key historical figures Charged with sedition;
SOCRATES, JESUS, GHANDI, THOMAS PAINE, PETER LALOR, NELSON MANDELA
commonalities
- a revulsion with the status quo and following orders. they all believed in equality and the inherent dignity of every person.
- they all believed in questioning authority
- they all believed in the greater good and the greater humanity which was somehow linked to the notion of JUSTICE
- they opposed leaders who said one thing and did the opposite, who stood up in public and told lies, encouraged bigotry and violence in order to rule more easily.
- they were all charged with sedition because they were a THREAT to the powerful and to the corrupt current order.
- they were all ENEMIES OF THE STATE! The State is not able to tolerate people who act with a conscience because the State has no conscience. In the words of Emerson; "every actual State is corrupt, men shouldn't obey the laws too well!"
UDHR general observations
- historic roots - Thomas Paine; 'The Rights of Man' (1737-1809) democratic- liberal.
- The UDHR is a an attempt to define 'universal' principles which express "the highest aspiration of the common people", which have today become the underpinning foundations of International Law.
- the real importance of documents such as the UDHR, (Geneva Conventions, Nuremberg etc) are not the documents themselves but the REASON and the CONTEXT in which they came into existence; they were drafted after WWII as an attempt to prevent the re-emergence of regimes which had cynically used racism, patriotism, or any other convenient division to co-opt their own populations into an aggressive militarist State.
- What was common to all these vicious regimes was the undermining of democratic intitutions due to the concentration of political, informational, military, economic, religious power (or a combination of).
- human rights cannot be given by any State or Government from above, they can only be fought for by citizens continually examining and challenging institutions of elite power. To not do so is an abrigation of our duty as citizens.
"Liberty can and must defend itself only through liberty; to try to restrict it on the specious pretext of defending is a dangerous contradiction." ~ Bakunin 1874
"The protection of our liberties does not ultimately depend on parliaments or even the courts. It depends on the love of the people for liberty." ~ Justice Michael KIRBY 2003
- rights and liberties have been won through generations of struggle against the excesses of State and private power. When democratic institutions (both domestic and international) are undermined by those in positions of authority then we are in danger of regressing to a scenario which existed prior to WWII or perhaps something even worse.
- Human rights cannot be seen as something apart from democracy. Any government or elite interest which has undermined democracy will also have undermined human rights.
- HR can't be extended without extending the spirit of universal brotherhood and intnl co-operation. Govmts which have broken and undermined intnl agreements and treaties will be guilty of undermining HR.
- in a democratic society the onus of proof should rest upon an institution to prove that it has a right to exist, and the criteria should be whether that institution uses democratic principles and whether it serves the public good. If an institution fails to pass these basic standards it should be dismantled or drastically reformed.
- the idea that politics should be relegated to 'experts' and only briefly engaged in at election time by the 'proles' is itself an attack on HR. Entry of the 'masses' into the political realm is considered a nuisance and even a threat. This conception of politics is more akin to the 'Divine right of Kings' than democracy.
- the struggle for human liberation is an ongoing process which involves the free exchange of ideas - no single group or institution, whether it be religious, state, government, or economic system, has the right to halt that struggle. no single group or institution can have a monopoly on the idea of 'progress'. to do so is not only the height of arrogance but is a direct afront to humanity itself.
Every victory for human rights has not been achieved by governments, but by popular libertarian movements usually opposed to the government of the day - whethr it was the battle against slavery, the battle against Monarchy, the battle for womens rights, the battle for indigenous rights and treaties, the anti-war movement, the battle for the 8-hour day. Still today governments and business lag behind the popular sentiments of the people, whether on the issue of the environment, global warming etc. Governments and business are always frustrated that they can't fully co-opt this struggle. They are always worried that the struggle itself might present a threat to their elite power.
- "Although tyranny, because it needs no consent, may successfully rule over foreign peoples, it can stay in power only if it destroys first of all the national institutions of its own people." [Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism].