One of the keys I found in the Hannah Arendt reading was a passage explaining that the Rights of man was not only unenforceable, but could not distinguish the difference between the general human rights to from the civil rights of citizens. Even though people could see how millions of people suffered from different violations, "no one seems to know which rights they lost when they lost these human rights" (Arendt 34). This passage conveys something important to me as it explained events that happened where the declarations human rights written in the French and American revolutions were not truly successful. When people were forced out of their homes, no one else realized the serious consequences those that were forced to leave faced. While …show more content…
Right before the passage, Arendt talks about that worst experience for the people that have had their rights violated is not that they were deprived of these rights, but they do not belong to any community at all, so the claim that "they are not equal before the law, but that no law exists for them" (36). The passage goes on to talk about the difference between the right of freedom people have depending on where they are. The main point I believe Arendt is making in this passage is that people first lose their place in society, which leads to the loss of their human rights. Her explanation of this is confusing to understand how there is a "right to have rights". One of the few points she gives to this idea that I can understand is her comparison that someone outside the law "may have more freedom of movement than a lawfully imprisoned criminal", but "their freedom of movement, if they have it all at all, gives them no right to residence which even the jailed criminal enjoys" (37). The person may be able to physically go wherever they would like while the criminal cannot move, the criminal still has protection from the government, unlike the