I meant the much more modern conception of them, not really things like the magna carta or all laws in general.
Also I don't really have any firm opinions on the whole issue, it's just interesting to ask questions and see what people say is all.
yeah of course I wasn't trying to come across angry
the more modern conception of human rights comes post-World War II with things like the UN, the Geneva convention, international humanitarian law, etc.
these are all good things that have made things better too. e.g. perpetrators of the Bosnian genocide wouldn't have been prosecuted without them. torture has reduced significantly because every country has agreed to formally ban it, thanks to the modern conception of human rights. obviously there's still torture, but there's less of it.
if there wasn't any human rights discourse, things like Abu Ghraib wouldn't even be controversial or make the headlines. who cares if there's no such things as human rights?
put it this way, if all states had totally free reign without the constraint of at least having to attempt to justify their adherence to human rights, a hell of a lot more people would be dead or suffering than currently are, even if there's still loads of death and suffering