And what I'm saying is, it doesn't work to say that only "negative rights" (stuff that doesn't compel anyone to do anything) are human rights.

People have a human right to participate in their government, too. That certainly compels something to exist: a structure in which they can voice their desires in their governance.

It'd take a lot of contortions to work that right into being an ok-to-exist "negative right," and for my part just shows how "negative rights" breaks down really quickly once you get past the really easy stuff like speech.

The only reason contortions are involved is because you are inserting them to make the issue seem more complicated than it is.

>People have a human right to participate in their government, too.

Which is a limit on government's power. That is the essence of the entire Enlightenment philosophy that all this is based.

But the structures necessary to participate: someone's compelled to do something!

Start from nothing, and try to build up a system that at all resembles a democracy, and you're compelling people left and right. Throw in property rights, such as land ownership, and you're compelling people just about 24/7.

Just because you like being able to use the violence of the state to throw people off your lawn doesn't mean that it isn't compelling people to be in a certain place.