Cassandra Scott-Laffey

Human rights are everyone’s rights
Everyone in the world is entitled to rights that allow us to live happy and healthy lives, such as the rights to liberty, security, an education, freedom of opinion and a life free of discrimination, torture and slavery.

These rights can be found in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). The UDHR was approved in 1948 by the General Assembly of the United Nations with the intention of ensuring an acceptable quality of life for all people.

Even though, to someone like me, they seem like simple and logical ideas for how we should be allowed to live our lives, not everyone enjoys these rights, due to factors such as corrupt governments, war or poverty.

I don’t have to worry about these problems personally, but any of us could have been born into a different situation. I am grateful for the life I lead and the fact that I don’t have to fight for basic rights, and I want to help those that aren’t so lucky!

UNCROC
Millions of people throughout the world, many of them children, have their rights violated, or ignored, on a daily basis. Children are especially vulnerable, as they can’t always have their say, and don’t always have someone to speak for them. This is why 191 countries have adopted the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCROC). This document covers the particular rights that protect children while they are still dependent on others. Unfortunately, for many children around the world, their needs and rights still get overlooked. This could be because their rights aren’t always the first priority when a family is just trying to survive, or it could simply be because people are not educated about child rights. But none of these reasons should be considered acceptable.

You can change the world
While it may appear that we can’t stop human rights violations on our own, we can raise awareness of it so that together we can create change for a better future. One voice is small, but many voices saying the same thing together can change the world. Even buying a bar of fair trade chocolate can make a difference!

TAKE ACTION!

Wherever things aren’t right, just one person can be enough to make a difference. Here’s what you can do:

• Buy fair trade whenever possible and keep an eye out in August for Trade Aid’s campaign on slave labour and the chocolate industry.
• But don’t feel guilty about eating your favourite chocolate bar, even if it isn’t made with fair trade cocoa; you just have to make a stand. Write letters, send emails and put pressure on the manufacturer to help put an end to child slavery!
• Support Stop the Traffik by joining the global movement of people from around the world who believe that people should not be bought and sold www.stopthetraffik.org
• Become a human rights champion in your community and join your local Amnesty International group or, if there isn’t one, start one www.amnesty.org.nz

LEARN MORE

For more information read Cassie’s other article Right the wrongs with chocolate and visit the following websites:

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
UN Convention on the Rights of the Child
Trade Aid
Fair trade pros and cons
Fair trade
The International Cocoa Initiative

This article was originally published in Tearaway Magazine.

Tags: child labour, child rights, human rights

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 24th, 2009 at 3:20 pm and is filed under Articles, Economics & Trade, Human Rights & Social Justice, Knowledge Centre, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.