Human dignity is the main philosophical foundation of human rights as expressed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the charter of the UN, and other like-minded documents.
And as many black South Africans would know, the fight to attain human dignity was a matter of life and death.
The recognition of human dignity is a central value of the objective, normative value system established by the SA constitution. The right to human dignity is perhaps the pre-eminent value in our constitution.
As South Africans, more than any other nation, we must protect each human being’s right to dignity as those who know the absence of such rights.
The horrific, if not barbaric rape of eight young women by suspected zama zamas at a mine dump in Krugersdorp last week is yet another assault on human dignity, particularly that of women and children of this country.
The men of this country, here illegally or not, have reached a level of depravity that astounds the mind. The footage of young men, stripped naked, packed like sardines into police vans with their torn flesh, is troubling. It’s another assault on human dignity and an affront to ubuntu.
The scenes from Krugersdorp are akin to a state of emergency where the constitution has been suspended and the law of the jungle takes root. What justice do we get for the young women viciously violated when we practically strip our fellow men of their dignity? What evidence do we have that the hundreds of men apprehended this week are linked to the rapes that took place in the area?
What type of a society have we become that men find it so easy to violate women and children? In his book, The Decent Society, Israeli philosopher Avishai Margalit seeks to define a decent society. Margalit argues that such a society is one that does not institutionally humiliate its members and people in its orbit. Simply put, Margalit says a just society is one that does not violate the rights of people that are dependent on it.
He further recognises that institutions and people make up a society and by extension a nation. Herein lies the failures of our government and institutions. The people of Krugersdorp have been under the yoke of crime for years, allegedly at the hands of illegal immigrants who mine and reside in the area.
It had to take the gruesome mass rape and mob justice for our government to wake up from its slumber and attend to the concerns of the citizens.
People who are suspected to be in the country illegally and of conducting illegal mining were rounded up, assaulted, and handed to police. In the process of the humiliation, and not a crime proven against them, their inherent human dignity was stripped away, literally in some instances. The question we must ask ourself is, “do we have a decent government that can build a decent society”?
The indignity of too many women and children in this country suggests we have a long way to go. Margalit says a civilised society is one whose members do not humiliate one another, while a decent society is one in which the institutions do not humiliate its members.
The main difference, he writes, is that with the concept of a just society we speak about the relationship individuals have with each other. In a decent society we consider the relationship between people and their institutions, and therefore we speak about the setup of society.
The grinding poverty, sky-high unemployment, massive corruption and a failing healthcare system makes it near impossible to build a decent society. A country where public health institutions are centres of humiliation for many people cannot claim to be decent.
Bheki Cele and the men and women in blue seem to have forgotten that it is every citizen’s right to live in a safe country. Crime has violated the rights of too many South Africans – it has become a way of life.
The Cyril Ramaphosa administration must move with speed to introduce a basic income grant to try bring a semblance of human dignity to the millions of youth out of work. The crass materialism of leaders and their families in the face of grinding poverty is a big impediment to building a decent society.
As negotiations for a new social compact unfold, may leaders recognise that human dignity, safety and prosperity are the only ingredients to keep this republic so many have died for.
Follow @SundayWorldZA on Twitter and @sundayworldza on Instagram, or like our Facebook Page, Sunday World, by clicking here for the latest breaking news in South Africa. To Subscribe to Sunday World, click here.
