You guys think we have human rights? Like genuine asking, basically your human rights are ...

Nah. We don’t. And it’s fascinating, because we’re letting a small group of people tell us, billions of us what to do.

you make it sound so simple.

Well the rich have rights, money makes the law. So, no if you're at the bottom of the ladder, no we don't have rights.
I've had people steal from me, harrass me, cheat me, and get away with it because A. The govt truly doesn't care and B. The rich always get all rights.

Human Rights are intrinsic to existence, but their actualisation requires external agents which are not uniformly present across countries and socio economic stratas. A lot of what ‘rights’ entails is protected by the nation state through their monopoly on creation of legal fiction and enactment of violence (which understand it like this: only the state can legally kill someone via execution). Citizens in theory are bound to their nation states via citizenship, which is a socio-legal contract of sorts wherein citizens give up the ability to do certain things (commit crime) and money (in form of tax) to the government in exchange for protection of their ‘rights’. This is a very rudimentary way of how the system of rights works.

Human rights are more an aspirational then actual tbh. A person by logic knows people should have them (right to live, eat, shelter, equality etc) but in observation society and its stratification across the lines of money and other ethno-social grounds (race, gender, caste, sexuality) leads to discrimination in how rights are protected and granted. Governments try to project a benevolent image of trying to work for everyone, but parties therein mostly work for the betterment of their voter block’s opportunities, ensuring they continue to stay in power.

On another hand, some people completely circumvent the system of rights, eg rich people get away with all sorts of crime by mere virtue of their money mostly because they can either bribe their way through bureaucracy or fund those in political power to be excused. They are the ones committing statistically the most crime, for the concentration of capital in one’s hand is never possible in clean hands.

International relations is another ground where the futility of HR as a concept is seen. eg US bombs countries all the time with the excuse of attacking legitimate objects (eg terrorists) but has no issue with killing civilians in their vicinity. Israel continues to commit genocide because of its close relationship with US. Russia wages a senseless war. They are all protected bc the p5 of the security council ensure to protect their own interests (US and Russia are P5 members, and US vetoes any resolutions against Israel). It is the only organ of an international organization with any sort of power, and its meaningless because the ones who commit the most heinous acts are the ones in charge.


What I am intrigued by is what you mean by freedom. True freedom does not exist. In order to conceptualise a freedom beyond government diction you must contemplate a system free of government. Perhaps anarchy? But then what ensures that once the state monopoly on violence disappears, we humans will be kind to each other. A concept similar to ‘outside the purview of law’ did exist sometime back. I’m not sure if you know of the concept of the ‘outlaw’ but it essentially is exactly as it is called. You exist outside the protection law. If an outlaw is tortured, murdered, sexually assaulted, no one is held accountable for doing any of these things to said outlaw because they are not protected by law. The status of an outlaw was granted to the worst criminals. This is one price of being free of government.

I’m not arguing for government. They are often a tool of oppression. Democracy exists in theory but concentrates wealth, health and power in the hands of the few. But I do think state monopoly on violence does enable social control. Anarchy is fascinating, but it does not ensure a world built on kindness where every person helps realize the rights of those around them. History shows that’s we have done extraordinary cruelties unto those we do not believe to be the same as us. What guarantee exists that in a world beyond government humanity would have as a whole learnt from the past to be better.


Once again, human rights are aspirational not actual. An aspiration is more fiction than a lie, but it is something that those who want to do good in the world strive to better the world towards. They are a state of ideals we want to evolve to meet. Freedom in its truest sense atleast as posited by the question does not exist. Disregarding government control, even social rules and roles, economic strains and cultural bounds exist to cut wings off free birds.