Re: WOT: Danish Cartoons and Muhammed

Ellen said:

Jane wrote:
                << I think the right to
free speech is a natural right, rooted in human nature, an universally
true and applicable to all people, and societies that do not recognize
it or that
violate it are objectively wrong.   I don't think this is a
culturally relative thing.>>

<<"Wouldn't it be pretty to think so?">>

            <<  Ah, but it is so. Natural
rights don't cease to exist because governments violate them. Your
natural rights can be violated, and you can be punished for exercising
them, but they never cease to exist as long as you are alive and human.


Then you're going to have to define what you mean by "natural right"
because I don't understand the term as you're using it. If you'd said,
"human desire" or "inborn need for" [free speech] I'd have no problem.

But are "human rights" inborn? ie, do they come with the territory?
Don't "rights" have to be granted, or commonly accepted, and therefore
aren't they culturally determined?

When you say all humans have a right to express themselves freely you
are saying what *should* be, not what *is.* What *is* is that politics
and culture and country dictate the exercise of one's rights, though not
one's yearnings--though it would be pretty NOT to think so.

This may be an issue of semantics, which is why I'd like you to define
your terms.

Ellen

.

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