We hear about human rights constantly these days, often in a global context. Yet according to Eleanor Roosevelt, they begin “in small places, close to home—so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world.”
She went on to say in her address at the 1948 UN Commission on Human Rights that “they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere.”
The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, now more than 50 years old, was not the first attempt to legislate human rights on an international scale. The post–World War I League of Nations Covenant required members to “endeavour to secure and maintain fair and humane conditions of labour for men, women, and children,” “secure just treatment of the native inhabitants of territories under their control,” and “take steps in matters of international concern for the prevention and control of disease.” Out of these provisions grew the work of the UN’s International Labour Organization.
Since 1948, much has been said and written about human rights, and organizations such as Amnesty International have worked tirelessly to combat flagrant violations.
Legally, rights have never been so extensively defined. For starters, there are the rights of ethnic minorities. Then we have the rights of women. The rights of children. The rights of homosexuals. The right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy or, depending on your viewpoint, the rights of the unborn. The right to claim compensation when your rights are violated. The rights of workers. The rights of consumers. The rights of the “unwaged.” The rights of single parents. The rights of companies and organizations. Even the rights of animals and, believe it or not, plants. It’s a list seemingly without end.
American society has a reputation for being the most litigious in the world. Lawyers often offer “no win, no fee” inducements, so the attraction of a quick, opportunistic buck can be alluring to those who believe their rights have been trampled. Germany, too, is now plagued with what was once referred to as “the British disease.” Most companies must now have a workers’ council, and companies with more than 200 employees must release at least one employee from other duties to work full-time on the council. The larger the company, the larger the prescribed council. Such councils expect to take on an enhanced advisory role, covering anything from planned job cuts to the introduction of new technology. This is, of course, a financial and administrative burden to companies, and German employers now look enviously across the channel to Britain, where labor laws are not as restrictive and the economy is buoyant.
Certain concepts of human rights appear self-evident: the rights of people not to be tortured or abused, freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom of political association. But what happens when perceived rights conflict with one another?
We seem to have moved light years from a society where personal responsibility came first, to one where personal rights are the first and sometimes only consideration.
Nobody said it better, from a national perspective, than John F. Kennedy: “Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.”
Apart from a few brave and increasingly lonely voices, it appears that many of our religious and governmental institutions are abandoning—indeed sometimes uprooting—the moral underpinnings of society.
Self-fulfillment and political correctness have replaced that deeper, lasting set of values that overarches and simultaneously underpins individual rights.
This lack of common sense has led inevitably to a rights revolution, where only selfishness and personal interest seem to reign supreme.”
She went on to say in her address at the 1948 UN Commission on Human Rights that “they are the world of the individual person; the neighborhood he lives in; the school or college he attends; the factory, farm, or office where he works. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere.”
The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, now more than 50 years old, was not the first attempt to legislate human rights on an international scale. The post–World War I League of Nations Covenant required members to “endeavour to secure and maintain fair and humane conditions of labour for men, women, and children,” “secure just treatment of the native inhabitants of territories under their control,” and “take steps in matters of international concern for the prevention and control of disease.” Out of these provisions grew the work of the UN’s International Labour Organization.
Since 1948, much has been said and written about human rights, and organizations such as Amnesty International have worked tirelessly to combat flagrant violations.
Legally, rights have never been so extensively defined. For starters, there are the rights of ethnic minorities. Then we have the rights of women. The rights of children. The rights of homosexuals. The right to terminate an unwanted pregnancy or, depending on your viewpoint, the rights of the unborn. The right to claim compensation when your rights are violated. The rights of workers. The rights of consumers. The rights of the “unwaged.” The rights of single parents. The rights of companies and organizations. Even the rights of animals and, believe it or not, plants. It’s a list seemingly without end.
American society has a reputation for being the most litigious in the world. Lawyers often offer “no win, no fee” inducements, so the attraction of a quick, opportunistic buck can be alluring to those who believe their rights have been trampled. Germany, too, is now plagued with what was once referred to as “the British disease.” Most companies must now have a workers’ council, and companies with more than 200 employees must release at least one employee from other duties to work full-time on the council. The larger the company, the larger the prescribed council. Such councils expect to take on an enhanced advisory role, covering anything from planned job cuts to the introduction of new technology. This is, of course, a financial and administrative burden to companies, and German employers now look enviously across the channel to Britain, where labor laws are not as restrictive and the economy is buoyant.
Certain concepts of human rights appear self-evident: the rights of people not to be tortured or abused, freedom of speech, freedom of worship, freedom of political association. But what happens when perceived rights conflict with one another?
We seem to have moved light years from a society where personal responsibility came first, to one where personal rights are the first and sometimes only consideration.
Nobody said it better, from a national perspective, than John F. Kennedy: “Ask not what your country can do for you—ask what you can do for your country.”
Apart from a few brave and increasingly lonely voices, it appears that many of our religious and governmental institutions are abandoning—indeed sometimes uprooting—the moral underpinnings of society.
Self-fulfillment and political correctness have replaced that deeper, lasting set of values that overarches and simultaneously underpins individual rights.
This lack of common sense has led inevitably to a rights revolution, where only selfishness and personal interest seem to reign supreme.”
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