Morality and Human Rights

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A topic for debate.

Morality and Human Rights, are they objective truth or subjective social construction?

Oh, I like this one...

Some human rights are surely objective, it would be helpful at this point (before the squabbling starts ) to try and define the difference between HUMAN rights and CIVIL rights. I think most of us would subscribe to the basic human rights as inalienable (and thus objective, insofar as all human concepts may be said to be socially constructed), while we differ in our commitment/acceptance of civil rights. Thats where societal conceptions of the individual and the state comes in... and the whole 'which right is more important' question.

Regardless of which faith (if any) you follow, few people can argue with basic human rights; a right to life, to earn a living, to raise a family. To be allowed to think your own thoughts. From these most civil rights spring - freedom from harassment, free association, freedom of movement, freedom of expression, equality of treatment/opportunity and so on. MORALITY, on the other hand, often conflicts with these where that morality is dictated by a religion with coercive power. A conservative Christian or Muslim armed with a book of thou shalt/shalt nots has a very different view of morality and the right to interfere with the conduct of others than a Pagan would have ('An it harm none, do as ye will...' - from The Witches' Rede) - it is this fluid concept of morality which causes much conflict, and harm to so many. In my not so humble opinion.

Let battle commence!

In my mind, Human Rights are just basic common sense, so of course, I would say they are objective truths. However, many people obviously don't think this, so I am actually inclined to say they are subjective. However, there is nothing wrong with something being subjective. In fact, nearly everything is subjective since people have different views on things. If you go deeper into philosophy, one will find there is no such thing as "objective truths".

That aside, I support all Civil Rights to back up basic Human Rights. As a socialist, I think the best way to ensure Human and Civil Rights is through State administration and public ownership rather than leaving things to individuals, who are often in conflict with each other and do not always respect each other's rights.

Human rights are most certainly objective. All humans deserve the right to live, work for their money, feed themselves, etc. Civil rights could either be objective or subjective. I think that they are more subjective these days, however...

Are Human Rights objective? Hmmm... A few months ago I probably would have answered a definite 'yes' to that question. Now, after discussing this a little bit in my anthropology class, I am not so sure. We didn't intensively cover the topic, but the professor did bring it up casually during lecture.

He said that in some ways Human Rights can be considered subjective. He used this example: Most of us agree that murdering/killing other people is wrong. There are some groups (let's say Group A) of people who often murder members of other groups (Group B) and don't think it's wrong at all. Why? Because according to Group A's cultural and religious beliefs, members of Group B are NOT human.

So before saying Human Rights are objective and universal, it's important to understand that what is means to be human is not necessarily objective or universal.

I'd say that it's fairly simple.

If you could excercise that right were you the only person in the world, or in a society without government, then it's a basic human right.

This is the libertarian concept of human rights though, and I have talked to people who believe that humans have no rights, only duties.

As far as I see it though, failure to call a rose a rose doesn't make it a tulip.

I have trouble understanding how rights could be considered objective. Rights are social constructs invented by governments. For any right you can think of, I can name a society (present or past) where that right doesn't exist for at least some of the people.

For example, the traditional American rights of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" didn't even apply to all Americans until slavery was abolished.

Many people talk about human rights deriving from God or "natural law," but I'm not religious so I can't subscribe to the former, and I'm still not sure what people mean by "natural law," or how such a thing could grant rights to individuals, so I can't agree to that either. A lot of smart people, including the framers of the U.S. Constitution, take the "natural law" position seriously, though, so I don't want to dismiss it just because I don't understand it.

Jeremy

I believe all morals are subjective constructions of man. All of them. All the time. But i dont act as though i believe they are, because if i did i would never act again.

I think all Morals and Human Rights are Subjective in this World. Though a Individual would see them as Objective.

Rights might be guaranteed by the Governments that should have made the Objective but really they are Subjective because the Governments can change them around ab-it so that would change them as being Subjective.

Morals are Subjective cause they are always changing in Society by the most part of Society.

I think all human beings are born with an innate moral sense and all are born with certain human rights. We strive to achieve this morality as much as possible but are not always able to due to worldly influences. How strictly we should enforce these moral values is influenced by how well people are able to live by their/society's morality due to the condition of the world,etc. and how widely the moral values differentiate within a culture.

But we should always be moving unerringly forward toward our own moral perfection while trying to respect and/or safeguard the moral values of others as well as we can