Whether the right was recognized or enforced, or recourse granted, would depend on whether others choose to recognize them, or enforce them, or see that recourse is granted. They may, or may not. There isn't anything that requires them to make any particular choice.
Law provides a mechanism which identifies a right and provides for its protection or enforcement regardless of what others are inclined to do or not do, with the power of the state available to be imposed if necessary.
Eh, a policeman is duty-bound to "serve and protect" and takes an oath swearing to uphold these norms. People in society don't just exist as free floating, independent entities that have complete freedom of choice in any given interaction. In healthy societies the police owe the public at least some level of protection or at least recourse. — BitconnectCarlos
Inalienable/natural rights such as life and liberty are first - atleast in the Anglo-American tradition - recognized as such and then enshrined into law. I can't think of any natural rights that aren't recognized by law. Even if there were no laws whether something is enforceable or not is just a question of the social reality or practical politics at the time, i.e. whether you can garner support or arms etc. — BitconnectCarlos
What you think are natural rights may be legal rights, or they may not. What you think are legal rights may be natural rights, or they may not. That's because they're different.
I voted "no" because I don't think it appropriate to speak of "rights" that are unenforceable. or the violation of which is without recorse. There are legal rights, but there are no rights that should be legal rights, which, I think, is all that "natural rights" are (unless they're legal rights).
Enforceability is extremely important and when I hear about a natural right - say, right to life - being unenforceable it should cause one to immediately ask "how do we enforce this?" not "I'm not going to recognize these rights because presently we're not capable of enforcing them." — BitconnectCarlos
When we refer to natural rights that are not recognized by the law, I think the only thing we're saying, for any practical purposes, is that they should be legal rights. — Ciceronianus the White
When we refer to natural rights that are not recognized by the law, I think the only thing we're saying, for any practical purposes, is that they should be legal rights.
I don't accept that nature somehow manifests rights to which all are entitled.
When we refer to natural rights that are not recognized by the law, I think the only thing we're saying, for any practical purposes, is that they should be legal rights.
1) A law may exist but it may not be enforced. On the flip side, an action may be legal but there could still be dire consequences for performing it in a given society, e.g. how blacks in the American south had to conduct themselves towards white women during the Jim Crowe era. — BitconnectCarlos
2) Other organizations outside of the government often do enforce - and enforce strongly - e.g. the mafia, the KKK, hell's angels, etc. In some societies the police were either weak, ineffectual, or corrupt and turning to the mafia was your best bet at recourse. — BitconnectCarlos
3) The grievance could just be aimed towards an autocracy, and what we're really aiming towards here is regime change not a legal change. An autocrat may ignore the laws or change them at whim. — BitconnectCarlos
But why should they be legal rights? — NOS4A2
That law should not have been adopted. Nonetheless it was. Does that make that law immoral, or does its adoption mean those who caused it to be adopted were immoral, or was the conduct it sanctioned immoral? — Ciceronianus the White
If the law allows something immoral or prohibits something moral, the law is immoral. — David Mo
What results from the immorality of the law is the right to oppose it, which is enshrined even in the preamble to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. — David Mo
It's more than just dissent. I explained the reasons why I dissented from your position. It's because we don't agree on what a law is. A law is a prescriptive act: it defines what can and cannot be done and what must be done. Therefore, if immorality refers to acts, you cannot separate the law from the acts, and the law that prescribes immoral acts is immoral. For example, depriving a minority of access to land ownership. If you remove the prescribed act, that law ceases to exist.I've explained why I feel this isn't the case already, so I assume you're just noting your disagreement. — Ciceronianus the White
When the UDHR mentions the right to resist unjust laws, it does not do so in an article. There is no article in the law that mentions the right to resistance. But the Preamble recognizes this unwritten right when it says that the Declaration is proposed as a way to prevent people from being forced to resort to the right to violent resistance (I quote from memory).If the Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a law (the U.S. Supreme Court doesn't seem to think so), the rights it refers to are legal rights. — Ciceronianus the White
Strictly speaking natural rights seem to depend on the needs and wants of the people who make them up. — VagabondSpectre
But also pleasantly surprised with those who simply see it as a short-hand or derivative of social arrangements. — StreetlightX
That can be used to justify slavery or any form of oppression. — Marchesk
That's the gist of it for me as well.I voted "no" because I don't think it appropriate to speak of "rights" that are unenforceable. or the violation of which is without rec[ou]rse.There are legal rights, but there are no rights that should be legal rights, which, I think, is all that "natural rights" are (unless they're legal rights). — Ciceronianus the White
I don't think such organizations enforce legal rights.
That might be historically true, but if we want natural rights to be something more than what those in power need and want, then it to ought to apply to everyone. For example, because you're human, you should have the right to determine your own life, and not be the property of someone else. And thus slavery was a violation of natural rights, no matter how the people at the time, or any time, rationalized it. — Marchesk
how would you instead persuade a slaver or slave-owner that they violating natural rights? — VagabondSpectre
And the slave revolts making it a ludicrously costly investment. — fdrake
Legal rights are a very small part of the law. — Ciceronianus the White
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