There has been a call to arms for national HUMAN RIGHTS DAY. A call to bloggers everywhere to post something on this topic. Though I don't necessarily consider myself a 'blogger' it does happen to be the medium of choice... so here I am.
First of all, I think media-driven celebratory things like this are very much like the American holiday mentality. Why take one day out of the year to celebrate something that we should be supporting vehemently every minute of our American lives? It seems to me to be a mis-placed value, an afterthought that we have the freedom to live, work, fuck, worship, watch, listen to, and ignore anything anywhere we fucking want (with a nominal amount of censorship). We should be cherishing every little thing we can retain because our rights are being taken from us, slowly but surely.
Over the last eight years we have been coerced by the government as well as the media to give up our inherent human rights in exchange for the illusion of safety. With NYC police being indicted on sodomy charges, the debacle at the Republican National Party, the horrors of the Hudson family murders, I’d venture to say I feel about as safe as a cat in the middle of a 6-lane interstate at rush-hour.
And when we say ‘human rights’ we are not just talking about the rights of families and the protection of children. Fuck them. That has nothing to do with MY reality. What about the fact that I, as a conscientious intelligent SINGLE taxpayer WITH NO CHILDREN, pay roughly 20% more taxes that an family of 4 who consume easily 5 times the amount of natural resources that I do. And that the IRS, through a gross misinterpretation of the constitution that clearly states that income tax is a VOLUNTARY contribution, is insisting that I owe taxes plus penalties for $4,000 worth of income I never even received in 2002… Yeah, I have complete unshakable faith in this country and it’s infrastructure… Not.
What are human rights? A simple definition is: The basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled, often held to include the right to life and liberty, freedom of thought and expression, and equality before the law. Human rights refers to the "basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled."[1] Examples of rights and freedoms which are often thought of as human rights include civil and political rights, such as the right to life and liberty, freedom of expression, and equality before the law; and social, cultural and economic rights, including the right to participate in culture, the right to food, the right to work, and the right to education. (notice the lack of "the right to procreate"- JC)
“ All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.”
—Article 1 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR)[2]
It seems that in this day of extended parentship, single-parent fatherless families and overstated moral obligations to proliferate as dominant organisms more and more human rights are protected for those who are being protected and not so much for the people who are doing the protecting. It is true that the more you have, the more you have to lose. So those in power use wealth as the buffer in a system that is anything but fair for all.
And in a society that glorifies the trainwrecks of humanity in celebrity tabloids and reality television where do we find a base on which to measure the quality of modern life and liberty? Just because you have the freedom to do whatever you want is not necessarily a good reason to do just that. And with morality being kept out of learning institutions more and more the burden of instilling discernment in children falls directly on the shoulders of the parents. But who is teaching them??
We must seek out education. We must teach ourselves how not to be manipulated by our own system. And that calls for ridged self-examination. In our society our rights are no longer ours in anything but theory. We must demand that our rights be given back to us by demonstrating that we DESERVE THEM. And that, my friends, is a frightening situation, having to be personally responsible for our own decisions.
The chaste system proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that all men are NOT created equal. And intelligence is not something sought out nor valued by everyone. How can we create a desire in citizens to strive for knowledge instead of hand-outs? It is an inherent philosophical tenant that transcends religion, education, and social programming.
Human Rights. A birthright? Not so much. But they are something that we as free-thinking men and women deserve. And it is up to us to figure out a way to get them back…
♠ JC
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