Historically, human rights have been a concept expressed and elucidated by Western philosophers, anthropologists, and legal theorists. This, coupled with the fact that Western world powers have been most vocal on the global scene in recent history, has led to a highly Western human rights discourse. This has also been highly nebulous, with ambitious declarations of idealized goals distancing ideas about human rights from their more practical and legal context. Nonetheless, changing legal perceptions of rights have affected great social change in the last hundred years and, given the increasingly global nature of culture and politics, human rights could continue to be a force for good. However, the discussion needs to become more nuanced, with an acknowledgement of social differences and cultural discrepancies in the idea of social good.
I believe there are four values the new AI system of Techie has to consider in its assessment process for any policy in order to have a meaningful perspective on human rights. I will present these four values then go through the most relevant views among the philosophers studied throughout the semester. The values are categorized according to their priority to the human society as follows: Equity, Equality, Liberty, and Privacy. This order does not mean that one is more…...
The majority of Americans view the West as an area that was dangerous, lawless, and male-dominated. Others native to the West viewed this region as a land of opportunity and freedom. Overall, however, it is evident that the West was where people began to fight for liberty and equality.1 The term is used to broadly describe social norms, traditions, beliefs and political systems, and class rankings that originated within European civilizations. The West was mainly comprised of major parts of…...
Harriet Jacob's book, 'Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl' asserts that slavery was a very crucial thing back then, it was very serious, and they had to go through a lot just to protect themselves. Jacob's supports these claims by explaining what she did to survive and keep safe for so long. This book is mainly about the obstacles Harriet Jacobs pseudonym Linda Bent went through and everything that she had to overcome, and she also had to…...
Human rightsPoliticsSlavery
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Harriet Jacobs was born into slavery in the year 1813 in the state of North Carolina. In her self-written narrative, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, she goes into pristine detail of her indentures of being a fugitive slave and the many struggles she faced throughout her time. Another fugitive slave that is profoundly known is Frederick Douglass, he was born in the year 1818 near Maryland. His exact birthdate is unknown to this day, however later in…...
Frederick DouglassHuman rightsNarrative Life Of Frederick DouglassSlavery
Road Traffic mishaps are one of the preeminent causes of mortality worldwide. According to the World health organization, globally 1.35 million people die each year due to road traffic injuries. Without proper initiatives, road traffic injuries and fatalities are estimated to intensify from the ninth contributor to the global load of disease in 1990 to third by 2020. The international federation and Red Cross have stated that this condition is “a worsening global disaster destroying lives and livelihoods, hampering development…...
It is proposed to bring about the reality of Memphis like what is happening in this city. He has shown clearly that either just developments matter or justice does also matter. He has discussed a story of her great-grandmother who was also treated badly by her husband in the 1960s. In this study, he has used an appeal to authority like what other resources the author has used. Basically, his own experience at Memphis gave him many lessons which will…...
Race RelationsVisit To Grandmother HouseWomen's Rights
In the mid-twentieth century, Birmingham, Alabama was known as the key that opened the door to the civil rights movement. For an extensive time in American history, the racial inequality created several disputes between citizens of differing cultures. There were countless amounts of racial viewpoints in the south, which led to brutality and inequality. In August of 1963, Martin Luther King’s famous speech “I Have a Dream,” spoke to many citizens throughout the historic march. The March on Washington was…...
Vincent Lingiari was a community elder and the head stockmen on Vesty's Cattle Station. This cattle station was originally Gurindji land. During this time Lingiari led what has been termed as the 'Wave Hill Walk Off'. This was to become Australia's first indigenous public land claim. The aboriginal people were undoubtedly treated unfairly with regard to wages, living conditions and rights to their land (Frank, 1981). In leading the Wave Hill Walk Off in 1966, the self-determination and courage of…...
Before the Berger Inquiry Oil and gas has been part of the economy and Canadian arctic for a long time. Aboriginals long used oil for things such as land construction and especially in their productions of the canoe. For trade, oil was used amongst themselves. From this, early Western explorers saw oil potentially available. This led to the early drilling in the oil industry. The first well was established in 1922 at Norman Wells. Prior to 1970 oil and gas…...
Faith, Hope and Reconciliation composed by Faith Bandler is a speech which methodically embraces its purpose, raising the issues of reconciliation which aid in inspiring her like minded audience to act in support for its movement. While fundamentally the text levies the support for indigenous people, predominantly indigenous Australians, who are deeply associated with the need for advancing improved Aboriginal rights. Bandler makes evident that “This movement should be one wherein we should ask not what is in it for…...
Since the beginning, Australia was said to be a colony of settlement, not of conquest. The legal fiction of terra nullius- the land belonged to no one with no official negotiations, no treaties was how the land is said to be the basic injustice on which modern Australia was built. The High Court of Australia overthrew this ruling in 1992 when it said that Australia's common law recognised indigenous people's property rights. The Mabo judgement, as it was called, due…...
Ensuring every child in the United States receives an education that is free and appropriate was not as important 30, even 40 years ago. In fact, during the 1920s thru the 60s era, separate but not equal was the norm. It was because of this, one of the most expansive education reform policies was enacted. Congress approved the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965 on April 9, 1965. According to Social Welfare History Project, this act was enacted as…...
Free Education For AllFree EssaysImportance Of EducationLife Without EducationRight To Education
The Civil War from 1861-1865 became a very monumental part in the history of America. A war which was initially fought to bring the South back in unity with the North, sought to a different agenda. Being that the South’s economy relied so heavy on the coerced labor of African slaves, Lincoln wanted to abolish slavery to simply weaken the South. Even being second class citizens, there were Africans who served in the civil war; as a result, Africans were…...
The year 1775 was when John Murray organized a colonial military unit called the Ethiopian Regiment that had over 30,000 black slaves who leave their masters to join their organization. They were promised freedom if they joined Lord Dunmore to fight against the rebels in the revolutionary war, many of them however, died or were sent back to their masters. Not only did these slaves risk their lives in order to gain their freedom, they also risked punishment from their…...
The peninsula of the Koreas has been established since ancient times, dating back to around 668 AD. It was with the uprising of the Silla Dynasty that the Korean people had been first united, providing an opportunity to create a culture and civilization of their own It went on that way for centuries, until in 1910, when the Chosun Dynasty was forced to an end by Japan. Japan had colonized Korea in a harsh and violent manner (“North Korea History”…...
The 1950s was the beginning of a new form of freedom of expression with style, verbal expressions, photography, and art. Photography was a form of individual freedom in the early 1950s. Images captured by photographers would represent what the world looked like in their point of view. Several famous photographers used different styles and techniques to portray a message. Freedom of expression is essential to a free society. It allows all individuals to communicate each person’s dignity and worth. Freedom…...
In the beginning of this short story named “A Man Called Horse” by Dorothy M. Johnson, we are introduced to a character who is arrogant and spoiled. His journey is told through third-person limited point of view, but his mental and character growth are unlimited. In “A Man Called Horse”, Johnson uses unique language and imagery to highlight Westerners appreciation and connection to freedom and equality compared to people from the East, both literally and symbolically. When living in Boston,…...
Religion inhibited the lives and freedom of women in the early 19th century. Religious men found ways that oppressed even the free women and used religion to justify their actions. In the Declaration of women’s right the women lamented that men “allowed (women) in the church…” but gives them the “subordinate positions...and excludes them from the ministry and church affairs” and use the Apostolic authority. Similar case applied to Sojourner Truth who was sold by Dumonots to Van Wagenens, both…...
Postbellum American society was characterized by greater freedom and rights for African Americans. While the Emancipation Proclamation freed all slaves in the South, a new problem arose with regard to the rights of full citizenship to the former slaves. African American played an important role in the transition from emancipation to full citizenship by strengthening the African American external political process through an internal one led by women. They achieved this through religious faith that drew parallels of the Bible…...
The United States is a nation built upon the idea of freedom; freedom of religion, freedom to life, freedom to liberty, and freedom to property. With freedom so wide and all-encompassing, shouldn’t that freedom extend to an individual’s choice to the lack thereof? That right to end one’s life has always been highly controversial, perhaps even more so when it comes to ending an elderly life. The complexity of end of life decisions has gotten more confusing with time, being…...
The phrase “Separation of Church and State” is not in the constitution. The first Amendment simply says that congress cannot make laws that establish a state religion or prevent people from exercising their own faith. It does not, however, prevent God from being acknowledged in schools and government spaces. Government should not interfere religion or religious freedom. Taking away someone’s religious freedom is like taking away their freedom of speech. A person’s religious freedom is another way of them expressing…...
Today, over 53 million Iranian have access to the Internet through their mobile phone and this makes Iran ranks 12th in internet user growth in 2018. The situation of Iran related to accessing to prominent social network sits (SNSs) is different from other countries because SNSs like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter are blocked since post-election protests in 2009. So that, the platform of Instagram is very popular in absence of other SNSs. It should be noted that, domestic social media…...
Today’s parents share upraising their child in social networking websites. This is a normal and routine activity of new parents in digital age. However, concerns raises when mothers and fathers excessively share personal information about their kids through online communication that invade their child privacy. Nowadays, children were born not only in real world but in virtual space as well. For instance it is common to see ultrasound picture of babies on Instagram posted by parents. That is to say,…...
The United States of America is not defined by a certain race, ethnicity, or religion. America is a country that is defined by its citizens liberty, freedoms, and equality for all. Being a naturally born citizen or an immigrant in the United States gives you ample opportunities for success. Every day American individuals are offered “The American Dream” along with new opportunities to help them grow. As a United States of America citizen, you have both duties and responsibilities. Some…...
A Northern Nigerian Islamic Court sentenced a single mother, Amina Lawal, to death by stoning for having sex out of wedlock. Lawal is the second Nigerian woman condemned to death by stoning for engaging in sex outside of marriage. The first woman, Safiya Hussaini had her sentence overturned in March on her first appeal, after giving birth to a child outside of marriage. In October of 2001, Lawal was found guilty of sex out of wedlock in. After a lower…...
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is considered a monumental document in human rights history. It was created after the Second World War. After World War II ended, the international community vowed never again to allow atrocities like those of the war to happen again. It was created by representatives of multi-cultural backgrounds from all areas of the world. This was the first time that nations agreed on an inclusive statement of basic human rights. The declaration was adopted by…...
Right To EducationRight To Freedom Of ReligionRights Of Citizens
When first approaching this question, it is important to understand what a human right is. Defined by Google, it is “a right which is believed to belong to every person” and when by Amnesty International they are “the fundamental rights and freedoms that belong to every single one of us”. At first glance, one would not be wrong in assuming that the answer to this question is that they are, of course, universal by definition. However, this essay will address…...
Imagine fighting during the Civil War for your freedom, only to still be treated like a slave nearly 100 years later. African Americans during the 1950’s and 1960’s were still being treated differently from white Americans years later. They were angry about this and decided it was time to make a change. They began the Civil Rights Movement. This movement was a difficult point for America during the 1960’s. The life of African Americans were not good.One reason the blacks…...
Words are used to communicate with others and express what one has in his/her mind. Platforms have been used to express feelings, thoughts, and ideas and those words formulate speeches. Speeches are being given all the time; it can run from informal to formal speeches such as a presentation in the classroom or a politician running for office. Everyday speeches are done, but there are few that make an impact on the audience. Franklin D.Roosevelt ran for office and delivered…...
Commemorative SpeechFreedom Of SpeechInformative Speech
In Frankenstein, Mary Shelley portrays a society where morality and virtue seems to be lost. In this society, the justice system cannot discern truth, innocent people are murdered as revenge and the natural cycle of life is destroyed. Therefore, I will apply Mary Wollstonecraft’s argument about education in order to shed new light on one potential reason for the lack of morality in Frankenstein. In Mary Wollstonecraft’s A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, she argues for a formal institution…...
Free Education For AllGender Inequality In EducationWomen Education
Audre Lorde is most famous for her vocal expressions of her thoughts and opinions and how she has inspired and persuaded countless others to do the same by putting aside their fears and doubts of unworthiness. Gaining power and self-confidence through speaking one’s mind should trump the concern of any potential fallout or misgivings. Regret is inevitable when you haven’t spoken the things that need to be said. By using rhetorical strategies through a personal story, Audre Lorde explains how…...
Action Speak Louder Than WordsEnglish SpeakingFreedom Of SpeechImportance Of Speaking EnglishSilence
An examination of the themes of violence and oppression in Richard Wright's autobiography, "Black Boy" "Black Boy" An Oppressionist Impression "You are dead to me dead to christ!" In the following paragraphs, violence and oppression in Ch. 5 will discussed and analyzed through examination of Richard Wright's - author of Black Boy (1945) - use of diction, tone, and metaphors. Were people of his time to read this book it's probable that would understand, wheather they agree with the author's…...
Slavery for women was far more complex than slavery for men. Undoubtedly, they went through the same hardships, but the experience was very different for women. Women had to suffer daily through their hardships, but they also had to experience their children being taken or having to leave their children. Women were also used as "breeders" and were forced to have children to add more slaves for their master. Women were also denied their rights to take care of their…...
Human rightsIncidents in the Life of a Slave GirlLifeRacismSlaverySocial Issues
Who was Mary Wollstonecraft? Mary Wollstonecraft was a very complex person and to try to completely describe who she was would be impossible. However it’s not impossible to share her life and what she accomplished. Mary was born in 1759 in London; she was the second of six children. Her father was an alcoholic and her mother was a battered house wife. Wollstonecraft tried to protect her mother from her father’s attacks but she was also a victim of her…...
Privacy and security are two phenomenons that have become subject to discussions in the recent years. A discussion about security issues cannot go on without privacy matters. The two go hand in hand. Terrorism has become a global threat to the peace and stability of a number of nations. The challenge poses security threats to countries. The problem of security has forced security agents and government institutions to develop technology that will mitigate the problem of insecurity (Economist, 2008). There…...
Women during the Romantic and Victorian Age (1785-1901) had very limited rights. Living in a patriarchal society created a vision that women were inferior, often times the only way to escape some of this inferiority was through hypergamy. Those women, who were unsuccessful in their attempts to woo a rich man, were left as fodder for the ever-growing industrial society, usually working intense labor or resorting to prostitution. Although most female authors were given no recognition for their writings at…...
"The United States government's support of slavery was based on an overpowering practicality." (Zinn 171) Before America even had a history it was busy creating a lower ethnic class for it to look down on. To work the fields and other low wage high risk jobs. To be there when a scapegoat was needed but to be as separate as could be maintained at all times. The history of black people in the United States begins with slavery. African Americans…...
In the current society, the term privacy is ever becoming ubiquitous. Furthermore, the earlier mentioned term is seen in different primary and secondary sources such as social network sites, online transactions and so forth. Therefore, in the essay, "why privacy matters even if you have nothing to hide" that was published in 2011 by Professor Daniel Solove makes an in-depth argument of the privacy issue that affects all individuals whether guilty or innocent. The author is direct in approach and…...
In the essay The Culture of Shut-Up, the author Lovett makes several bold statements and revelations about the internet and free speech as well. Many of these points made by the author include controversial phrases such as the word “faggot”, such language, to a degree takes away from the purpose and causes focus on it. Nonetheless, audiences learn a lot from the story at the beginning and the following conversation paragraphs. Although, some attention is taken away from the main…...
Can one trust the protection of the most critical part of any American's everyday life to the Government? “Civil Rights” are “enforceable rights or privileges, which if interfered with by another gives rise to an action for injury.” Frederick Douglass and Henry David Thoreau discuss occasions when civil rights are violated. Douglass writes with clear and direct language about the abysmal conditions he lived under as a slave, while Thoreau writes a long winded, philosophical protest against the government after…...
Civil DisobedienceCivil RightsNarrative Life Of Frederick Douglass
In the past, conceptions of basic human rights centred on the principle of liberty and autonomy of the individual in mind. Following John Stuart Mill’s ideas on the subject, for example, one can claim that autonomy is “one of the elements of well-being” (Mill 1859/1975, ch. III). Mill, born in 1806 and composing his most influential theories in the height of the Industrial Revolution, put forth his ideas during a time in which government intervention in the liberties of an individual was at an almost record low. Despite the obvious presence of ‘negative’ rights theory – legal prohibition of the impairment or injury of the freedoms of another – the idea that an individual would be expected to fulfill any form of positive obligation, even in order to protect said freedoms – or ‘positive’ rights – would be, based on this concept of rights, an interference with the single key right of autonomy. Legal theorist and legal positivism exponent H. L. A. Hart argued in favour of this notion, placing strong emphasis on the need for rights to protect personal liberty. Hart put forth the argument that the only absolute right to which all individuals have a claim is the right to be free, as this right does not arise through any societal agreements or interactions (Hart 1955/175). Every other right, therefore, is derived from a necessary interference with this crucial right. The first defined generation of human rights theory, then, was largely concerned with the protection of the individual’s right to liberty and autonomy – a concept put forth, largely, by western philosophers and seen in action most obviously in western societies like Victorian Britain and her European contemporaries.
Evolution of Western Human Rights
With time, however, we can clearly chart the evolution of western human rights theories away from this focus on personal liberty, increasingly favouring the protection of equality, evident in the emergence and subsequent espousal by most western governments – among others globally – of social and cultural rights. This introduction of positive rights theories, in the form of healthcare, social welfare and benefits systems, introduced really for the first time a legal obligation to perform positive actions, rather than merely avoiding those negative impairments of the freedom of others. The concepts of tort law regarding negligence and government protection of the weaker, underprivileged strata of society, for example, are underpinned by the transitioning acceptance of basic human rights as protecting, increasingly, not the liberty of an individual but the equality of a social system. However, the fact that three of the most landmark cases on Tort Law (Donoghue v Stevenson (1932), Nettleship v Weston (1971), Smith v Leech Brain & Co (1962)) (LawTeacher 2013), providing foundations for much of the modern law of negligence, were decided only in the latter half of the twentieth century should provide some indication of the relative novelty of the move towards more equality-based rights theories, as proffered by legal theorist Ronald Dworkin in his book Taking Rights Seriously (Dworkin 1978).
European Convention of Human Rights
In more recent years, though, particularly with the declaration of increasingly far-reaching Human Rights protections like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the European Convention of Human Rights, it is evident that the westernised concept of first personally, followed by nationally and societally concerned human rights has morphed into that of much more universalised, collective declarations of rights. Rather than working on a highly localised scale, these would take effect, ideally, as a globally recognised social framework; a universal set of principles, as it were, from which each state takes its ultimate authority. It cannot be doubted that these declarations have acted as significant forces for good, both on an international level and in individual legal cases. Regarding the european Convention of Human Rights, for example, the Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy states that ‘The human rights set forth in the Convention are legally enforceable rights to which member states are bound. In creating the European Convention and Court, the countries of Western Europe gradually proved that effective protection of human rights could be provided at the international level.’ (Stanford Encyclopaedia of Philosophy 2003/2014). This concept has also been shown to have been successfully translated onto the personal level, as when the Convention, in the 1985 Malone case, defended the individual’s right in upholding that police needed a warrant to tap phones (rightsinfo.org).
On the other hand, though, the European Convention, and others like it, are by no means infallible. Even in the case of the European Court of Human Rights, which remains one of the most successful scenarios of practical enforcement of human rights, there have been numerous examples of failure to implement these more globalised, standardised rulings on human rights. In the 2005 Hirst v United Kingdom case (rightsinfo.org), for example, the ECHR declared that it was against Human Rights to prevent prisoners voting – and yet the UK government has failed to act on this decision since the ruling. If legal systems struggle, even in the relatively manageable-sized and culturally uniform European Union, to successfully implement a specified standard of human rights, then it seems that to do so on a global scale would be impossible without an almost impossibly comprehensive understanding of cultural nuance and variance. Dr. Seth Kaplan summarised the issue this way: ‘Models, ideas, and policies that are imported into a country without any consideration for local context can all too easily end up largely divorced from and autonomous of the societies that they are supposed to serve, producing consequences quite different from what was intended.’ (Kaplan, S. fragilestates.org)
Furthermore, despite the evidence of powerfully positive effects we have seen from the implementing of ‘human rights’, the issue remains conceptually frustratingly nebulous and, as James Griffin states: ‘The term ‘human right’ is nearly criterionless. There are unusually few criteria for determining when the term is used correctly and when incorrectly – not just among politicians, but among philosophers, political theorists, and jurisprudents as well.’ (Wacks 2008/72) The fact that it has become increasingly difficult to isolate what exactly is under discussion when the term is haphazardly bandied around political debate has detracted from the practical benefits of human rights application and has tended to relegate it rather to the realm of the philosophical and ambiguous, rather than the practical, results-driven thinkers.
Universally Applicable Human Rights
It cannot be denied that universally applied human rights, if implemented there, would have serious shortcomings. We must also accept that, while every civilisation that can reasonably be called humanised must endeavor to establish some code of conduct, the western world powers have remained practically unceasingly the loudest voices on the world’s political and philosophical stage – very possibly to the detriment of the quality and diversity of the global human rights debate. This extended period of power has rendered the western construction of human rights a definitive influence on the standard by which we as humanity define a large proportion of our concepts of ‘good’ and ‘bad’; whether behaviour is embraced or searingly repudiated. Despite the obvious presence of defects, however, the move over time towards more equality-driven and universally applicable human rights charters as seen in the western world must be credited for its undeniable potential. If we can retain the powerful practical benefits of smaller-scale application and avoid lapsing into an ambiguous discussion of big ideals, the universal application of a highly evolved, refined reconstruction of westernized human rights concepts could well be a huge force for good in the world.
...It is quite evident that the Stele of Hammurabi has influenced many different civilizations. Hammurabi’s regulations may have had many harsh punishments, but they were viewed as necessary elements to create order in society. This concept is still r...
...Ethos and rhetoric criticism are aspects that are evident in the essay by Solove on privacy issues. As a plausible essay, the author exudes expertise in making an emotional connection with the readers. The incorporation of ethos tools such as the gra...
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