So What Is a "Basic Human Right"?
Is health care a basic human right? Bob Lupton, writing at the Sojourners presumptively-named blog "God’s Politics", thinks so. I created an account so I could post a comment that includes a question I’ll now formally pose here:
Is food a basic human right?
Food you need constantly in order to live. Health care you only need occasionally. (For some, very occasionally.) So which is more important for life?
Clearly, food is more important for life, and thus shouldn’t we have universal food care before we have universal health care?
(Before you point to food stamps or the WIC program, understand that they are nowhere near as invasive to the rights of all as ObamaCare would be. Those programs for the poor do not place any restrictions on my food purchases; on what I buy or where I buy it or what sorts of foods are sold. ObamaCare would force me to get a certain type of policy as soon as I cross a state line or change jobs. And there are many other restrictions on people and employers all in the name of covering those not currently covered. None of these kinds of restrictions come from food programs for the poor.)
So the questions before you are: If you support the health care reform that the Democrats are trying to pass:
1 – Is health care a basic human right?
2 – If your answer to #1 is "Yes", then is food also a basic human right?
3 – If your answer to #2 is "Yes", then why not universal food coverage? And what, exactly, do you consider a "basic human right" in general?
4 – If your answer to #2 is "No", why isn’t food a right if it’s more important to life?
5 – And finally, if your answer to #1 was "No", then why do you support a program that restricts everyone in order to deal with a few? Why not a program that just covers the poor, like food stamps do in the area of food?
Your comments appreciated. And I’ll report back if Mr. Lupton answers my question.
Filed under: Culture • Doug • Economics & Taxes • Government
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No to question number one.
Government may have an obligation to provide it to it’s citizens, and we as individuals have an obligation to help our fellows, but those are not the same as rights.
I certainly do not support any Democrat proposal now on the table. But you knew that already!
Obligation vs right, good point. Lupton called it a basic human right, but I still don’t know his definition of that and why food might not be one. From what (little) I’ve seen so far, the authors don’t respond to questions in the comments, even though this particular post has generated a lot of discussion.
I haven’t thought much about this in these terms, but it might be suggested that God thought food a basic human right, since God commanded Israel to set aside a portion of the harvest as belonging to the poor, the foreigner, the marginalized.
It wasn’t suggested as a charity (“let’s be nice to these poor hungry folk…”) but rather, as a matter of Justice, or at least that’s the way I read it.