Declarations and Campaigns for Equal Dignity (DCED)

HumanDHS is primarily grounded in academic work. We are independent of any religious or political agenda. However, we wish to bring academic work into "real life." Our research focuses on topics such as dignity (with humiliation as its violation), or, more precisely, on respect for equal dignity for all human beings in the world. This is not only our research topic, but also our core value, in line with Article 1 of the Human Rights Declaration that states that every human being is born with equal dignity (that ought not be humiliated). We agree with Professor Shibley Telhami, who advocates the building of bridges from academia as follows, "I have always believed that good scholarship can be relevant and consequential for public policy. It is possible to affect public policy without being an advocate; to be passionate about peace without losing analytical rigor; to be moved by what is just while conceding that no one has a monopoly on justice." We would like to add that we believe that good scholarship can be relevant and consequential not only for public policy, but for raising awareness in general.

We, as Human Dignity and Humiliation Studies network and fellowship, receive innumerous messages, continuously asking us to support campaigns, often from opposing camps. One side in a conflict typically is in rage against the other, and everybody is enraged that we do not support their side against their "evil enemies." The "hotter" a conflict, the more there is a tendency toward "if you are not with us, you are against us."

We, as HumanDHS network, however, would like to keep in mind the following quote from Jeremy Bentham in 1789:
"Conscious or not conscious of your own bad intentions, you suspect theirs to be still worse. Their notion of your intentions is the same. Measures of mere self-defense are naturally taken for acts of aggression. The same causes produce, on both sides, the same effects; each makes haste to begin for fear of being forestalled. In this state of things, if on either side there happen to be a Minister [of War], or a would-be Minister, who has a fancy for war, the stroke is struck, and the tinder catches fire" (Jeremy Bentham, 1789, "Plan for an Universal and Perpetual Peace").

HumanDHS is a loosely knit cooperative community of scholars and activists. We are not a monolithic organization that speaks with one voice, neither do we wish to be a monolithic organization. There are other such organizations around, which we do not want to duplicate. Our aim is not to become a political group that engages in day-to-day campaigning, particularly not campaigning that "heats up" conflicts (please see reflections on this point here). We are not impartial - we are deeply partial in our rejection of all acts and institutions that humiliate, whoever the perpetrators are, while being deeply respectful towards all human beings, on all sides. During 27 years in prison, Mandela turned some of his prison guards into friends. We wish to follow his example.

As a non-monolithic network, with the Mandela-inspired vision of radical respect for every human being, on the background of equally radical rejection of humiliating acts and institutions, we can therefore not endorse any specific actions, movements or legislative campaigns "officially," as an organization. However, we like to make an effort to work in a long-term fashion and above fault lines. Even though we cannot sign petitions as a network, we thus encourage our members to get active wherever they see fit. Please see, among others, our Intervention Ideas as one way for our members to address specific issues that are related to dignity and humiliation.

We see our function as bringing to the attention of our friends and the general public instructive examples of compassionate advocacy, and encouraging each person to reflect on such examples and take action in accordance with their own values, abilities, convictions and circumstances.  We wish to encourage every global citizen to become much more active than thus far, as an individual, and support the campaigns and declarations they feel they can stand for. We regard campaigns to be extremely important!

Foot binding in China, for example, was practiced for 1000 years, and ended within ten years, through public declarations and campaigns. Social change can be affected by using public declarations and campaigns, and a more dignified world can be built by using the same techniques.

Female genital cutting in Senegal is in the process of ending just as Chinese foot binding, as is being demonstrated by the work carried out by Tostan. Tostan, which means "breakthrough" in the language of the Wolof of Senegal and the Gambia, is a non-profit and non-governmental organization incorporated in the United States in 1991 and based in Thiès, Senegal. The mission of Tostan is to contribute to the human dignity of African people through the development and implementation of a non-formal, participatory education program in national languages. Tostan provides learners with the knowledge and skills to become confident, resourceful actors in the social transformation and economic development of their communities. Tostan pedagogy combines traditional and modern techniques to help bring about positive change on the personal, community and national level. A guiding principle of the Tostan method is based on the African tradition of participation and respectful consultation of all those concerned and affected by the implementation of any eventual decisions or policies. Villagers themselves determine their future goals and obstacles to overcome in order to achieve those goals. Quality, holistic education and development activities based on principles of human rights provide communities with the tools to direct their own social and economic transformation.
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Since 1997, over 1,000 villages in Senegal and now also in Burkina Faso have publicly declared an end to harmful traditional practices including FGC and early or forced marriages upon completion of the Tostan program. The World Health Organization and the Population Reference Bureau have chosen the Tostan "model" as one of the most promising strategies for ending FGC. Using a human rights approach, Tostan provides communities with essential health information so that they may fairly evaluate the merits of tradition against a potentially harmful practice. Tostan's model is not simply an education program, however, but includes support for serious community mobilization and ultim

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We look for interested people, who would like to develop our DCED page. Please see our Call for Creativity.

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Links

Unfairly Sentenced to Die

Rosita Albert writes to the HumanDHS network (March 17, 2008):
"Dear friends: I thought you might join me in signing this petition today to prevent an injustice to Mr. Davis. Seven out of nine witnesses at Troy Davis' trial have since recanted or altered their testimony with many citing police intimidation. Stand with us in saying that Fairness Matters!"

Virtual Demos over Net Censorship

Thousands of people are taking part in "virtual protests" against countries accused of censoring the internet. For its first Online Free Expression Day, media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) has created virtual versions of nine public spaces...
Please read more at http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/world/7292130.stm.

The Elders Call for a Billion Signatures

2008 is the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
It‘s a time for a global conversation about human rights. To consider the values that unite society as one human family and one global village. But it can be more. For the last 60 years it‘s been governments that have been asked to sign the Universal Declaration. The Elders hope that 2008 can be the year that individuals, not just governments, sign the declaration. The Elders are calling for one billion signatures from across the world. The old generation of leaders wants yours to be one of them. They urge you to embrace the values and goals of the declaration; to protect the rights of fellow global villagers and encourage others to do the same in communities, workplaces and schools. To sign the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, click here.

Rosika Schwimmer and World Government

Rosika Schwimmer or Bédy-Schwimmer "Rózsa" Rózsika (1877-1948) tried to create a world government. In 1935 she formed the World Centre for Women's Archives with Mary Ritter Beard. She received a World Peace Prize in 1937 and formed the Campaign for World Government with Lola Maverick Lloyd. In 1947 she was nominated for Nobel Peace Prize but no one received it the next year...
Please read more on http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosika_Schwimmer, or, please read also Remarks on the History of Hungarian Feminism by Judit Acsády.

Garry Davis: World Citizenship, World Passport, World Presidency, World Service Authority, World Government of World Citizens, World Government House

Garry Davis (Bar Harbor, Maine, July 27, 1921) is a peace activist who created the first "World Passport." A former World War II bomber pilot and Broadway actor, he renounced his American citizenship in Paris in 1948 to become a "citizen of the world." Davis founded the World Service Authority, which now issues the passports - along with birth and other certificates - to applicants. Davis first used his "world passport" on a trip to India in 1956, and has been variably admitted into or jailed by countries around the world after using his world passport. Up to 150 countries have purportedly accepted the world passport at one time or another. In France, his support committee was co-founded by writers Albert Camus and André Gide and the Abbé Pierre (quoted from wikipedia).

See also www.onefilms.com and www.1worldcitizen.com.

 

DECLARATION for actively caring decision-makers/ entrepreneurs:
"FAMILY PLANNING AND STDs/AIDS-PREVENTION SHALL BE INTEGRATED IN OUR PROGRAMS!"

Every hour: 9000 unwanted pregnancies cause 1/3 of the global population growth…
<www.dsw-online.de>
1. “Sexual and Reproductive Health Services (SRHS) are Human Rights and must therefore be available to those who are sexually active. Knowledge about safer sex and contraception must be given before young people are sexually active. SRHS shall be integrated into all our projects: Even if health workers are not available, at least A) condoms (dignified, attractive access) and B) information about STDs/AIDS, FP must be organized.”
Questions to Alec Gagneux: www.FairCH.ch / +41-56 441 91 75.

 

Citizens' Coalition to Reaffirm and Extend the Geneva Conventions
welcomes your participation.

Initial Call to Action  --  by Dennis Rivers, MA
(Dedicated to three of my teachers, Joanna Macy, the late Prof. Walter Capps and the Quaker peace activist, Gene Knudsen Hoffman)

It's a very human attitude to imagine that laws, treaties and constitutions, once passed, will simply enforce themselves, without strenuous effort on our part.  But experience shows otherwise. Experience shows that the passing of a bill or the signing of a treaty is not the end of the journey, but only the beginning.  Over the past century, people of goodwill around the world have sought to limit the violence of war by entering into various Geneva Convention Treaties. But although we can receive the concepts of the Geneva Conventions from previous generations, we cannot inherit as passive beneficiaries the actual benefits of these treaties.  If the Geneva Conventions (and the U.S. Constitution, for that matter) are going to mean anything in our time, it will be because we campaign actively for their study, observance and enforcement in our time.  They are more like a handful of seeds than a handful of diamonds.

The Geneva Conventions are far from perfect and far from effective. It is widely estimated that 90% of the casualties in modern wars are civilians.  The Bush administration seems determined to find clever ways around the Geneva Conventions, in order to allow itself to torture whomever it wishes (new euphemized as "alternative procedures" in an orgy of denial), and imprison without trial whomever it wishes. The technology of war has also dramatically changed since the first Geneva Conventions were framed.  For example, the current use of depleted uranium anti-tank munitions constitutes a low-level atomic war on civilians that will go on for many generations.  The toxic, radioactive dust left behind by the explosion of depleted uranium will stay toxic and radioactive for several billion years.  A billion years is a long time to give cancer and birth defects to the inhabitants of a particular region, something the framers of the original Geneva Conventions could hardly have imagined.  This poison dust will eventually circulate around the world, and our descendants, to some unknown degree, will suffer the same fate as the descendants of our enemies.

Confronted with these unhappy facts, reason and compassion suggest that we take up a new advocacy of the Geneva Conventions.  Each citizen can sign a personal statement affirming the Geneva Conventions, and can send such statements to their elected representatives requesting that their representatives make every possible effort to uphold, and extend the scope of, the Geneva Conventions.  We can also ask each candidate for federal public office to support the letter and the spirit of Geneva Conventions as part of their campaign for election.

The treaties that the United States enters into become part of the law of the United States.  The Supreme Court has recently reaffirmed that in Geneva Conventions are part of the law of the United States.  Therefore it is appropriate for every high school and college student in the United States to be introduced to the Geneva Conventions, to study them, and to reach their own conclusions about how the spirit of the Geneva Conventions will be carried forward in our particular time.  If we do not persuade new generations to take up this cause, the cause will be lost.

The Citizens' Coalition to Reaffirm and Extend the Geneva Conventions is developing an educational web site to distribute statements of reaffirmation and study guides.  We will also be inviting churches, synagogues, mosques, temples and civic groups of every sort to take up consideration of the Geneva Conventions, and to pass resolutions of reaffirmation as part of a global effort to both limit the violence of modern war and introduce new forms of conflict resolution.

The idea of extending the Geneva Conventions is important because regulating the conduct of war can easily be taken to imply acceptance of war as a legitimate policy option of nations and aggrieved groups.  The truth is that wars are often monumentally stupid and misconceived, along with being extraordinarily cruel. (If you doubt this, please explain the compelling reason why at least 20 million people had to die in World War I.)  There is now much more material available about non-violent and creative conflict resolution practices than was the case even as recently as the Vietnam war.  Advocacy to restrain the conduct of war will only make sense to many people if it is immediately accompanied by new information about alternatives to war.

Along with a reaffirmation of the existing provisions against torture and the maltreatment of prisoners (which you can read at www.genevaconventions.org), and a ban on depleted uranium munitions, one of various needed extensions of the Geneva Conventions would be a strong "no evidence based on torture or coercion" principle.  Anyone who reads the news carefully will notice how quickly the torture idea is spreading.  Just two years ago it was all about "the ticking bomb" scenario in which we needed to torture suspects in order to interrupt a bombing plot already underway. But now the Bush administration proposes to use coerced evidence in some sort of quasi-judicial hearings with the intention of executing people, or at least keeping them locked up indefinitely -- a different and much larger goal than the immediate prevention of a bombing already launched.  In a court that admits coerced evidence, a person might be imprisoned for confessing to whatever sympathies or activities he or she thought would stop the torture.  Since "sympathizing with the enemy" could become a crime in itself, or a mark of being dangerous, there would be no facts that needed to be checked in order to justify incarceration or execution.

If you think this sounds far-fetched, consider that John Ashcroft, during his tenure as Attorney General of the United States, asserted in U.S. Senate hearings that all those who publicly questioned the wisdom of government plans to spy on US citizens "aid terrorists, for they erode our national unity and diminish our resolve," alluding to the definition of treason in the Constitution. This is exactly the sort of thought-crime for which one could be arrested in various dictatorships, past and present. The senators were spared prison and the rack, but we know for a fact that others, less privileged, were not.  In Afghanistan, Mr. Dilawar and Mr. Habibullah were beaten to death by US troops over a period of several days simply because the troops had vague suspicions about them, based on false accusations made by a person later revealed to be a double agent. The lesson to be learned here is that interrogation by torture represents punishment without a trial, based on suspicion rather than evidence, in which the process of accusing becomes the process of convicting. Following in this direction will surely lead us toward the horrific injustices of the Middle Ages, Colonial witch trials and Soviet purges of the 1930s.  How many innocents will have to be tortured as our security services search for the true terrorists? Thousands? Millions? And how will we live with the knowledge of what we have allowed? A newly affirmed global ban on both the process (coercive interrogation) and the product (coerced evidence) would help us step back from this moral abyss.

The United States is going through a difficult period right now, politically, psychologically and spiritually.  The careful, systematic and compassionate advocacy of the Geneva Conventions would help people regain their emotional equilibrium and long-term perspective, and help people to resist the seductive appeals of fear, war and revenge.

We invite you to join us in these efforts and to send any web site references, educational materials or personal statements on the above topics to the address shown below.  Also, please visit our evolving web site: www.SupportGenevaConventions.info which will be adding many new features and references over the next few months.

Dennis Rivers
rivers @ newconversations.net
or
1563 Solano Ave. #164
Berkeley, CA 94707