Georgia College Human Rights Symposium

This past week I enjoyed a stay at Georgia College and State University to speak on behalf of Invisible Children at their annual Global Rights Symposium. This year, the focus was human rights, so I was honored to lend my voice to the symposium.

First, we heard from Dr. Bertram Ramcharan who was the former Acting UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.
He brought home a few ideas that really stuck with me about America's approach to justice post 9/11.
-The UN hoped to approach Osama Bin Laden's attack against America as a CRIMINAL act. Bush's decision to approach it as a WAR/TERRORIST act is the reason that the USA is still engaged in war with places like Iraq and Afganistan.
-The US Senate has later arrived at a consensus with the UN that America should have treated it as a criminal act, not a terrorist act.
-America's war on terror has had a ripple effect because other countries around the world have also begun to wage their own anti-terrorism wars but in ways that violate human rights much more than America has violated human rights post 9/11.

Then, I heard from Bill Nigut from the Anti-Defamation League.

Here's some points I picked up from him:
-Jews are fortunate in a way because they can "delay" racism against them. So many other children who physically stand out a minority face racism against them from the day they're born.
-Rabbi Hillel once asked 3 great questions about human rights:
1. If I'm not for myself, who will be?
2. If I'm only for myself, who am I?
3. If not now, when?

On Tuesday, I heard from Sister Helen Prejean, the author of Dead Man Walking and advocate against the death penalty in the USA.


Here's a few points she touched on:
-80% of the people currently on death row killed a white person.
-139 people have been taken off of death row for wrongful conviction. How many other innocent people were killed over the past 34 years?
-If I'm struggling with my feelings about the death penalty, I should ask myself, "would I be willing to be the person to kill the convict?"
-Do we ever think about the people who DO have to do this killing?
-They are normal people like myself who now have the profession of killing another human being.
-98.6% of people who are sentenced to death row are considered "poor" by our society's standards.

Finally, I was given the chance to screen The Rescue, Together We're Free, and deliver the closing keynote address on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Here's a few photos:

Presenting The Rescue to a classroom that had standing room only.


Merch table following the screenings.


My new friend Abby, a senior at Georgia College, was extremely helpful in getting the word out about Invisible Children and encouraging our work.

Overall, it was a pure joy and such an honor to have been brought on with such an impressive crowd. My thanks go out to the event organizers and all of the participants of the symposium. Keep up the hard work!