Human Dignity

Our existence as human being is complementary with our missions or goals in life. It somehow tells us what we want, what we need, and what we aspire of in due period of time. Personally, I do believe that those reasons of our existence, being alive, here and now are primarily based on that goal. Unless we might say, it is the need of the rope. Stop! And life is just until there. Absolutely, it could not be. If then, one might be foolish to do or to be such. Most probably, the way we crave for something that will fulfill our existence could be based on palpable experience, external things. In usual and plebeian way of life, it is actually true and might be for it manifests giving value by fulfilling all the potentialities that we have given by Someone’s gift of life.

Good looks, money, material possession, fame and popularity are maybe our external or sentient goals in life. It seems to be appearing temporarily in our world but then its may sometimes our source of survival. If we are just contented with what we have and what we are, it can manifest a realm of mediocrity. We want to have good looks since we have given the nature that can be possibly developed to somewhat superficially better or best. It is our natural inclination to have such, for it is our nature. It would be irrational for us to neglect to become what nature has meant us to become. So, be human in nature because we are human beings. We want that money and material possession. Those are things that make us to endure life in the competition for survival. We incline also to have or to possess fame and popularity. Is he an approval addict? Pleasure seeker? Maybe, he is. But this desire will somehow cater to be honored and to gain respect just only in different means. Thus, it represents a desire for an increase of ones selfhood.

 I am not incriminating those individuals who aiming for those things. Actually, I myself do it just to live fully my existence in its utmost potential as a way of valuing or giving highest degree of meaning to my being, human being. Yet, the prevalence of this predicament might devour us to be blind, to be ignorant and to be too materialistic at some point. We may be enthralled with its glimmering spark of luxury but it will tend to deceive us in putting our life in disdain. We might use other persons to attain such goals. We couldn’t deny the circumstances that it really happened in our society. We tend to lead ourselves in perilous terrain of arid place. The dignity that human person must mold, must have and must possess has just taken a backseat. If then, we all get a big mistake. It shouldn’t be.

 As human being, we possess that faculty which somehow dominates other living creatures, our rationality. Being rational is our identity to have that capacity to think and to possess will. In the stratification of our hierarchic dimension of all living creatures, rationality is the possession that makes us on the top and has dominion over other lower being such as animals and plants. Thus, we have that supreme worth and profound dignity due to the fact that we are rational agents. Whereupon, we can think and decide what goal we may pursue and what we want to our life.

Thereby, our capacity to determine our vintage uniqueness as human being endowed with rational faculty lies on ourselves on how we could find our destiny or end as a self-directed and conscious being. Moreover, treating human beings as objects, manipulating or exploiting is undignified act and absolutely not in accordance to its nature. Treat humanity not as a means but as an ends.

For Kant, human beings have value that is absolute and unconditioned as an end in themselves. So act so as to treat humanity whether in your own person or that of any other always as an end and never as means only (Fernandez, 2006). Hence, a human being must be treated as human being not as animals. The value that he endowed is the true manifestation of his nature. Consequently, a person cannot be treated as an object of any means of his existence. The worth belongs to other person and to the one who value it and it is unconditioned worth. We cannot think that they are mere thing, object or means in achieving our goals. Respect on their nature is much important and that really matters on the person. Unlike things, their worth is not sporadic state rather it is interminable ulterior possession. For the things or material goods, these are just spasmodic desires that the boundaries of worth will lost when no one will desire on these things.

 Hence, human dignity is innate in us. It is intrinsic attributes within us. It speaks of what we are, who we are and determines or guides how we might live in, live by, live for. Without this, we are nothing; we are empty. Sometimes, this realm seems to be impractical. Our day to day experience of life will somehow attest that these are opposite to what kind of dealings we apply with others; it seems that it is too idealistic kind of reality. It might be so stupendous scene of life. It’s good but it is not usual that we do. If we do then, yet in other way around, is it justifiable? does it subvert or overthrow our dignity as human being?

Typically, when I go to school, I have that goal to study, to learn or to experience what life is. My teachers or my instructors are persons, human beings. Thus, they must be treated as a person not as a mere object. But sometimes, when I try to scrutinize some points, ponder and reflect on it, I tend to realize and discover that I use them as my means to achieve my goals. Really, they are and I am convinced that I do it otherwise. Their existence, presence is my means to reach my end. I do believe that same thing as well babbling on their minds, I as a student, is just a means to carry out their role or function as instructor , as teacher, if not, maybe their profession would be futile. When riding a tricycle, do you think I am not using someone to reach my destination? I do. I am using the tricycle driver as means, the same scenario on the part of the driver that he is somehow using me as a means to get what he wants, money from me. If we are going to look closer about this situation, is it wrong to do such thing?

Personally, it’s not. In that encounter with the teacher in school, with the tricycle driver, I am not only thinking of myself, of what I can gain from those individuals, what services they can provide for me but for the fact that I never treat them rudely will somehow show them what is due to them, the respect as a person, as human being. I think at some point I do not just looked at them as a mere thing, a means to get along with what I want. The respect that I shown to them is equivalent to the dignity they possess as a person, as rational being. On the other hand, making someone respectable, putting a human person in dignified pedestal in elevated platform, it is duly justified to treat our own selves with the same respect we yield to others. It is our moral obligation for our own selves not just only to others. Thus, we must treat ourselves in humane and just vis-à-vis to the pole of dignity. We must not let or allow others to manipulate us for we have that willful respect to our own self, in order to get something. It is our duty to protect this gift. We have that obligation to care for it and live it to the fullest. We have duties of proper self-respect permeated the staidness of upholding the concern to our bodies, to our being. That is why, self-exploitation can somehow go against in preserving the dignity of a person. It is justifiably immoral in a sense of prohibiting oneself to rest, if we are too busy, to play if we are so pressured with school requirements, to stop for a while if we are bombarded with confusions, to pause for meditation if we are so engrossed with what is happening in our lives.

We can say that we can try to set time for work, for plat, for everything. Otherwise, we can intermingle both work and leisure. These are best efforts that we can show love and respect to ourselves. Consequently, as a social being, we do not only mean to be socially able person but we can also value our personal existence by valuing our own self with dignity. We must to corroborate that we have dignity to be glorified. Everyone is valuable. No one is futile. We are all noble.

Thus, we must be in our own self, fully alive, existents, here and now. In the end, we, albeit many goals, have in our life either it is material possession, good looks, fame or popularity, it doesn’t really matter because what matters in life is not what we have but what we are – our innate and distinctive dignity as a person. Hence, with our rationality, we have that capacity to think and to exercise our own freedom and reason in determining what is good for us and for others. We are the makers, arbiters and promulgators of goodness to human race. In confidence and vehement spirit, we can claim our own inherent dignity and we are worthy to be called human persons – the masters of our own fate, the captain of our own ships, the architect of our own dreams and the carpenters of our own desired future.

 REFLECTION ON KANT'S MORAL PHILOSOPHY