Before taking this course, there was no question in my mind that the protection of human rights was the absolute single, solitary moral and legal obligation that binds us all in a global community. The fact that you cannot go a day without reading in a newspaper about human rights abuses, and how the international world is going to respond to them, is proof positive that, as least in the Western world, we have convinced ourselves that we are the guardians of human rights and have done, do and will do anything in our power to protect them when some developing country does not (as it could only be a less developed nation abusing their citizens right? *cough* Canada + aboriginal rights). Everyday I feel I hear the term, or shall we call it a buzz word, being thrown around, willy nilly; usually it is to justify the intervention of a first world nation in the affairs of a "third' world nation (I prefer developing, but third in this context provides the right amount of condescension). It's almost become a formulaic sentence...so and so is abusing its citizens civil and human rights and so we...(usually America will be the first in line)...are sending an armed intervention to protect the people of so and so because their government will not. This, or some form of this sentence seems to get repeated often, especially in modern events such as Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya to name a few. A special amendment actually exists in the Charter of the United Nations that justifies third party intervention in a country when human rights abuses are evident and accurately reported. There is no question therefore that human rights, at least in the the Western world, are something that we have convinced ourselves, as everyday people through school, the media, and governmental ramblings, that we believe requires the utmost protection and is the most despicable abuse a government can subject its people to. Until this course, I was a proud defender of human rights and the first to object against any action performed by our or any other government that could infringe on a solitary human right.
Nearing the end of this course, I can't say I still have the same, narrow view of human rights. This first half of our course taught me, embarrassingly enough, that I had never considered the idea that any and all human rights discourse has been written by and from the perspective of a Western, "first world" nation. For example, in considering our current UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights--how many "third world" nations were included in the discussion while writing this lengthy document? Furthermore, the fact that some of the earlier rights documents were written by middle class, white males (and therefore only protected a very limited section of the population) has taught me that if anything, supposed "universal" declarations can actually be more exclusionary than inclusive. With this in mind, if we once again consider the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, written from a first world perspective, and therefore only taking Western first world cultures and traditions into consideration, I believe even this recent document excludes many developing nations populations who have different cultures and ideals than us in the Western world. Therefore while I recognize that the UN Declaration was written with good intentions (I'm not that cynical), I believe a more inclusive document, with input from developing nations, needs to be written if we are to create a truly universal and inclusive international declaration of rights.
The second half of this course...oh boy...that's where my ideas about human rights and their power to protect really started to change. I've always been aware of the atrocities committed in South America, by the government against its own people, just maybe not to the full extent. What I was unaware of however, is the amount of complicity developed nations, especially America, had in either allowing or blatantly helping corrupt governments continue to abuse its citizens. This for me was most shocking because as supposed crusaders for human rights protection, the fact that developed nations have been, and still are (in my personal opinion) involved in military operations and political dealings that harm human beings is nauseatingly hypocritical and disillusioning. How can we go on and on about the necessity of protecting human rights, at home and abroad, when we don't practice what we preach, by any stretch of the imagination. More and more it seems that the protection of human rights is of secondary importance to achieving political and military wins; the term human right will get thrown in there only to capture greater attention or to provide shallow justification to a naivee population that believes, 'hey, if human rights are at stake, we have every right to intervene,' an assumption that lacks a thorough understanding of one's government's true motive and intention.
To me, what was particularly revolutionary? shall I say, from these readings was the idea, most clearly articulated in the last section of reading about Guatemala, that people who are enduring human rights abuses recognize that was is occurring to them is wrong, but have little to no faith that these wrongs will ever be righted. I think it was a priest who said something along the lines that the human rights commissioner might as well be a thousand miles away for all the good it would do for him and his people that were being killed by the military. This statement shows just how disillusioned people living under corrupt and abusive governments are towards the ability of human rights to protect them. And so they should be. We can talk until we're blue in the face about the universal rights people should have, but until an effective instrument for protecting those rights is imagined, human rights really are just another way of talking. They mean nothing when millions of people are suffering from indignities that limit their ability to survive as "free" human beings. They mean nothing to the families of Argentinian and Guatemalan desaparecidos who still have no answer to what happened to their loved ones. The very phrase "human right" means nothing to people who live under a known abusive government and yet receive no help from the international community. In fact, human rights protection has been constantly trumped by other, supposedly more pressing issues of political or economic importance. It is only because we, the people of the industrialized world, are able to live in relative prosperity, that we have the luxury to discuss the various human rights violations that have occurred and are occurring. And really, that's all we do; we talk about human rights and how important they are to protect; we shake our heads at the horrible atrocities occurring around the world and thank our lucky stars that we are fortunate enough to live in a country that, after experimenting with rights abuses, finally cleaned up its act. However, the actual amount of true, honest to goodness, altruistic protection of human rights missions we embark on, without any other motive, political or economic? Very, very few.
So, what is the answer then. Are human rights useful? Is there a point in continuing this protection rhetoric that we, quite obviously, have failed to uphold? My simple and short answer would be: Yes. Yes this is a use for human rights. Despite the fact that the world has a horrifying track record of human rights abuses, I think they serve a purpose. Human rights exist as a promise that one day, everyone will be equally free from abuse. They exist as a guideline for how human beings must be treated. If you compare it with the laws of a country, human rights should be considered the law of the world; unquestioned and undisputed boundaries that exist to keep people safe, conflict free, and enable them to prosper and live the one life they have, for as long as possible. Yes it is incredibly disheartening how completely inadequate we have been thus far in protecting human rights, or rectifying situations that abuse them. Governments are especially defective in protecting human rights because they let other more petty yet more financially rewarding motivations obscure their vision of their obligation to protect. However, I think it is important to recognize that some groups of people, particularly non-governmental organizations, have tirelessly and discreetly (in the sense that they don't clamour for recognition of every good deed they do) worked to help people that are suffering. For me, I believe NGOs set a far better example of human rights protection than any government ever has; NGOs are the epitome of an altruistic group of people, who do try to help people as their primary motivation; political and economic incentives do not exist, as are the inherent characteristics of a non-governmental body. Therefore, maybe the future for human rights protection isn't necessarily through national governments as the first line of defence (although they could certainly clean up their act) but through NGOs and other, more apolitical and morally motivated bodies that still believe human rights are and should be a universally shared commonality between all of the world citizens. Call me an optimist, but I believe their is possibility for greater collaboration and improvement of global human rights; we just need to figure out the appropriate avenue to achieve them.
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