On human rights (1)

Over the past decades there has come a subtle, indeed, not so subtle, change in the meaning of the word ‘rights’.  Previous definition of ‘rights’, such as the ‘right to private property’, enshrined the freedom of people to possess property, whether they wanted to be burdened with it or not.  Yet, nowadays, the word ‘rights’ is more likely to be viewed as an entitlement than a freedom: if you have right to something, under the present mindset, then you are entitled to have it, and must have it, whether you have the wherewithal or not.  It is now the duty of the state to supply you with not just the freedom to have it, but the very thing desired itself.

Such a view of rights is fundamental to the process of revolutionary Marxism, which sees rights, and the proliferation of rights, as a weapon for breaking what it terms ‘bourgeois’ society down.

I must confess at this point to having for many years a problem with the whole idea of ‘human rights’: that is the assignation of common rights to everybody on the planet irrespective of contribution or desert.  This problem that I have occurs purely in the context of the Marxist and liberal of view seeing a right not as a freedom but rather as a guarantee of something that must be delivered, no matter who else has to deliver or pay for it.

Now the whole matter of rights and the definition of rights seem seems to represent something of a philosophical and legalistic nightmare.  I do not pretend to any expertise in this field, yet it seems to me from a common sense point of view that certain things are undeniable.

A right has always seemed to me to represent almost by definition something limited and exclusive.  A right, on this interpretation, is access to some thing or some entitlement that is not available to the world at large, which is why we need a specific word ‘right’ to define it.  If everybody has access to something, then it is no longer a matter of ‘right’ but simply a condition of existence.  Put another way, if everybody has guaranteed access to a certain entitlement or thing, then in those circumstances the word ‘right’ itself becomes redundant.

The right to private property, used as an example earlier, is what is described as an ‘inalienable’ right.  According to the Collins English Dictionary: ‘If you say that someone has an inalienable right to something, you are emphasizing that they have a right to it that cannot be changed or taken away.’

Yet is it inalienable?  Of course, its not.  There is arguably no right that is inalienable.  The secret of undermining a right is to drown it in a plethora of contending rights, so that somebody has to decide between them; somebody often with an ideological axe of their own to grind, because there are very few disinterested intelligences in the world, no matter how much one might wish for them.  The ongoing struggle for control of the Supreme Court of the USA is a very good example of what the process involves and its social and political implications.

And this what lies behind the huge increase in rights and the demand for rights of recent decades.  It is part of a process of revolution from within.  It is designed to dynamite the supporting pillars of the status quo and replace it with the lunacy of a classless society—which is in itself a contradiction in terms because there must always be someone in control and inevitably they tend to look after their own interests and those of their families.  Russia and China are good examples from twentieth century history.

The truth of the matter is that the term ‘extension of rights’ or ‘human rights’ is quite often a cover for the destruction of rights.   Rights can only become universal to the extent that they cease to be local or restrictive.  As the universal ‘right’ increases so does the particular one diminish.  In fact, the logic of the position as described above might well be encapsulated in the phrase: Where everybody has rights, nobody has rights.

And yet . . . and yet . . .

More next day.