balancing act. Either side can be wrong in different instances. The checks and balances may be slow, but mostly work.

There you go again, Edgar: sober, balanced and right.

It seems to me that it was an insistence on the primacy of community standards and states' rights which led to such things as legislated segregation in the South and the banning of James Joyce's Ulysses in many cities and states of the USA, just to name two reasons why "community standards", in most cases, don't really cut it. On the other hand, there may be specific community issues in which the Federal government has no stake and therefore no interest in legislating. In those cases, the local government would obviously have to take steps.

Man, it's really hard to find examples on this topic....

Here are examples of how community standards can function as restraint on individual creativity and cultural advancement: Mayor Guliani's censorship of art and the Church's burning of Giordano Bruno for his scientific beliefs. How can something like philosophy or art function as it should (viz., creative development of new possibilities) if it must comply with the status quo of "community standards?"

I have a very basic question that has been bugging me. Does one go about "protecting a civil liberity" by making it more free? That is, the more someone can do, the more civil liberties they have? If so, then would any situation where any civil liberity is being restrictred be inherently bad? For example, were the people of Skokie inherently wrong to try to limit the Nazis' free speech? Is it inherently wrong for the government to forbid someone to yell fire in a burning building because that is limiting the civil liberty of free speech? I might not have said this correctly, so I'll try to re-word my post if it isn't clear.

On something totally unrelated, to define the community standards wouldn't one look at the majority to see if their civil liberties are being protected? Should I let Nazis speak out however they please in a community of 50 nazis and 49 jews? If so, then can't a nation just be viewed as a large community?

If you think about it, you HAVE to take care of the community needs before you do it for the nation. The community need changes are brought to the national level not the other way around.
If we don't take care of ourselves in our own areas then how are we to take care of the national areas?

By the way i am a newbie so i would like to get to know people.

Welcome, eagle. One way to know your fellow A2Kers, besides exchanging ideas with us over the months is to click on our "profile." Not everyone reports on themselves, but many do.

Hello, eagle and justwork. Welcome to A2K.

Very nice...But, what are communitial standards without national standards? Because, if you think about it, all communitial standards are BASED off of national standards. And, national standards DO come down to communitial level, not change to communitial to national. True as it may be, one community can make a difference, but, on a more "realistic" plane of existence, realistic being defined as the most likely probability of the world, the national government always influences us, and we let them take over us with their regulations. At times, this is bad, but at others, this isn't. This encourages me to start a little mini poll here: Do you think that we should allow the government to intrude on our lives to protect us, or should we be more free and have a lower level of security? What do you have to say?

How can one define National Standards and Community standards?

bthewalker, good question. Short of taking polls, we who live in the society come to get, after much exposure to people, media, movies, etc., a sense of the distribution of ("commonly held") standards. This refers to the majority, not to everyone. Another way, is see how the "public" responds to behaviors branded "deviant" (standards and rules are often honored and realized in the breach). The problem is, of course, that every moral community within a complex and plural society like ours often insists that its standards are more widely held than are those of other moral communities.

Where to run "Balanced"?
About the balancing act....what could u run that on??? Aff or Neg?? im just wondering b/c it seems to me that you have to chose one or the other and there is not a lot of room to take the "balanced" stance...i know this might be a stupid question but im a noob debater...

Re: Where to run "Balanced"?


huh

Here are a couple of examples of how community laws influence national law and vice versa:

Pre 1973 (pre Roe v. Wade) abortion laws

State abortion laws after Roe v. Wade.

The current disagreement over Oregon's Physician Assisted Suicide law which is headed to the Supreme Court soon.