Re: DIS: Re: BUS: Knocking at the back door

[ais523]

On Tue, 2008-09-30 at 10:58 -0400, comex wrote:
> Googling 'rights and privileges', one of the websites that comes up
> contrasts the right of life or liberty with the privilege of driving a
> car.  Assume that a teenager does not have the privilege of driving
> his car, and MAY NOT and CANNOT do it (he doesn't have access to the
> keys, for example).  If he gained the ability to do it (found the
> keys), but was still forbidden to do it, we wouldn't say that he had
> gained the privilege of driving his car; nor would we in the more
> bizarre situation that he became allowed to do it but remained unable
> to.  We would only say that he has the privilege of driving his car if
> he MAY and CAN do so.
>From what I know of English, an ordinary-language privilege is something
that you've been allowed to do, but which might be revoked at any time
(usually for bad behaviour). The contrast is that a right is something
that is given to everyone, whereas privileges are given to people often
as a reward for good behaviour.
-- 
ais523