Individual Rights: Natural, Equal, Universal

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midcan5

Member
Often on JustPlain and other sites the question over whether rights are natural or created causes great debate. Starting points are difficult as primitive women didn't bother writing down how they handled rights at the dawn of consciousness. Lynn Hunt's view is they evolved as womankind evolved. An interesting perspective as it challenges the nature argument with interesting analyses of the changes, which leads me to the question how societies address rights and how we think of them. Review is below.

Note: This touches on our discussion in "Which is Which."

By Gordon S. Wood

"The 18th-century American and French declarations unleashed “an implacable logic” that expanded rights to all sorts of individuals and groups, including Jews and other members of minority religions, slaves and women. In the 19Th century, however, rights became attached to particular nations and ethnicities, and they lost much of their equal and universal character. “It took two devastating world wars,” Hunt writes, “to shatter this confidence in the nation.”

Only following the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948, which “crystallized 150 years of struggle,” did rights once again come to dominate the conscience of much of the world. Human rights, Hunt concludes, have now become “our only commonly shared bulwark” against the brutalities and cruelties that still afflict much of humanity."


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/08/books/review/Wood2.t.html?_r=1&ref=review

Amazon.com: Inventing Human Rights: A History (9780393331998): Lynn Hunt: Books@@AMEPARAM@@http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51E%2BTiHBE4L.@@AMEPARAM@@51E%2BTiHBE4L
 
human rights are natural, equal, and universal. The fact that some people had theirs denied to them by other humans at some point in time does not mean they didn't exist then.
 
I'm going to call bullshit on the book just because of who posted it, but if the book attempts to claim that natural rights are made-up and that rights exist only when governments assert them, then that is wrong.
 
Threedee said:
I'm going to call bullshit on the book just because of who posted it, but if the book attempts to claim that natural rights are made-up and that rights exist only when governments assert them, then that is wrong.
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But that is the reality. You can dream of your abstract rights, but if you don't have them, you don't have them.

This is why we must be vigilant against all forms of totaltarianism working it's way into government.
 
AssHatZombie said:
But that is the reality. You can dream of your abstract rights, but if you don't have them, you don't have them.

This is why we must be vigilant against all forms of totaltarianism working it's way into government.
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I got into this with Dixie, who argued that anyone that claims to believe in NR but refuses to subscribe to imperialism is a hypocrite. Natural Rights are more than mere abstractions, and as the Declaration states, they are a gift from God.

I take the Real Whig approach to them. NR are a fragile thing that are constantly under fire, and only a few societies are fortunate enough to have them. In that sense, they can be viewed as a privilege, because to aquire them in any meaningful way, a society must evolve enough to willingly accept them, and then fight to maintain them.

I am perfectly comfortable with letting people throughout the world be denied their NR, because the alternative is altruistic warfare and imperialism, both of which are evil.
 
Just as I suspected no thoughtful, insightful answers, just the usual it is wrong because I say it is wrong. How odd but so consistent with the modern American children and parents who argue little Joanie or little Threedee is right please be nice. LOL

We are becoming a nation of dummies for sure when hard topics get such scant thought. It isn't our education that is failing it is our students.


http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10817
Amazon.com: The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30) (9781585426393): Mark Bauerlein: Books@@AMEPARAM@@http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/411JegI9VyL.@@AMEPARAM@@411JegI9VyL
 
Threedee said:
I got into this with Dixie, who argued that anyone that claims to believe in NR but refuses to subscribe to imperialism is a hypocrite. Natural Rights are more than mere abstractions, and as the Declaration states, they are a gift from God.

I take the Real Whig approach to them. NR are a fragile thing that are constantly under fire, and only a few societies are fortunate enough to have them. In that sense, they can be viewed as a privilege, because to aquire them in any meaningful way, a society must evolve enough to willingly accept them, and then fight to maintain them.

I am perfectly comfortable with letting people throughout the world be denied their NR, because the alternative is altruistic warfare and imperialism, both of which are evil.
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Ok. But sometimes god's gift is intercepted by despots and kept, and not delivered properly. WHere's your god now? Your precious baby jesus.
 
THis abstract debate about the source of rights stops us from doing the needful, namely shooting despots in the face.
 
Threedee said:
I got into this with Dixie, who argued that anyone that claims to believe in NR but refuses to subscribe to imperialism is a hypocrite. Natural Rights are more than mere abstractions, and as the Declaration states, they are a gift from God....
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I take back what I said above. This was thoughtful.
 
midcan5 said:
Just as I suspected no thoughtful, insightful answers, just the usual it is wrong because I say it is wrong. How odd but so consistent with the modern American children and parents who argue little Joanie or little Threedee is right please be nice. LOL

We are becoming a nation of dummies for sure when hard topics get such scant thought. It isn't our education that is failing it is our students.


http://www.prospect-magazine.co.uk/article_details.php?id=10817
Amazon.com: The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes Our Future (Or, Don't Trust Anyone Under 30) (9781585426393): Mark Bauerlein: Books
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This isn't the first time you have tried to trash my generation. I can tell you, we are not the one's who created our ballooning national debt, spent SS into its current path of bankrupty, turned numerous STDs from a minor health concern to an epidemic, started the wars on drugs, poverty, crime, etc., invented postmodern thought, and a whole host of other ills.

We simply inherited a world that people like you fucked up. Thanks.

Now, Natural Rights are what America was founded upon. They are spelled out in the Declaration and appear in the 4th and 14th Amendments to the Constitution. I honestly do not believe that anyone can call themselves a patriot or a force for liberty in America that does not subscribe to them, or who actively attacks and criticizes them.
 
I wonder if threedees priest told him that god took back his gift of freedom because people were bad, if then he would help in assisting god in his new decision to revoke rights.
 
Threedee said:
That sounds to me like Armagedon, so its not something to worry about.
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It's a hypthetical. What if he said that one day? Would you reject the church.

This is the danger of believe rights come from god, it makes it too contradictory to stand up to an oppressive church in the mind of the true believer.

ORganized religion is a force for evil.
 
AssHatZombie said:
It's a hypthetical. What if he said that one day? Would you reject the church.

This is the danger of believe rights come from god, it makes it too contradictory to stand up to an oppressive church in the mind of the true believer.

ORganized religion is a force for evil.
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The entire New Testament speaks of free will as an absolute necessity for this life to have any meaning. God is not about to revoke freedom and thus make our entire worldly existence pointless. That's why there is a judgement - because people are free to accept or deny communion with God.
 
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