Voiceover by Sian: What are human rights? Well, that is one of the most searched-for questions around human rights and I'm going to try to answer that for you right now, in just two minutes. Let's get into it.
Human rights are the basic freedoms and protections that we all have, just by virtue of being human. They keep society fair, just and equal. Human rights have been around for a long time, like a very long time. But human rights law as we know it came about after the Second World War, in response to the horrific atrocities that were committed.
Winston Churchill saw human rights as a way of uniting Europe behind basic values like dignity, tolerance and decency. In the UK, The Human Rights Act provides us with all the rights set out in the Human Rights Convention. Those rights include the right to life, the right to a fair trial, freedom from discrimination and loads more. So who do human rights protect?
Well, this is where it gets a little bit complicated... I'm just kidding. Everyone! Children, the elderly, people in care, soldiers. Essentially, if you're human, you're in. But what rights matter most to us here in the UK? Well, according to a YouGov survey, the British public value the right to vote more than any other, which makes sense, because, you know, the British loves to vote.
Second place was right to a fair trial, which was seen as most important to those over 60. While the right to affordable healthcare was the favorite among 18 to 24-year-olds. Of course millennials care about healthcare, they're all drinking coconut soy lattes on their way to goat yoga. Yes, that is a thing. Side note: human rights laws don't technically include affordable healthcare, but they do protect the right to life and to basic dignity and healthcare.
Human rights help people get justice every single day. They are for everyone. We need to know our rights if we want to protect them. So get searching, or better yet, come straight to RightsInfo because we are the Google of human rights. That is genius. Can we use that as our slogan? We are the Wikipedia of human... Okay, anyway, see you on the site.
