Thomas Paine Natural Rights

Natural rights are the basic rights all humans hold that are not restricted or altered by human laws, cultures, and governments. Some people hold differing ideas about what these rights include but most follow Thomas Jefferson’s take on them which states “that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.” The basic ideas being that all men are equal and free to live life. It is stated that a government infringing on these rights is grounds for the people to “. . . alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government. . .” in order to protect their rights. Thomas Paine follows these basic ideas of natural rights and accuses
Americans thought that when the people of these countries overthrew their governments they would adopt more secular and progressive forms of government. Most of the governments of the countries involved in the Arab Spring follow various levels of sharia law from their judicial systems and law being based on it entirely to certain aspects of it being applied to their government. The leaders and governments that were overthrown most definitely did not follow any of the ideals expressed in Paine’s and Jefferson’s documents. Many of the leaders have been put on trial or accused of violating human rights laws and corruption, the laws of these governments also violate Paine’s and Jefferson’s documents by creating unequal opportunity and restrictions on the freedoms of their citizens. Then new governments put in place were largely unsuccessful in the short term besides the country of Tunisia who successfully transitioned to a democratic system of government. Other countries had power struggles and civil war erupt when their governments attempted to violently put down protests. The governments now are torn between secularists and Islamists fighting for political power. The new governments do not fully follow natural rights as Americans see them. They still discriminate against religion and gender, for example, in Egypt, a
We see these freedoms as non-negotiable since we are born with them and a person cannot be stripped of these natural rights at a later date. These views come from the colonists in America fighting against unfair rule by the British who they believed infringed on their natural rights as human beings. America gained independence and based the government on these values being non-negotiable. Although we see these as non-negotiable natural rights in our country not every country in the world agrees with us. We are incorrect to impose these values on foreign cultures even if it might help that country. If they are not supportive of these values then they should be left alone as long as they don’t try to force their values on anyone but their own country. Forcing American values on foreign cultures is not consistent with America itself. America is a large country with a diverse population of different races and cultures. You are free to live how you want as long as you don’t infringe on other’s freedoms. By trying to force American values on foreign countries we are being inconsistent. By forcing our sense of values or right and wrong on other parts of the world we can end up hurting our national security, for example, ISIS being formed after we tried to push American values in that part of the