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Photo courtesy of Jayne Midura.
Photo courtesy of Jayne Midura.
By Guest Columnist Jayne Midura
ZEBULON - On Saturday, Jan 21, 2017, 35 brave souls weathered torrential rain, lightning, and a nearby tornado touchdown to show their solidarity for Women’s and Human Rights, as a sister march to the national one in Washington, D.C. Atlanta, Savannah, Athens and Columbus were sites of similar marches in Georgia.
Marchers in Zebulon walked around the courthouse square sidewalk and later huddled under business awnings on the West side of the square holding signs that read “Dignity”, “Solidarity”, “Equality” and “Mother Earth”. There was no speech-making according to agreed-upon norms; also negative and political signs/speech was not allowed. The event was a non-partisan one to raise awareness of the need to continue the fight for Women’s and Human Rights throughout America and the world. War, political suppression, poverty, disease, lack of access to healthcare, lack of access to education, violence against women and children and modern slavery are factors that prevent people from having or cause citizens to lose their rights to basic human needs.
UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency, states that as of 2015, there were 21.3 million refugees, half of whom were under age 18, displaced by war and political upheaval. According to a Global Issues, The Human Development Report from Oct 2015, the number of people living on $2.50 per day is 3 billion, with 1 billion of those being children. The World Health Organization states that “In 2012, 6.6 million children died before reaching their fifth birthday; almost all (99%) of these deaths occurred in low- and middle-income countries. The major killers of children aged less than 5 years were prematurity, pneumonia, birth asphyxia and birth trauma, and diarrheal diseases.”
Violence against women and children is another major contributor to loss of human rights: a 2014 report from the Centers from Disease Control states that nearly 1 in 5 women in the U.S. have been raped in their lifetime and that 1 in 4 women have been the victim of severe physical violence by an intimate partner. According to the International Labour Organization, “Almost 21 million people worldwide are victims of forced labor – 11.4 million women and girls and 9.5 million men and boys.” This includes an estimated 4.5 million who are exploited for human trafficking. UNICEF estimates that 1.2 million children EACH YEAR are victims of human trafficking.
The organizers of the Zebulon event hope that the marches make local citizens, as well as citizens around the globe, more aware of the various human rights issues in America and throughout the world.
The organizers of the march thank the Pike County Sheriff’s Office and Mayor Bobby Blalock for working with them so that the march would run smoothly.
Photo courtesy of Don Brown.
Photo courtesy of Don Brown.