RE: What Human Rights?
July 16, 2015 at 10:11 pm
(This post was last modified: July 16, 2015 at 10:12 pm by Dystopia.)
(July 16, 2015 at 10:00 pm)Jenny A Wrote:(July 16, 2015 at 6:48 am)Nestor Wrote: Do you believe in human rights? What do you include in these? What is it that gives anyone a right?
Remember, I DON'T mean legal rights. I mean something more, in nature, whatever that is, that entitles (is that the word I want?) a person to enjoy certain benefits, and that as a right it is others' duty not to impose or negate that right.
If you do not believe a person has anything like a natural, universal right, then how does that affect your beliefs/actions IRL circumstances when the issue of so-called violations (of life, liberty, property, etc.) comes up?
There's nothing in nature that entitles anyone to anything be they human or tree squirrel. All human rights are legal rights, or rights that humans argue ought to be legal rights. Regardless of whether we call them human rights or not, it's very clear that both other humans and/or nature can take them away. They are alienable. There is no such thing and an inalienable right. Life itself can be taken in a heart beat whether you think you have a right to it or not.
Adding god to the equation doesn't seem to help. If we add god we get rights some humans think that god has declared human rights and people ought to enforce as such. But since humans and/or nature takes them away with impunity, they are certainly not inalienable.
The more interesting question to me is what rights should we attempt to make legal globally and why.
The declaration of HR was heavily influenced by the Second World War and it's noticeable - Arguably it's based on a Humanist and Charitable conception of the world and Human societies - In many ways I would argue that HR as we know them are based and influenced on religion, particularly Christianity ---> The holiness of Human Life, the obsession with income inequality and helping the lower classes, the idea of eternal sin (we are eternally obliged to do our best to provide others their rights - And by us I mean governments), the absolutism of HR and strong reprehension of whoever denies them - Sounds a lot like a religion. Belief without evidence

[To be fair I think you've got the inalienable part wrong - It simply means you can't lose your right - People can't take that right away - It doesn't mean that violations don't happen, but that's precisely why we punish offenders - Because you weren't supposed to do it - I think the most important part of inalienability is that you can't give up your rights, so things like slavery and civic death (Losing all your rights) are deemed illegal and inhumane.
Note - I'm really happy to see I'm not the only Human Rights' denier - I thought I would be deemed a conspiracy theorist

Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And if you gaze long enough into an abyss, the abyss will gaze back into you