Chapter 4 - Background Information on Human Rights
4.5 Q&A http://eycb.coe.int/compass/en/chapter_4/4_5.html
Compass 不只是一本給老師而是專門寫給年輕學子的教育手冊。幾十年來，歐盟中學生都熟悉它的內容，更懂得自己有哪些權益並且更懂得尊重他人。
但是你可以想像嗎？亞洲太平洋地區是全世界五大區(另外幾區為歐＼美＼非＼阿拉伯區)唯一沒有成立法律強制性的人權系統的區域。
很多其他地區的人基於價值觀上的不同覺得無法和亞洲人溝通。底下這兩個亞洲人常對人權提出質疑的問題也在教育手冊中出現：
Why should I respect the rights of others if others do not respect my rights?
… In the end, though, it is probably down to you and the type of person you want to be or the kind of world you want to live in. So you could reflect on what it would say about you if you were to behave in the manner that you dislike in others. Or think about the type of world it would be if everyone violated everyone else's rights in a tit-for-tat manner.
另外一點跟台灣很多人喜歡叫殺人犯惡魔有關，很多台灣人因此認為死刑犯不需要人權，甚至有讀法律的或是當檢察官的朋友都這麼認為。
Why should those who violate the rights of others in the most inhumane way be regarded as subjects of 'human' rights?
This is perhaps the most difficult but also the most essential part of human rights theory to accept. It can sometimes seem that certain individuals are so lacking in humane characteristics that only blind faith could enable us to see them as human. The important points are perhaps the following:
- Firstly, despite some people's apparent inhumanity, every individual possesses some humanity. Villains love their mothers, their children, their husbands and wives - or someone. Villains feel pain, rejection, despair and jealousy; they desire to be appreciated, valued, supported, loved and understood. They all, every one of them, possess some, if not most, of these exclusively human emotions. That makes them human and deserving of our respect.
- Secondly, we do ourselves no good in desiring to hurt villains in the same way that they have hurt others: such feelings only make us less worthy of respect as well.
- Thirdly, even if, perchance, a villain were ever to emerge with 'human' form but without any human characteristics (and there has never been one yet), who among us could say with absolute certainty that he or she is Not A Human? On what criteria? On the basis, perhaps, that they are incapable of loving or being loved? But what if we turn out to be mistaken in that belief?
The third point reminds us that we need to consider the risks for humanity as a whole in setting up some people to judge others where the consequences of that judgment are terrible and irreversible. Do we really want a world where such judgments are made and where some people are simply designated as not possessing human rights and therefore as non-human? Without the absolute universality of all human rights, that is the type of world that we would have.
所以請不要因為某個人狠毒地殺了人就說他是惡魔。舉個真實的案例，有個家長對其中幾個孩子討厭得不得了，甚至親手殺了一個，還告訴另一個孩子，但是對其他的孩子好得不得了，有的還不是自己親生的。你該怎麼說？
又常常有人理論到：幸福的人沒有要求不幸的人放下的權利！
但是恨和活在過去會讓人放棄自己的健康快樂，這是對自己生命的責任，你不是為死者而活。如果你自認為你跟死者是同一個人，他死了你的心也死了，那搞不好連死者來托夢叫你要往前看都叫不醒。而且你又知道勸你放下的人比你幸福多少了嗎？家家都有本難念的經，人家的痛苦不一定比你少，或許人家只是懂了放下了生活才有意義，希望你也瞭解才勸你。
其他有趣的問題有：
Even criminals and heads of state[have human rights]?
English as a Foreign Language (2)