Some Thoughts on Human Rights

Written in chalk on a concrete section of Union Lawn at Melbourne University was the assertion that human rights are a western bourgeois construct that should not be imposed upon other cultures. And the American constitution states that human rights are "self-evident". That they require no argument to support them because they are obviously true. This sounds frighteningly similar to religious morality, where the command of a supreme being is taken as all the justification necessary for following a particular set of rules. The latter statement is obviously wrong, simply because there is no compelling argument tendered to accept it as morally correct. The same applies to the assertion that a set of morals is "self-evident".

Thus I shall here attempt to argue that human rights ARE "guidelines for the treatment of people" that actually SHOULD apply to all. I do not believe that a moral can be self-evident in that it is god-given, something essentially programmed into the universe (for I have heard no compelling argument to support it), but I do believe that it only takes basic logic to arrive at most human rights, and in that sense they are "self-evident" in that they are obvious.

As for the word "universal". The are two possible meanings. The first: a universal thing is a thing accepted by all. Now by this definition, human rights obviously are not universal. The second definition is that human rights are morally universal; that is, it can be argued that they should apply to everybody, regardless of wether everybody accepts them. Hopefully it is clear which definition is being applied when I use this term in my arguments.

*PERSON

Let me begin with a rationale to consider assault and murder as universally criminal: that basic visceral hurt is universal.

All our bodies can be damaged or destroyed (this is universal, that is it applies to everybody), and generally we do not want to have our bodies damaged or destroyed. This generalisation is not strictly universal, as the existence of flagellants in the past, suicide bombers in the present, and those seeking to commit suicide or self-mutilation attests to.

But - unless one is inside somebody's mind - one cannot know wether or not another person wishes to be injured or to die. Thus injuring or killing a person is considered wrong because it unnecessarily does something to that person that they probably do not want to have done to them. Something that you wouldn't want them to do to you.

A rather cruel, yet valid, counter-argument to this is that by not injuring or killing a person, you risk depriving a suicidal person of something they wish to have done to them. However this counter-argument is easily dispelled by the fact that to kill or injure a person does something that is irreversible (scars may heal, but you cannot change history if you discover later that the victim did not want to be injured. In this sense even giving someone a minor injury is irreversible.). Not injuring them does not leave them irreversibly alive and in good health. When in doubt, it is obviously logically sensible to leave somebody uninjured. Especially since the consequences of injuring them when they do not want it FAR outweigh the severity of the consequences of not injuring them when they DO want it.

Now the human right calculated from these principles - namely that no one should have to be injured or killed by another person - contains an obvious paradox. What of the situation where a person is attempting to assault or kill another person and the only way to prevent the crime from being committed is to assault or kill the aggressor? In the case described, the aggressor has made a conscious choice to directly create such a situation, whereas the victim presumably has not. I believe this is a good argument for the aggressor not having a right to expect freedom from injury or death so far as it is necessary to protect the victim.

*FREEDOM

What is the point to life? There is none. No objective one, in any case. The simplest possible thing to do, then, is to allow everyone to do what he or she wishes - to achieve his or her own subjective purpose.

But what if that purpose involves killing someone else? The argument given above, in the first section of this essay, should, morally-speaking, restrict one from doing that.

In science there is a concept called "Occam's Razor". It states that the simplest possible situation is acceptable, and there is no reason to assume anything more. (For example, when you are assessing a set of evidence, the simplest possible theory explaining the evidence is acceptable. That is not to say that the theory is absolutely correct, simply that there is no reason to deem it incorrect, and there is no reason to assume anything more. Otherwise we end up with a theory that we cannot defend, and this pretty much betrays the original purpose of having a theory of all.) Occam's Razor recognises that we cannot know the absolute truth absolutely (if indeed one exists), it acknowledges the subjectivity of the matter, and it gets around this "problem" of subjectivity by simply choosing the easiest, simplest, most basically defendable situation, and assuming nothing more.

I believe this is analogous to the concept I am arguing for here. People should be allowed to dress how they wish, speak how they wish, associate how they wish, move around how they wish, and so forth, because morality is subjective. We should not risk denying someone his or her rights when we don't need to. All points of view, manners of dress, expression, etc are allowed under this model, except for those which violate other's rights. To use the analogy with Occam's Razor, we form our theory restricted by the evidence we can see ("killing is wrong") and simply make no assumptions on the areas in which we actually know nothing ("wearing green is wrong").

Rules based on religion or tradition or culture (for example the Taliban ruling Afghanistan at the time of writing) all assume we know something objective (eg// what the will of a god is). But this way, we assume nothing, and recognise subjectivity.

Interestingly, in defending freedom as argued for here, we can arrive at other morals, for example: Killing a person should not be allowed, as it places a restriction on someone else's freedom.

*PROPERTY

Now we come to the assertion that the right to own something is universal. I do not believe I know of any culture that does not in some form or another support this (including communist societies), so in the sense of being widely accepted, it is universal. There may be different restrictions placed upon it, such as the idea that certain things cannot be owned, or that certain things can be owned by all (ie. it is "public property"), but the basic idea of ownership does appear to be universal (at least it is sadly more of a universal cultural concept than the right to not be assaulted or killed is). I believe it to be a fact of human neurobiology. But is it morally supportable?

Let me start by defining a term. To "own" something means simply to have a right to use it as you wish, except when that use violates some other right. For example, if you "own" a pet it does not mean you can abuse it, if you "own" a section of waterway that ultimately supplies a community's drinking water, it does not mean you can release deadly toxins into it.

It sometimes seems that most people's definition of "ownership" contains the first part of my definition, but omits the second part. Why should the second part be included at all? Because (by the definition of "crime") for whatever "crime" is being carried out on or to ones property, there exists a compelling argument not to commit that crime on it. The argument in the examples given above is the argument described in the first section of this essay ("Person"). The argument against slavery - that is, the concept of owning a person - would be based on the second section of this essay ("Freedom").

So something can be owned as long as it doesn't violate any other rights.

[We have an elaborate web of rules regarding ownership of property. Pretty much the most basic feature of it is that, if we own something, we have the right to turn our ownership over to another person. This idea is the basis of "capitalism". A trade is an exchange wherein one party has agreed to turn its ownership of something over to another party, on the condition that the second party does the same thing in return.

This concept provides us a method of translating our work into something else. And this is how work or activity - or to put it more accurately, our time can be regarded as our property. Say I want a watermelon, but I don't have the time or resources to grow one. I can do other work though, provide a service to an employer, who in return gives me some of his property, which I can then pass on to someone who can and has put their work into growing a watermelon, on the agreement that they pass the watermelon to me in exchange.

Obviously, unrestrained capitalism can lead to trades we regard as "unfair". Not only that, but unrestrained free trade can violate other rights (eg// if every employer demands that all their employees work 24 hours a day, violating freedom to an obviously unacceptable extent). This is why there is a network of laws regulating the way in which things can be traded, and the way in which the value of a trade is expressed to potential buyers. Added to that, it is possible for someone to not make good on their end of a trade, which is why we have laws regulating this also. Furthermore there are laws regulating what can be owned and what cannot be owned. It can be argued, for example, that a section of parkland provides a freedom to appreciate it (above) that outweighs a logging company's right to own it. I am personally in favour of such a regulated capitalism. Many so-called right wing politicians seem to believe that free trade is important above all else; I disagree with this, I believe free trade is important, but not the most important thing. I would emphasise the word "regulated" in "regulated capitalism".]

*EDUCATION

Why should I go to school? I would say that education begets and enhances freedom. Essentially I say this because it allows someone to have knowledge of things that she or he might otherwise have overlooked. An example: I am a dinosaur fanatic. I find the study of prehistory richly rewarding. But unless someone had shown me that such things existed, how could I have found them and been inspired to explore further? If you don't know that something exists, you're not exactly going to go looking for it.

By allowing children access to it, it broadens their scope (a cliche, I know, but an accurate one) and basically gives them a head start in exploring their freedom. Thus everyone should be allowed access to an education.

A second reason is that education provides a child with the knowledge necessary to live. Children are not born armed with all the knowledge they need. To ensure that they have a chance at the ability to access their freedom by surviving, they must be taught how to survive.

But why should they HAVE to go? Because you don't know wether or not it can help you unless you first know what it is. I definitely wouldn't trust myself at age 8 to decide wether or not I should keep going to school; I'm very glad that I had to go (Personally I see myself back then as the oppressive force, the threat to my freedom, rather than seeing my having to go to school as an oppressor). It does put a restriction on freedom of movement for minors, but ultimately I believe it enhances and multiplies freedom.

*PARENTS AND CHILDREN

A child is a product of its parents. In a sense, parents have created the child, and it is now in their "ownership". Wether or not we use that sometimes offensive word is irrelevant, because wether they are in the parent's "ownership" or not, the child has rights (argued above) that the parents must therefore respect.

Furthermore, a child is less physically capable of taking care of itself than an adult, someone has to take care of it if it is to access its freedom later on. If they are around, then the best candidates are the ones responsible for bringing them into the world. The argument is similar to the justification for self-defence: They are the ones who made the decision (or were capable of making the decision), so they can be held accountable.

*LAW

These rights are not built into the fabric of the universe. They have been derived through an intellectual exercise, and simply claiming that they exist does not mean the code of conduct that they imply will be followed.

The justification for a policing force, and a system of courts (to determine wether those who have violated another's rights have actually done so) and checks and balances (internal affairs) becomes blindingly obvious. I'd just like to extend a big fat hairy "duh" to all the PURE anarchists out there.

Punishment is another aspect of law: there is a need to give people some incentive for respecting other people's rights, and a need to remove those who pose a danger from their ability to be dangerous. But obviously, there is no way to punish someone without hypocritically violating one of their rights. I do not believe someone should be injured or killed as punishment or to prevent them from further crimes; at least, I do not support these things where there is another feasible choice. Not only does it violate perhaps the second least debated human right of all, but it also removes their ability to protest, to speak in their defence (and is therefore an affront to our "Occam's Razor" argument for freedom - it is morally safer to allow more speech than less), and once it is done it cannot be undone.

Exile is another option - it removes them from the community. But it leaves them for another community to deal with, and they can still pose a danger.

Obviously, to prevent further crimes, a restriction must be placed on their freedom of movement. This leads me into incarceration as an acceptable punishment. It is true, it does violate their freedom, but it not only forms an effective deterrent and a block from further crimes (at least, for the duration of their incarceration), but it also leaves them with the ability to protest, and leaves the law with the ability to reverse their punishment to an extent. Obviously such a reversal does not change history, but it is more reversible than killing the person. Added to that, "rehabilitation" - basically, convincing someone to be good - is possible if the person is merely incarcerated. It is not possible if they are dead.

*GOVERNMENT AND COMMUNITY

I have argued that a child is less able to take care of itself than an adult is, thus an adult should have some responsibility to taking care of the child until it CAN care for itself. My justification for this was that the child cannot realise its rights to freedom if it cannot support itself.

Using the same justification, the need of a government that somehow supports community services becomes apparent.

If an adult cannot support him or herself, there should be something in place to support them. And something to organise and sustain that. The health system, the education system, dole payments, pensions, the courts and police, all these things must be put in place and sustained by something. That something would be government.

*DEMOCRACY

You will notice that I have not anywhere here argued for democracy. To an extent, I don't think it is necessary for a free society. In theory, as long as human rights are recognised, I do not fault a country for not being a democracy. I do not believe it is as important as the other things on this list.

Indeed, it is quite possible to have a perfectly free society that is ruled over by a dictator, and equally possible to have a perfectly democratic society that violates every human right you can name.

However, I do believe that having a democracy should restrict a government's ability to change a law unjustly much more effectively than a dictator could be restricted, and for this reason I believe it to be a good thing.

Ironically, however, it increases the community's ability to make an unjust law - this aspect is why I would argue in favour of a clear constitution dictatorially mandating only those most basic of human rights, and leaving democratically mandated laws to be structured around them by the community.

*DISCRIMINATION

Notice that none of these arguments are specific to a person's race, gender or religion. In fact these things are irrelevant to the arguments for human rights. These arguments apply equally to all. The best argument against racial, sexual, religious or national discrimination is that there is no argument for it.

*CONCLUSION

I believe I have shown that these principles we call "human rights" are not simply culturally instilled ideals of purely Western society, and "self-evident" principles that have no solid basis, but that in fact they are principles which do have a rationale behind them, and can be argued for, unlike many culturally based rules.

I do not believe I have ever heard a compelling rationale for maintaining a rule that violates these human rights. With the possible exception of socialist restrictions on the distribution of wealth, i.e. property - but even in this case, socialism is merely another FORM of capitalism: albeit a much more regulated one than most Western societies practise. However my view is that free trade is pretty much equal with democracy, in that it can facilitate freedom, but is not nessecarily a pre-requisite.

And those are my thoughts on the topic of human rights.