Archive for the ‘Human Rights’ Category

Newer Entries »

Head of WITNESS on Filming the Truth

Monday, August 2nd, 2010

yvette-alberdingkthijm.jpg Yvette Alberdingk Thijm is the Executive Director of WITNESS, an awesome TILE Human Rights charity. Yvette has ultimate responsibility for envisioning, conceptualizing and implementing WITNESS’ overall direction. She leads efforts to carry out the programmatic, organizational and funding strategies necessary to ensure her organization’s mission and health. She’s also responsible for overseeing the organization’s compliance with legal and regulatory requirements. What a job.

TILE: How do issues relating to human rights affect young people?
Yvette: All over our globe, we want the same things: access to education, clean water, non-discrimination. We want to be treated fairly and with respect; we’re global citizens and the future is ours – we need to protect it and the earth.

TILE: What’s the most important thing we can do to affect human rights around the world?
Yvette: WITNESS says: see it, film it, change it! You’ve got the power. Tell your story. Get involved your community, neighborhood, school, and use your iPod or cellphone to document what’s going on around you and change it!

TILE: What’s the biggest challenge you face in your work?
Yvette: All the injustice in the world can feel overwhelming. But anyone can make a difference and when we work together we can change a lot.

TILE: What’s the best advice you would give to your teenage self?
Yvette: Get involved and stand up for what you believe in. Your voice is important. Make sure it’s heard and help others’ stories get out there.

TILE: How do you think young people can play a role in the changing landscape of philanthropy?
Yvette: Young people understand what it’s like to be connected digitally, and can make a big difference easily through Twitter, Facebook and social networks – it’s a lifestyle: if you decide to care, people will listen and join you.

>> TILE brings you exclusive opinions, explanations, and interviews from experts in every industry. To read more, click on Ask the Experts in the TILE Library.

Have a burning question or an expert you’d like to see interviewed? Just Ask TILE!

White South Africans Fall On Hard Times

Friday, June 25th, 2010

Repairing apartheid in South Africa wasn’t beneficial for everyone…

  • In the last decade, the number of white South Africans living below the poverty line has greatly increased, contradicting the common stereotype of white South African privilege and black South African persecution.
  • In response to years of apartheid, the government removed some of the safety net that kept poor white citizens afloat, and replaced it with harsh affirmative action laws that guaranteed black South Africans more economic opportunities.
  • Today, many poor white South Africans have been forced to squat in cramped trailer parks, some without electricity or running water.

Facts & Figures

  • White unemployment nearly doubled between 1995 and 2005
  • Ten percent of the white South African population live below the poverty line

Best Quote

“The vast number in black poverty does not mean we must ignore white poverty, which is becoming an embarrassment to talk about.” - Jacob Zuma, South African President

TILE Announcement: World Water Week!

Monday, March 22nd, 2010

Today is the first day of World Water Week, and our friends over at charity: water have just launched UNSHAKEN – a new campaign to support clean water efforts in Haiti. All donations will go to one of eleven projects currently underway in the devastated country. Check out this great video they made:

Unshaken – charity: water’s campaign for Haiti from charity: water on Vimeo.

Scientists Stumble Upon Potential Key To Eternal Youth In Stem Cell Research

Friday, February 26th, 2010

An unprecedented breakthrough in stem cell research may hold the key to combating a terrible disease and unlocking the gate to immortality…

  • In the process of working with a new type of cell—induced pluripotent stem cells, a stem cell similar to embryonic stem cells but made from ordinary skin cells—a team of researchers at the Children’s Hospital Boston and the Harvard Stem Cell Institute were able to reverse the aging process of a rare genetic disease.
  • The disease, dyskeratosis congenita, is a blood marrow disorder that causes premature aging, warped fingernails (among other symptoms) and an increased risk of cancer. In the process of creating iPS cells from diseased patients’ skin cells, the scientists found that a gene in the cells multiplied three-fold, helping to restore telomeres (little caps on the ends of the chromosomes that carry DNA), which are integral in the process of aging and death in cells. Replenishing the telomeres could, in theory, help reverse the aging process.
  • About half of the people with the disease have bone marrow failure (meaning that their bone marrow stops making blood and immune cells properly), and of those people, many often die during bone marrow transplants. However, researchers think that bone marrow transplants from a patient’s own cells may be a gentler process.

Facts & Figures

  • Dyskeratosis congenita is a very rare disease and is usually diagnosed between the ages of 10 and 30.
  • In dyskeratosis congenita, the cells lose telomerase, an enzyme that helps maintain the telomeres. As telomeres deteriorate, cells age, and disease and death follow.
  • In cancer, telomerase apparently helps tumor cells become immortal and proliferate. Experimental cancer drugs target telomerase.
  • TERC helps rejuvenate telomeres, and researchers suspect that tumor cells employ TERC in order to achieve immortality.
  • Researchers speculate that replenishing TERC might help the sufferers of dsykeratosis congenita.

Best Quote

“We’re not saying we’ve found the fountain of youth, but the process of creating iPS cells recapitulates some of the biology that our species uses to rejuvenate itself in each generation.” – Suneet Agarwal, Researcher at Harvard Stem Cell Institute

Human Rights are…

Monday, December 7th, 2009

Human rights are those rights to which every human being on Earth is entitled, including the right to life and freedom from violence, enslavement, or other types of abuse. Many organizations, including governments and charities, fight to secure human rights for people around the world.

Human Trafficking is…

Tuesday, October 27th, 2009

Human trafficking is when people, usually poor or otherwise vulnerable people, are taken captive and exploited. They are often transported far from home and treated as slaves or forced into hard labor or prostitution. Most of these helpless people are women and children who are subject to brutal living conditions. Human trafficking is a major international problem with estimates of the number of trafficked people ranging between 500,000 to 4,000,000 a year.

Aren’t health and a clean environment human rights?

Monday, August 10th, 2009

Deciding which causes you want to support – with time or money – can be confusing. If you give to just one cause, you might feel like you’re neglecting something else you care about, and it seems like some of the categories overlap anyway. Aren’t health and a clean environment human rights? It depends on who you ask. Even defining exactly what it means to be or have a human right isn’t simple.

The UN’s Universal Declaration of Human rights and other major documents have listed health and a clean environment as “human rights,” but what might be more relevant for you as a budding philanthropist to realize is that giving to an organization with a specific mission can have a broad impact. Many microfinance and poverty causes aim to help their constituents develop sustainable livelihoods – which has environmental and health implications as well financial ones. Helping to preserve and restore local environments can have major health and economic benefits as well. All of these things make people better able to live happy, meaningful lives, which is the true spirit of human rights.

The point is to find a cause that excites you and in which you will enjoy becoming involved, whether by giving money or time. The impact you make might be far wider-reaching than you think.

A Human Rights Cause is…

Friday, August 7th, 2009

A Human Rights Cause is an organization that works to champion human rights around the world. As Martin Luther King Jr. said, “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.” Human Rights causes fight against issues like slavery, abuse of prisoners, refugees from violent conflicts, and human trafficking.

The New Face of Philanthropy Is Slightly More Feminine

Friday, May 29th, 2009

The way people spend, grow, and give their money is changing. This write-up demonstrates one way in which the face of philanthropy and finance has changed.

  • Three years ago, sisters Swanee Hunt and Helen LaKelly Hunt seeded a philanthropic challenge with $10 million, named Women Moving Millions, to raise money for programs helping girls and women.
  • Women’s charitable giving is often less publicized or done anonymously; this initiative has inspired many women to step out and give boldly.
  • The fiscal prowess and sophistication of this group has caused some people to consider if this current economic crisis might have been avoided had more women been in positions of power within the finance sector.

Facts & Figures

  • Women Moving Millions has raised $176 million for programs to improve the lives of girls and women.
  • 98 women and 2 men have joined the challenge so far.

Best Quote

“It’s about standing up for what we believe. I’ve done a lot of amazing things. I have climbed mountains and dived ocean waters. But the very best thing I’ve done is to give this $1 million gift.” – Anonymous Donor to Women Moving Millions

Life Without Clean Water?

Monday, March 23rd, 2009

Water, water… everywhere?

  • A meeting of nations at the 5th World Water Forum took place in Istanbul this week, focusing on international diplomatic and economic solutions to the ever-present worldwide shortage of clean water.
  • The primary causes of the shortage are climate change and poor local resource management. As the earth heats up, the hydrological cycle is disrupted. Rising sea levels begin to infuse natural fresh water sources with salt, which makes the water unfit for human consumption. In rapidly modernizing countries like China, deforestation and desertification also disrupt the hydrological cycle and encourage salinization of freshwater aquifers.
  • Some outside conservation groups say that the council doesn’t go far enough beyond making proclamations to properly address the issue, though this year’s forum tried something new: Focusing attention on the economic impact of improved access to water and sanitation, in the hopes this would motivate local governments to take a more active role in dealing with the water crisis.

Facts & Figures

  • Humans can survive 30 days without eating food but only 7 days without drinking water.
  • 1 billion people lack any access to clean water; 2.5 billion lack water for sanitation purposes.
  • According to the World Health Organization, every $1 spent on water and sanitation can result in economic returns of $7-$12.

Best Quote

“I don’t know why anyone should need to be reminded of this, because it’s so obviously important and so obviously solvable. The answer really is people are blind to the obvious. It’s not sexy.” – Susan Keane, Public Health Expert at Natural Resources Defense Council

Comments Off
Newer Entries »