Argumentative Text on Human Rights

Argumentative Text on Human Rights

Universal human rights: a key piece for the future

A long time has passed since, within the framework of the French Revolution In 1789, the French National Constituent Assembly approved the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, document that will serve as the basis for the contemporary idea of ​​fundamental, inalienable and inalienable rights that are granted to every human being at birth. And yet, in the XXI century, there are many regimes and situations in which the disrespect and the violation of these basic rights is evident and remains unpunished.

In the West we often boast of having "invented" modern human rights, ignoring its long line of antecedents in antiquity. We also often invoke them to criticize the most ruthless governments in Africa and the Middle East.

We assume our moral superiority and regard them as barbarians, we accuse them of being backward and even thus justify the decision to intervene militarily in their countries. And is it true that in our countries we fully guarantee the right to life? Isn't there the

race discrimination, by religion, by sexual orientation? Do not the crimes of powerful rulers go unpunished?

Of course, comparing the situation of extreme vulnerability of an inhabitant of North Korea, Eritrea or Afghanistan with that of a citizen of Europe or the United States can be unfair, and can even be interpreted as a way to make invisible the progress made in legal and social matters after centuries of struggle in West.

The latter should push us towards the construction of a more ethical society, with less hypocrisy, that judges equally the murder of a white citizen than one of color, or who punishes with equal harshness the crimes committed in war by the losing side and the victorious. How easy it is to remember the horrors of Nazism during the Second World Warwhile dropping atomic bombs on the civil population of two Japanese cities is justified as an extreme and necessary measure!

Human rights, a moral compass

The I respect for human rights, then, should lead us to question our western societies, as well as the societies of others. It is unethical to negotiate commercially with regimes that persecute, torture and murder their citizens, and that should apply to everyone without distinction.

Thus, for example, it does not make sense for the United States to justify its military actions in the Middle East on human rights, but at the same time themselves ally themselves commercially and militarily with the bloody monarchy of Saudi Arabia, a country where homosexuality is punished with the death.

Similarly, China is attacked for its mistreatment of Muslim minorities, while in the United States the police treats African American civilians as second-class citizens, whose killings by law enforcement often remain unpunished. Either human rights are, as they are supposed to be, universal, fundamental and sacred, or then we are not making any progress on the matter.

In this sense, we are not very helpful cultural relativism which accuses human rights of being a Western invention that we want to impose by force on other cultures. Are we supposed to turn a blind eye to despotic, cruel and bloody governments? Respect for the culture of others cannot be a refuge for genocidaires, just as neither is the right to self-determination or political autonomy. In addition, this perspective forgets that universal human rights had important antecedents in ancient cultures of the East, such as the declaration of the Persian king Cyrus in the 6th century BC. C., contained in the so-called "Cyrus Cylinder".

A more humane future

Finally, it is not possible to think about the future of our species without taking into account human rights. Especially when we face in the 21st century a crucial point in the history of our species, when the Climate catastrophe and the global economic crisis threaten to lead us to complex, unequal scenarios, challengers. What will happen to human rights if the world's food supply begins to run low? What place will respect for life and not discrimination if the increase in seas continues and the portion of habitable land is reduced?

To design a more humane future, one that we are proud to pass on to generations to come, we must lay its foundations in the present. It is not a simple task, and the enormous cultural, social, political and religious differences that are typical of our species make everything even more difficult. But precisely the universality of human rights can provide us with a solution to the conflict, insofar as can become a common floor on which to negotiate with those who think differently, look different or speak different.

On conclusionEither we treat each other as unique and valuable human beings, or barbarism will always continue to be there, crouched, waiting for the ideal moment to take us back centuries.

References:

• "Human rights" in Wikipedia.
• "Argumentative text" in Wikipedia.
• "The Universal Declaration of Human Rights" in the United Nations (UN).
• "What are human rights?" on the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.
• "What are human rights?" on Unicef.

What is an argumentative text?

A argumentative text is one that offers the reader a point of view, supported by arguments, opinions, examples, justifications, reasoning and other resources (many of them expository) that have the purpose of convincing you. It's about a type of texts They seek to form a specific opinion in the reader, to push him to think in a way about a topic.

Typical examples of argumentative texts are: literary essays, journalistic texts opinion (such as editorials), some advertising messages or electoral campaign texts. And in these texts two types of arguments can be used: the logical ones (which appeal to reason and critical judgment) and the emotional ones (which appeal to passion and feelings).

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