Trolls and "Free Speech"

The periodic devolution of discussion is here -- the descent into claims that I'm an "authoritarian" who suppresses people's "free speech" by deciding who can comment on this blog and in what way.

So let's talk about two characteristics of "rights."

Characteristic #1: A right creates no obligations on the part of others to facilitate its exercise. Your right to "free speech" creates no obligation on my part to provide you with a microphone or loudspeaker.

Characteristic #2:

If you claim a right to do X, and I claim a right to do Y, and those two claims conflict, then either X or Y is not a right.

I have a property right in this blog, via an agreement with Blogger/Blogspot.

I have a property right in the comment section of this blog, via an agreement with Disqus.

The blog and the comment section are no different than rooms in an apartment that I rent.

I may or may not be allowed to do certain things with them per those agreements.

I absolutely have the right to decide who can use those rooms and in what way.

The anonymous troll or trolls whining about "authoritarianism" and "free speech" certainly have a right to free speech ... but he/she/they don't have a right to use this blog or its comment section. He/she/they do so solely by permission, because I control those properties by right.

Since the troll or trolls, for some reason, seem very sure that I'm a big fan of gay pride parades, here's a little thought experiment for them:

If I decide to host a gay pride parade that marches through your yard, in your front door, and around your living room, without your permission and in defiance of your order not to do so, do I have a right to do that?

Hey, it's all about MY FREE SPEECH. "How authoritarian of you" to decide that I don't get to use your property to express my views on gay pride.

The answer, of course, is that no, I have no such right. Your yard, your door, and your living room are your property, not mine. If I want to host a gay pride parade, I should do so on property that belongs to me, or belongs to someone who'll allow it, or on unhomesteaded, unowned property (governments are criminal gangs with no "property rights" in the property they pretend is "public" -- it's just property they've violently withheld from homesteading and legitimate ownership).

You certainly have a right to say that I'm "not a libertarian."

But if you don't respect my property rights, you aren't a libertarian and may not even know what a libertarian is.

Every time you show up to comment after having been asked to leave -- and just to make sure, consider this that request -- you're trespassing. You are stealing the use of property, including storage and bandwidth, from its rightful owner or tenant.

Yes, it's fairly easy to remove the trash you leave lying around. And it's only mildly annoying.

It's a little more annoying that you do it under the pretense that you're a libertarian or libertarians, but not really upsetting. I got on to that trick when Bill Clinton said "I'm a libertarian on that" (pot legalization, IIRC) back in the 1990s. If I had a dime for every two-bit criminal who pretended to be a libertarian when pretending to be a libertarian seemed convenient, I'd be very wealthy.

So, you'll keep showing up to feed whatever obsessive need drives you, and I'll keep deleting your comments when I find them annoying. Cry a little more if you want to.