We Have 30 Basic Human Rights: Do You Know Them?
By Sarah Melody
Sarah Melody, musician and spokesperson for Youth For Human Rights International
We have 30 basic human rights, according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, created by the United Nations in 1948 to provide a global understanding of how to treat individuals. Before I became National Youth Spokesperson for Youth For Human Rights International’s Canadian chapter in 2005 at the age of 16, I had no idea what my human rights were, and even though the document has been around for 61 years I know most people don’t.
Back in 2005, I was promoting anti-bullying through my tune “Song of Peace,” which led me to the Stop the Violence conference in Toronto, held by Michael “Pinball” Clemons, then coach for the Toronto Argonauts. I spoke on behalf of my generation, in front of teachers and community leaders. My three minutes grabbed the attention of Youth for Human Rights International, a non-profit organization teaching people their human rights. They asked if I would represent their organization. After seeing their “United” music video, a street-savvy, multi-ethnic, anti-bullying message, and their other video PSAs and printed materials, I accepted the position. I was titled National Youth Spokesperson and my first major assignment was to represent Canada at the 2006 International Human Rights Summit held at the United Nation headquarters in New York.
Human Rights is a global term we hear often, but many people can’t define. So the question is what are human rights? “Rights” are things we are allowed to be, to do or to have, simply by being human. We each own 30 basic human rights, based on the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and in my role as National Spokesperson, I have been speaking and singing my songs at elementary and high schools across Ontario. We hope to expand to the rest of Canada. I educate the kids about human rights and how it’s our responsibility to learn them and spread the word, since human rights are not taught in the schools or at home. My message to everyone is not political; it focuses on education. Even in Canada, a place of freedom, we still have issues of violence in homes and on the streets. By educating each other, we can hopefully, eventually, eliminate this.
Sarah on the Human Rights Education panel at the International Human Rights Summit in Geneva, Switzerland
Youth for Human Rights International presently has more than 180 chapters in over 80 countries around the world, including Australia, Denmark, Ghana, Guyana, India, Japan, Liberia, Morocco, Puerto Rico, South Africa, Uganda, the UK, U.S.A. and, of course, Canada. Last August, I represented Canada in Geneva Switzerland at the 6th annual International Human Rights Summit. I met youth delegates ages 16 to 25 from all across the globe with the same goal in mind, human rights education.
International Human Rights Day is right around the corner on December 10, celebrating its 61st year of existence. So what can you do? Learn your rights! If you’re a parent or teacher share these rights with your kids or pass them along to a friend. Feel free to learn more about your human rights at www.youthforhumanrights.org or email info@sarahmelody.com
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
1. We are all free and equal. We are all born free. We all have our own thoughts and ideas. We should all be treated in the same way.
2. Don’t discriminate. These rights belong to everybody, whatever our differences.
3. The right to life. We all have the right to life, and to live in freedom and safety.
4. No slavery – past and present. Nobody has any right to make us a slave. We cannot make anyone our slave.
5. No Torture. Nobody has any right to hurt us or to torture us.
6. We all have the same right to use the law. I am a person just like you!
7. We are all protected by the law. The law is the same for everyone. It must treat us all fairly.
8. Fair treatment by fair courts. We can all ask for the law to help us when we are not treated fairly.
9. No unfair detainment. Nobody has the right to put us in prison without a good reason and keep us there, or to send us away from our country.
10. The right to trial. If we are put on trial this should be in public. The people who try us should not let anyone tell them what to do.
11. Innocent until proven guilty. Nobody should be blamed for doing something until it is proven. When people say we did a bad thing we have the right to show it is not true.
12. The right to privacy. Nobody should try to harm our good name. Nobody has the right to come into our home, open our letters or bother us or our family without a good reason.
13. Freedom to move. We all have the right to go where we want in our own country and to travel as we wish.
14. The right to asylum. If we are frightened of being badly treated in our own country, we all have the right to run away to another country to be safe.
15. The right to a nationality. We all have the right to belong to a country.
16. Marriage and family. Every grown-up has the right to marry and have a family if they want to. Men and women have the same rights when they are married, and when they are separated.
17. Your own things. Everyone has the right to own things or share them. Nobody should take our things from us without a good reason.
18. Freedom of thought. We all have the right to believe in what we want to believe, to have a religion, or to change it if we want.
19. Free to say what you want. We all have the right to make up our own minds, to think what we like, to say what we think, and to share our ideas with other people.
20. Meet where you like. We all have the right to meet our friends and to work together in peace to defend our rights. Nobody can make us join a group if we don’t want to.
21. The right to democracy. We all have the right to take part in the government of our country. Every grown-up should be allowed to choose their own leaders.
22. The right to social security. We all have the right to affordable housing, medicine, education, and child care, enough money to live on and medical help if we are ill or old.
23. Workers’ rights. Every grown-up has the right to do a job, to a fair wage for their work, and to join a trade union.
24. The right to play. We all have the right to rest from work and to relax.
25. A bed and some food. We all have the right to a good life. Mothers and children, people who are old, unemployed or disabled, and all people have the right to be cared for.
26. The right to education. Education is a right. Primary school should be free. We should learn about the United Nations and how to get on with others. Our parents can choose what we learn.
27. Culture and copyright. Copyright is a special law that protects one’s own artistic creations and writings; others cannot make copies without permission. We all have the right to our own way of life and to enjoy the good things that “art,” science and learning bring.
28. A free and fair world. There must be proper order so we can all enjoy rights and freedoms in our own country and all over the world.
29. Our responsibilities. We have a duty to other people, and we should protect their rights and freedoms.
30. Nobody can take away these rights and freedoms from us.
* List provided by Youth For Human Rights International, adapted and simplified from the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Here is a link to the original: http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/
AS old as I am I thought I knew everything but admit I did not know these rights, the PSA’s are amazing, if you get a chance to check them out, my favourite was the Don’t discriminate
Dear Angie,
It is interesting that your favorite is the Don’t Discriminate! It happens to be mine too. Yes those 30 public service announcements (PSAs) really help to understand in a clear manner what our 30 basic human rights are.
nicole
To Bad if you are a gay person half of the rights listed above do not belong to us. but maybe someday we will be equal to everyone else
I would like to add – the right to care for your dead however you choose.
I don’t agree with The Right to Social Security. I believe one’s survival should be based on merit and earnings created – not taken for granted.
I have a friend… he has no retirement plan. I’ve known him for 25 years. He’s currently unemployed due to “attitude problems,” not the economy or anything beyond his control. He involved himself in several fist fights and refused to follow policy. He’s been unemployed for several years. Lucky for him, the government keeps extending his benefits (along with everyone else). He has twice been hired since his firing, but he quite those jobs within hours of arriving (and told the bosses not even to pay him or do any paperwork – out right Unemployment Fraud if you think about it).
He has no health insurance except that provided by the state. He suffers from high blood pressure and is given his medication. When his grandfather died, he inherited $150k which he demolished his way through in 15 months of drinking and drugging. Over a year ago his father died and he was left with less than $100k. He’s down to his last $2,000 already. He has no house, no car, and still has no job. He halfheartedly engages in the two job interviews he’s required to every week in order to qualify for his unemployment checks, but the true history is showing that he in fact does not want to work. Other than the two jobs he quite immediately after being hired (shhh, don’t tell big brother or he’ll have to pay it all back), he’s only had two different jobs in his entire life – one as a dishwasher and one as a custodian. He quit school in the seventh grade because he was tired of getting up in the morning (that’s his problem still, why he only sort of does the interviews – he won’t work anything before 4pm).
We all have the right to *pursue* our “social security,” to be allowed to “be cared for,” but it is not my opinion that anyone should be “slave” to the responsibility of doing it for them. I have the right to choose not to support the weak, wicked, and leaching populations.
The real human rights are the Church of Scientology creed if you take away its references to “man” and “men” and replace them with “human being” and “all human beings” respectively.
The “Rights” you listed here above is basic education on democracy!
30. Nobody can take away these rights and freedoms from us.
Except that our governments can and do take these rights and freedoms from us all the time, even in the U.S.
Our current debate about healthcare says it all – there are plenty of ordinary people in this country who believe healthcare is a privilege not a right.
Notice the absence of health care on the list?
I agree with all but one. I think that it needs to be stated within the Right to Marriage and Family that all consenting adults should be given the right to marry and have a family. Though it says that, directly afterword, it specifies men and women. It should include same sex marriage as well.
“I don’t agree with The Right to Social Security. I believe one’s survival should be based on merit and earnings created – not taken for granted.”
It doesn’t matter if you agree or not. This has been international law since the 40’s when the governments of the world ratified it. If you don’t agree with our rights, then please find another planet to live on.
Hate to burst your homophobic bubble, but these rights also apply to homosexuals. If your government denies these rights to anyone, then you should take them to court because they are breaking the law.
This list is ridiculous. Some aren’t rights, just a wishlist, others are just statements (ie #2, #29), while the rest are redundant and could be simplified into fewer than 10 “rights”. “Life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness” covers most of them.
The person who says that these are international law should reread the first paragraph. A declaration isn’t the same as a law. The American colonies declared their independence from England in 1776; they still had to fight hard for several years to obtain that independence.
I agree with you no donut. Remember, it is
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights:
1. We are ALL free and equal. We ALL are born free. We ALL have our own thoughts and ideas. We ALL should be treated in the same way.
2. Don’t discriminate. These rights belong to EVERYBODY, whatever our differences.
4.NO Slavery-Past or present. Nobody has any right to make us a slave. We cannot MAKE anyone our slave.
29. Our responsibilities. We have a duty to other people, and we should protect their rights and freedoms.
How does that not tie directly into
22. The right to social security. We all have the right to affordable housing, medicine, education, and child care, enough money to live on and medical help if we are ill or old.
25. A bed and some food. We all have the right to a good life. Mothers and children, people who are old, unemployed or disabled, and all people have the right to be cared for.
&
16. Marriage and family. EVERY grown-up has the right to marry and have a family if they want to. Men and women have the same rights when they are married, and when they are separated.
??
Jessica and Tony: 16 doesn’t specify anything about the gender of a man or a woman’s spouse so to me that seems like it can be interperated as a right for everyone regardless of their orientation.
Angelic: It seems like your friend of 25 years is suffering enough without comments being made about him on the internet. Why would you use such a detailed expamle like that to make your point? TMI my friend. So what should happen to the people who do not live up to your survival standard? Let them perish? I hope that is not what you ment. I respect your opinion but I have to disagree that any population of a human species could be considered weak or wicked or leach like just because of economic differences.
All of you who wrote negative comments, get over yourself. What is more important, making the youth aware of the importance of human rights, and what we should all be allowed, or discriminating between # 3 5, 20 etc and saying they should all be mashed up together, instead of negative comments, why don’t u support your youth, and be proud that they want to make a difference!
Scientology is violating these human rights on a daily basis. Hypocrites.
I love these. All debate aside, these human rights exist, and are your human rights. whether you want to utilize them, they are there for you. But the world would be better if everyone knew them and used them. debate about them does not change that they are there for everyone.