Schrödinger’s ECHR: doesn’t give us rights we wouldn’t have had anyway but always interfering and stopping governments doing what they want to do.

Maybe they have a point. Maybe the ECHR acts like a bumper in a bowling alley, stopping governments doing stupid things they'll quickly come to regret and stop doing of their own accord. Obviously, the bumper is rather helpful for the human bowling balls who would otherwise end up in the gutter.

The key to resolve the paradox is that what the anti-ECHR brigade are implicitly saying is that the ECHR doesn’t give *you* rights you wouldn’t have had anyway but it stops government doing things to *them*.