Rural Diaries – country life, the countryside and rural issues

Posted by Sally on May 15th, 2008 in Rants and Rambles

It is 15 May 2008 and today bloggers around the world will unite in posting about global human rights issues. Will it change the world, of course not but hopefully it will make everyone that reads blogs stop and think.

Many bloggers have been worrying about what to blog about, China, Darfur, the Olympics, etc but for me the decision was easy.

My topic of choice is apathy.

I shall be the first to hold my hand up and say the apathy bug has bitten me when it comes to human rights. I feel so impotent when it comes to being able to effect change in other parts of the world and yet one artist in South America reportedly starves a dog to death in a gallery and I blog about it, post links in forums for petitions, sign petitions, etc, yet when did I blog about a child in Darfur or a monk shot in the street by a military regime? I am ashamed to say I never have, nor have I signed petitions.

In part I blame our government because the UK is now a shining example to the world of what happens when individual human rights are put before the collective human rights of it’s citizens. We now see a convicted murderer, who is not a UK national, legally allowed to live freely in the UK and criminals suing their victims, because it is their human right to do so.

This does not encourage me to think or care about human rights, what it makes me do is switch off and the real issues of human rights abuses get washed away with this lunacy. Our government also trade with regimes I would rather shoot than support in order to keep our economy bouyant.

However, I cannot lay the blame squarely at their door, I have the right to vote (something many people do not have), I have freedom of speech and internet access, so it is entirely my own fault that I do not do something about human rights.

Okay so my single name on a petition or email to an embassy is not going to have any effect but just imagine what would happen if Mr Ambassador from We Kill People Land woke up tomorrow to a billion emails saying the world is watching you and we do not approve, we do not support your actions and we will not buy products from your country or send you any more aid. It would be worth it just to see the mans face.

Rural life in the UK is certainly not what it was even a decade ago, the government are not supporting British farming, green land is being used for development, food prices around the world have increased massively but that extra profit never sees a farmers bank account, global warming is bringing animal disease to our shores and the current state of the economy means that there is simply less disposable income.

You have your own problems, so why should you care about some kid in Darfur or protesting monk?

Because you can, because you have the freedom to care and the resources to do something abut it. You can send emails, sign petitions and think about what you buy in Tesco.

Join me in ridding ourselves of apathy.