International Human Rights Day

Today is International Human Rights Day. Here’s a piece from the Voice of America:

The United Nations says intolerance, prejudice and discrimination lie at the heart of human rights violations.  To mark this year’s Human Rights Day, the United Nations is calling on governments and people around the world to live up to the international laws and standards that exist to protect the human rights.

U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay admits sometimes she, too, has been guilty of discriminating against others.

“And, really in my own life, in my adult life, I must confess that – and my young children pointed it out to me – they said ‘Mommy you are being racist,'” Pillay said.

Pillay says, growing up in South Africa, during the era of apartheid, conditioned blacks and other minority groups to view all white people as oppressors.

“I myself, growing as a child and as a young adult really suffered the inferiority complex.  You really think that, because of your color, you are ugly and no good,” Pillay said. “And, you have no sense of self-confidence.”

Pillay is of Tamil descent and grew up in a poor neighborhood in Durban.  She overcame the discrimination she suffered under apartheid to become the first non-white woman on the High Court of South Africa.

But, she says hundreds of millions of other people, around the world, have not been able to overcome the discrimination that continues to deprive them of their human rights. Click here for more.

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