Q&A: The Difference Between Rights and Obligations
The Difference Between Rights and Obligations
Question
Hello Rabbi,
Recently the disability organizations filed a petition to the High Court of Justice to equalize the disability allowance with the level of the minimum wage.
In their petition, the disability organizations argued that the State of Israel is violating the Basic Law: “Human Dignity and Liberty,” because it discriminates against people with disabilities in Israel and causes them to live below the poverty line. “It is impossible to live with such an allowance in dignity, it is impossible to live with such an allowance without humiliation, it is impossible to live with such an allowance at all,” the disability organizations wrote in the petition.
I think there is a common fallacy here, in which people do not distinguish between rights and obligations. Sometimes you’ve spoken in your classes about this fallacy. What do you think about this whole issue of people with disabilities? (Maybe it could be an interesting idea for a post that sharpens the distinction on this topic.)
Answer
For some reason it seems to me that I already mentioned this in one of the posts. There is indeed a mistake here. People with disabilities, single mothers, and anyone else have no rights whatsoever to receive any income from the state. Nobody owes them anything. At most, the state has a moral obligation to support them. Just as a poor person does not have a right to receive charity; rather, the giver has an obligation to give to him. One practical difference is that the recipient cannot sue the giver if he does not give.