From: odin@world.std.com (Hank Roth)
Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive
Subject: Universal Human Rights
Date: 18 Dec 92 20:22:52 GMT
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Organization: ?
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu


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                HUMAN RIGHTS
                         by Hank Roth
 
      Universal Human Rights, as spelled out in various declarations, 
      including the United Nation's Universal Declaration of Human 
      Rights are practically useless when power is only vested in the 
      hands of a few. 
                                                                
      Human rights became vogue towards the end of the 
      eighteenth century and were strong enough to topple several 
      powerful governments, but individual rights also were transformed 
      into national rights and duties were imposed which also set limits 
      to desire. 
 
      Government by consent is not a modern idea, but in return for 
      governance (protection, etc.) there were duties to the sovereign. 
      And with greater rights there was also a dichotomy of rights, 
      whereby natural rights became formal and description of status, 
      which also legitimatized inequalities and that anomaly has become 
      universal in modern capitalist societies. 
 
      Marx explored these consequences of natural rights as 
      conditions necessary for the accumulation of wealth by the 
      bourgeoisie. To put this in other terms, it was, he felt, a 
      meaningless mockery to those who were propertyless that 
      there be rights to property, since ones status often 
      prevented one from ever owning the means of production. And 
      a natural right to work doesn't guarantee work. Eric Fromm speaks 
      of America's cherished freedoms as the freedom to be poor, 
      and thus free to starve, free to be homeless, etc. 
 
      It would seem to me that we have also lost sight of the tendency 
      to think in communal terms. Individualism has led to 
      alienation and heightened egoism and selfishness. 
 
      This movement today towards nationalism is a breaking with 
      the communal nature of the world. More division is bound to 
      lead to more differences. The United Nations started with 51 
      countries and now there are close to 200. 
 
      It has been established that human rights are no longer simply a 
      matter of domestic jurisdiction, that the U.N. can issue decrees 
      condemning national conduct (even if it is and can be ignored---as 
      happened with us when the United States embargoed Nicaragua and 
      mined its harbors.). The United States was been rightfully condemned 
      for its embargo of Nicaragua and is rightfully criticized for its
      current embargo of Cuba because of the human cost. 
 
      It was in 1926 that slavery was officially condemned and its 
      abolition brought about by U.N. initiatives. Even though de facto 
      slavery still exists when women are abused by husbands and kept 
      from leaving their imprisonment as the law looks the other way or 
      favors the man, and in other countries women are kept in their 
      lower status; or a caste system is maintained in India, Pakistan, 
      Bangledash, etc. 
 
      In 1948 when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights 
      was passed by the General Assembly of the United Nations and 
      declared it to be universal, it said that everyone should enjoy 
      certains rights as basic, the right to life, liberty and securty, 
      freedom from slavery, freedom from torture, freedom from 
      discrimination and to equal protection of law, presumption of 
      innocence until proved guilty, freedom of thought, conscience, 
      religion, freedom of opinion and expression, rights to 
      social security, right to work, right to equal pay for equal 
      work (ERA) right to an adequate standard of living, right to 
      education. Certainly not rights in the technical sense that 
      they are legally enforceable. They meant these to be a basis 
      for conduct. A really profound statement. To be apart of a 
      customary international law and binding upon states in this 
      international system, that is now breaking apart into many, 
      many nations. 
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Newsgroups: misc.activism.progressive