The Rights of a Person End Where the Rights of Another Person Begin

People have certain rights, but the observation is generally that they end at the point where others’ rights start. The statement makes a lot of sense since it guides how people should act around others. The implication is very clear: the right of the individual does not occur in a vacuum but exists based on how the person interacts with others. If conflicts occur, then the person’s rights should have limitations. The reason individuals have rights is to ensure they avoid conflicts in the inevitable interactions that will occur with others in social settings. The rights of individuals do not exist in abstract contexts; rather, they occur with certain responsibilities and obligations.

Rights, just like most social conceptions are not absolute entities. Throughout history, scholars have viewed individual rights as legal concepts that have deep-rooted limits. One rights individuals value the most that illustrate the truth about the argument is the right to freedom or liberty. Many famous thinkers and researchers have agreed with the notion that a person’s liberty ends as soon as the other person’s starts (Saunders, 2016). It is a principle that supports the other-regarding conduct. In other words, it means that people have an obligation to themselves, and to other people,  within their social settings.

The idea of a person’s right ending with the beginning of another’s can mislead people to think rights get limited when interacting in social contexts. The notion is majorly untrue since the aim of individual rights is to give them the liberty to live fulfilling lives without interference with other’s way of life. If people’s ways of life conflict, then the rights are limited to provide the best outcome for each individual or the overall good of society (Savulescu, Persson & Wilkinson, 2020). The principle is about the collectivist argument of ethical superiority over the individual. It is, therefore, true that the right of one person ends with the start of other persons’, and it is a principle that sustains a better society for all.

References

Saunders, B. (2016). Reformulating Mill’s Harm Principle. Mind;125(500), pp. 1005–1032,

https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/fzv171

Savulescu, J., Persson, I., & Wilkinson, D. (2020). Utilitarianism and the pandemic.

Bioethics, https://doi.org/10.1111/bioe.12771