What’s Your Definition of a Victim?

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure for more information.

Can you be deliberately harmed by someone else and not be a victim?

At first blush, I believed the answer was no. If someone deliberately goes out of his or her way to harm you, and this uncaring someone is successful, how can you not be a victim?

But the more I toyed with this question, the less convinced I became that victimhood automatically equates with suffering harm. Consider the following two examples:

Example One

Suppose for a moment I’m the chief expansion officer for a big-box retailer and I decide to locate a new store a few miles away from the heart of a small town’s commercial district. Within one year of my company’s new store opening, all the mom-and-pop businesses on Main Street are wiped out.

Are the owners of those bankrupted mom-and-pop businesses victims? They were surely harmed. But did my company’s expansion into their community deprive them of anything that was rightfully theirs? Do owners of mom-and-pop businesses have a right to be shielded from competition? And if they do, how do you provide that protection without compromising the rights of my company and this small town’s consumers? Doesn’t my company have a right to challenge the status quo and expand its business? Don’t consumers, especially those on the lowest economic rung, have a right to more affordable clothing, toiletries, babycare items, cleaning supplies, and food?

Example Two

I see no evidence that one can change one’s sex. A man can do a number of things, both surgically and non-surgically, to take on the appearance of a woman, but he can never be a real woman. Regardless of how earnestly he “identifies” as a woman, or how often he subjects himself to the tender mercies of Big Surgery and Big Pharma, his chromosomes, testicles, and penis will never morph into their female counterparts. The intractable laws of biology have prohibited him from ever knowing or living the birthing side of the human experience. And the same goes for women. No force on earth will ever allow a woman to know or live the impregnating side of the human experience.

Because “transitioning” from one sex to the other isn’t possible, and because anyone with a rudimentary attachment to reality knows this, I firmly believe that transgender people are mentally ill. This doesn’t mean, of course, that I believe transgender people should be mistreated or denied the freedom to cosplay the opposite sex. I’m a live-and-let-live type of guy all the way. If some dude wants to use his own money to get breast implants and enrich Big Pharma, I say let him. It’s his life. But forcing me to submit to the fantasies of transgender people is as obnoxious and tyrannical as forcing an atheist to submit to the fantasies of Christians. And I refuse to comply. If I encounter someone in a dress who is obviously a man, I’m not going to use his “preferred pronouns” if those pronouns are she/her. And I will never vote for a politician who believes it’s okay for biological males to compete in athletic contests against biological females or who has no problem with parents subjecting their children to the “transitioning” surgeries and drugs that the Dr. Frankensteins of the medical community have to offer.

Are transgender people victims because I refuse to submit to their fantasies? Yes, they are surely harmed. Feelings are undoubtedly hurt whenever one’s sanity is questioned or worldview is coldly rejected. But does my failure to submit to their fantasies deprive them of anything that is rightfully theirs? Do transgender people have a right to be secure in their fantasies, to never have their heartfelt beliefs questioned or challenged? And if they do, what about my rights, and my heartfelt beliefs? Don’t I have the right to speak my mind and follow the dictates of my conscience? In what way would I remain free if I had to use the “preferred pronouns” of others or remain quiet as the LGBT community pushed for transgender policies that I found destructive to society and freedom?

Defining Victim

The above examples show that victimhood doesn’t perfectly correlate with harm. One can be harmed and still not be a victim.

So is there a better way to tell what constitutes and doesn’t constitute a victim?

In my mind, a person is only a victim when his or her property is violated. Either a fellow citizen or the government vandalizes, steals, or destroys one or more of his or her four kinds of property: classic, cognitive, corpus, and constitutional.

Now let’s return to our examples above and view our victim determination through the lens of property.

In example one, our bankrupted mom-and-pop businesses were harmed economically. But what property of theirs was violated? Their classic property wasn’t violated. Their storefronts weren’t vandalized or burned to the ground, and their wares weren’t stolen. Their cognitive property wasn’t in play, but their corpus property was—and it wasn’t violated. The owners of those mom-and-pop businesses always had full use of their faculties (i.e., their minds and bodies), and no one was stopping them from using their faculties to fend off the competition of a big-box retailer. Finally, their constitutional property wasn’t violated either. A big-box retailer moving to their community didn’t strip them of any of their inalienable rights.

But let’s suppose that our small town decided to protect its mom-and-pop businesses and refused to give our big-box retailer a building permit. Would such obstinance violate anyone’s property? I think so. It would violate our big-box retailer’s classic property. It brought property that was zoned for retail and now the local authorities say it can’t place a store on that property. That sounds like theft to me—the value of the property has been seriously compromised. And what about equal protection of the law? Aren’t the local authorities stealing the constitutional property of our big-box retailer by being arbitrary—by not allowing it to do what others are allowed to do (i.e., engage in retail)?

In example two, I surely harmed the feelings of transgender people. But, again, what property of theirs was violated? Was any of their classic property vandalized, stolen, or destroyed by my refusal to submit to their fantasies? And what about their other kinds of property? Does my assertion that transgender women aren’t real women suddenly render the copyright or patent of any transgender person null and void? Does my failure to use preferred pronouns suddenly cut the flesh or break the bones of any transgender person? And does my belief that giving hormone blockers to children is twisted beyond words suddenly strip any adult transgender person of his or her inalienable right to vote, own a gun, speak his or her mind, practice the religion of his or her choice, receive due process if arrested, etc., etc.?

But let’s suppose the federal government goes full-woke and passes a law that makes “transphobia” a crime. People who refuse to submit to the fantasies of transgender people are fined, thrown in jail, or stripped of any professional license they might possess. Would such a law violate the property of gender heretics? Without a doubt. The government doesn’t own my tongue. If I’m not using my tongue to slander or defame anyone, what right does the government have to steal that aspect of my corpus property? And what about my inalienable rights to freedom of the press and equal protection of the law? If atheists can write blog posts that challenge the worldview of Christians, Jews, and Muslims, why can’t I write blog posts that challenge the worldview of transgender people? Why is the constitutional property of atheists sacrosanct but the constitutional property of gender heretics scorned?

Final Thoughts

Okay, groovy freedomist, that’s all I got. What say you? Are people victims when they are harmed economically through honest competition or harmed emotionally through honest discourse? Or are people only victims when they have had their property vandalized, stolen, or destroyed? Let me know what you think when you get a chance. Peace.