There is no such thing as a right to dignity I just found this interesting and wanted to share, from the Oxford Academic International Journal of Constitutional Law https://academic.oup.com/icon/article/10/2/551/666082 conclusion: "Many people feel that autonomy is so fundamental to the human condition that it is, essentially, a facet of our human dignity. Many people also feel that the idea of human dignity is so fundamental that we should have a right to dignity. While superficially appealing, both of these viewpoints are essentially inconsistent with the concept of inherent human dignity as an underlying foundation and basis of international human rights law. Consequently, when they feature in domestic constitutional provisions and adjudication, they create confusion and uncertainty and lead to logically unsatisfactory statements of what human dignity as a constitutional principle entails. This creates disharmony between international and domestic rights protection; limits the scope for comparative constitutional analysis; and ultimately, serves to discredit human dignity as a constitutional principle and undermine its importance and centrality in human rights law. The logical conclusion to draw, therefore, is that domestic constitutional provisions and adjudication should distinguish between the right to personal autonomy and self-determination and the underlying principle of human dignity from which it derives. Moreover, it should be accepted that if dignity is an inherent characteristic of every human being which calls for that human being to be afforded equal treatment and respect, then there can be no such thing as a right to dignity." full analysis: https://academic.oup.com/icon/article/10/2/551/666082 What Im reading here is: you can either be promised dignity or allowed to actually attain it, but never both. And that seems accurate to me.
Dignity - the state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect. “All labor has dignity.” - Martin Luther King Jr. I agree with King. The fact that such an elaborate mess of an essay must be written to deny such a concept speaks against its message. This essay operates on a proposition that we live in a perfect egalitarian meritocracy. A complete lie. A person deserves respect upfront, they must do something to deny it. And to consider someone unworthy of dignity based on sociological criteria is a conception of pretentiousness. Equal treatment of respect does not conclude to equal pay. Treat your janitor with respect, do not dump orange juice on the floor they just cleaned. Conversate with them, engage with them as a person, instead of a profession. If you can’t, consider looking at yourself.
Generally, I agree. Individuals have a moral obligation treat eachother in a dignified manner. I was speaking more to the expectation of socially provided or protected dignity than I was to any moral obligagation of the individual. Oiow, dignity cannot be enforced.
