Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
about caring. The mutual caring that characterizes a healthy marriage results in a greater
level of intimacy than can be gained simply by sharing personal information.
SUMMARY
To summarize our discussion, allowing people to have some privacy has a variety of
beneficial effects. Granting people privacy is one way that society recognizes them as
adults and indicates they are responsible for their own moral behavior. Privacy helps
people to develop as individuals and to truly be themselves. It provides people the
opportunity to shut out the world, be more creative, and develop spiritually. It allows
each of us to create different kinds of relationships with different people.
Privacy also has numerous harmful effects. It provides people with a way of covering
up actions that are immoral or illegal. If a society sends a message that certain kinds
of information must be kept private, some people caught in abusive or dysfunctional
relationships may feel trapped and unable to ask others for help.
Weighing these benefits and harms, we conclude that granting people at least some
privacy is better than denying people any privacy at all. That leads us to our next ques-
tion: Is privacy a natural right, like the right to life?
Most of us agree that every person has certain natural rights, such as the right to life, the
right to liberty, and the right to own property. Many people also talk about our right to
privacy. Is this a natural right as well?
PRIVACY RIGHTS EVOLVE FROM PROPERTY RIGHTS
Our belief in a right to privacy may have grown out of our property rights [7]. His-
torically, Europeans have viewed the home as a sanctuary. The English common law
tradition has been that “a man's home is his castle.” No one—not even the king—can
enter without permission, unless there is probable cause of criminal activity.
In 1765 the British Parliament passed the Quartering Act, which required American
colonies to provide British soldiers with accommodations in taverns, inns, and unoccu-
pied buildings. After the Boston Tea Party of 1773, the British Parliament attempted to
restore order in the colonies by passing the Coercive Acts. One of these acts amended the
Quartering Act to allow the billeting of soldiers in private homes, breaking the centuries-
old common law tradition and infuriating many colonists. It's not surprising, then, that
Americans restored the principle of home as sanctuary in the Bill of Rights.
THIRD AMENDMENT TO THE UNITED STATES
CONSTITUTION
No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without
the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be
prescribed by law.
