As the world watched the Occupy movement take a stand for rights as they see them, the right to occupy public land came into question. As a society, we look at citizen rights and responsibilities on an ongoing basis as society evolves. There are seldom easy answers, but we are right to ask the questions and when we see injustice, take a stand.
Human rights are challenged, championed, and upheld throughout the world constantly. Sometimes we win, and sometimes we lose. What’s important is to fight the good fight for rights, and to that end, Amnesty International is an organization dedicated to upholding human rights globally.
On Saturday, volunteers from the local chapter of Amnesty International will be in the library for Human Rights Day (and in Oso Negro Coffee the next day). It’s an annual event that shines the spotlight on rights and wrongs — and asks you to write. Letters, that is.
Each year, Amnesty International’s Write for Rights letter-writing campaign addresses cases of people imprisoned because they spoke out, worked for change, or stood up for human rights. Writing letters to those in power in an attempt to effect change: for individuals, and for the greater good.
At a letter-writing event, volunteers hand out information on specific cases of human rights abuse: for example, Nasrin Sotoudeh, a lawyer and human rights campaigner and women’s rights activist, sentenced to 11 years in prison for criticizing the Iranian legal system. Or Jean-Claude Roger Mbede, arrested and jailed in Cameroon for homosexuality. Even the Government of Canada; Amnesty International is concerned that Bill C-4, the Preventing Human Smugglers from Abusing Canada’s Immigration System Act, will in reality punish people seeking protection in Canada.
So — does letter writing work? According to Amnesty International, letter-writing efforts have made a difference in about one-third of the cases — successes that may also avert future detentions or influence clemency for those imprisoned.
For more on Amnesty International, check out Like Water on Stone: The Story of Amnesty International (323.0601), its title suggestive of how persistence pays off. Other titles on our shelves include The Concise Guide to Global Human Rights, Michael Ignatieff’s Human Right and The Rights Revolution, and for activists, Rules for Radicals, among others.
Kootenay Co-op Radio’s Zoë Creighton created the public affairs radio series Canadian Voices (broadcast across Canada), available on CD at the library. The Human Rights edition (323 CAN) includes the voices of Stephen Lewis, Jeffrey Sommers, Michael Goldberg and others on AIDS, housing, child poverty and more.
In DVD we have such films as Triage (362.1 TRI), which looks at Nobel Peace Prize recipient Dr. James Orbinski’s work in Africa, where humanitarianism and politics collide. And in fiction, a wonderful collection of short stories celebrating the Universal Declaration of Human Rights penned by authors including Rohinton Mistry, Yann Martel, Chimananda Ngozi Adichie, and Nadine Gordimer.
If all this sounds a little contrary to seasonal merriment and gift-giving, consider this: the ability to speak out is a gift, too.
It’s a gift that we live in a country, where, for the most part, we do enjoy freedom of expression and the right to peaceful protest. In Nelson, nobody was jailed as a result of the Occupy demonstration, nobody hurt, and the viewpoints of the occupiers were heard. There are no easy answers, but there is a will to effect change.
As for those for whom December is another month of many behind bars because they spoke out for human rights, learning about these people and writing that letter is a gift to them, and to the world — because our voices do matter.
That’s a nice exchange of gifts. And rightfully so.