what a strange concept...do you dis/agree with the notion that everybody has an equal right to exist? if you disagree, what alternatives would you propose?

we exist. but whether or not we have rights to existence is debatable. (if you disagree that we exist, then you've no "right" to answer this question, it's like voting: if you don't vote, then don't complain!)

i don't believe anyone has an intrinsic right to anything. To say that would need a 'something' to recognise that right.

Quote from: Pica Pica on April 29, 2009, 02:24:30 PM
i don't believe anyone has an intrinsic right to anything. To say that would need a 'something' to recognise that right.

I'm pretty much with Pica on this one.

Quote from: Pica Pica on April 29, 2009, 02:24:30 PM
i don't believe anyone has an intrinsic right to anything. To say that would need a 'something' to recognise that right.

Agreed.

No rights but those afforded by enlightened souls.

Existence is an accident. Not a right.  Just ask my mother.
Nature, the universe, and governments crush everything that exists.

Everyone has an equal right to life. Any other solution leads towards genocide and fascism...

First it was not your choice to exist. It was your parents choice. Second all rights come with responsibilities. The earth has only so many resources that are needed by 6.7 billion people not everyone has enough to survive. Nature law is survival of the fittest. So where does that leave your right to exist? You have to fight to exist.

Quote from: lisagurl on April 29, 2009, 04:05:02 PM
First it was not your choice to exist. It was your parents choice. Second all rights come with responsibilities. The earth has only so many resources that are needed by 6.7 billion people not everyone has enough to survive. Nature law is survival of the fittest. So where does that leave your right to exist? You have to fight to exist.

There are plenty of resources if they were distributed fairly. The Capitalist West is to blame for the disastrous situation in the developing World in my opinion.

There are not enough resources for people to live equally or even in the place that they are born. Take Phoenix for example. They do not have the water to support the population. They take water from others. In the no too distant future there will not be a Phoenix as we know it. Where will those people go? Every where else the resources are not being replaced as fast as the population is using them. Either nature or war will reduce the population to a sustainable level.

Read "Collapse" by Jared Diamond

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Post Merge: April 29, 2009, 04:20:49 PM

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The root of the global financial crises is too many people chasing too little resources.

No we don't. We earn it.

A right to exist?  Yes by the virtue of just being born.  We may not have been asked, but here we are.  So we have the right to exist.  And that includes the right to earn a better place in the world.

Excuse me for being an American, but

Quote from: Thomas Jefferson, The Constitution of the United SatesWe hold these truths to be self-evident, that all humankind* are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Angie Zapada was denied two of those rights.  Life and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Janet
* Modified by Janet to include ALL of humankind.  Angie's killer does not get these right because he is an animal.

I second what Janet said above.

He damn sure is entitled to those self-same rights, and only when he was found guilty were those rights taken from him.

Be careful who's rights you might seek to take-away or limit.  Its not like your not on the top of other people's lists eh?

And, any discussion of 'rights' without a corresponding discussion of 'responsibilities' is pretty much nursery school philosophy. 

So, do people have a 'right' to exist, sure.  Do I have an obligation to work so they can eat and stay alive even when they choose not too?  I doubt it.

I feel it depends upon the definition of the right to exist. I don't believe anyone has the responsibilty to deny a persons life. Yet we know that life is being created every second somewhere in the world and we do damn little to "help" it exist. We as the rich,wealthy, educated debate. The poor, starved and uneducated don't. Why?

I remember Tekla's table from another post showing the causes of death in the USA. Most of it from life style diseases. So we have a right to life put many take that right away by conciously, drinking alcohol, smoking, over eating, not doing any excercise, suiciding. If there is a right there is a responsibilty, that many do not take.
Childhood mortality in Australia (excluding the Aboriginal Population) is less than 1% in the first 12 months. Taking African stats overall CHM is around 20%, most due to RSV and Diarrhoea. Both largely preventable. So if people have a right to life, is the right different for different people.
In the Australian Aboriginal population the CHM is not as bad as in Africa but nowhere near as good as in the non-aboriginal population. Australians believe in equal rights, but maybe not in all of them. I'm an Australian and happy to use my country as an example.
I would be interested in the USA stats for native Indian and for Mexican CHM.

So what is the right to life? You have the right to be born, but to survive? Well that's a different story.

What are the rights for the innocent in war? The Geneva Convention had rights for all sorts of things that are ignored, modified or changed to suit a particular Govn't.

What is a right?

Cindy J

On 10 December 1948, the General Assembly of the United Nations adopted and proclaimed the Universal Declaration of Human Rights...

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html


Article 1.

    * All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.


Article 2.

    * Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.


Article 3.

    * Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.

Well to be crude
"WE" have totally crapped on that.
But it only happens in Indonisa, and such other countries.


Never  in USA

Quote from: Pica Pica on April 29, 2009, 02:24:30 PM
i don't believe anyone has an intrinsic right to anything. To say that would need a 'something' to recognise that right.

There are however the rights we give each other and those are both important and fragile.

they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, - it's that sort of thing I don't believe in, for I believe in no creator to endow. We endow them on each other.

Quote from: CindyJames on April 30, 2009, 06:58:10 AM
Well to be crude
"WE" have totally crapped on that.
But it only happens in Indonisa, and such other countries.


Never  in USA

The genocide committed in Indonesia in the sixties was US guided. The CIA provided the lists of the Communists to be killed (the estimate is between 500, 000 and 1,000,000).

I think your fellow Australian John Pilger did an excellent documentary on it, which is available on Torrent sites, can't remember the name...