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Rights And Civil Rights

Decent Essays

Civil rights are the rights granted from our government to the citizens to make sure that government treats citizens equally, applies all laws fairly and does not discriminate against any group based on race, religion, gender and disability. Civil liberties are individual freedoms that restrict the power of the government in our lives, they are guaranteed in the Constitution and are described in detail in the Bill of Rights. A great example of a civil liberty is free speech and the right of expression. While free speech helps citizens to keep the government in check by being able to debate and engage in conflicting narratives, it provides a voice to express new ideas and avoids censorship which would otherwise skew information for the benefit of majority. While free speech and symbolic free speech is protected, even in the case of flag burning, the courts have ruled that if free speech causes an immediate lawless action of violence, it become an infringement of other people’s rights. Sometimes it is difficult to balance conflicting rights between individual or between individual and the entire country. Who is to prevail? Who has more rights? In the case of individuals, an example of conflicting rights is a candidate for election who has the right of privacy but, at the same time, people need to know about his private affairs to have enough information to make a good determination on casting their vote. A conflict of rights with society may be the Patriot Act which purpose is

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