[jwalsh07]

But rights are not a matter of contract. They follow ineluctably from taking human life as the standard of value. That's all there is to it! Now, you may say that not everyone has to take human life as their standard of value, and you'd be right. But such people are often easy to spot: criminals (value money above human life), totalitarians (value the state above human life), terrorists (value their creator above human life), animal-rights activists (value animal life above human life), greens (value "nature" above human life), etc. But the overwhelming majority of people take human life as their standard of value, whether they acknowledge it or not, so this is a much firmer foudation for the Rights of Man than any book or sect.

Your post is exactly the reason the founders of this country made a point of saying that "we are enowed by the Creator with certain inalienable rights" for if we are not then our rights, the right to life among them, depends on which of your laundry list is in power.

By making it clear that these rights are inalienably ours they make it clear that it is righteous to crapcan any group coming to power that seeks to abridge them.

[atlaw]

Your post is exactly the reason the founders of this country made a point of saying that "we are enowed by the Creator with certain inalienable rights" for if we are not then our rights, the right to life among them, depends on which of your laundry list is in power.

Who was the "we" in that sentence at the time it was written? And what is the "Creator's" antecedent for the subsequent expansion of the covered "we"?

[js1138]

I think you have a misapprehension about what "unalienable" means. It does not mean that rights cannot be abridged, and behavior limited by laws and government.