Honoring International Human Rights Day today, everyday

Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, the United Nations’ high commissioner on human rights, traveled Nov. 13, 2017, from Geneva to brief the nongovernment-organization community in New York on the latest developments and engage in dialogue on human rights-related issues. I attended for Church and Society and was thrilled to hear Al Hussein speak.

He’d just come from updating the U.N. Security Council on conditions in Venezuela and was frustrated with select member states for prohibiting U.N. access to areas where human rights violations are being reported. A lesson he’d learned from Venezuela and other ailing member states, he said, is that the governments and organizations tasked with protecting human rights often turn out themselves to be the sources of violations.

He urged NGOs and individual citizens alike to keep a close eye on our judicial systems because whether the tension is armed conflict, natural disasters, forced migration or something else, people will be detained and arrested. The extent to which these people’s human rights are respected while displaced or in detention matters a great deal. Whether they emerge from these situations with their human dignity intact can determine whether the situation will improve or deteriorate further, he explained.

As United Methodists, we are called to defend international human rights. The Book of Resolutions tells us, “Human dignity is the foundation of all human rights. It is inherent and inborn. Human dignity is the image of God in each human being. Human dignity is the sum total of all human rights. We protect human dignity with human rights. Human rights are the building blocks of human dignity. They are indivisible and interdependent. It is God’s gift of love for everyone. Human rights, being the expression of the wholeness and fullness of human dignity, are indivisible and interdependent.”

For me, Al Hussein’s statements reaffirm why the U.N.’s Agenda 2030, the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, fit so beautifully with our human rights work at Church and Society. Both seek to preserve dignity.

A colleague asked the high commissioner a question you’ve probably asked yourself: how are we supposed to monitor our judiciaries, demand fair elections, fight for clean air and water, defend the free press, protect migrants, donate to Puerto Rico, and volunteer in our local communities all at the same time?

“There’s no coasting in human rights,” he replied. He encouraged the NGO community and everyone who cares about human rights to use today, International Human Rights Day, as an occasion to recommit ourselves to fully-realized human rights worldwide. In other words, to dig in and keep going.

“We feel we’re regressing, and that leaves us worried,” he said. But, he noted, authoritarian governments love to propagate the dangerous argument that human rights efforts aren’t working. They want us to think we don’t make a difference. But, we do.

“A small child once asked me why discrimination exists,” he said. Noting his appreciation for Nelson Mandela’s famed assertion that we are born pristine and free of hate, he had nonetheless formed his views over the years:

“We all inherited the abuses of our forebears, and thus we all have the capacity to be bigoted. We must fight against that every day.”

To close, I’d like to share a word I recently learned from a friend in the CCUN Chaplain’s office: ubuntu. It means, “I am because we are.” Being human means we are part of something amazing. The dignity of each of us depends on our respect for the dignity of all of us.

With that in mind, please join me in celebrating International Human Rights Day throughout this holiday season and beyond by protecting human rights through conscious consumption. Strive to avoid products and traditions that exploit our fellow brothers and sisters. It’s better to accumulate friendships, not things, after all!