You also can be a part of it!
Human rights activists are those who defend the noblest causes: solidarity and support for victims of political persecution, enforced disappearance, harassment, repression, imprisonment, and censorship, as happens in all dictatorships—for instance, in the sixty that currently exist worldwide, without exception. They are the ones who are outraged by the plight of those suffering from armed conflicts, criminal, terrorist, or political violence, internal displacement, and discrimination against minorities. They are also those who show empathy for the most disadvantaged, from those living on the streets and suffering from hunger to those without access to healthcare, education, culture, and housing—in other words, those who lack equal opportunities.
The defense of democracy—meaning civil and political liberties—along with economic, social, cultural, and environmental rights, as well as peaceful coexistence, is what defines human rights activism. Supporting dictatorships that criminalize fundamental freedoms—such as freedom of expression, association, assembly, and political participation—or endorsing widespread corruption in democratic governments that hinders the guarantee of social rights, such as education, healthcare, housing, and public transportation, and/or upholding dogmatic and exclusionary models in the political, economic, social, and cultural spheres are, in all cases, incompatible with the defense of human rights.
To avoid sounding abstract, it is precisely the countries that lead The Economist’s Democracy Index that best guarantee respect for human rights in their indivisible and interdependent nature—that is, through their comprehensive application. These are countries with strong democratic institutions and high levels of transparency, combined with an economic system that upholds fiscal responsibility while ensuring private initiative, inclusion, and social well-being. These same countries also advocate for the universal nature of human rights through their foreign policy and international cooperation.
The Memory of Nunca Más in Argentina means defending democracy, participating in elections, petitioning authorities, and exercising the right to protest—provided it remains peaceful, as is essential for the latter to be recognized as a human right. It also means fostering dialogue and coexisting with political differences, showing empathy for the socially disadvantaged, and, on the international stage, refusing to be complicit in the silence that remaining dictatorships seek to impose while standing in solidarity with their victims.
In a year of legislative elections in Argentina, it would be beneficial for alternatives to emerge—beyond the populist rhetoric of both the right and the left—that uphold human rights as a central pillar of democratic public policy.
