New US food aid programs

This is the link to the article: http://politicsofpoverty.oxfamamerica.org/.

The US is reforming the food aid program to allow them to assist more people around the world.  From the outside, this seems like a great initiative.  It is hard to argue against feeding the hungry.  But, in the face of one of the worst US recessions of all time, now might not be the best time to increase efforts in foreign aid.  Right now, the American unemployment percentage is higher than any other time in the last 50 years.  I believe that the government should start focusing their efforts on ensuring that Americans are not hungry.  Before doing anything else, our government should ensure that all citizens have their basic needs met(food, water, shelter).  It may sound selfish, but most people would agree that you have to take care of yourself before you can help others.  The US has always gone out of its way to
provide assistance to any country in need.  It would be a selfless act, if the assistance for these countries wasn't coming from American taxpayers.  I find it hard to feel responsibility for other countries when I know there are thousands of people in Atlanta tonight that are jobless and hungry.  I believe that the reason the government is more inclined toward foreign aid compared to domestic aid, is because its simpler.  In the US, people have to qualify for programs like welfare and food stamps.  The government has to jump through self-imposed hoops in order to provide those people any sort of assistance.  These restrictions are necessary to prevent undeserving people from obtaining aid.  However, there are no restrictions against the government helping foreign countries.  Ironically, the laws imposed by the US to protect its integrity are the same laws that prevents its government to helping its own citizens.

No Exit: China Uses Passports as Political Cudgel

      Imagine not being able to visit your family because the government does not allow it. Imagine that you want to go to graduate school but you can’t because you do not have a passport. Imagine you take a flight home and are denied entry into your home country. Currently, China is denying specific ethnic groups and activists who speak out against the government the right to renew or even receive a passport for fear of dissent from citizens and to punish them for opposing the government.

     In the 1980s China began providing exit visas and passports to citizens. By 1991, the dissent grew so China reacted by creating approved destinations of travel and then followed up this action by making it harder for people to gain passports. For the ethnic majority (the Han), it takes about two weeks to get a passport but for other ethnicities it can take years or there is even the possibility that they may never receive a passport or visa. Mr. Sun, a 79-year old man, has repeatedly been denied a passport to go visit his 90-year-old brother in Taiwan or his daughter in America because he has written against the current party ruling over China. This is an outrageous violation of his human rights. No person should be denied the right to be ‘caged in’ their home country and no person should be denied the right to see their family without just cause. In this last year approximately fourteen million people have been denied the right to leave or re-enter China. Unless China changes their policy on passports and allowing people the right into and out of the country, China will see major problems in the future including but not limited to, more dissent, intervention from other countries, and a possible uprising by minorities. 

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/23/world/asia/chinese-passports-seen-as-political-statement.html?pagewanted=2&_r=0&ref=freedomandhumanrights

US Immigration Reform

http://news.yahoo.com/reid-predicts-u-congress-pass-immigration-legislation-172812947.html

This article from Yahoo News highlights President Obama's proposed legislation to overhaul the U.S. immigration system. The President is proposing giving an estimated 11 million illegal immigrants a pathway to citizenship. Senate majority leader Harry Reid was asked if he believed that the proposal could pass in both the Democrat-led Senate and Republican-led House of Representatives. "It has to get done," was Reid's response. Upon reading this article, there were a few issues that came to mind with this new pathway to citizenship for current illegal immigrants inside of the United States. What does this adopted new policy say to immigrants who legally paid and went through the long process to become a citizen? I can see how this new proposal undermines the current hispanic-american people that went through the current citizenship process. Also, what are some of the implications of this new 8 year step to citizenship for current illegals? This sounds very much like a reward to the 11 million illegal immigrants who broke the boundaries of current U.S. law. I feel that Congress needs to clarify what illegals are eligible for this citizenship program and they need to set forth objectives and requirements that will lower the eligible illegal immigrants that have a path to citizenship. Washington needs to take into account the costs that the United States will incur with this new program. Allowing 11 million people access to citizenship will tighten an already poor job market for young Americans, pose risks to current American citizens, and cost the government millions of taxpayer dollars. After taking all of this into account, there must be certain requirements that limit the amount of illegals that are eligible for citizenship. Limitations on the amount of current illegal immigrants eligible for citizenship will lead to a higher number of available jobs for current young Americans, an overall better job market, and fewer risks and costs to current U.S. citizens. 

Enforced Disappearances in Mexico

link to article:http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/02/20/mexico-crisis-enforced-disappearances


Over the past 6 years, Mexico has faced a crisis of enforced disappearances. Under former president Felipe Calderon, security forces including the police, the army, and the navy has enforced disappearances. There have been reports that 25,000 people have "disappeared" or been missing since 2006. Only a very small number of the victims have been found. Obviously, this is a serious human rights violation and a serious crime. President Calderon denied the allegations that the security forces were involved in the disappearances for a long time, but later did admit that they were responsible. Despite admitting it, he has taken very little steps to resolving the issue. New president Pena Nieto has pledged to help end and solve the disappearances, but has not yet taken any action.

I think it is ridiculous that the Mexican has done anything to help find the victims and to find the people responsible. The police and armed forces are getting away with kidnapping and then possibly torturing and killing civilians. The government or somebody should step in to stop it. Even the new president hasn't taken any action, which I find hard to believe. The families of the victims should at least know what happened to the loved ones. I find it hard to believe that the Mexican government doesn't know what happened to these people. The government is covering it up or is responsible for the disappearances. Either way something has to be done about it, as this serious human rights violation can't continue.

Corporate Influences on Human Rights

On December 18, 2010, a serious of protests, marches and demonstrations began in the Middle East. This fateful event is known as the Arab Spring, and was caused by the oppressive authoritarian governments common to most of the Middle East, and North African countries. Furthermore, as an outlet for events of the Arab Spring, many revolutionaries have been using the internet as the primary medium of communication. Such action has led to the repression of the rights of many middle easterners to use the internet, that is to say, the governments want to contain knowledge of this revolution and ultimately retain totalitarian control. The problem with trying to stop internet use, is the fact that there is always some way to get the information out into the data stream. Therefore, governments have been buying spyware in order to catch human rights activists/revolutionaries, and subsequently kill or torture them. This leads to the crux of the article: should the companies that sell these items to those governments be punished, or take responsibility for the repression that is a direct result of their sales? They should most definitely take responsibility for the repression. I don’t, however, think prosecution should take place; the companies themselves should just make an effort to stop selling those weapons to those government. Furthermore, a blacklist of countries where human rights suppression is taking place should be created, and then the companies would have no excuse to say, “I didn’t know I was selling it to these governments”. Companies, just like people, have a responsibility to take all actions necessary to prevent human rights oppression and repression.

http://www.hrw.org/news/2013/02/13/should-companies-take-responsibility-repression

Chinese Labor Camp Reform

Alright, much of the Chinese government is a mystery to the United States, right? The more I look up about the Chinese government the more confused I get. The article I read goes into detail of a leaked news article detailing statements about how China is moving away from labor camps and plans to provide laws in the near future however, almost immediately after that was heard the website trace was lost and hours later a watered-down With such a large bureaucracy in China, moving away from the old ways and giving humans more rights will be a longer battle than it was in the United States, not to say that it is over. What does this mean for you and I you say? I think that it means that as China ramps up the power of the individual, the more powerful they will become and the U.S. will be taken down a notch and perceived as a second rate superpower. Maybe it will even quell the U.S. to take advances faster to outstep the competition one day keep up. At any rate, rights for more people in more places is a win for the world. In 15-20 years we must remember to be so bold, to invite change and give rights in every direction. The rest of the article goes into how the Chinese law enforcement is heavily impacted by the judiciary government, which sounds a little like the U.S. Police have "detention" of humans rather than prison for rudimentary crimes because there simply is not enough space. At what point should you sacrifice the penalization of crime with capacity limitations?  




Accessed by http://articles.cnn.com/2013-01-15/opinion/opinion_china-labor-camps-human-rights-watch_1_rtl-reforms-china-hints. Wang, Maya. January 15, 2013.

Media Responsibility

In the book The Plague, the people of Oran are highly affected by what is reported on the radio, despite the fact if this news is true or not. Although The Plague is a fictional novel, it’s depiction of the relationship between the media and popular opinion pretty accurately reflects the relationship in our world today. A commercial that exemplifies this relationship is a State Farm commercial where a man and woman are making small talk as the leave their apartment building. The woman refutes something than man says by saying that she heard it on the Internet and that, “they can’t put anything on the internet that isn’t true”. “Where did you hear that?” the man rebuttals. “The internet” she responds.

            Because of the media’s universality and omnipresence, people have become accustomed to relying on the media, especially television media, as their main source of information and not questioning the validity of the media’s reporting.  This is becoming a serious problem in regard to awareness of human rights. This is because most of the time, the way human rights problems are fixed is first through awareness and then through action. No action can be taken if one is not aware of the problem. The last article I wrote was on Syria and I was pretty familiar with the cause because it has seen some coverage in the news but also because my brother is very interested in this issue and keeps me updated. However, as I began to look for other human rights articles, I was shocked at the amount of sites reporting human rights violations in countries where I had never heard of human rights violations occurring before. I found this article in Aljazeera that pretty much summed up the countries where human rights violations occurred in 2012 and the list was shocking. The countries included: Ethiopia, Syria, South Sudan, Kenya, Belarus, and China. It is disheartening how the media disappoints the people time and time again by picking exciting stories over the stories that people need to be informed about – and often the people don’t even realize that they are being disappointed. This is the most disheartening fact at all.

In my last blog, I also wrote a bit about the importance of corporate responsibility and now I am writing for media responsibility. The media needs to be held accountable for the informing of the American public of human rights issues of importance. I think that with increased awareness human rights violations will decrease.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmx4twCK3_I

http://www.aljazeera.com/humanrights/2012/12/2012121011938507569.html