The concept of "rights" is growing less useful, I fear.
The internet is particularly important because it is very good for getting a message out to the world at large. Other existing channels tend to be more difficult to use or more limited. The internet lets people document current events first-hand without having to rely on reporters or news organizations.
So there are definitely some completely rational and practical reasons to declare internet access an international right, at the very least as a check against oppressive government.
Isn't that already covered under freedom of speech?
Reading a political screed, for instance, is not speech. It is probably protected in some other way, but I'm actually unaware of how. (Actually, considering workplace laws, I begin to suspect it's not protected.) Differently, is clicking a Like button considered speech? What about Unliking? How about transferring a file, or maintaining a personal wiki that no one else has access to?
These aren't questions I want answered anytime soon. I'd rather leave them alone and simply say that people should have the opportunity to engage in these activities, full stop, without having to figure out whether or not they're speech.
No one has a right to travel. It's actually phrased as the right to freedom of movement, which is a good confusing phrase because it prevents you from thinking you already know what it means. You have (in a free country) the right to go where you want. You don't have the right to a plane ticket.
Positive rights are dangerous. Positive rights inherently impose obligations on someone. They should be phrased that way to begin with. I can rationally discuss the idea of "education is an obligation of government" because it means what it says. If I dare say "children don't have a right to an education" I'll get lynched.
For many many many examples of how your argument breaks down, look no further than the US constitution. We have the right to freedom of the press - yet no one demands they get a free press. The right to bear arms - yet no one demands the government give everyone guns to exercise that right. The right not be compelled to self-incriminate, yet no one demands free paper shredders or disk wiping utilities. The right to sue anyone for more than $25, but no one demands free lawyers (for this purpose criminal defense is a different -- no disingenuous replies on this please).
So yeah a positive right in this case would provide an obligation for someone, but it doesn't mean providers must give no-charge options, it means the government would be obliged to not deny citizens internet access (except possibly as a penalty for crimes, ala prison does for a lot of rights).
Essentially this is a longwinded way of me stating this is a combination of strawman and slippery slope fallacies piled on factually incorrect statements.
I mean, there are politicians in democratic states who believe that protections afforded to the press on the basis of rights don’t apply to, for example bloggers. It’s not altogether obvious why freedom of expression or speech should automatically include the internet.
The primary diplomatic function of the U.N. is laying down specific guidelines for international conduct, so that there's no more arguing about what constitutes a violation of a specific treaty.
For example, suppose Ukrageria says, "But Zimbraqistan stationed 14 battleships outside of our port, that's an act of war," and Zimbraqistan counters, "But we just want them to lift the 200% tariff on Zimbraqistanian goods." The U.N. has specifically said that free access to ports is a sovereign right, so that resolves this dispute and gives Ukrageria international support for a declaration of war against Zimbraqistan.
Similarly, some countries have criticized Egypt for disconnecting its citizens from the global internet. Egypt in turn counters that their citizens still can express their opinions and speak freely so it's not a human rights violation. The purpose of the U.N.'s resolution is to resolve this dispute and clarify that freedom of expression must include international communication over the internet.
If you take this as the former, then perhaps I agree. But I suspect this was intended to be the latter -- i.e. freedom from ignorance.
I think the Internet absolutely should receive First Amendment protection in the US (and the US Supreme Court agrees), but calling it a human right doesn't seem to agree with the definition[2]. I'd love to hear arguments for the other side.
Note that this doesn't mean I think governments should be able to actively deny individuals access to the Internet, but a Constitutional right is not the same as a human right.
The purpose of the law is to make sure, that those bubbles are about equally sized for everyone.
Rights are "not absolute" only is the sense that exercising your right does not absolve you from responsibility for violating other people's rights. So, if you exercise your right to freely use your property, say, a gun, and shoot somebody - you'll go to jail. But not for using your gun - but rather for violating other's right to live unshot by your gun. Your right to use your property didn't go anywhere, but it also didn't remove your responsibility for the consequences of such use. If there's no consequences, there's no place for government to intervene (I know most governments disagree, of course they do).
This seems to be the most natural definition of rights. I can say whatever unless doing so prevents you from also speaking. Thus, I can't use even larger speakers to drown out what a protesters outside my factory are saying. But, I could use them to convey my message.
[1]https://www.btg-bestellservice.de/pdf/80201000.pdf - see Article 5
Second, "freedom" is not a right and never has been. It is not a useful term on its own. You can be free to do something, or free from something, but you can't just be generically free.
You seem to be asking this rhetorically, but I don't see what your objection to people being allowed to demand access to the Internet is. Could you actually spell it out?
The Internet just seems really specific (see the list of others at http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/).
That's why people who campaign for positive rights make a grave error, IMO. It cheapens the entire concept.
That's roughly what taxes are for, yes.
> Why is the Internet a human right but electricity, which is kind of critical to running the Internet, is not?
There are a number of arguments for electricity being a human right. I'm perfectly okay with saying it is one.
That said, the interesting point is that you're imagining electricity here to be an implicit right of Internet access. That's fine, but it implies that, if Internet access did not require electricity (and who knows, maybe it won't someday), the claim is that Internet access remains a human right without a need to imply a right to electricity.
I'm okay with those who have having to pay for those who have not.
Freedom to access internet is to same level, it means human people shouldn't be arbitrarily blocked from accessing internet, that's all, that's enough, and that's already a lot, actually.
Does freedom of speech mean everyone should be able to demand access to a printing press?
Specifically: This marks a departure from the conclusions of the 2nd World Water Forum in The Hague in 2000, which stated that water was a commodity to be bought and sold, not a right.[102] There are calls from many NGOs and politicians to enshrine access to water as a binding human right, and not as a commodity.
It seems to imply pretty clearly that access to water as a human right contradicts requirement for payment. The same argument is frequently heard when the healthcare is discussed. So I would say implying that it means not only ability to access but actually ability to access for all, regardless of means - is not out of the question. At least it does not contradict how many other "rights" are interpreted.
Nah, that's freedom of the press. :P
(Aaand thinking about it, half the people who see this comment won't realize this, so:
That was a joke.)
>The first of these political senses of freedom or liberty (I shall use both words to mean the same), which (following much precedent) I shall call the ‘negative’ sense, is involved in the answer to the question ‘What is the area within which the subject – a person or group of persons – is or should be left to do or be what he is able to do or be, without interference by other persons?’ The second, which I shall call the positive sense, is involved in the answer to the question ‘What, or who, is the source of control or interference, that can determine someone to do, or be, one thing rather than another?’ The two questions are clearly different, even though the answers to them may overlap.
[1] http://www1.nsd131.org/classpages/bwilliamson/Shared%20Docum...
What is one of the main arguments against that distinction? Well, consider: many people here are arguing that the Internet isn't a right because someone has to provide or pay for it. In some sense, it's not a "natural" right in the same way that they perceive, say, property rights to be.
But when you say you have property rights, you're not just saying that the government won't come and take your stuff. You're saying that the government has a positive obligation to send violent thugs in uniform to protect a monopoly, of use and transfer, over a physical object that it has recognized for you. (After all, otherwise a right to private property would be meaningless.)
That leads the people making the initial positive/negative distinction into an intellectual trap: all of a sudden, their negative liberty has shown its true colors. It requires as much government involvement as, say, the universal provision of healthcare service. Or the Internet! Even freedom of speech requires government action to uphold: it's pretty meaningless to have freedom of speech if the government won't back up its guarantee of force on individuals who would harm you for saying something.