[TLDR (too long didn’t read): If you are reading this, chances are you care about HR. This Reader is about why we must fight against atomization to consolidate our HR power. For a quick overview, just read the bolded text]. Traducir/traduire los/les Readers; usar/utiliser deepl.com.
-‘The commoners’ have qualities very convenient to the elites given their low education and their degradation by the general system that burdens them with an overly oppressive dependence. Therefore, they have, so far, been unable to emancipate themselves unless they are led by a well-recognized and well-respected activism. (Manuel Rodriguez, Chilean patriot, 1816)
Human rights activists’ credo in one-liners
1. have found some fitting quotes that suit our challenges; each and every one is a genuine food for thought issue:
- It is not just about nuts-and-bolts activism, but about instilling hope. (Achin Vanaik)
- Hope beats fear (or hope wins over fear; or hope trumps fear…).
- The job entails recruiting the heart as much as training the brain. (America Bracho et al)
- Our asset is we persevere, we never desert. (Jorge Arrate)
- We must act without further delay and, for that, we have the ‘duty of memory’ — the crime is silence. (Federico Mayor Z.)
- We fight our way out of setbacks and defeats. (Revista Primera Piedra)
- Nothing will ever make us uncaring; more of the same will never give us anything.
- We unambiguously go with just one flag.
- We do get tempted by the seemingly impossible. (Mario Vargas Llosa)
- Ultimately, our actions are what show what our priorities are. (Mahatma Ghandi)
2. What do human rights activists strive- and call-for in the long run?
- People ought to and can freely express themselves equal in dignity.
- Activists ought to and can thus appeal to conscious citizens to safeguard the effective fulfillment of the human rights (HR) duties in any society.
- They ought to and can also feel compelled to call for rebellion –as clearly stated in the third paragraph of the Preamble of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
- In such a rebellion, they ought to and can rally the many to initiate the essential transformation from words to force, from a culture of understanding to a culture of confrontation. (Federico Mayor)
Conflicts are energy generators (Giorgio Solimano)
3. My impression is that reality feeds on conflicts that confront us HR activists when we address fundamental problems. Many blabber-slogans proclaim to be zeroing-in on HR. But, in reality and objectively, they do not proactively feed and build on such conflicts and contradictions in society. Facts based on concrete conflicts make it clear: Enough of palliative policies! It is structural changes that are required. Claim holders are to react to the conflicts affecting them so as to decisively act to resolve them. Therefore, at the present moment (when it is questionable whether the state is responding to purportedly build-a-more-egalitarian-society), the right path is to demand the definition and consolidation of a new social pact between claim holders and the state as the primary duty bearer.* (Pamela Eguiguren)
*: I am tired of hearing only nuances and hints where actions ‘should’ be going. The state uses its biased discretion to keep rapidly growing problems under control –and that is our big problem. [To defeat an enemy, it is essential to know him well –particularly when he disguises himself in the habits of progressivism. (Louis Casado)]. It is, therefore, necessary that activists secure access to places where they seldom go –the places where fiscal policies are being debated behind closed doors.
Bottom line
4. Are we to be concerned about the power that we do not (yet) have to carry on with the above? No. There is popular power out there if you/we look for it. It is just that we must fight against atomization to consolidate this power.
Claudio Schuftan, Ho Chi Minh City
Your comments are welcome at schuftan@gmail.com
All Readers are available at www.claudioschuftan.com
Postscript/Marginalia
—Too much kindness will wear you down
The bad guys have more fun and reach old age in better condition than activists like us. Does this mean it does not make sense to put too much effort into being a good person? No. So, remember, no one gives you anything in life; you have to take it, sometimes by force; and as soon as you get careless they will take it back. (Isabel Allende in her novel ‘Violeta’)
—Optimism and pessimism can coexist
If you look hard enough, you will see them next to each other in virtually every aspect of your career. They seem like opposites, but they work together to keep everything in balance. You can only be an optimist in the long run if you are pessimistic enough to survive the short run. So, acknowledge the cold statistics of how common bad news are. Know that the assumptions you hold today could (and often do) break tomorrow, and you will need enough room for error to make it to the next round. Progress is cumulative, but setbacks are temporary (we rebuild): the long-term odds tilt toward the good. (Do they?) Once the odds are in our favor, then you start to see results. So, survive an inevitable chain of short-term setbacks and disappointments in order to enjoy long-term progress. (Collaborative Fund) [But: we cannot be so naïf or excessively optimistic or wishful as to place our fate in the hands of others. We must never expect, hope or believe that any one person will save the situation that we aim to change. Why? Because naive expectations can crush us. (Daily Stoic)].