By: Guillermo Stampur
Biking uptown along Broadway this afternoon after handing in my final exam, I noticed a homeless man talking to two well-dressed ‘corporate looking’ older men – they turned out to be missionaries. They were wearing pretty nice clothing, hair parted to the side, and held small brief-case like looking bags. The homeless man was sitting on a milk crate with a sign that read, “Ask me anything for 1 dollar.” Having just taken my Human Rights and the holocaust final, I could not resist hopping off my bike and entering the discussion. Having just thought about our legal system’s obsession with the body and things material and having actually used the homeless man hypothetical in my take-home exam, i gingerly approached the three men and asked, ” Do you think humans have any fundamental rights?” Taken aback by the frankness of my question, the two men in nice clothing looked at me like I was crazy – i looked a little crazy since I just finished my last exam – but the homeless man looked at me and said, “Does it look like we have any human rights?” I got it right away. While the two men looked at the homeless man in confusion, I got it – negative rights! Like Anatole France said, “In america everyone has the right to live under the bridge.”
Remembering the lesson put forth in The Myth of Moral Justice regarding the moral sphere and languages limits i remained quiet – acknowledging that sometimes language has its limits and sometimes pretending like you understand what people are going through is in fact diminishing. I let the man continue. He talked to me for the next 5 minutes about his upbringing, explained that his family lives in Newark, his sister works for the post-office, and he loves to watch the kids play baseball in riverside park. While the ‘church guys’ and I looked on and listened to the man talk – quite a scene with Grays Papaya as our backdrop - I realized that this was a source of healing for the man. He did not know either the men or myself, but he was getting to tell his story. While he might be totally content with his current situation and who i am to judge whether or not he is, he showed me that story rally does have remedial and therapuetic powers and in America we really do have negative rights. It was a very powerful lesson to learn on the last day of exam period.
