How could an atheist defend the concept of unalienable rights?

Answer 1

Unalienable rights are another name for natural rights or in more modern usage: human rights. Human rights refer to the rights and freedoms that all people are entitled to.

Natural rights is a complicated topic with many facets and the concept dates back at least to late Antiquity. Briefly, natural rights have been described as universal, inalienable rights that all people are entitled to regardless of political and legal institutions and beyond the authority of secular or religious authorities. Some people recognize no difference between natural rights and human rights which include: life, liberty and property; freedom from oppression; self determination; religious freedom; equality; privacy.

Some people believe that human rights come from a Creator who after creating the universe endowed its inhabitants with these certain rights and then became detached from the world. Others believe we have these rights simply by being human.

The view of natural/human rights has changed from one era to the next. However, there is no universal description of natural rights and they are viewed as non-sensical by many since they are truly non-existent for millions of people around the world and have been throughout history, i.e., witness the enslavers and the enslaved who have always been a part of human history. One school of thought holds that in the natural state only the strongest can benefit from their natural rights so people form a social contract ceding their natural rights to an authority (government) to protect them from abuse by the stronger individuals.

Although every human is entitled to human rights we must depend on governments to provide them. The reality is that not all governments provide their citizens with human rights. In many countries the people are exploited, abused, tortured, killed by government troops, starving, denied education and medical treatment and live on the edge of death every day depending on relief provided by other countries. In some cases that reality is made worse when the government leaders are themselves rich and living in luxury.

Any person, atheist or theist, can defend the concept of unalienable rights. That concept is not an exclusively religious concept.