This week marks the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which was signed into law on July 26, 1990. The ADA prohibits discrimination based on disability, which is defined as a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits a major life activity. In the United States alone, one out of every five people are affected by a disability, which is roughly 54 million Americans. However, since the ADA was enacted into law, significant changes in technology have created new challenges and forms of discrimination for people living with disabilities. For instance, people with disabilities are twice as likely to not have access to the internet or are severely limited to certain online activities. Those who are blind, for example, are often unable to enter passwords and use certain authentication software, barriers that could be overcome with the development and availability of voice recognition technologies.

As we look back at the last twenty years of progress in increasing access and eliminating forms of discrimination based on disability, we must keep the voices and experiences of people with disabilities at the forefront of policy debates to ensure that our laws keep up with changes in technology and that they continue to protect against new forms of discrimination which impede upon peoples’ capacity to engage with their communities and fulfill self-determined lives.

The average American is a slave to technology. Although no one really knows the physical and psychological impact of this, there is a lot of discussion recently about the danger of computers and cellphones. According to several articles and books, these “gadgets” have resulted in shallower thinking, weakened concentration, reduced creativity, heightened stress, and interrupted work and family life. There are also concerns about the physical impact. One Swedish study that followed young people, who began using cellphones as teenagers, for 10 years calculated a 400 percent increase in brain tumors. Another study revealed a potential link between cellphone radiation and loss in bees’ honey production—given that bees pollinate 90% of commercial crops in the USA the side effects of this could eventually be dire. However as Maureen Dowd wrote, “even if scientists told us our computers would make our arms fall off, we’d probably keep typing.” All this recent attention to the physical and psychological impacts notwithstanding, it is people who don’t even use these “gadgets” that are at the greatest, yet far less talked about, risk. Smartphones and laptops are built from minerals—tin, tantalum, tungsten, and gold—that warlords trade and use to fund mass slaughter and rape in eastern Congo. This straightforward video by the Enough Project describes how these minerals leave a trail of destruction from the mines in Congo to the cellphone in your pocket, and what consumers can do to help end the violence.

Today, June 22nd, marks the Global Day of Solidarity for death row prisoner, Troy Davis. Davis is accused of fatally shooting Mark MacPhail in 1989. However, after serving more than 18 years on death row, Davis continues to assert his innocence, and serious questions concerning the fairness of his trial have sparked international concern in the human rights community: there was no physical evidence presented in Troy Davis’ trial, the weapon used in the crime was never found, and the case against him rests entirely on witness testimony, even though seven of the nine witnesses have recanted or contradicted their testimony and have admitted they were coerced by police.

As part of its Freedom School in Savannah, Georgia held this past week, representatives from Amnesty International USA and Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty have held educational programs around universal human rights and the death penalty, and the application of capital punishment here in the United States. The Global Day of Solidarity, which will include vigils around the world, is being organized to raise consciousness surrounding Troy Davis’ case as the Georgia Federal District Court begins reviewing new evidence, as ruled last August by the U.S. Supreme Court. Human rights groups will be holding a candlelight vigil in Savannah and at the Georgia State Capitol in Atlanta, and along with the NAACP, will be holding hours of prayer for both Troy Davis and the family of Mark MacPhail.

Vigil Participants Hold Photos of Troy Davis

“Immigration” is an issue that embodies many of the concerns and issues that are central to any discussion of human rights. It touches on many of the worries that people have about their lives. Nobody wants to experience discrimination, any form of degradation or torture, or have their movements restricted based upon nationality, religion or ethnicity. Everyone wants to be free to make a living.

There are two core questions in the current immigration issue that are not being addressed: 1)  How does someone prove their citizenship in the United States? 2)  What are the fundamental causes of illegal immigration and how do we prevent them?

Every country has the right and responsibility to protect its borders and to determine who has a legal right to inhabit the country and therefore legitimate claims on the resources of the nation and how those resources are to be distributed. In the United States, we have only one method of identifying citizenship. Only an American passport, or the newer passport card, can irrefutably identify someone as a citizen of the U.S. However, very few U.S. citizens have passports, and if they have them, no law exists that requires them to carry them on a daily basis. Many countries have national-identity-cards that details an individual’s citizenship status, but in the U.S., any talk of anything that approximates such a card, or something that might become a proxy for such purposes, instantly raises fears about government intrusion and control of personal information.

Without some national-identity-card, how does someone prove citizenship? Attempts to visually identify non-citizens, who may or may not be illegal immigrants, automatically requires a form of ‘racial profiling’, and is so arbitrary, that it leaves it to the enforcement officer to make judgments based upon their own perceptions and biases. This becomes a particular problem in the U.S. because the popular perception is that ‘illegal immigrants’ are Latinos crossing the Southern borders into the US. However, approximately 50-percent of illegal immigrants are people who have been legally admitted into the U.S. but have overstayed their visas. Therefore, most American citizen contact with illegal immigrants, are with people who are from countries not commonly associated with illegal entry, such as European and Asian countries.  Unfortunately, there is no reliable entry/exit tracking-process for people who have visited the U.S.

Ultimately, undocumented immigrants exist in the U.S. because of the ease of acquiring employment from the many businesses that hire them as cheap labor. Those businesses are also reluctant to participate in any efforts to identify undocumented immigrants.  It is likely that people would not seek to breach the U.S. borders if there was not a potential job awaiting them.

The appropriate questions for this dilemma are: 1)  Is there a form of citizenship identification that would be acceptable to U.S. citizens? 2)  How can the government enforce a process that punishes businesses for hiring undocumented  immigrants?

It has been an interesting two weeks, to say the least, since Arizona governor Jan Brewer signed SB1070 into law, a law which effectively makes the failure to carry immigration documents a crime and gives police broad power in detaining anyone who is “reasonably suspected” of being an “illegal immigrant.” I do not aim to provide a perspective that has not already been articulated by former Nobel peace prize winners or millions of recent immigrants whose lives will be directly impacted by such legislation. However, I would like to highlight Arizona’s recent ban of ethnic studies, which underscores what is really at the heart of Arizona’s immigration law: legalized xenophobia, targeted not at the immigration system, but at human beings of a different color, origin, and linguistic heritage than those who have the power to identify themselves as “real Americans.” This is why, on May 1st, also recognized as International Workers’ Day, hundreds of thousands of people around the country rallied for immigration reform that respects human dignity. In Washington DC, the four students who marched 1,500 miles from Miami along the Trail of Dreams were joined by thousands in their rally at the White House; in Los Angeles, more than 60,000 marched; in Atlanta, more than 5,000.

Of course, media coverage and public discourse on this issue end with the person who claims: “It’s simple. Those people are illegal.”

As a person of conscience, however, I can’t help but ask myself: Looking back in history, who gets to decide who is us or them? Who writes the laws? What happens when a certain group of people is dehumanized and made into the scapegoat, the root cause of all of the society’s problems? How would an honest, and thus radical, reading of human rights principles interpret the concept of ‘illegal people’?  Not surprisingly, the only source I am able to find that seems to make some sense of this current immigration ‘debate’ is in the form of brilliant satire:

Currently making its way through the Georgia State Legislature is Senate Bill 67, or the English-Only for Driver’s License Exams bill. The bill’s proponents argue that the bill will work to keep the roads safe and that it is “tough on illegal immigration.” However, many human rights groups and religious organizations in Atlanta, such as the Georgia Refugee Policy Initiative, the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights (GLAHR), and the First Iconium Baptist Church, among others, argue that it is a fallacy to claim that the same language level is needed to take a written exam as to follow clearly marked street signs and warnings. Such a bill, they assert, would make roads less safe by preventing people from taking the exam in their native language, and thus increasing the likelihood that they may not fully understand the rules of the road. Moreover, the bill targets “lawful, documented immigrants who are trying to make a living in the state of Georgia, but whose English may not have yet reached the level of proficiency needed for a full license exam,” as Teodoro Maus, President of GLAHR, points out. Because the bill makes exceptions for illiterate Georgians, many claim the bill is discriminatory against newly arrived Americans, and is reminiscent of the Jim Crow literacy tests of the past. For New Americans unable to pass a full English-only driver’s license exam, the bill would take away their ability to fully participate in their new community- with mounting cuts in public transportation, how do the bill’s sponsors propose that these Americans get to their English classes or buy groceries to feed their families?

Groups such as the Refugee Women’s Network have argued that the bill would be especially detrimental to refugee and immigrant women by keeping them isolated and unable to access jobs or health services, attend domestic violence prevention programs, or engage in parent-teacher conferences or their children’s after school activities. Many of these women are also active entrepreneurs who contribute greatly to the economy by opening up restaurants, day care centers, beauty salons, etc. Such driving restrictions would prevent them from providing for their families and helping to strengthen Georgia’s economy. The test is currently offered in 13 languages, and not only are there no data that prove that people who pass the translated tests are less safe drivers than those who take the test in English, but Americans who travel or live abroad are overwhelmingly given the opportunity to take their driver’s exam in English. For a state that is trying to become an “international destination,” it is hard to understand why it would impose restrictions on people of international origin.

For the first time, the United States will submit a domestic human rights report to the United Nations Human Rights Council for review this fall. The U.S. refused to participate in the universal periodic review process under George W. Bush Administration, but under the current Obama Administration, the U.S. State Department under Secretary Clinton has agreed to hold itself to the same human rights standards as the other 192 U.N. member countries. Will such scrutiny of the United States’ human rights record lead to justification of abuses by other nations? What impact will such a report have on local social movements struggling for universal human rights protections, such as LGBT communities, migrant workers, and Native American groups?

U. N. Human Rights Council, Credit: OHCHR

This week I saw a provocative ad at a bus stop in my Washington, DC neighborhood. A picture of George W. Bush gazing out an airplane window alongside a battered piece of cardboard with “AIDS is DC’s Katrina” scrawled across it. The ad is intended to prod President Obama to act on AIDS, specifically in DC where HIV prevalence rates are at least 3% (higher than in Lagos, Nigeria). This video reinforces the message that “56,000 new US infections each year symbolize neglect and indifference.” Race played a critical role in the devastation in New Orleans and it is a central factor in the HIV epidemic in the US. African-Americans make up 12% of the population yet account for more than 45% of new infections and 46% of people currently living with HIV. AIDS is currently the leading cause of death for Black women ages 25 to 34. On March 10th –National Women and Girls HIV/AIDS Awareness Day – set your phone or computer to alert you every 35 minutes. This is how often an American woman tests positive for HIV. Hurricane Katrina illustrated that natural disasters are neither gender- nor color-blind. The same is true of HIV/AIDS.

AIDS Healthcare Foundation Ad Campaign

This past Saturday, I had the opportunity to attend a welcome party for the four students who are marching from Miami to D.C. for immigration reform. It was a beautiful event filled with music, food, and people from throughout the Atlanta community. The event was organized by the Georgia Latino Alliance for Human Rights and the Georgia Association for Latino Elected Officials, among others. The four students shared with us stories of their march thus far, including a recent encounter with a KKK anti-immigrant rally in south Georgia. Luckily, the students were accompanied by local NAACP members, and were able to sing freedom songs together while surrounded by the KKK. As they move through Atlanta, supporters are worried for their safety as they pass through Gwinnett County, where Sheriff “Butch” Conway has instituted serious anti-immigrant measures in his police force. According to Georgia immigrant rights leader, Adelina Nicholls: “Sheriff Conway is one of the most dangerous figures in Georgia, who has turned Gwinett County into a place of fear, racial profiling, arrest, and deportation.” While the welcome party was a time of celebration and fellowship, there was also recognition that there may be further incidents of fear and intimidation for the students on their long journey to the capitol. However, the students shared their unwavering hope and commitment to their cause with the audience and will proceed north in the days to come…

Last week, the United Nations released its first report on “The State of the World’s Indigenous Peoples.” The report finds significant disparities in basic human rights and development standards for indigenous peoples as compared to non-indigenous populations. For instance, in terms of economic rights in the United States, more than twice the percentage of Native Americans and Alaska Natives were found to live below the poverty line as compared to the total U.S. population. And women’s rights standards are even more disconcerting: Native American women are 2.5 times more likely to be raped or experience sexual violence than other women in the United States. Human rights organizations such as Amnesty International are working to pass several bills in Congress this upcoming year to address these severe and pervasive human rights disparities. Of course, Native American communities have long been aware of these injustices, and groups such as the Alaska Native Justice Center and the Native American Rights Fund have worked to promote and defend Native American human rights.