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Old 03-27-2008, 01:41 PM   #11
shasarak
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Join Date: Sep 2007
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Re: MUD Players' Bill of Rights

There is no such thing as a "right" that exists in a vacuum; people only have the rights that their society chooses to confer on itself. Strictly speaking, talking about "human rights violations" is (usually) a misnomer; what you mean is not "these people's rights are being violated" but "these people don't have rights that I think they ought to have".

Obviously any given MUD therefore has its own unique set of rights, and no one outside that MUD can enforce them (unless there is a conflict with a higher authority such as a nation's legal system). So what is being debated here is not "what rights do players have?" but "what sort of rights might it be a good idea for MUDs to choose to give players?" Whether or not any given MUD decides to sign up to such a Bill is entirely up to the MUD in question, just as it's up to a country whether or not to sign up to an international treaty, and just as it was a matter of choice for each state to sign up to the Declaration of Independence (or not).

It's perfectly reasonable to say "I think people would be a lot more comfortable playing on a MUD where they have a right to X" or "I think it is unreasonable for a player to expect to have the right to Y"; that's simply a matter of opinion, not enforcement.
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