What are Your Rights?
CONSUMER JUSTICE CONCORD
It is often asked, “What is a “right”? A “right” is a just (as in guided by truth, reason, justice, and fairness) claim or title, whether it be legal, prescriptive or moral. Sometimes rights, are that which is due to anyone by just claim, legal guarantees or even moral principles. Now that is a mouthful.
You mean that you have the ability to ‘claim’ your rights based upon your moral principles? And the answer there is yes.
Most times, believe it or not, we as humans come to understand our ‘rights’ after the fact. Sometimes it takes defining our rights, stating our rights, before people understand that they even have those rights.
Imagine a time before the United States came into being. Imagine yourself in London, circa 1750, living and working as a barber. Now back then, there were no concepts of “of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” Those ideas were not exactly floating around in British minds at that time. Yet, once the United States came into being, those famous words, those rights, were never truer. As Jefferson wrote: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
But consider that those rights were always true. We just did not know about them. Just because Thomas Jefferson wrote them down, quantified them, brought them out, crystalized them in people’s minds, Jefferson himself would tell you that by just stating those rights, did not make them ‘his’. Truth never has had ‘ownership’. We give credit to those who come to bring the truth out, state the truth, but those same people never look to take ownership of that truth. Truth transcends ownership of any kind. It’s just truth.
Today, we live in a pent up, quarantined, restricted world, the likes of which, we never could have ever imagined. Due to that same pandemic, the one big thing which has come out of that is situation is the explosion of ‘online shopping’. Online shopping took such a massive leap forward thanks to the safety concerns, even the fears that people had, while they were making their way through life. Shopping malls? Food Courts? Window shopping like before, not. Hours online looking at websites. Of course. That is the new normal.
When a consumer enters a sale with on online merchant or store, they are knowingly or unknowingly entering into a contract with that party, through that purchase.
The three elements of a contract are: offer (which is what the merchant looks to sell you) acceptance (the buyer agreeing to purchase the goods being offered) and consideration (the exchange of money for goods, goods for money, as both sides derive some benefit through the sale. If for example, the seller gets their price and the consumer gets shafted, the contract is broken, and the buyer can look to remedy the situation as is needed or wanted by the buyer.
There are 192 members in the United Nations General Assembly. Of those there many many countries which have active governments today. Of those, most have a Consumer Affairs Department or Agency there to help consumers. But if you think that they’re there to help you get justice from an online merchant you’re having issues with, forget it. That’s not going to happen. It cannot happen because they do not have the time nor the resources to ensure that your situation gets turned around. They don’t. Nearly all those agencies will tell you that your problem is a “private matter”, and you need as a private party or private person to solve your own problems.
Now on the other hand, we as Consumer Justice Concord are indeed here to help you and we’ll do what we can to see you done by rightly. All you have to is become a member of Consumer Justice and request our help. Easy enough to do.
But first, let us suggest that you find out about your rights as a consumer and appreciate what you’re entitled to. That’s important. The Consumers’ Bill of Rights