I think I see what's going wrong in this conversation.
By definition, "rights" can be legal, social, or ethical.
To you, they are only a legal thing and if they don't exist in law or custom, then to you they don't exist.
But to me, (and others here) they also have an ethical dimension and exist as an ethical value independent of the legal or social useage.
Saying ethics depend on laws and customs would be moral relativism (which is a tricky thing to hold for most people, because of the implications around stuff like child rape and murder being ok if everyone was doing it).