Iran Essay Contest (3rd Place): Integrating Human Rights --- Politics, Sexual Orientation, and Poverty

This is not just a problem for the excluded group in question, be it sexual minorities or the poor. It has implications for how our civil society envisions a new culture that is respectful of difference, and values equality and diversity. We cannot claim to work for creating a human-rights oriented system that would respect the fundamental rights of its citizens to personhood, privacy, freedom and equality, but remain indifferent to --- worse yet, supportive of --- structures that either fail to recognize the right of all humans to human rights or fall short of empowering all humans to meaningfully claim and exercise their rights.

Click to read more ...