Protecting Dignity in Virtual Space

• Author: Ana Alina Ionescu Dumitrache, Océane Rivoire
• Pages: 437-445

The Youth of Today - The Generation of the Global Development

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The Youth of Today - The Generation of the Global

Development

Protecting Dignity in Virtual Space

Ana Alina Ionescu Dumitrache1, Océane Rivoire2

Abstract: Human dignity is a fundamental right protected by national, regional and international law. This

research is about the ways of protecting this right in the particular space of virtual li fe, space which became

more and more conductive to abuses of dignity. Human dignity in the digital age is being contested very openly

today, and the Universal declaration of Human Rights (1948) must update every time because of new ways of

abuses. This research is mostly based on cases studies of the European Court of Human Rights, so as to highlight

that the more someone expose his/her life on the Internet, the more he/she will be at grave risk for his/her

dignity because of a lack of protection. Finally, this research argues that no wadays, in a cyber-time like our,

protection of dignity becomes a fundamental issue to deal with.

Keywords: human dignity; cyberspace; protection of human rights; dignity abuses

1. Introduction

The idea of human dignity dates back to Ciceron: it’s the public recognition of a social status and

something intrinsic within human being. In legal domain, this notion appears, mostly, in the Universal

Declaration of Human Rights (1948). There is, and it’s a fact, a difference between “explain” (from

outside) and “understand” (from inside). If dignity is doubtless hard to define and explain, we can

however understand it, in the way of visualizing it or perceiving the intended meaning of it. Therefore,

dignity seems to be a relational reality we need to experiment, i.e., life from the inside, to understand it.

If someone is alone, without anyone in front of him/her, it would be hard for this person to feel what

dignity is, both his/her and other’s one. Thus, dignity is understandable without needing a preliminary

explanation, without needing an instruction booklet. But another question needs to be asked: do we need

to be reasonable to be worthy? If so, what about human beings we consider as monsters: Hitler, Saddam

Hussein. This said, we must outline that human dignity is an end, and not a means.

In this study, we first aimed to raise the important issue of protecting dignity, i.e. understand why our

dignity is so important, and how people can be ensure that their dignity is protected. Then, we focused

on dignity in virtual space, this new connected world in which people can be anonymous (or they think

so), and we asked ourselves how, in a legal term, can dignity be protected in this specific space?

1Coordinator, Senior Lecturer, PhD, Faculty of Law, Danubius University of Galati, Romania, Address: 3 Galati Blvd., Galati

800654, Romania, Tel.: +40372361102, Corresponding author: alinadumitrache@univ-danubius.ro.

2 Erasmus Student, Jean Monnet University of Saint-Etienne, France, E-mail: oceane.rivoire@hotmail.fr.