One Day for Human Rights – One Signature to Make a Difference!
Posted on December 10, 2008
If you know me personally, or are acquainted with the articles I’ve written for this site, you’ll know that I’m pretty nonpolitical, and for good reason.
This issue transcends partisan politics and any administration.
If you take a look at just about any news site, you’ll see examples of human rights abuses every day - child labor, religious persecution, prosecution of political dissenters, to rape and outright genocide. Often times these guilty regimes and leaders hide behind the veil of national sovereignty, without realizing that they, like the rest of us, face an accounting to a higher power.
That’s why on December 10, 1948, the United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. After ratifying this very important document, the General Assembly urged all member nations:
“to cause it to be disseminated, displayed, read and expounded principally in schools and other educational institutions, without distinction based on the political status of countries or territories.”
60 years later, fulfilling that goal is an ongoing struggle. According to the UN, 93% of people in the United States were unable to identify the UDHR. Today is about changing this.
You can click that above link and read the document for yourself, but did you know there’s even more you can do? The Human Rights Action Center currently has an online petition to include the UDHR in our U.S. Passports. Think about what a simple, practical measure this is! If you’re harassed, bullied, or threatened by any official during your travels abroad, imagine being able to authoritatively quote from this landmark document to which their nation, as a member of the UN, is subject.
It only takes your name, a valid e-mail address, and a few minutes of your time. But hopefully today won’t be the only day you’ll think about the issue of human rights. The United States may be no Nazi Germany, but does anyone remember slavery? The Japanese-American internment camps? Jim Crow laws? The Patriot Act? It only takes one elected official, one law, one court decision to completely change things at home, so it’s well worth always being ready to defend our civil liberties.
» Filed Under Everything and Nothing
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