Lol that's what you get for admitting you are human on this forum. I already do it: I have stolen a pack of pens from a store, downloaded movies illegally, smoke weed, drunk underage, sped.

I could try to argue that I broke these laws because I morally disagree with them but I would be lying. I'm not talking about murder or other things. Rather, I can say just as honestly as I said that people need laws and oversight that even in a lawless world I would lay down my life to protect innocent people.

Instinct can be a moral enemy (ooh yum that cookie looks tasty. It's not for me but I bet I could grab it and no one would know), but it can also be an ally (I should stop that man who is pushing that old lady around. I should do something).

Frankly, Octavious and Draugnar, your level of smear approaches krellin-levels. Knock it off and don't intentionally misinterpret my words because it boosts your Internet-ego.

To semck: it's okay, it was my mistake for forgetting the first quotation. Do I acknowledge that the human rights regime culturally originated in the West? Certainly. But I will not apologize for defending universal egalitarianism. Indeed it is on this basis that I respect and wish to protect cultures that are not my own. I think there is something inherently compelling about egalitarian rights that has driven the notion's expansion over the centuries. Think of the Declaration of Independence, "we hold these to be self-evident..."

Certainly "all men" was not thought in those days to include Chinese immigrants or black women, or gays or Native Americans or 11-year old mentally handicapped people, but today this is what it has come to mean. Once the cat is out of the proverbial bag and people have been exposed to the idea that they and their neighbor are morally equivalent, it doesn't go back in. Even if it fails to radically change that one person's actions, it shapes the landscape of ideas permanently. It empowers the oppressed, and there are a shit ton of non-Western oppressed people who indeed, as they become aware of the ideas behind human rights, apply it to their own cultures.

You can, if you want, play the moral relativist card (though I wouldn't have expected that from you semck), but if that's the road you go I would counter that it is paternalistic of you to claim that somehow other cultures cannot learn about what were at first Western ideas and incorporate them into their own culture as free agents. Why do you think almost every nation on earth at least lays lip service to democracy? Do you really believe it is all down to pressure from Westerners, and not from the people of these countries themselves?