Defend Human Rights

Why Defend Human Rights?

Davis defends human rights because he believes they are important. Human rights show the least standards that people must meet to live with dignity. It gives individuals the freedom of choice; people can choose how they express themselves, live, and the type of government they want to support, etc.

Human rights also ensure that people have access to basic human needs such as housing or shelter, food and education, ensuring that they make use of all opportunities available to them.

The rights of humans also guarantee liberty, life, security, and equality, ascertaining that people are protected from being abused by those in power.

Human rights, according to the United Nations, ensure that people develop fully and utilize available human attributes such as talent, intelligence, and conscience, to meet personal, physical, or spiritual needs.

Human rights are universal, indivisible, non-discriminatory, inalienable, and interconnected. This means that these rights belong to all humans, can’t be taken away from them, depend on other rights, can’t be treated in isolation, and requires respect without prejudice.

History of Human Rights

Where did human rights come from? The history or origin of human rights dates back to the previous centuries when people struggled to end discrimination, slavery, apartheid, genocide, and government oppression.

During World War II, atrocities indicated that previous efforts to safeguard the human rights of individuals from being violated by governments didn’t make a cut. Therefore, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was born as the United Nations (UN) emerged.

The rights of humans also guarantee liberty, life, security, and equality, ascertaining that people are protected from being abused by those in power.

Human rights, according to the United Nations, ensure that people develop fully and utilize available human attributes such as talent, intelligence, and conscience, to meet personal, physical, or spiritual needs.

Human rights are universal, indivisible, non-discriminatory, inalienable, and interconnected. This means that these rights belong to all humans, can’t be taken away from them, depending on other rights, can’t be treated in isolation, and requires respect without prejudice.

The first international document that defined fundamental political, civil, cultural, social, and economic human rights was the UDHR. On December 10, 1948, the UN General Assembly ratified the document declaration. However, UDHR wasn’t legally-binding when the declaration was adopted, despite its great moral importance.

The UN drafted a couple of treaties, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to give the list of human rights in the UDHR the force of law.

The two covenants drew a clear artificial line between the two, showcasing the ideological divide worldwide during the Cold War. The covenants are interconnected despite politics preventing them from being transformed into a unified treaty. The rights in the two covenants go hand in hand.