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Unalienable Rights
Unalienable Rights cannot be separated from the human identity. As integral parts of humanity, these rights cannot be relinquished, reduced, or taken by any means. References to "unalienable rights" are presented as statements of fact about the human condition.
Contents
Unalienable Rights in Art and Literature
The best known use of the term "unalienable rights" may be found in the United States Declaration of Independence. In the Declaration, the United States Congress explains the reason that the colonies must separate from the British Crown: that rule of the Crown is in direct conflict with the unalienable rights of the colonists. The colonists assert that self-preservation and the desire to benefit self and society as one sees fit are so integrated with human nature that they cannot be relinquished. The Congress unanimously proclaims that, by virtue of their basic humanity, they must alter or abolish any government threatening these rights.
In modern literature, rights that cannot be alienated from the nature of man are called natural rights. In contrast, rights based on religious and moral principles are called human rights, universal rights and, infrequently, inalienable rights.
Source of Unalienable Rights
In literature, the source of mankind's unalienable rights is said or assumed to be the force of nature or being that created them.
The Declaration of Independence says that the unalienable rights of man come from "their Creator." As was the Freemasonry custom of the era, mankind's creator was referenced, but not specified.
While human rights often rely on a generally accepted source to provide proof of existence, unalienable rights require no source. Proof of their existence is "self-evident."
Proof of Unalienable Rights
- "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights," ~US Declaration of Independence
The United States Congress asserts that unalienable rights are self-evident: evident for all to see. Other works of literature and film expand the necessity of natural rights to all thinking beings. In the extreme example of Warner Brother's Animatrix, the popular science-fiction prequel to The Matrix, the question of natural rights in thinking machines is addressed. That film and other philosophical works point out that one must make choices in order to think, and that one must have freedom in order to make choices.
Natural Rights History
The idea of rights that cannot be taken from human beings by virtue of their nature can be traced to ancient Greek and Medieval thinkers. Grotius, Hobbes, Pufendorf, and other influential thinkers codified these ideas in the modern era. John Locke used the concept of natural rights to justify much of his Second Treatise of Government in 1690. Natural rights were the original basis of the liberalism movement. Robert Nozick's popular 1974 book Anarchy, State, and Utopia begins, "Individuals have rights, and there are things no person or group may do to them."
Inalienable v. Unalienable
Controversy exists over whether inalienable means the same thing as unalienable. Unalienable is an archaic term always used in reference to that part of the human psyche which cannot be relinquished through any means. Proponents for a common definition assert that inalienable means the same thing. Whether or not they should mean the same thing is a matter of debate, but in current speech ([1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7]), inalienable is widely used in the context of a plea for things not to be taken, or to be given back after they are taken, based on moral grounds.
