Resolving the "Rights" vs. "Duties" Philosophical Problem ~ Elder Of Ziyon

Tuesday, July 29, 2025

Resolving the "Rights" vs. "Duties" Philosophical Problem

For centuries, moral and political philosophy has been entangled in the tension between rights and duties. On one side stand advocates of rights, insisting on inherent entitlements to life, liberty, speech, or property, which are often treated as inviolable and absolute. On the other, duty-based systems focus on obligations: what we owe to one another, to society, or to a higher moral ideal.

This conflict is not just academic. It plays out in political debates, legal systems, workplace policies, and personal decisions. Who wins when one person’s “right to speak” clashes with another’s “right to safety”? Are these claims equal? Is one more fundamental? Can either be limited?

Traditions across time have sought to resolve this problem. From Confucian role ethics to medieval natural law to modern personalist philosophy, many thinkers have emphasized that rights only make sense within a network of duties. But even so, contemporary discourse - especially in the West - tends to treat rights as freestanding absolutes. This often leads to moral gridlock, where no claim can yield without appearing to betray justice itself.

My own journey in developing the AskHillel ethical framework began with frustration toward this rights-based thinking. Rights often seemed like floating moral trump cards that are asserted without context, weighed without tradeoffs, and wielded without accountability. By contrast, obligations offered structure, relationships, and clarity. I began to favor a duty-first worldview, where moral coherence came not from what one could demand, but from what one was responsible for. I even wrote that rights themselves are a fiction.

And yet… something didn’t sit right.

Despite its flaws, the language of rights clearly served a vital function. It pointed to something deep in the human moral intuition: the need for protection, dignity, justice, and fairness. Rights language resonates with people for a reason. Could it be refined rather than discarded?

Then yesterday, as I was writing another article, it hit me:

Rights aren’t metaphysical absolutes. They’re values.

The word "rights" is famously ambiguous. It can refer to:

Legal guarantees (e.g. the right to vote),
Moral claims (e.g. a right to be treated with dignity),
Political slogans (e.g. "the right to choose" or "the right to bear arms"),
Or philosophical assumptions about personhood and freedom.

These usages often blur together. That’s one reason why rights-based arguments frequently collapse into shouting matches. People use the same words to mean very different things—and treat all versions as equally sacrosanct.

My reframing resolves this confusion. If all forms of “rights” are understood as expressions of values, then we are no longer debating abstractions. We’re dealing with real, nameable, ethically actionable priorities: the value of autonomy, the value of truth, the value of life, the value of dignity.

This reframing provides a common grammar. Whether we’re debating a legal right to protest, a moral right to privacy, or a political right to healthcare, we can now ask a more meaningful question:

What value is being asserted—and how should it be weighed against other values in this context?

AskHillel is a derech-based ethical reasoning framework that treats values as the basic building blocks of moral decision-making. Its architecture includes:

Tiered prioritization: Values are organized by ethical urgency. Life and truth typically sit at the top (Tier 1A), followed by foundational societal values (Tier 1B), and then amplifying or situational values (Tier 2).
Override logic: When values conflict, AskHillel applies structured override rules to resolve the tension. For example, the value of life can override the value of speech during times of imminent threat or incitement.
Contextual evaluation: All values are assessed relationally—meaning, the weight of a value depends on who is affected, the type of harm involved, and the proximity or immediacy of the moral claim.

By understanding rights as values within this system, we gain an elegant solution to longstanding moral dilemmas. There is no need to debate whether rights are “natural,” “granted,” “inalienable,” or “alienable.” They are simply values that must be weighed—just like all other values—using transparent principles and override logic.

This brings practical benefits:

1. From Stalemate to Moral Triage

Instead of clashing “rights” claims, like speech vs. safety, religion vs. equality, or privacy vs. justice, we can now evaluate which values are at stake, and apply a coherent process to resolve them. This enables principled ethical triage rather than ideological deadlock.

2. Clarifies Ambiguous Debates

Many public disputes rely on buzzwords like “freedom” or “justice,” which mean radically different things to different people. AskHillel’s value-based grammar disambiguates them. For example, one person’s “freedom” may prioritize autonomy, while another’s emphasizes social stability. By making the underlying values explicit, we create space for actual dialogue.

3. Transcends Legal Minimalism

Law may recognize rights, but law is often reactive and limited. “Rights” is treated like a concept that is protected by law and therefore moral. By translating rights into values, we enable deeper ethical reasoning. For instance, a company legally allowed to run offensive ads may still violate the value of public dignity or communal trust. AskHillel gives institutions a tool to think beyond compliance toward integrity.

4. Promotes Responsible Freedom

When rights are treated as values, they are no longer passive entitlements but active ethical priorities. The question shifts from “What am I allowed to do?” and "What is owed to me?" to “What am I responsible for, given the values at stake and who is affected?” This shift nurtures maturity and moral agency.

5. Enables Shared Moral Action

In a fragmented world, shared frameworks are rare. AskHillel offers a common foundation. When communities or institutions adopt the same grammar of values - even if they prioritize and rank them differently - they gain a mechanism for cooperation without coercion.

This reframing of rights as values does not weaken the moral force behind rights discourse—it strengthens it. It allows us to preserve what matters most in rights-based ethics (dignity, protection, autonomy) while discarding the absolutism that leads to gridlock, irresponsibility, or conflict.

Rights are powerful because they name things we care about. But their power becomes destructive when they are treated as untouchable or context-free. Once we recognize that rights are simply prioritized values, the conflict between rights and duties collapses. Duties flow naturally from the values we uphold. And values can be managed, weighed, and balanced—transparently, responsibly, and with moral clarity.

AskHillel doesn’t reject rights. It translates them.

And in doing so, it offers something rare: a path forward.