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> China does not recognize Human Rights and so it is difficult to say they are "breaking" them. Whether or not China recognizes human rights doesn’t have any b

> China does not recognize Human Rights and so it is difficult to say they are "breaking" them. Whether or not China recognizes human rights doesn’t have any bearing on whether or not they are breaking them. The international community recognizes human rights at least on some level, and it’s not particularly useful to use China’s perspective as a lens here any more than it would be useful to judge other atrocities throughout history through the eyes of the perpetrators. Edit: Adding [0] for consideration as some responses seem unaware. - [0] https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights https://www.un.org/en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-huma...

lmilcin 5y ago
This is poor logic, even if we agree on the ultimate result. > Whether or not China recognizes human rights doesn’t have any bearing on whether or not they are breaking them. "Whether or not your country recognizes Sharia doesn't have any bearing on whether or not you are breaking it and you should be prosecuted for breaking it." See how stupid your logic sounds when it is told from another perspective? If you want to fight for something at least try to understand what makes you right and the other one wrong.
- tomjen3 5y ago
  You are assuming that all world views are equal, and doing so in a way that appear to be quite arrogant. We are absolutely saying that not all views are equal and that it is a violation whether the country acknowledge it or not. If you need to anchor it in something else: humanism has brought the quickest, most effective and most complete, reduction the suffering of individuals of any system ever practiced anywhere, by more than one magnitude. Sharia is hanging of men for having sex with men, and the beating of women for getting raped.
  - laurent92 5y ago
    Humanism? How do you check this? Why not “It’s extremely probable that economic development brought the quickest most effective reduction of human suffering”? Why not “Fossil fuels brought the quickest reduction of suffering”? Maybe our interest for humanism depleted when we had to get rid of fossil fuels because of climate change; at which point we noticed that humanism was only a pipe dream atop a fossil-dependent society, and coal had made our life much easier for a short period of time, until we fell into hard times again.
    - wangii 5y ago
      why is this down voted? I honestly don't know. imho the point is perfectly valid. is there too much political correctness?
    - tomjen3 5y ago
      You may as well ask if we stopped humanism when we stopped using asbestos. The answer is the same: no.
- stale2002 5y ago
  > when it is told from another perspective? The difference is that the other perspective is wrong, and ours is much closer to being correct (even if it still has problems). So that is why your statement is silly. And before you say it, no, I do not care about any of your arguments about cultural relativism. I am perfectly happy, saying that people who, for example, want to kill gay people, have morals that are wrong, and that our morals, which are that we shouldn't do that, are correct. Are you able to do that?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- haswell 5y ago
  You are mixing "Rights" and "Laws" in your analogy, which are often directly at odds with each other.
  - lmilcin 5y ago
    Rights are laws. In US they are written into Constitution which is the law and which is source of these rights and basis for enforcing them. "Human rights" are part of international law which is an agreement signed by multiple countries -- a form of law.
    - floxy 5y ago
      >which is source of these rights Not in the American tradition. "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..." "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/rights-constitution-2/ https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/rights-constitut...
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- AllegedAlec 5y ago
  > See how stupid your logic sounds when it is told from another perspective? It makes no sense because the Declaration of Human Rights is morally right, and China's refusal to acknowledge them makes them by definition evil. And before you try moral/cultural relativism in saying that 'well, they think they're right/ Sharia followers think they're right'. Even if you managed to argue that position well, that only means that there is an irreconcilable gap between the moral cornerstones of civilisations, and because of that, we will at some point have some huge war to figure out which one will turn out to be right.
  - qwytw 5y ago
    Killing millions of innocent people in a pointless war does not seem like a very good way too prove that all countries should respect human rights. I mean as oppressive as the Chinese government is almost all of the people they oppress in Honkong or the mainland are still much better of (and more free) than they would be during or after WWIII regardless of who won. And claiming that it would be the right way to solve these "irreconcilable" differences is much more antithetical to the Declaration of Human Rights than whatever China is doing now...
    - AllegedAlec 5y ago
      > And claiming that it would be the right way to solve these "irreconcilable" differences is much more antithetical to the Declaration of Human Rights than whatever China is doing now... I'm not saying it's right. I'm saying its inevitable.
    - stale2002 5y ago
      We don't have to kill them. Instead, we just have to recognize where they are wrong, and oppose them as much as is feasible. If there was a modern day nazi nation, that was genoiciding people en mass, that had nukes, such that invasion was impossible/mutually destructive, the answer would be the same. Yes, sometimes it is difficult to stop all the bad things that evil people are doing. But that does not change the fact that those actions are still clearly evil and should be opposed where possible.
  - 5y ago
threatofrain 5y ago
A right without enforcement is just a nice idea. I don't think we've ever had anything close to international human rights. It is not remotely obvious how a framework of global human rights would work in current times.
- tomjen3 5y ago
  Poorly, and with lots of violations, is how I imagine the framework would work, but by having such a framework we have something that we can refer to, something that we can point to when countries aren't living up to it. Yes, it is just a peace of paper, except that it is also not once it becomes something to fight for and something that people believe in. The US declared itself independent while British troops were in the country. It asserted rights against somebody else who didn't recognize them. And that worked well enough that later people would refer to those assertions when debating freeing the slaves, and it was that which MLK was able to refer to in his speech. I won't live long enough to see international human rights become a norm and neither will anybody else alive right now. But that doesn't mean that it isn't important that we start creating the norm now.
- haswell 5y ago
  > A right without enforcement is just a nice idea. There was a time that all of these were just "nice ideas" in the US - Same sex marriage - Women having the right to vote - People of color having the right to freedom - And on the list goes Most of these rights were not enforced, or even recognized until people fought either with pens or with weapons and progress was made. I linked to the UN's framework for this in my parent comment, and while I agree that this is an incredibly hard problem to address globally, we shouldn't discount the value and power of "nice ideas".
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
bllguo 5y ago
the "international community" is dominated by an affluent western minority that had no qualms about pillaging the rest of the world for centuries with no regards for human rights. _This_ is the Chinese - no, the foreign - perspective. If we think it's not useful to consider then so be it, we'll be locked in cold war for the foreseeable future. Personally I think there are more productive methods than hypocritical grandstanding.
- wangii 5y ago
  don't understand why it's down voted. seems to be a valid argument. care to clarify?
- another_story 5y ago
  Looking back at what other countries did centuries before is a weak argument for justifying what one does today. The “international community” includes more than a western minority when it comes to the issue of Hong Kong.
  - wangii 5y ago
    yes, basically the argument against 'whataboutism'. however I have a hard time to process the idea of 'follow what I told you, not what I have done' attitude.
    - torstenvl 5y ago
      The affluent Western minority is led by an anti-colonial rebellion whose record on this issue, while nowhere near perfect or even an absolute good, is the best of any major power in the history of humanity. When China says "You know what, China? No. We will not break our own agreement. How could you even suggest that? Hong Kong is sovereign" (as the United States recently did in McGirt v. Oklahoma), then we can talk about whataboutism. Until then, that kind of argument is utterly unconvincing.
      - bllguo 5y ago

lmilcin 5y ago

This is poor logic, even if we agree on the ultimate result. > Whether or not China recognizes human rights doesn’t have any bearing on whether or not they are breaking them. "Whether or not your country recognizes Sharia doesn't have any bearing on whether or not you are breaking it and you should be prosecuted for breaking it." See how stupid your logic sounds when it is told from another perspective? If you want to fight for something at least try to understand what makes you right and the other one wrong.

tomjen3 5y ago
You are assuming that all world views are equal, and doing so in a way that appear to be quite arrogant. We are absolutely saying that not all views are equal and that it is a violation whether the country acknowledge it or not. If you need to anchor it in something else: humanism has brought the quickest, most effective and most complete, reduction the suffering of individuals of any system ever practiced anywhere, by more than one magnitude. Sharia is hanging of men for having sex with men, and the beating of women for getting raped.
- laurent92 5y ago
  Humanism? How do you check this? Why not “It’s extremely probable that economic development brought the quickest most effective reduction of human suffering”? Why not “Fossil fuels brought the quickest reduction of suffering”? Maybe our interest for humanism depleted when we had to get rid of fossil fuels because of climate change; at which point we noticed that humanism was only a pipe dream atop a fossil-dependent society, and coal had made our life much easier for a short period of time, until we fell into hard times again.
  - wangii 5y ago
    why is this down voted? I honestly don't know. imho the point is perfectly valid. is there too much political correctness?
  - tomjen3 5y ago
    You may as well ask if we stopped humanism when we stopped using asbestos. The answer is the same: no.
stale2002 5y ago
> when it is told from another perspective? The difference is that the other perspective is wrong, and ours is much closer to being correct (even if it still has problems). So that is why your statement is silly. And before you say it, no, I do not care about any of your arguments about cultural relativism. I am perfectly happy, saying that people who, for example, want to kill gay people, have morals that are wrong, and that our morals, which are that we shouldn't do that, are correct. Are you able to do that?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
haswell 5y ago
You are mixing "Rights" and "Laws" in your analogy, which are often directly at odds with each other.
- lmilcin 5y ago
  Rights are laws. In US they are written into Constitution which is the law and which is source of these rights and basis for enforcing them. "Human rights" are part of international law which is an agreement signed by multiple countries -- a form of law.
  - floxy 5y ago
    >which is source of these rights Not in the American tradition. "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..." "The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/rights-constitution-2/ https://www.fff.org/explore-freedom/article/rights-constitut...
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
AllegedAlec 5y ago
> See how stupid your logic sounds when it is told from another perspective? It makes no sense because the Declaration of Human Rights is morally right, and China's refusal to acknowledge them makes them by definition evil. And before you try moral/cultural relativism in saying that 'well, they think they're right/ Sharia followers think they're right'. Even if you managed to argue that position well, that only means that there is an irreconcilable gap between the moral cornerstones of civilisations, and because of that, we will at some point have some huge war to figure out which one will turn out to be right.
- qwytw 5y ago
  Killing millions of innocent people in a pointless war does not seem like a very good way too prove that all countries should respect human rights. I mean as oppressive as the Chinese government is almost all of the people they oppress in Honkong or the mainland are still much better of (and more free) than they would be during or after WWIII regardless of who won. And claiming that it would be the right way to solve these "irreconcilable" differences is much more antithetical to the Declaration of Human Rights than whatever China is doing now...
  - AllegedAlec 5y ago
    > And claiming that it would be the right way to solve these "irreconcilable" differences is much more antithetical to the Declaration of Human Rights than whatever China is doing now... I'm not saying it's right. I'm saying its inevitable.
  - stale2002 5y ago
    We don't have to kill them. Instead, we just have to recognize where they are wrong, and oppose them as much as is feasible. If there was a modern day nazi nation, that was genoiciding people en mass, that had nukes, such that invasion was impossible/mutually destructive, the answer would be the same. Yes, sometimes it is difficult to stop all the bad things that evil people are doing. But that does not change the fact that those actions are still clearly evil and should be opposed where possible.
- 5y ago

threatofrain 5y ago

A right without enforcement is just a nice idea. I don't think we've ever had anything close to international human rights. It is not remotely obvious how a framework of global human rights would work in current times.

tomjen3 5y ago
Poorly, and with lots of violations, is how I imagine the framework would work, but by having such a framework we have something that we can refer to, something that we can point to when countries aren't living up to it. Yes, it is just a peace of paper, except that it is also not once it becomes something to fight for and something that people believe in. The US declared itself independent while British troops were in the country. It asserted rights against somebody else who didn't recognize them. And that worked well enough that later people would refer to those assertions when debating freeing the slaves, and it was that which MLK was able to refer to in his speech. I won't live long enough to see international human rights become a norm and neither will anybody else alive right now. But that doesn't mean that it isn't important that we start creating the norm now.
haswell 5y ago
> A right without enforcement is just a nice idea. There was a time that all of these were just "nice ideas" in the US - Same sex marriage - Women having the right to vote - People of color having the right to freedom - And on the list goes Most of these rights were not enforced, or even recognized until people fought either with pens or with weapons and progress was made. I linked to the UN's framework for this in my parent comment, and while I agree that this is an incredibly hard problem to address globally, we shouldn't discount the value and power of "nice ideas".
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

bllguo 5y ago

the "international community" is dominated by an affluent western minority that had no qualms about pillaging the rest of the world for centuries with no regards for human rights. _This_ is the Chinese - no, the foreign - perspective. If we think it's not useful to consider then so be it, we'll be locked in cold war for the foreseeable future. Personally I think there are more productive methods than hypocritical grandstanding.

wangii 5y ago
don't understand why it's down voted. seems to be a valid argument. care to clarify?
another_story 5y ago
Looking back at what other countries did centuries before is a weak argument for justifying what one does today. The “international community” includes more than a western minority when it comes to the issue of Hong Kong.
- wangii 5y ago
  yes, basically the argument against 'whataboutism'. however I have a hard time to process the idea of 'follow what I told you, not what I have done' attitude.
  - torstenvl 5y ago
    The affluent Western minority is led by an anti-colonial rebellion whose record on this issue, while nowhere near perfect or even an absolute good, is the best of any major power in the history of humanity. When China says "You know what, China? No. We will not break our own agreement. How could you even suggest that? Hong Kong is sovereign" (as the United States recently did in McGirt v. Oklahoma), then we can talk about whataboutism. Until then, that kind of argument is utterly unconvincing.
    - bllguo 5y ago