runs with scissors
08-19-2009, 11:23 PM
[div class="excerpt"]By Kent Paterson
Frontera NorteSur
Wednesday, Aug 19, 2009
Getting doused with pesticides is the first memory Sebastian Coral has of the United States. Crossing the border as a young bracero, or contract farmworker, in the 1950s, Coral made the obligatory stop at a reception center near El Paso, Texas, where he and other guest workers were subjected to delousing and blood-sampling. The experience has never left the mind of Coral, who wonders why farmworkers were treated in such a way.“It was a very ugly form of discrimination,” said the Chihuahua-born ex-farm worker.
Coral’s story held the undivided attention of youth and elders alike at the El Cerro Community Center earlier this month. Organized by the non-profit, Las Cruces-based Colonias Development Council (CDC) and other community groups, the gathering discussed living and working conditions in underdeveloped border-area communities known as colonias. Often lacking paved roads or even basic utility services, southern New Mexico colonias are heavily populated by recent immigrants from Mexico who labor in the agricultural and service industries for low wages.
......
While many of the issues discussed at the meetings are familiar ones across the US and globe, the New Mexico initiative stands out from many other community organizing campaigns by its reference to the Universal Declaration as a fundamental framework for understanding and solving social problems. At a time when the US is debating whether health care is a collective right or personal responsibility, promoting the primacy of human rights could expand the social agenda of the nation beyond its current political boundaries and media frames.
Discussion of human rights in the US usually focuses on political and religious freedoms. However, the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration also include guarantees of health care, education, employment, and housing.
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_56683.shtml
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Frontera NorteSur
Wednesday, Aug 19, 2009
Getting doused with pesticides is the first memory Sebastian Coral has of the United States. Crossing the border as a young bracero, or contract farmworker, in the 1950s, Coral made the obligatory stop at a reception center near El Paso, Texas, where he and other guest workers were subjected to delousing and blood-sampling. The experience has never left the mind of Coral, who wonders why farmworkers were treated in such a way.“It was a very ugly form of discrimination,” said the Chihuahua-born ex-farm worker.
Coral’s story held the undivided attention of youth and elders alike at the El Cerro Community Center earlier this month. Organized by the non-profit, Las Cruces-based Colonias Development Council (CDC) and other community groups, the gathering discussed living and working conditions in underdeveloped border-area communities known as colonias. Often lacking paved roads or even basic utility services, southern New Mexico colonias are heavily populated by recent immigrants from Mexico who labor in the agricultural and service industries for low wages.
......
While many of the issues discussed at the meetings are familiar ones across the US and globe, the New Mexico initiative stands out from many other community organizing campaigns by its reference to the Universal Declaration as a fundamental framework for understanding and solving social problems. At a time when the US is debating whether health care is a collective right or personal responsibility, promoting the primacy of human rights could expand the social agenda of the nation beyond its current political boundaries and media frames.
Discussion of human rights in the US usually focuses on political and religious freedoms. However, the 30 articles of the Universal Declaration also include guarantees of health care, education, employment, and housing.
http://axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/Article_56683.shtml
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