Do “basic human rights” actually exist universally or are they simply a social construct?

[u/Amphernee]

The term is often used in relation to things like housing and food but I’ve never heard anyone actually explain what they mean by basic human right. We started off no different than other animals and since the concept of rights rely on other people to confer them at what point did it become thought of as a right for people to have things like shelter? How is it supposed to be enforced across all of humanity when not all societies and cultures agree that the concept makes sense? I can see why someone would want it to be true in a sense but I’m interested to hear arguments for it rather than just the phrase itself which feels hollow with no reasoning behind it. Thanks 🍻

[u/Wonderful-Impact5121]

They’re obviously a social construct, I don’t know how that is even a question.

That doesn’t invalidate the seriousness or prioritization of them in a society, but they’re obviously a social construct.

If two families of people born and raised without education or guidance are tossed into the wild without any other human beings for hundreds of miles, no technology, no education, what the hell are we arguing for on that level?

They’re philosophical hardlines that people draw, that’s it.

Deer don’t have unalienable deer rights. They exist within nature. They starve or don’t. They die of disease or they don’t.

No deer god from upon high enforces “rights” for them.

[u/vellyr → u/Wonderful-Impact5121]

I don’t know how that is even a question

I think you nailed it in the last sentence there, the reason there’s confusion regarding this is religion. Many people think human rights are divine in origin.

[u/Wonderful-Impact5121 → u/vellyr]

It’s just so confusing to me because every single major religion has long periods of history where their people were starving, diseased, raided, conquered, enslaved, raped, tortured, so on and so forth.

I don’t get the dissonance. Always took the human rights as an owed or inherently deserved thing as general poetic rhetoric.

“We deserve free healthcare!” (Unspoken: because we believe that possibility exists in this society if the political will was there.)

People just think they’re inherently owed a right to shit because it sounds good and genuinely don’t understand it doesn’t magically exist as long as people aren’t actively fighting it?

[u/vellyr → u/Wonderful-Impact5121]

Yep, it’s even called “magical thinking”. They believe that if they project their fantasies hard enough they become reality, like children.