Quote:
Originally Posted by Paul Markham
As for you reply about hate and libel, well that wasn't very good. It was a very bad reply.
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It was a strict and consistent application of proprietarian ethical theory.
Simply stated: you do not own your reputation. You do not own the part of people's brains where the information about how they think or feel about you is stored. If someone does or says something that causes other people to change their opinion about you then that person has not violated your property rights. The people who have changed their opinions have changed them themselves based on the new information presented.
Let's say for example that you own a clothing store and a competitor buys the building next to yours and opens a new clothing store. The competitor's store has a new ultramodern design. He carries new brands that your store doesn't. And he's running different kinds of promos. Based on those things people might start to think of your store as "old fashioned and expensive".
Has the owner of the new store done anything wrong? Did he violate your property rights? Of course not.