It's Human Rights Day!

I went to American University today and was mistaken for a faculty member. Awesome!

But more importantly, today is international Human Rights Day, marked to celebrate the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the UN in 1948. The day symbolizes both celebration of past accomplishments as well as ongoing struggles. Amnesty International always hosts events around the world, including the Global Write-a-thon. Even if you don't read this until after Human Rights Day, think about writing a letter from Amnesty's action prompts, or donating. Human rights are important every day.

So go celebrate.

I've been thinking a lot about what we call our rights. For example, there's a lot of bruhaha over the marriage equality debate and the use of the words "civil rights". On the one hand, we are talking about marriage which is a civil issue (correct?), and the right to marry. So civil rights. However, the term civil rights is pretty much inseparable from the Civil Rights Movement, and some people feel that it's a word that you shouldn't and can't co-opt because of that - especially in light of all the "blacks are to blame for Prop 8!" crap that came out after the election.

So if not civil rights, then what? Some people seem to think that "human rights" would be a better term. Others argue that human rights are those very basic things: food, water, shelter, medicine, safety from violence. But wouldn't you put "the pursuit of happiness" in that list? Isn't that the point of the list? It's the base of Maslow's triangle! The whole reason for advocating for these things is that people can't be happy without them. So does that mean that the pursuit of happiness is a human right? And wouldn't marriage - or whatever one might call the ability to be with the one you love and have it be legally recognized - therefore be a human right?

I'm still not sure about all this. The best I've been able to come up with is "equal rights". I feel that even if the left can't agree on the names, we can at least agree that everyone deserves equal rights.