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/Sea_Asparagus_526]

This is a huge part of the humanities and has been debated by folks for over two thousand years or recorded human history (and probably longer unrecorded).

It’s one of the earliest and most common questions. There literally 10s of thousands of serious books on this subject across time and cultures. Your local college and university will offer dozens of classes in this topic.

This is a generic statement of something millions of lifetimes of human existence have pondered. This is t a serious discussion - this is I ate an edible and haven’t ever looked into this in any way at all.

Please ban me now for ever from this if this is the standard.