“Rights Inflation,” as I call it, is a growing pet peeve. Here’s what I mean: Too many policy advocates these days attempt to elevate what they consider to be desirable public polices to the status of basic human rights.
That’s not a good thing. A right is something quite important and relatively rare in the total scope of human behavior and interaction. From the Political Dictionary:
Human rights are a special sort of inalienable moral entitlement. They attach to all persons equally, by virtue of their humanity, irrespective of race, nationality, or membership of any particular social group. They specify the minimum conditions for human dignity and a tolerable life.
As I see it, this means means that if something is a right, it really can’t be opposed because “rights” prevail over “policy” disagreements every time. Thus, some readers don’t like what I write here, but they don’t contest my right to host this blog as a matter of freedom of speech.
In this regard, I recently groused about declaring access to pain control a right–the aggressive delivery of which I support completely as a proper policy, but not a right. Now, NYT commentator Nicolas Kristof, promoting an international push for new forms of, and access to, contraception as a method of combating poverty, has pumped up the rights volume. Here’s the conclusion to his column:
Family planning has long been a missing — and underfunded — link in the effort to overcome global poverty. Half a century after the pill, it’s time to make it a priority and treat it as a basic human right for men and women alike around the world.
I don’t opposed contraception, nor do I oppose programs that make it widely available to poor people–if it isn’t coercive, which is sometimes a big “if.” But should birth control be considered a basic right akin to the rights to life, speech, and personal autonomy, such as freedom from rape? Is access to birth control really so central to the minimum level of human existence that everyone should be legally required to have access to it? Nope.
Of course, should birth control ever be deemed a basic human right, it would stifle ongoing debates about contraception. For example, would that prevent people from objecting to taxpayers funding forms of contraception that prevent pregnancies by destroying embryos in some fashion? Would churches theologically opposed to contraception be prevented from instituting policies within their institutions consistent with their beliefs? Not if access to birth control is a right, it seems to me. Would we be able to debate whether making contraceptives universally accessible is the smartest use of our resources? I don’t see how financial considerations trump the exercise of basic rights since human rights claims often trump issues of national sovereignty.
Again, I am not criticizing Kristof’s thesis, about which I am not particularly engaged. But I do oppose the loose use of the term “rights” and am suspicious that its misapplication is intended to embed many policies into the bedrock of universal rights application And that stifles democratic deliberation–which truly is a basic right.
September 26th, 2010 | 10:40 pm
I don’t really understand how anything that requires any sort of advanced technology can be considered a “right.” To be a basic human right, doesn’t it have to apply to all people at all times, not just to people living after functioning contraception was invented? For example, adequate living conditions may be a basic human right, but air conditioning cannot be…
September 26th, 2010 | 10:48 pm
It seems as though the Supreme Court already made abortion a “right” via the Roe v Wade decision. Since President Obama was very interested in signing the FOCA (Freedom of Choice Act) into law when he became president maybe they could just have a two for one deal and make contraception a “right” also. That would be great! (I am being sarcastic!)
I think this is all going to lead to undermining parental authority even more by telling kids that they have a “right” to birth control (without parental consent, of course).
September 26th, 2010 | 10:53 pm
Where contraception is, abortion and the culture of death will follow.
Wesley, your blog is one of few I check every day, and this issue is my only disagreement with you. The battle against the culture of life begins with the desire to prevent a new human existence. When such prevention fails, abortion becomes an inevitability. When we become used to ridding ourselves of human burdens, preventative destruction of the disabled unborn is justified, and euthanasia becomes the next logical step. Is this not a logical progression even a child could follow? I’ve been longing for you to revisit this issue. My prayers, as always, are with you and yours.
September 27th, 2010 | 2:17 am
Wesely,
You state that you don’t oppose contraception.
Do you mean that you simply don’t oppose its legality, or do you mean that you consider its use morally acceptable (even if you would allow for its legality).
If the latter is your answer, I was wondering if you have considered what psychological side-effects the use of contraception has, especially in terms of creating a culture in which having sex has become a sports activity devoid of responsibility. There is also the problem of change of attitude towards pregnancy itself and the conceived child.
Basically, do you think the use of contraception and its social acceptance has led to the creation of a culture of death.
September 27th, 2010 | 7:51 am
“Too much of a good thing?” Are you actually suggesting the alternative, that people do not have a right to determine the size of their families, be that ten children or no children at all? That the state has a right to determine how and when that can be done?
If planning the size of one’s family according to one’s choice is a basic human right (and I think anyone arguing that China’s forced “one child policy” curtails human rights would have to admit that it is — then it follows that the means of doing so must be a corollary right.
At any rate, the matter of access to contraception was settled here in the United States by the Supreme Court’s decision in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965). The Court held that privacy rights, while not specifically stated in the Constitution, flow from basic rights that ARE specifically stated there, and that access to contraception is such a right.
Frankly I don’t believe there are any debates about contraception that are of significance except in theological circles, and in a secular nation such discussions should be more a matter of academic interest than a compelling basis for legislation.
As for whether some taxpayers should have to pay for that with which they disagree on moral
grounds, it’s an interesting argument, but one which taken to its logical conclusion would allow anyone to withhold the bulk of his income tax payments (i.e., an amount in the same ratio as the military budget bears to the total national budget) were he a pacifist; or to withhold that portion that goes to the NIH because it subsidizes animal research.
In sum, contraception has been a non-issue for nearly half a century.
September 27th, 2010 | 9:24 am
HistoryWriter: “Frankly I don’t believe there are any debates about contraception that are of significance except in theological circles…”
Go talk to the graying populations in Europe.
September 27th, 2010 | 2:23 pm
Well, no, Griswold didn’t establish that _getting_ contraception was a basic right, in the sense that the state had an obligation to _supply_ it. The idea was merely that if people wanted to purchase it, its sale, purchase, etc., could not be outlawed. Surely this is a pretty basic distinction, no? Compare: In America purchasing and reading Bibles is a “right” in the sense that the government can’t ban the sale and purchase of Bibles. But it isn’t a “right” in the sense that the government has to buy everyone a Bible who asks for one.
September 27th, 2010 | 5:26 pm
Lydia: I didn’t say that government must pay for everyone’s contraceptives. Griswold, as I pointed out, protects ACCESS to them. However, I would add that there is no reason for insurance of any kind not to cover contraceptive prescriptions (except in some very, very narrow circumstances, the iteration of which would undoubtedly bring down the wrath of Wesley upon me). This is especially true for drugs that are in wide use and are FDA approved.
bmmg39: the “graying populations of Europe,” as you call them, are totally irrelevant. To the best of my knowledge policies that limit family planning in Europe went out with Hitler and Mussolini. Are you about to come out in favor of a reverse-Chinese policy, in which government should force people to have as many children as possible? How many do YOU have?
September 27th, 2010 | 10:05 pm
<<I don’t opposed contraception, nor do I oppose programs that make it widely available to poor people–if it isn’t coercive, which is sometimes a big “if.” But should birth control be considered a basic right akin to the rights to life, speech, and personal autonomy, such as freedom from rape? Is access to birth control really so central to the minimum level of human existence that everyone should be legally required to have access to it? Nope.<S (usual sinners) should ask ourselves, Is “IT” possible that some day we might have no choice but to team UP with our soul, spirit and flesh in our own World?
I hear ya! If we believed in such a thing Victor, “IT” sure would be a Quantum Leap past The Fourth Dimentia, I mean Dimention! Go Figure! :)
September 27th, 2010 | 11:35 pm
I’m opposed to contraception in any form, save abstinance, which I personally practice. Having said that, my opposition to calling birth control a “right” is that when you start lobbing the word “right” around and attaching it to anything under the sun you think you should have a right to, without interference, then anything comes up for grabs.
Is it my “right” to own a cat? No. It’s a privelage, one that could be taken away from me if I’m accused and found guilty of animal neglect or abuse. Or at any rate, it *should* be taken from me, and I should be lobbed with fines for such abuse. (a momentary pause to pet the kitty)
Is it my “right” to be free of pain? Nope. Right now I’m going through insane amounts of heart-ache because I’m taking care of my father in his terminal stages of cancer. It’s not his “right” to pain medication, either, but it should be granted to him as a matter of policy, as Wesley said. Yes, I’m reitterating what’s already been stated – I’m exhausted and mentally fatigued. I’m not sophisticated enough right now to come up with better anologies. Sue me.
Stick the word “right” on something and you lessen what true *rights* are – you make a “right” something that, on your whim, is something you don’t want taken away, even though at times it might be beneficial to yourself and others to take it away.
September 28th, 2010 | 12:15 pm
Well, Tabs, you ARE entitled (a) to remain in pain, (b) to be without animal companionship and (c) live without engaging in sexual activity — if that’s what you want. Is that NOT an exercise of your rights? And if it isn’t, then what’s the alternative?
What “should be” a right, and what “shouldn’t be” a right?
September 28th, 2010 | 5:52 pm
“Is it my “right” to own a cat? No. It’s a privelage, one that could be taken away from me if I’m accused and found guilty of animal neglect or abuse. Or at any rate, it *should* be taken from me, and I should be lobbed with fines for such abuse. (a momentary pause to pet the kitty)”
This reasoning is very poor. There are very few if any rights that Americans enjoy that cannot be qualified or removed under certain circumstances in any way. Convicted felons do not enjoy gun ownership or voting rights. A right can be taken away through due process of the law. Being found guilty of animal abuse in a criminal trial is due process of the law, and only after that has happened can your property–a cat–be taken away from you by the government.
I don’t believe the author of this article understands the concept of rights any better than you do. Access to contraception is a guaranteed right (Griswold v. Connecticut; Eisenstadt v. Baird), as well it should be. Attempting to sidestep this by qualifying certain rights as “basic human rights” above and beyond simple rights that aren’t universal is irrelevant because even the things we consider to be “basic human rights” can still be abridged under due process of law: a person’s right to life has been forfeited if he is convicted of murder and sentenced to death.
September 28th, 2010 | 10:37 pm
HistoryWriter writes: “What “should be” a right, and what “shouldn’t be” a right?”
When you demonstrate a rudimentary grasp of the answers to these questions, in terms beyond fashionable prattle, your comments on the topic might begin to approach credibility. (Hint: a person’s fundamental human rights oblige others to provide for them, with warrant of force, if necessary.)
These are basic concepts where there really isn’t an adequate substitute for basic comprehension on you part if you want to participate in their discussion.
Until then,
CH
September 29th, 2010 | 7:32 am
[...] Wesley J. Smith reveals one of his pet peeves: calling contraception a “right.” Smith writes, “But should birth control be considered a basic right akin to the rights to life, speech…? Is access to birth control really so central to the minimum level of human existence that everyone should be legally required to have access to it? Nope.” Sep.28, 2010 4:00 pm | Blogs | Print [...]
September 29th, 2010 | 7:32 am
Craig: You speak, yet say absolutely nothing. Perhaps you talk (long-windedly at that) for no better purpose than to hear yourself. I will admit that you don’t make the usual spelling and grammar errors, which indicates that you’re of an age when proper English was taught in school (i.e., that you’re likely to be 60+). Which raises the question: were you equally boring as a child, or have you worked a lifetime to develop the skill?
September 29th, 2010 | 3:24 pm
[...] J. Smith writing at First Things / Secondhand Smoke: “Too many policy advocates these days attempt to elevate what they consider to be desirable [...]
September 30th, 2010 | 11:57 am
dancingcrane & Andrzej
Have put this nicely:
“Where contraception is, abortion and the culture of death will follow.”
AND
“Wesley, your blog is one of few I check every day, and this issue is my only disagreement with you. The battle against the culture of life begins with the desire to prevent a new human existence.
psychological side-effects the use of contraception has, especially in terms of creating a culture in which having sex has become a sports activity devoid of responsibility. There is also the problem of change of attitude towards pregnancy itself and the conceived child. “
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
September 30th, 2010 at 12:04 pm
Thanks Reginald. I have great respect for that generally Catholic view, but don’t see it. For example, Natural Family Planning helps couples decide when not have intercourse during the woman’s cycle–even if they want to express that love. It seeks the same thing as barrier birth control it seems to me–family planning, albeit through a method of not expressing love, rather than expressing it and preventing the possible fruit of that love.
But let’s not get into that here. My point was that access to contraception is not a basic human right. Thanks, Reginald.
September 30th, 2010 | 2:31 pm
Wesley: do you not consider it a basic human right to decide how large a family you should have? Would you argue that China’s “one child policy” does NOT deprive its people of a basic human right?
September 30th, 2010 | 8:32 pm
A confused understanding of “human rights” leads to HistoryWriter’s brand of nonsense (the kind that apparently only bores want to see clarified.) People can be free to choose the size of their families without contriving newly-defined “basic human rights.” Conferring this sort of right would also imply that folks with dreams of filling out the quiver have a “basic human right” to fertility treatments, IVF and the like, which by definition obliges others to provide it at someone else’s expense if need be.
September 30th, 2010 | 9:32 pm
Craig: my question was addressed to Wesley. However, since you’re presumptuous enough to have interjected yourself I shall ask you to answer it instead: would you argue that China’s “one child policy” does NOT deprive its people of a basic human right? That’s a simple enough question even for you to answer. Just a yes or no will do. I appreciate that this may require that you curtail your natural verbosity, but give it a try. Brevity, they say, is the soul of wit. [Gratuitous insult deleted--History Writer, I am blackballing you if you do one more thing I have asked you not to do. Grow up.]
September 30th, 2010 | 10:47 pm
HistoryWriter,
The answer to your question is as obvious as it is irrelevant. A state’s exertion of power over choices of procreation (China’s one child policy, for instance) violates basic freedoms, and I suspect you know that Mr. Smith doesn’t endorse anything of this sort. What you don’t seem to understand is that freedom from negative restrictions on the basis of rights as a human isn’t necessarily equivalent to “basic human rights” that assert the positive (the basis for compelling a state or any other party to facilitate procreative choices.) This was exactly the point of Mr. Smith’s post, which you seem to have missed.
October 1st, 2010 | 4:29 am
It’s your topic, Wesley, but I look forward to you “getting into that here”. Forgive the jab in the ribs, but I really want to see a serious discussion on contraception’s role in the origin of the progression from abortion to euthanasia to death panels. Contraception spurred western society’s attitudinal change from sex as procreation/marital bonding to sex as ‘sports activity’ (thx andr!) for anyone with anyone. If we don’t address the root problem, will addressing the developments from it do much good?
Agreeing with you that access to contraception is _not_ a ‘basic human right’ goes without saying, but it’s not enough. Say we succeed in erasing everything ‘culture of death’ except for contraception from our society. We would still have abortion, since many contraceptives are abortifacient, poisoning the embryo’s environment. It would not be long before we were right back where we are now, discussing what to do about elective abortion as a fruit of contraceptive failure, and the growing urge to rid ourselves of any inconvenient human burden. Expecting different fruit from the same root is just another form of insanity.
I’m sorry that you don’t ‘get’ Natural Family Planning. You’re not alone. For now I’ll only say that loving self-control while being open to life is a very far remove from making sure one’s womb remains a chemically lethal environment. The difference in attitude _is_ the difference between life and death. The _Catechism of the Catholic Church_, c. 2368-70, explains it well.
October 1st, 2010 | 7:53 am
Craig: You say: “[a] state’s exertion of power over choices of procreation (China’s one child policy, for instance) violates basic freedoms.” Agreed.
But then you claim that: “freedom from negative restrictions on the basis of rights as a human isn’t necessarily equivalent to ‘basic human rights’ that assert the positive (the basis for compelling a state or any other party to facilitate procreative choices.)”
That seems an odd concept. If “basic human rights” are to exist as anything other than abstractions they must be institutionalized in practice. It makes no sense to have a basic human right that government policy can render incapable of enjoyment; thus the means of availing oneself of a basic human right becomes a corollary right in and of itself. This is not “rights inflation.” On the contrary, it’s the means by which the whole panoply of human rights is undergirded.
ACCESS to contraception becomes a case in point.
October 1st, 2010 | 7:57 am
Wesley: I apologize for what you term the “gratuitous insult” to Mr. Henry, although I disagree that it was gratuitous instead of well-deserved. As you’re fond of saying — it’s your blog.
October 1st, 2010 | 10:49 am
So does access to other procreative choices based on confering a “basic human right” oblige facilitating IVF or other fertility treatments? After all, some folks, within their rights, may want a very full quiver.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
October 1st, 2010 at 11:50 am
Craig Henry: As I wrote in Consumer’s Guide to a Brave New World, there are those that say the entire area of reproduction is a basic right, allowing unlimited destruction of gestating life, unlimited access to contraception, unlimited rights as to how one procreates, e.g. IVF, cloning,y etc., unlimited right to have the kind of baby we want, including sex selection, genetic engineering, eugenic abortion, etc.
I believe people have a basic right to procreate or not procreate as they decide. But that doesn’t extend to a right to access every means to obtain those ends, such as IVF, contraception, or cloning. I have a right to free speech, but not to own a newspaper or have a radio show.
October 1st, 2010 | 1:24 pm
Perfectly agree, Mr. Smith. The distinction is not that difficulty to understand.
October 2nd, 2010 | 9:41 am
Of course the distinction “is not that difficulty [sic] to understand.” It’s simply difficult to justify, except by means of arcane philosophical exertions by the terminally long-winded.
October 2nd, 2010 | 10:26 am
Craig: to answer your question, it depends on what you mean by “facilitating”, and by whom. If you mean government supporting individual reproductive choices financially, then I would agree that one does not have a “right” to have governmental financial support for his/her reproductive choices. But be that as it may, one must expect government not to impede reproductive choice, at least to the extent that such choice is not a criminal act (e.g., infanticide); for while reasonable people may disagree about the ethical ramifications of family planning, once a fundamental right to have children has been articulated it follows that all legal means of enjoying that right should be honored.
Surely you’re able to see that inherent in the fundamental right to have children are the corollary rights not only to have as many as one wants, but to have none at all, just as the fundamental right to free exercise of religion includes the right to ignore religious practices entirely. Government can no more limit my access to contraception than it can have me dragged off to church on Sunday mornings.
That is the point that I’ve been making all along; that these corollary rights ought not to be demeaned as if we were talking about the trend toward granting easy ‘A’s in college courses.
BTW, I’m willing to admit to the possibility of owing you an apology for some of my comments, even if your occasional tendency to come on like an aging Young Republican’s version of Gangbusters does tend to grate on the nerves. Shall we declare a temporary cease-fire?
October 2nd, 2010 | 2:09 pm
HistoryWriter,
Yes. Appreciated.
Succinctly,
CH
October 3rd, 2010 | 8:43 pm
Thanks CH. Same here!
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