MEDIA ROOTS– Every issue around the world can only be truly communicated with unfettered access to media sources. Without an informed citizenry on the issues that impact our lives, there can be no true representation for the people. I believe communication is a human right, which is why I am organizing for a campaign called Communication is Your Right!, an advocacy campaign based on Article 19 of the United Declaration of Human Rights.
Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights reads: “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
On December 10, 1948 the United Nations adopted The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Today in 2010, more than 60 years later, entire groups of people still don’t have access to factual news and information in order to better their lives, community and country and make a positive impact in this world.
I speak with Larry Cox, the executive director of Amnesty International USA about Article 19 and why the human right to communicate is so essential in the fight for human rights.
I speak with Denis Moynihan from Democracy Now! about Article 19 and the current media landscape.
GLOBALVOICES– Communication is Your Right! recently interviewed Larry Cox, Executive Director of Amnesty International USA, who said that freedom of expression is central to the fight for human rights. “People need to understand that communication is a right, and it’s a right that is not being fulfilled at all,” he said. “That’s what it’s all about, because if people can’t express themselves, they can’t protest any issues that are going on.”
Communication is Your Right! is a platform for media makers, human rights advocates, and citizens around the globe to speak their truths.
“When people are trying to use power in the wrong way the first people they go after are journalists,” Cox said. More than 267 cases of journalists being threatened, arrested, killed, or disappeared are tracked on Global Voices Project Threatened Voices, which states “Never before have so many bloggers been imprisoned.” These numbers are unacceptable- not only because being able to communicate is vital to changing our lives and community- but because it is a human right.
Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the human right to communicate, makes threatening and silencing citizens for communicating their thoughts a human rights violation. Article 19 reads, “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.”
On the front page of our site is a petition demanding that the United Nations take the Human Right to Communicate seriously. “With the profound changes happening in the way people connect and share information, now more than ever it’s important to protect that right to connect and share,” explains Matthew Schroyer, a journalist from www.MentalMunition.com and Communications is Your Right! organizer. “If you can’t protect that right, then you can’t protect a democracy.”
The Communication is Your Right! petition also states that the consolidation of media companies is damaging to universal communication and without stronger UN support global communication rights none of their Millennium Goals will be achieved.
We urge people to exercise their right to communicate with a blog, podcast or video and submit your work to this campaign. We would like citizens around the world to reflect on why they haven’t been heard by their larger community. Does corporate media allow you a platform? How is government control and media policy stifling free speech in your community? These questions need reflection and we must act together to create solutions.
We are building a decentralized campaign of media makers, media reformers and human rights advocates that are working together to network with organizations, speak with our communities, and create media about Article 19. “We need a communication revolution in order to have a human rights revolution,” says Abby Martin, founder of www.MediaRoots.org and Communications is Your Right! organizer.
To join our mission to advocate for people around the world to openly and fully communicate, visit our “Organizing Together” page to learn how to become an organizer and share this campaign’s message.
Written by Abby Martin, Mera Szendro Bok and Matthey Schroyer from www.CommunicationisYourRight.org
