Browsing by Subject "ihmisoikeusfilosofia"

The rights of sexual minorities are either violated or inadequately materialized in most countries of the world. Discrimination against sexual minorities is not explicitly banned in internationally recognized human rights law. Thus human rights philosopher Jack Donnelly concludes that the rights of sexual minorities cannot be viewed as internationally recognized human rights. In this study, Donnelly’s human rights philosophy is situated within the political conception of human rights. It is observed that Donnelly’s human rights philosophy and anthropology leads to an emphasis on the importance of international consensus as the foundation for the justification of human rights. Since the current consensus nevertheless fails to grasp the human rights situation of sexual minorities realistically, the purpose of the study becomes to explore whether naturalistic conceptions of human rights might help understand the human rights status of sexual minority rights. The study criticizes the anthropological skepticism of several human rights philosophers of the political conception. Instead, the study emphasises the importance of scientific approaches such as cognitive neuroscience and evolutionary psychology. Following naturalistic conceptions, the study asserts that human rights can be based on best available science about human nature. The study tentatively concludes that the most central sexual minority rights appear to fit within various naturalistic conceptions of human rights philosophy. The study proposes conceptualizing central sexual minority rights as natural human rights. A pluralistic model of progressive naturalism is proposed as an outline for a more ambitious multidisciplinary study.