Friedrich Nietzsche Is Wrong About Human Rights

An excerpt from Wikipedia article on anti-humanism:
For Friedrich Nietzsche, humanism was nothing more than a secular version of theism. He argues in Genealogy of Moralsthat human rights exist as a means for the weak to constrain the strong; as such, they deny rather than facilitate emancipation of life.


I agree that human rights are a means for the weak to constrain the strong. The entire concept of human rights arose because of an endless array of tragedies in human history involving strong people trampling on the lives of weaker people. But the concept of weak versus strong has to be expanded to include docile versus ruthless and unarmed versus armed. So when I say "strong" here it also applies to "the man with the gun", even if physically, mentally, and emotionally he is weaker than his prey. 


I strongly disagree that human rights deny rather than facilitate emancipation of life. 


First, rights are only a zero-sum game in situations with acutely limited resources and unequal rights. For example, granting everyone the right to vote does not limit anyone's right to vote in normal situations. Granting certain people the right to haul water from a specific well but not granting that right to other people will potentially deny freedom to those others to haul water when there is a large demand by people with rights that causes a long wait for people without rights. But granting everyone the right to haul water from a specific well does not deny anyone freedoms - they all have the same opportunity. 


Second, to suppose that a strong person's emancipation somehow hangs on his ability to trample on the lives of others is ridiculous. Can you imagine what new entries the Guinness Book of World Records might hold in this situation?  How about "Most 5-year-olds decapitated in a 2-minute period" - can you imagine someone being free to do that? And then someone else trying to beat their record? All in the name of being free to do whatever?  Of course, in a world where nobody has even basic human rights, there's no need for a justice system, because there's nothing to enforce. So when your 5-year-old gets decapitated by the Nietzsche fan you would be just as free to round up your friends and retaliate against him without fear of paying any consequences other than having to later defend yourself against HIS friends. This is anarchy.


Third, if we try to adopt only those rules that make life better for society as a whole, then a set of basic human rights are naturally the first rules that should be adopted. Look at Myanmar. A country of 55 million people, most of them oppressed by just one million in the employ of the government (military, police, bureaucrats, informers) who are themselves controlled by just a few thousand people who can be said to comprise the elite who are topped by the single military dictator. That country has no human rights. Millions suffer for the benefit of a few. Ending the oppression and suffering of those millions would clearly cause a lot more happiness than is currently enjoyed by the strong few who rule them, because all human hearts are similar in size. 


Fourth, not all people are created equal. We are not all the same. But we all share similarities, and it's each person's unique differences from others that gives the potential to succeed where others fail. For the sake of the survival of the human species, we should preserve the potential to use our differences for our common good. But allowing the strong to trample the weak erodes that potential. We need human rights so that all humans will be treated equally in certain situations in order to overcome the fact that we are not all equal. I believe this creates more liberties than it denies, and I believe that enforcement of human rights is one of the most noble things that can be done.