Caitlin on making connections and realizing we can make a difference

I greatly enjoyed the Human Rights Weekend and the workshop we participated in. Not only did I learn a lot about human rights, but I was able to learn more about the world through the people I met and the connections I made there. I was vaguely familiar with human rights, but this weekend served as a good introduction for me and got me interested in learning more as I move forward. I was exposed to the core principles- how they are universal, inalienable, indivisible, interdependent and interrelated. I really wasn’t sure how to define what is and isn’t a human right, but I learned that the UN Declaration of Human Rights spells them out pretty thoroughly. I was actually surprised at how many human rights there are- for some reason I assumed there were only a handful, but I was happy to find that there are quite a lot. I guess since we see so many rights violated every day, especially socioeconomic rights, we don’t even realize that they’re human rights. I was especially interested to learn the differences between civil rights, political rights, and socioeconomic rights. I had never previously been able to articulate the differences between these terms which I hear so frequently.

 I also was especially fascinated by the activities we did concerning asylum seekers, refugees, and migrants. I had never known the legal definitions of these groups, and had used the terms interchangeably before. It was especially powerful to learn that some of the people I had made connections with over the weekend were refugees and had dealt with the situations we were learning about. When we were learning about migrants my roommate was quick to point out that I am currently a migrant, something I had never thought about before. When I heard the term migrant in the past I thought of migrant farm workers in the US, and I associated the word with impoverished people from South and Central America. It was eye-opening to realize that I myself fall into that category, as does anyone who travels to a different country for a short period of time. I liked how one of the women commented that not all refugees fit the stereotype of starving, rural people running from war- oftentimes refugees can be wealthy and educated. It was cool to have my perceptions challenged by the experiences of the people surrounding me.

However, I think the most important takeaway for me was the shift in perspective which occurred during the “New Planet” activity. I thought it was amazing that even when given completely free reign, everyone just recreated what they already knew. We worked inside the categories we’d been given and all took a defensive stance, focusing on differences rather than similarities, because that’s the world we live in. I related this to the story Vincent told about the Home Affairs officials who had the realization that their job is really to help people rather than be difficult. It also made me think of the Stanford prison experiment and the Essential Blue-Eyed video, when the facilitator declared that “People will lower themselves to your expectations.” I’m beginning to realize how important this concept is- that people are programmed to accommodate themselves to the standards and roles which are set for them. This is also why no one wanted to strike when we were doing the Applying for Asylum activity- even though we knew that in reality we could, that no harm would come to us, people were still trying to play by the rules and work within the system of the make-believe scenario. Throughout the whole weekend I had that Alice Walker quote running through my head: “The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.” I think for human rights on an individual level it’s important to first realize that we can make a difference, and that we have a responsibility to stop being a bystander and start acting. If we’re going to address human rights as a global community, we also need to take the approach that Vincent explained during the New Planet activity: to stop thinking competitively and start thinking collaboratively.

 This is why I think it was so important that we were able to make connections with people from all over Africa. They taught me a lot about their respective cultures, but in the end I was really struck by how, despite our cultural and socioeconomic differences, we really all had so much in common. It was surprisingly easy to talk to everyone about all sorts of things, not only human rights. We had all sorts of conversations about music, politics, life experiences, movies and a bunch of other things as well. I left feeling hopeful about the future and grateful