My Gripe with Rights Skepticism

nico@nico-behrens.de (Nico Behrens) — Tue, 22 Jul 2025 19:18:20 +0200

Recently I have been involved in discussions with skeptics denying the existence of individual rights. A common claim is that rights cannot be inherent in nature because they are purely man-made. I want to pose a concise counterargument to this claim, that highlights some shortcomings of what is commonly called rights skepticism or skepticism in law.

First we need to define what a right is. A right is always assigned to an individual and grants him or her exclusive access to something. This access has to include some kind of interpersonal enforceability when someone else tries to access the same thing. E.g., a right to my body must be my will taking precedence over what other people intend to do with it; in the utmost case, a right legitimizes force.

The Christian Democrats and the Idea of the Digital Gulag

nico@nico-behrens.de (Nico Behrens) — Sat, 01 Jun 2024 00:00:00 +0000

It is well-documented that the Chinese Communist Party employs a so-called social credit system. Albeit fragmented, it is capable of evaluating individuals, businesses, and institutions based on their compliance with communist ideals.

Frankly, this is nothing new. More surprising is the growing number of Western politicians contemplating a synthesis of such systems with liberal democracies.

Just recently, the German politician Mario Voigt—a possible contender for the office of Minister-President of Thuringia—proposed multiple measures to combat hate crimes and fake news on social media during a speech in the Landtag. In addition to proposing a ban on bots, he called for a mandatory real-name policy for all social media users, akin to what Elon Musk had in mind for Twitter (now X), though he has not yet implemented it. Any such proposal would directly undermine individual anonymity. Fortunately, a handful of countries have already ruled similar measures unconstitutional.

Articles on Nico's lair

My Gripe with Rights Skepticism

The Christian Democrats and the Idea of the Digital Gulag