Korimyr the Rat

And considering that "just cause" is an entirely subjective matter-- prone to the whims of the legislature and the judiciary-- what you've said here is all very high-minded and noble sounding but it doesn't mean anything.

You use as an example "your own life being threatened", but that is not the only circumstance in which one person may legally take another's life-- and not every society has held that every person has the right to kill even in those circumstances.

In other words, the existence of rights is a moral opinion with no supporting evidence-- and thus any given human right can be argued to exist or not exist by the whims or political agenda of the person doing the arguing.

Just as, for instance, Felicity can argue that an unborn human child's right to life implies the right to commandeer its mother's reproductive, digestive, and circulatory systems, and 1069 can argue that a woman's right to life implies the right to remove and destroy any unwanted organism that either threatens or impairs any of her biological functions.

In addition to my original argument that they are a "ridiculous fiction", the inherent contradictions in this concept of "human rights" make it more difficult, if not outright impossible, to have a logical moral argument about them.

Created equal in what fashion? We are not equal in the strength and health of our bodies, nor in the capacities of our minds. No two people are alike in their moral beliefs and functioning, nor in the performance of their duties.

So how, exactly, are we equal?

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prometeus

To some people that is "self-evident."

Jerry

Yes, the right to life means we should have slaves so long as we water board them routeenly

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Palin/Miller 2012!

Jerry

The writers admited that even the constitution was not perfect, which is why one of it's core purposes was "to form a more perfect union".

Granting slaves and women equal rights is part of becoming a more perfect union. Gay marriage advocets argue that establishing gay rights is part of becoming a more perfect union.

Ahead of their time the founders were, but falable men they were also.

Jerry

According to the Natural Law the founders subscribed to, we are all equal because we are all created in the immage of God.

One's personal beliefs do not alter the form or state of one's being, so rather or not one subscribes to the Natural Law premis is irrelivent. You are what you are and have every right as the next person.

prometeus

So that is what we have at Gitmo?

prometeus

OK, but no one abides by natural laws, we abide by written laws that reflect the needs of society. Even the founders saw fit to lay on paper the laws by which the new nation was to be governed. They did not say: "OK, we are independent, lets just abide by the natural laws, because they are the best."
After all natural laws include the survival of the fittest at the expense of the weak. Clearly not something the founding fathers wanted to establish.

prometeus

Not perfect? How far of does one have to be before being called outside of the ball park. How blatantly can one disregard what one believes and still be hailed as wise? So in light of all the self-evident rights the Creator endowed us all with, they remained OK with what I mentioned , and decided that for that great goal it was worth going to war and have a lot of people killed, because that is what inalienable right to life is?

Jerry

The entire body of Human Rights stands on the premis that humans inherantly posess verious rights by virtue of their existance. This was the basis of the anti slavory argument, which, BTW, is well founded in the DoI.

Your Human Rights do not need to be written down in order to exist.

You're Civil Rights do, but your Human Rights do not.

Jerry

Pointing out their flaws ony further evidences their wisdom in providing us, their decendants, with the tools to correct what they got wrong.