Entitled said:
Rights are contradicting each other all the time, neither of them are absolute. Your right to life and freedom can be limited if you violate laws, your right to bear arms can be limited from certain types of arms, Your right to free seech can be limited by copyright laws, slander laws, hate speech laws, etc.
To look at only one Right as if it would be absolute, always leads to extremism. If you want to say that a publisher's right to sell copies of a game to children under any condition, originates from "free speech", that's so indirect, that you could as well explain that you have an inherent right to own any drugs as your property, or otherwise your "right to property" is violated.
The US Constitution said:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
Dictionary.com said:
a·bridge
verb (used with object), a·bridged, a·bridg·ing.
1.to shorten by omissions while retaining the basic contents: to abridge a reference book.
2.to reduce or lessen in duration, scope, authority, etc.; diminish; curtail: to abridge a visit; to abridge one's freedom.
3.to deprive; cut off.
Yeah, the constitution makes it quite clear that speech and anything that can be adequately defined as speech cannot be censored as such; speech is wholly protected. The right to property, however, is never explicitly stated as such, and was more of a guideline as the the mentality behind the constitution than actual law. I find it funny that the first thing of property that everyone always goes for is drugs (libertarianism, ho!), ignoring the fact that anything that could be evidence of a crime can also be taken permanently without compensation. If someone stole my care and ran someone over with it, for example, even if it's still in working condition, I may never get it back, as it is evidence of a crime that may need reinvestigating later. And plenty of other things fall into that category as well.
In short, the right to speech IS in fact a guaranteed absolute, whereas the right to property is not, and much like separation of Church and State, was more of a behind-the-scenes mentality of the founders than actually put into law.
The right to keep and bear arms is more iffy; militias are (currently) definable by the state. My state's militia is defined as any able-bodied male. Because I'm fat and asperger's, I may not fit into this model, and therefore my right to keep and bear arms isn't absolutely guaranteed, but plenty of my friends' right to do so is. Likewise, "arms" is a roughly definable term. If I took it to mean I could wield any sort of gun because "arms", then I could take it to mean a butterfly knife, brass knuckles, or other weapons that are commonly illegal and excluded from 2nd amendment rights, because they are "arms". So "arms" is not absolute, but it is guaranteed.
And please remember that if the rights DO overlap somewhere, you're misinterpreting the rights (at least in America, this shit was well thought-out before put into law, hence why it's lasted so long). Absolute speech for example, I'm allowed to say anything I want, but you don't have any right to not be offended. Likewise, I don't have the right to have an audience. Therefore, you are allowed to be offended and that does nothing to me, but you can of course walk away without infringing on my rights. Absolute guns is another; I'm allowed to own a gun if I want, but it doesn't affect you in any way. In no place am I guaranteed the right to SHOOT a gun, which may in certain circumstances infringe on rights, even though owning does not.
