re: Is there such thing as a basic human right?

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you've been bitching about people's inability to access healthcare

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Please link the post in which I did this.

I would argue there is no basic human right. Only privileges.

You have the privilege to breathe until you are sentenced to death. I’d say abortion is murder. Abortion steals the privilege of life from a future person.
We all have privileges until they are taken away by another person or an authority which acts to maintain order.

The right to breathe is a privilege and should be protected for the best interests of everyone.

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There’s no such thing as a right to health care

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What?

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until the state executes you.

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That's called a consequence and is entirely separate from natural rights.

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Some people don't recall signing the Social Contract.

Maybe they were drunk at the time.

LoL

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It’s just meaningless. Saying something is a right with no way to guarantee it is just theater.

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So now rights have to be guaranteed and protected?

Well, yeah, nothing is guaranteed in life I guess.

But again, you are worried about man's definition, man's impact, man's choice.

A natural (or "basic human")right, by definition, would have to be beyond man-made control, even if it isn't guaranteed because of, well, man.

And it is.

I would say that if you seek out and protect others' natural rights, in accordance with God's will, your "rights," would be relatively meaningless in the cosmos. And while "right," is the wrong word you'd be rewarded with a claim to eternal life and happiness. Guaranteed. There's your guarantee.

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I just want to state again that I don’t believe there is such thing as basic human rights

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In a sense, you are correct. Is there really basic rights? Rights only exist through the exertion of force. Countries that do have codified rights only have them because they forced them, most times through violence, and governments were compelled to codify them.

If we want to be totally truthful, rights for all only exist because the men of that country want them to. Most times, the majority men. Women have no true means to force rights or enforce them if by chance they get them. Minorities do not have the numbers to do the same.

But in context of any conversation taking place in tUSA, we follow classical liberal ideas of natural rights. All based on ownership. That is what we forced when we broke away from the crown.

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It’s just meaningless. Saying something is a right with no way to guarantee it is just theater.

I’d love to see a compelling argument against this though.

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Good grief.

There IS a way to guarantee it.

In the US we have a constitution that legally guarantees rights and various law enforcement agencies and a court system to enforce them.

But let's say we didn't have any of those things. The right would still be there, there would simply be no enforcement or protection other than what the individual could provide for him or herself.

The RIGHT wouldn't cease to exist. The external, institutional protection of the right is what would be missing.

If a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, it does still make a sound. The laws of physics tell us that it does.

Likewise, the laws of logic tell us that IF a right exists, it still exists whether or not an institution is available to protect it.

And I've already explained to you why it matters. In 1860, black people had the right to live freely, but they didn't have institutional protection of that right.

They were eventually able to get the protection because the right existed and it was successfully argued as such and the government was eventually compelled to recognize and protect that right.

Given your logic, you would have argued that the right didn't exist in 1860.

So upon what basis would you have argued for a change?

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Because the governments of these countries believe the citizens have a right to these things.

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Maybe according to the leftist conception you've been posting here, but that's just what I already posted, just using the term "rights" to describe, "something we just voted for."

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That’s why we see signs saying healthcare is a basic human right.

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That is why we see those signs. Because like many other things before this one, the left is using the favorite tactic of changing what words mean to incite the ignorant.

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maybe not your personal definition of a right

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No, I posted the dictionary definition of the word and referred to the concept of the word reflected in the founding documents of the US. I haven't used any "personal" definition of the word.

You're confused. That's what you and the author you're quoting are doing.

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those societies have dictated that transportation, healthcare, education, etc are rights.

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Maybe they have and then again, maybe they haven't...for all I know you are saying that simply because they do provide those services, which doesn't necessarily mean they consider them to be rights. We provide things for citizens that we consider to be entitlements, but we don't consider them to be "rights."

Do these countries have a Bill Of Rights or comparable document? And are the things you listed just now codified in that document?

And I'll go ahead and anticipate your next objection and address it here. It matters because by definition a "right" is not something that a government is authorized to deny a citizen, but the government can legally and morally choose to stop providing an entitlement at any time (as long as it does so using the proper mechanisms of government).

Surely you realize that this is the whole reason for the word game to begin with, right? It's why the left won't leave a perfectly good word like "right" alone and communicate what it wants to communicate using the words that already exist that describe the position correctly. It's because they (you) wish to have your cake and eat it too. You want the historical association of the word in so far as it communicates to people that these are things that the government is morally and legally obligated to provide and that no one can take away from them, but you also want to avoid the fact that the only rights that exist as such are basic human rights that are inalienable, not government handouts or redistribution of wealth, and not something that you get to decide or vote on. So you deny the latter exist, yet keep the word when what you really mean is "government program" or "government entitlement."

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this is exactly what that means.

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See?

No, that's not what that means at all, not even according to your own definition of the word. Anything that can be voted in can be voted out just as easily. Basic human rights cannot be voted on (which is why you deny that they exist when it is obvious that they do). If the government passes a law guaranteeing free skittles and unicorn rides for all, sure, they are legally obligated to provide what they voted on to provide, but if tomorrow they decide otherwise and hold a vote, then they no longer have said obligation and the public is no longer entitled to said largesse.

To put it another way, they choose their own obligations when it comes to entitlements. In the context of basic human rights, they do not. Again, this is the whole point of denying them. Those like the author you quoted do not want God to be able to decide the limits of how human beings are to be treated; they want the government to have that sole ability. Therefore they deny that God given rights exist and claim they only exist from the government.

I suspect you understood that without me having to waste a minute and a half typing it out, but there you go.

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Morality perhaps, but certainly not justice.

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Justice is—strictly defined—as the administration of the law.

What are laws based on? Maybe not traffic laws, but the laws pertaining to the types of issues we are discussing here, like life and freedom and the like. What are they based on?

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here’s no such thing as a right to health care.

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I think you mean health insurance.

Life: you should get to live.

Liberty: you should get to choose.

Pursuit of happiness: you should get to live and make choices that make you happy.

None of these require government funds or regulation.