The Power of The Collective Necessitates Rights

Membership into a collective is varied. We are all members of a collective in one manner or another. Most of us were born into a collective and that collective is referred to as a family. At birth we became a member of another collective as citizens of the State our parents chose to abide in. Marriage is the accepted means of the creation of the collective that a child is born into. In fact science considers the family as the smallest and singular most important collective in a society.

We become members of a collective by means of birth, by voluntarily joining a collective such as religious establishment or club of some sorts. Lastly we become involuntary members of a collective as designated by others who determined our place in life based upon a singular attribute that we may share in common.

The last form of a collective is usually the designation of scientists for the purpose of comparison of differences if any. I have never been an advocate of this form of determining collectives. The reason being is that it leads to false conclusions in regards to the individuals of that collective. This results in prejudicial and biased judgments of the individuals within that collective by those differences though it may not be the intention of the scientist performing his task as a scientist. Thus, I refuse to recognize these collectives as a valid collective from a political point of view therefore any references in regards to collectives will not apply to these sort of collectives as designated.

All collectives can be designated as being of a voluntary membership. By voluntary I mean that any individual member of that collective has the right to remove himself from that collective regardless of the means by which membership was attained. Of course, the collective has the authority and power to expel an individual from membership also.

A collective is not viewed as possessing rights because it has no need for the possession of rights. It is viewed from the point of possessing power and authority over the individuals within that collective. Rights belong to the individuals of that collective and for good reason. Rights restricts the power and authority of the collective over the individual.

Every collective is represented by a governing body of individuals. This governing body of individuals possess the right to exercise the power and authority which as possessed by the collective. It is these individuals who make up what politics refers to as a government. It is from this that it can be said that those individuals who occupy the seat or seats of government are the most powerful men in society.

It is the possession of power, whether authorized or unauthorized, that permits one individual to dictate the lives of other individuals. And power, like any possessed attribute of a man, seeks to beget itself thus it is inevitable that those who possess power seeks to be evermore powerful for as long as they possess any power.

And every person possesses some power in life if only enough power to dictate his own life which is the least amount of power that any individual can possess. And it is this need that recognized the necessity of rights. It is the protection provided in the recognition of rights possessed that determines if a individual is allowed to dictate his own life or whether the collective through its representative, the government, will dictate it for him.

As Abe Lincoln said, “ Government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the Earth.”

The truth in this statement can be found by recognition of one thing. While Governments may fall and rise, while government may change its form of governing, one thing remains. The people will remain the same, each person seeking only the liberty to dictate his own life and not have it dictated for him. That will never perish.