Why Human Rights Theory Has Been An Unrivalled Disaster (for the West)

Why Human Rights Theory Has Been An Unrivalled Disaster (for the West)

No one wants to talk about it; few will admit it, not even to themselves. There is a growing realization that human rights theory has become a problem. That the concern has not pushed its way into the consciousness of more people, is because human rights theory (HRT) supports so many other narratives. Critical Race Theory, the civil rights movement, socialism, and even capitalism. In fact atheism and modern secularism would not exist were it not for human rights theory.

There is little in Western Civilization that does not, to some degree, owe its existence or moral virtue to the idea that humans have rights that are inalienable, specifiable and morally and intellectually defensible. What value would the American Constitution have, if the doctrine of human rights was shown to be fallacious and without merit?

To extend this thinking further into the experience of the West, why not consider recent historic events? Do you care to look at how the West has been bled dry and infiltrated by peoples and cultures that hate us? If anything typifies the West, it is our idea that humans have rights. Western culture is defined by the notion that human rights are natural and universal. All humans everywhere are endowed with rights at the moment of birth.

An idea that has been extracted from our ideas on human rights is the Doctrine of Subsidiarity. This is the belief that all power flows from the base. Now office or authority ought to be exercised one a higher level than necessary to fulfill the necessary functions of the office. In other words, we restrict the upper levels from exercising any authority not specifically assigned to it from below.

The Doctrine of Subsidiarity is a totally alien concept in most places and with most people. Even in the West the idea of individual freedom and personal sovereignty has existed only for the shortest amount of time.

The underlying assumption of HRT, is that all persons, everywhere, are all equal. Regardless of race, creed, age, religion, color, origins, nationality, sex, gender or characteristic or attribute, we all share one common attribute, and this supersedes and has priority over all other features and factors. We are all human beings. We all belong to the human race.

No one disputes the bare fact, but few people put much weight on it. It is not that the basic premise of our human birth is disputed. Only the West considers the accident of our birth relevant. Only the West seems to have looked at the birth of the human child and extracted an entire narrative from the event.

The problem for the West is that they ascended to a moral throne they had no right to. The problem is not that the West is more committed personally to HRT, or that they pursued the narrative more vigorously, though these things are true. The West is being judged and found wanting. The West is being held to account for their lapses. We have fallen from grace. This is especially visible in the US. The higher one ascends the faster and harder the fall. Every slight and social gaff is dredged up and restoration demanded. Considering the language of the Constitution and the history of slavery and colonization the demand for restitution will not abate any time soon.

The idea that all persons are born with inalienable rights, permits disposed persons to leverage concessions out of an oppressive upper class. This is so, only if the elites have made themselves susceptible to moral arguments. Perhaps, the greatest weakness of the US is that they were birthed from oppression. The U.S. was seeking relief from the domination of Britain. The arguments they used to justify their revolution were based on the universality of the rights of man. This was a technical error they have had cause to regret. In fact, Americans are unlikely to have noticed their error, so besotted with the language of Human Rights, are they.

Once this was done, once America had declared all men had inalienable rights, they revolution was overturned, and their republic was lost. Every minority disposed population and failure demanded equality. The question was with whom, and who held the measure?

When American poet Emma Lazarus (1849–1887) asked in her poem “The New Colossus” engraved at the base of the statue of liberty, for Europe’s tired and poor, she had no idea what the long term implications were.

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she

With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

And so the ones asked for came, but these were not human rights advocates, that ravelled to America, far from it. They had been raised in an earlier ideology, based on merit. It was a doctrine that had given England her power. But as was the case with America. The focus on merit was subverted in the desire for equality.

Briton herself, fought for greater equality in society. The move away from inherited power to a more equalitarian politics, was impossible to stop, once the process got underway. From the most noble of nobles to the lesser nobles, to the landed gentry to property owners and then to males generally and finally to women, the right to vote percolated down through society. The thinning of political power gave rise to calls for more integration. More room was demanded for those who have come late to the feast. In time equality was demanded for even those who had come so late they had not contributed to the growing, harvesting, preparations nor serving of the feast. They were all able to eat, even gorge themselves, often at the privileged citizen’s expense.

The elitism of the past was attacked on the basis that birth did not confer merit. The idea that birth inalienably gave one the right to rule, was manifested in the right of the king or emperor to rule because his father had ruled before him. But this right of primogeniture percolated down to the noble families. Even the peasants sought the right for their sons to inherit the family estate. But the sons did not exhibit nobility or even competence regardless of their birth or bloodline.

The equality of all persons came to mean that all persons had equal rights. This gave rise to the proposition that anyone could become the president if they had sufficient merit. Merit was the deciding factor in how far one went, in a society of equals. But merit that produces a form of wealth that is inherited, presupposes greater difficulty for those who come later. As many authors have observed, those children born to two doctors have a decided advantage over those persons born to a single mother working as a waitress.

HRT is not consistent with merit. Indeed, human rights are diametrically opposed to a merit system. Human rights are not even compatible with the concept of an absolute and categorically valid morality. Indeed, if we dig just a bit deeper, we find HRT is more consistent with the idea man is a being of flesh and blood. Man is a physical creation not a spiritual one. Indeed, Christians ought not to subscribe to any theory about the inalienability of human rights. This might be better understood if we realize the other term for human rights, are natural rights. Natural rights refer back to the idea of man being a physical creature endowed at birth with rights by his creator. This begs the question as to whom the creator is. The bible is noticeably devoid of a human right narrative.

That a human rights narrative is absurd, from an evolutionary perspective, ought not need to be said. How can physical creatures have rights? Where could rights come form in a casualist framework?

In any system or ideas based on nature, claims that a person at birth is heir to a certain number of benefits is untenable. We may say this is so, but unless we have a way to deliver these rights in a predictable manner, we are playing games.

More importantly perhaps, if we cannot ensure the delivery of benefits, is the same for everyone, why are we giving people a level of expectation that is guaranteed to disappoint?

HRT give aliens the leverage needed to extract more and more concessions from the West, without any corresponding benefit to us. Indeed, if we view rights as a benefit, but still a benefit that has costs which must be paid, the demand for more benefits and a better response to their rights, makes it more difficult to provide benefits for citizens.

Either HRT will collapse under the weight of people expectations, or we will realize we are being scammed and return to a merit-based system.

Going back to the problem of delivery. If we propose everyone has a right to a home, then everyone and anyone can claim housing. That you have a home your paid for is immaterial, what matters is the need for homes that has not been met. Housing is a cost borne by citizens, when housing is a right. Even if citizens do own shelter to new arrivals, we are still left with the problem of delivery. If the new residents are not willing to pay into the program, citizens cannot maintain the program forever. If anyone deserves benefits at birth, is it not an obligation to help others after receiving help? A theory about why this is so may comfort some, but what mechanism ensures the program is maintained without interruption? Why get involved in a program if the means do not exist for its perpetuation?

It has been made clear that regardless of the virtue of what one promotes, if the means by which it is financed are inadequate, investing in it is foolhardy. One does not get involved in something which is not sustainable. Even were we to agree human rights are a nice idea, if citizens bear the weight of the program alone, it is probably not something to invest in. Ultimately, human rights apply to all or none. This ought to apply to the giving as well as the getting.

But, in fact it is not possible for human rights to be universal. There is no credible way for a human right to apply to every person. In every application one group will pay and another group will benefit. This is always so in every case. The Western nations supply the rights and the rest of the world enjoy the benefits.

Human rights were a remarkable idea when developed by the West, for Westerners. The East has taken the idea and turned it into a scam.

Human rights theory when applied is you making a pie and I coming along with a tag giving me equal access to it.

Whatever one thinks HRT is, it has been a disaster for the West. Democracy has only worsened the situation. Not only are aliens given equal rights to the assets of our nation through the right to vote they are able to bend our laws more towards the East.

Over time, HRT and democracy will give residents the power and legal rights to overthrow the rights that come with citizenship and turn the West into a copy of the East.