Recently in GPERS, we’ve been discussing human rights and some of its aspects. One of the more controversial issues about human rights is how it should be applied. In theory, according to the Human Rights Declaration, human rights are supposed to be universal and apply equally to every human. However this has not come to be, many people around the world disagree with this statement and believe instead that it should be culturally relative. This means that human rights should be determined by one’s culture, and not apply if contradicting to one’s culture.
To further explore this, we used the case study of The Girl in the River. It is a very powerful film/documentary about honor killings. It was about Saba, a woman who had wanted to marry the man she loved, but her family had disagreed due to their family’s lower social status. Although she was told not to, she went off and got married. In their culture, it is deeply offensive towards their family. This had incited her father and uncle to try and kill her. Although they had sworn to the Kuran not to harm her, they had still attempted to kill her. This violates many human rights. For many, this case would definitely be violating human rights. However, to many of the same culture, they would disagree. For their family’s honor is the most important thing, and killing her would have restored that honor. This is why some people argue so strongly on these two opposing sides. While it is generally viewed as morally wrong to try and kill somebody, for them in this context it is justified. Some people this applies based on location, while others think it is based on ethnicity and cultural background.
Personally, I feel that there are many very important human rights that should never be broken no matter who you are. Some of the very major violations in this documentary were:
- People are born free and equal
- The right to life
- No one shall be treated cruelly and torture
These human rights are basic and morally makes sense to follow, and shouldn’t be allowed no matter where, when or who had violated these human rights. I do think that some of the human rights are less important than others, but that doesn’t mean I believe that any of those rights should be violated.
This was a well written post. Your introduction clearly explains the debate and the reasons why some people argue against human rights being universal. I found it interesting that you believe there are some human rights that are more important than others, yet you still believe in the concept that human rights should be applied universally. I agree that human rights should be universal because they are basic rights that we are meant to be born with.
I agree with your perspectives because I think the UDHR should be universal because all humans deserve their rights and if everything was taken from a cultural point then everything will be different and humans cannot come to an agreement.The example of Buddhism was a very good example and is that what has influenced your perspective of UDHR. I think you explained the UDHR and other things really well and that was good as you made it clear what the differences were. You mentioned about the documentary quite a lot which was really good and how some human rights were being violated and how you explained both opposing perspectives.