Imagine a world without equality, where only a certain race, class and sex are entitled to rights and privileges; justice is nonexistent. Such a world would be unthinkably harsh and cruel and inevitably lead to segregating the world into polarizing groups. To prevent such abomination from reaching reality, certain standards that are observed and respected by all of humanity is necessary. The famous excerpt from Declaration of Independence by Thomas Jefferson sets a good direction for the standards all humans should endorse, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, 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"(878). Indeed, all men possess certain unalienable rights, because we are all intrinsically valuable. However, these rights are not self-evident. People are entitled to these rights only on the basis that they do not infringe on others' rights to freedom and happiness.
We possess natural rights because, as human beings, we have intrinsic value. Our value doesn't serve any instrumental value to others and is completely independent of the assessment of other people. Even if no one values our life, it is still valuable. An excerpt from Peter Cave's Should We Save the Jerboa echoes this idea; "Some of us see beauty in sunsets a beauty that is valuable and would still exist even without humans around to appreciate"." (28) It is indisputable that nature is still beautiful even if human beings never existed to appreciate that beauty. Likewise, each individual human is intrinsically beautiful and valuable without anyone else's acknowledgement. The fact that we breathe, live and operate a complex biological mechanism, that fact that we exist makes us valuable. .
However, when people infringe on others' rights to life, freedom and pursuit of happiness, they are no longer entitled to natural rights.
