universal human rights: tryout#1
i guess to begin, i will start off with something lifted from chomsky: did mitch have a class bias?
Flooding in Honduras or Bangladesh takes a huge toll. An earthquake measuring 7.7 on the Richter scale shook up California in 1992 and one person died. A less intense earthquake in Managua left 15,000 victims. A typhoon in Bangladesh can signify half a million lives.
It's a question of good governance or lack thereof. Why are the poor always most affected by disaster? According to Chomsky, because the poor farmers in Posoltega, Nicaragua, were pushed into the most ecologically fragile zones, most unsuitable for agriculture. In other words, the poor were pushed by government and capital to more risky ecological locations. The result? A devastating and deadly mudpie in Posoltega where entire families were buried by mud and dirt with inadequate government aid. The president refused to declare a state of emergency, there was little advanced warning. And of course, the agri-export industry monopoly in the less compromising ecological regions benefited from the fertile ground that the rains gave them.
It's a sad reality. Why do I only see the urban poor in the streets in New Orleans? This disaster feels so similar yet so different than the tsunami in asia at the start of the new year. The attitudes... This is where we get into the rights of humans. As Sarah brought to my attention, the attitude of new orleans seems so different from the people affected by the tsunami. In new orleans, it seems more like, This is OUR right to be saved to be compensated to be insured, to be safe. Flip the page upside down and you see Asia says "help us help ourselves. the disaster has happened, we are in serious need of help". Life dealt asia a Bunsen poker hand to start off, but they are still hopeful that they will be saved on the turn and the river. Rights... I don't think there was any vehement debate on the rights of the victims to help.
Now both parties have equal rights as humans if you subscribe to the universalist school of human rights. But the attitudes are so different. Does that change the universalist claim that all humans deserve equal rights? Or does it lend support to a more culturally relativistic conception of human rights? In the tsunami situation in asia, there was little talk of the right to food, water and security. It was more like, this is what is needed. "what can you spare?". Not, "this is our right, government, start the hamster wheels of justice!".
I will try to expound on this later. Just some thoughts right now.
New Orleans is sinking, and I don't want to swim.
Flooding in Honduras or Bangladesh takes a huge toll. An earthquake measuring 7.7 on the Richter scale shook up California in 1992 and one person died. A less intense earthquake in Managua left 15,000 victims. A typhoon in Bangladesh can signify half a million lives.
It's a question of good governance or lack thereof. Why are the poor always most affected by disaster? According to Chomsky, because the poor farmers in Posoltega, Nicaragua, were pushed into the most ecologically fragile zones, most unsuitable for agriculture. In other words, the poor were pushed by government and capital to more risky ecological locations. The result? A devastating and deadly mudpie in Posoltega where entire families were buried by mud and dirt with inadequate government aid. The president refused to declare a state of emergency, there was little advanced warning. And of course, the agri-export industry monopoly in the less compromising ecological regions benefited from the fertile ground that the rains gave them.
It's a sad reality. Why do I only see the urban poor in the streets in New Orleans? This disaster feels so similar yet so different than the tsunami in asia at the start of the new year. The attitudes... This is where we get into the rights of humans. As Sarah brought to my attention, the attitude of new orleans seems so different from the people affected by the tsunami. In new orleans, it seems more like, This is OUR right to be saved to be compensated to be insured, to be safe. Flip the page upside down and you see Asia says "help us help ourselves. the disaster has happened, we are in serious need of help". Life dealt asia a Bunsen poker hand to start off, but they are still hopeful that they will be saved on the turn and the river. Rights... I don't think there was any vehement debate on the rights of the victims to help.
Now both parties have equal rights as humans if you subscribe to the universalist school of human rights. But the attitudes are so different. Does that change the universalist claim that all humans deserve equal rights? Or does it lend support to a more culturally relativistic conception of human rights? In the tsunami situation in asia, there was little talk of the right to food, water and security. It was more like, this is what is needed. "what can you spare?". Not, "this is our right, government, start the hamster wheels of justice!".
I will try to expound on this later. Just some thoughts right now.
New Orleans is sinking, and I don't want to swim.
