If Y wants to declare their assets, their IQ, their number of kids, their wives, number of their kids, the size of their waist.. so on.. Hey.. all power to them.
No argument there. Haan if a journalist group want to create a Standard of higher journalism where declaration of asset is a must, then journalists can make their own call if they want the prestige of being a member of a certified and reliable group.
You know how you got the "Certified Financial Analyst" or MCSE in IT... Govt doesnt force u to take the exam but you do it to increase your chances of landing a better source of income.
Keep Govt out!
No argument there. Haan if a journalist group want to create a Standard of higher journalism where declaration of asset is a must, then journalists can make their own call if they want the prestige of being a member of a certified and reliable group.
You know how you got the "Certified Financial Analyst" or MCSE in IT... Govt doesnt force u to take the exam but you do it to increase your chances of landing a better source of income.
Keep Govt out!
No worries. The point I was coming at was that the person you were arguing against may have been suggesting something that although sounds wrong from a libertarian perspective, but it is actually finding practical feasibility in circles that matter.
So while the person (whose name I can't recall) was perhaps wrong in suggesting that he felt that he had a right to demand journalists to disclose their wealth and sources of income, I was appealing to you and others to ignore the fact that he was missing the point that you were making, but rather appreciate that journalists themselves are looking to disclose their assets and sources of income. What I was trying to suggest was that the journalist community is increasingly coming to a consensus on this matter and although no individual would have the right to demand such a thing, but it hardly matters if you are either a libertarian or conservative in this debate. So in terms of boolean algebra it would be like this:
Libertarian (A) believes that no individual has the right to demand journalists (Y) to disclose their assets.
Conservative (B) believes that individual has the right to demand journalists (Y) to disclose their assets.
However, Journalists (Y) themselves are increasingly agreeing amongst themselves to disclose their assets.
So it doesn't matter what A and B think because the decision has to be made by Y!
On another note, I was hearing someone who was making a very compelling case as to why TV anchors ought to disclose their assets and that they should not be treated as private citizens. They argue that: (i) Media is increasingly becoming a 4th pillar of governance (Judiciary, Legislature and Executive being the other 3) ; (ii) Any person/organization who is playing the role of opinion-maker and influencing a society or community needs to come clean on their source of funding and ideology.
While the above points can be debated till the cows come home, I feel that there is some substance to the above arguments. This is perhaps why conspiracy theories are becoming such a farce in western societies to the extent that now we have organized groups being led by such opinion-makers that are now becoming a threat to society at large. For instance, the anti-vaccination groups in the West is a serious challenge to governments of the West (episodes like UBL and Shakil Afridi dont help the cause though).
In a more local context, people like Zaid Hamid are operating because of the freedom that they are allowed to spew all kinds of nonsensical rhetoric without being answerable to anyone. Zaid Hamid was just that big an idiot that he was involved in the Yusuf Kadhdhab issue and got exposed by the Anjuman-e-Khatm-e-Nubuwwat folks. Otherwise this guy was just having a field day with his nonsense!
Tags: @AsifAmeer, @Temojin