Editor’s note: This article was initially published in The Daily Gazette, Swarthmore’s online, daily newspaper founded in Fall 1996. As of Fall 2018, the DG has merged with The Phoenix. See the about page to read more about the DG.
The campus chapter of Amnesty International is mid-way through “Human Rights Week,” a full week of events planned to “raise awareness and incite students to act upon human rights issues around the world,” according to member Linda Wang ’09. Each of six days is themed around one of Amnesty’s most active campaigns.
On Monday, students were able to take direct action by signing the “Million Faces Petition,” which involved writing a message like “Stop the Global Arms Trade” on their hand and taking a photograph. Amnesty hopes to collect over a million such portraits as a powerful visual representation of support for its campaign against the global arms trade.
Tuesday’s theme was Amnesty’s “Corporate Action Network,” and featured a screening of “The Corporation” followed by a discussion.
Wednesday’s events were focused around the theme of “Life Without Parole for Juveniles” and organized by Sasha Grenier ’08. She told the Gazette that “while the US has a colossal 2,225 juveniles behind bars, with over 300 in Pennsylvania alone, the entire rest of the world combined has 12… the entire world recognizes it as a human right to not lock up children.” Events on this day included speaker Gerald LeMelle, the Deputy Executive Director of Advocacy for Amnesty USA, a movie screening, and “Dessert and Discussion” in Paces.
Still to come are days themed around “Stonewalled,” Amnesty’s gay rights campaign, “Stop Violence Against Women,” and “Denounce Torture” on Saturday the 10th to close out the week.
December 10th is actually Human Rights Day, but the chapter “figured that there was no way we could [encapsulate] all of Amnesty’s campaigns into one day,” says Grenier, and also that “having an entire week divided into campaign themed days would allow for focus and breadth.” While Reading Week may seem like a strange time to put on such an intense schedule of events, Kristen Shonborn ’09 hoped that “everyone would need lots of study breaks.”
Shonborn organized “Amnestea” for the 10th, a coffeehouse event in Olde Club that will feature “fresh baked goods, lots of caffeinated beverages, musical performances by students, and letter writing campaigns.” She described it as “a low key way to wrap up the Human Rights Week and a nice relaxing study break before finals.”
What’s in store for Amnesty next semester? Shonborn said that the chapter was thinking about holding “a similar campaign at a more ideal time… we may model it after Class Awareness Month and schedule things to be more spread out.” Campaign or no campaign, Wang promised more film screenings and “more interesting speakers on pertinent human rights topics!” Even if you can’t make it to all of the events this week, Amnesty is certainly a club to watch.
