What You Need to Know About Water and Sanitation

Water, Sanitation and Hygiene, or WASH, are issues that affect the health and wellbeing of every person in the world. Everyone needs clean water to drink. Everyone needs a safe place to pee and poop. And everyone needs to be able to clean themselves. For many people, WASH concerns are taken for granted and their combined impact on life isn’t always appreciated.

But for hundreds of millions of others, water, sanitation and hygiene are constant sources of stress and illness. The quality of water, sanitation and hygiene in a person’s life is directly correlated to poverty, as it is usually joined by lack of education, lack of opportunity and gender inequality.  

What's the scope of the problem? 

780 million people do not have regular access to clean water.

2.4 billion people, or 35% of the global population, do not have access to adequate sanitation.

Photo credit: Flickr - Gates Foundation

Inadequate sanitation generally means open defecation. When people defecate in the open without a proper waste management system, then the feces generally seeps into and contaminates water systems. Just standing in an open defecation zone can lead to disease, if, for instance, the person is barefoot and parasites are there.

The problem is concentrated in Sub-Saharan Africa, Southern Asia and Eastern Asia. The country with the most people lacking adequate WASH is India.

Girls are the hardest hit by lack of clean water and sanitation for a few reasons. When schools lack functional toilets or latrines, girls often drop out because of the stigma associated with periods. Also, when families don’t have enough water, girls are generally forced to travel hours to gather some, leaving little time for school. This lack of education then contributes to higher poverty rates for women.

What are the health risks?

There are a lot of health risks associated with inadequate WASH. Just imagine what it would be like if you were drinking contaminated water and everyone in your community defecated in the open.

801,000 kids under the age of 5 die each year because of diarrhea. 88% of these cases are traced to contaminated water and lack of sanitation.

More than a billion people are infected by parasites from contaminated water or open defecation. One of these parasites is called the Guinea Worm Disease, which consists of worms up to 1 meter in size that emerge from the body through blisters.

Photo credit: Flickr - Andrew Moore

The bacterial infection Trachoma generally comes from contaminated water and is a leading cause of blindness in the world.

Other common WASH-related diseases include Cholera, Typhoid and Dysentery.

And, again, step back to consider what life without clean water and adequate sanitation would be like. A lot of your time would be spent trying to get clean water and avoid sanitation problems in the first place. And the hours not revolving around these concerns would probably be reduced quality of life because of the many minor health problems associated with poor water quality. Ultimately, inadequate WASH leads to reduced quality of life all the time.

What's being done?

For every $1 USD invested in WASH programs, economies gain $5 to $46 USD. In the US, for instance, water infrastructure investments had a 23 to 1 return rate in the 20th century. When people aren’t always getting sick, they’re more productive and everyone benefits.

While the numbers are daunting, a lot is being done. And the economic benefits of WASH investments make the likelihood of future investments and future progress much higher.

Some investments are small-scale, others are large-scale. On the smaller side of the spectrum, investments can go toward water purification methods, community wells or sources of water and the construction of community latrines.

Photo credit: Michael Sheldrick

For instance, in a slum in Nairobi, Kenya, the government recently installed ATM-style water dispensers that provide clean water to the whole community.

Larger scale investments include piped household water connections and household toilets with adequate sewage systems or septic tanks.

An often overlooked aspect of WASH involves behavioral hygiene, and, more specifically, hand washing. Simply washing your hands with soap can reduce the risk of various diseases, including the number 1 killer of the world’s poorest children: pneumonia. 

What progress has been made?

In 1990, 76% of the global population had access to safe drinking water and 54% had access to adequate sanitation facilities.

In 2015, even though the population had climbed by more than 2 billion people, 91% of people had access to safe drinking water and 68% had access to improved sanitation.

That means in 25 years, 2.6 billion people gained access to safe drinking water and 2.1 billion gained access to improved sanitation.

India is currently in the process of an unprecedented WASH investment program. At the 2014 Global Citizen Festival, Prime Minister Narendra Modi committed to end open defecation in the country and has since mobilized substantial resources with the help of The World Bank.   

What role does Global Citizen play in all this?

Global Citizen puts pressure on world leaders to focus on and direct money to poverty solutions around the world. When it comes to WASH, global citizens have helped raise awareness of the various associated problems and motivate politicians to invest in specific programs.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON GLOBAL CITIZEN 

JOE MCCARTHY

@mccarthyj71

Joe McCarthy is a Content Creator at Global Citizen. He believes apathy is the biggest threat to creating a more just world and tries his hardest to stay open-minded and curious. Living in New York keeps him aware of how interconnected our world is, how every action has ripples.

 

Highlights from Mashable's Social Good Summit 2016

“It’s the spirit of innovation, of risk taking, of daring that we need now more than ever in the humanitarian world,” Ravi Gurumurthy of the International Rescue Committee said. Gurumurthy was one of many leaders to speak at Mashable’s Social Good Summit, where topics ranged from mental health to child marriage to social activism. The two day conference (mentioned in last week’s roundup) brought speakers from around the world to lead roughly 55 sessions.

All of the sessions can be viewed here, but let’s take a minute to look at five of the highlights:

01 | Vice President Joe Biden and His Renewed Fight Against Cancer

"Imagine, just imagine, what the world could look like in 2030 if we're smart and we work like hell." Vice President Joe Biden’s message on day two was one of optimism. His three-part plan aims to end cancer by the year 2030 and "accelerate progress toward prevention, treatment and a cure." He spoke confidently of modern technology and international cooperation finishing the fight against cancer. Watch his 45-minute session here. Source: Mashable

02 | Minister Mohammad Al Gergawi’s New Measure of Success

In the session “Future and Hope,” Kathy Calvin sat down with Mohammad Al Gergawi, United Arab Emirates Minister of Cabinet Affairs and the Future. His title might seem far fetched, but the UAE has been focused on modernizing their government positions. Al Gergawi’s position is joined by a Minister of Happiness, a Minister of Tolerance, and a Youth Minister. Together, they represent the UAE’s new defense in the fight against terrorism and extremism: happiness, technology, and hope.

03 | The Social Progress Imperative Releases the People’s Report Cards

In line with the summit’s mission, the Social Progress Imperative teamed up with Global Citizen to create a new way to “grade” world governments on their alignment with the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals. The People’s Report Cards is a way for citizens to hold their governments accountable to the promise they made one year ago. (See last week’s roundup and Impact 2030.) Currently the world’s overall grade is only a C+: something Social Progress Imperative aims to improve with the People’s Report Cards.

04 | Memory Banda’s Courage in Standing Up Against Child Marriage

Memory Banda’s cause holds a personal importance to her: at the age of 13 she was nearly married off to a man much older than her. Now she champions the end of child marriage around the world. During her short interview “Rise Up,” Banda shared just a little bit about the Girls Empowerment Newport, which helped pass a law in Malawi banning child marriage and protecting 4 million girls. But the fight isn’t over, and Banda encourages other countries to follow Malawi’s lead. Source: Mashable

05 | An important Conversation with Ertharin Cousin

Social Good Editor Matt Petronzio welcomed the Executive Director of the World Food Programme in his “A Conversation with Ertharin Cousin.” After presenting a short video showing refugees suffering from malnourishment in South Sudan, the two launched in a discussion of what the rest of the world can do to help. While the task might be daunting, Cousin admitted, WFP uses technology to make it easier for individuals to help. Their “Share the meal” app allows people to provide food for children in Zomba—and it only costs US $0.50 to feed a child for a day. With that app and other kinds of technology being used to fight hunger, Cousin is hopeful of achieving the no hunger goal by 2030.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON CONSCIOUS MAGAZINE

MICHALAH BELL

Michalah Bell is a writer for Conscious Magazine. 

VIDEO: Old Subway Cars and Planes Get a Second Chance Underwater as Thriving Ecosystems in the USA

We’ve have all heard the phrase, “one man’s trash is another man’s treasure,” but New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority has turned their trash into a marine treasure.

Over 2,500 retired New York City subway cars have been hauled out to the the deepest, coldest parts of the Atlantic ocean and thrown overboard one by one into the ocean using a hydraulic lift. But before you panic, it’s okay. It’s actually a good thing!

As these stripped carbon steel subway cars reach the darkest lows of the ocean floor they are warmly welcomed by their soon-to-be marine life inhabitants. Over time, the cars become part of the underwater ecosystem, creating an artificial reef system, providing surfaces for invertebrates to live on and shelter for fish playing hide and seek with their predators.

The Subway cars act as “luxury condominiums for [the] fish,” providing more surface area for food and marine life to grow and flourish.

Though the project ended in 2010 and no new cars have been taken to sea, the Delaware Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control has reported a 400% increase in the amount of marine food available per square foot. While this particular project only ran for 10 years, the changes it sparked are self-sustaining and the benefits will last much longer than that.

Restoring the ocean’s reefs helps to restore balance to marine ecosystems that have been damaged by pollution, coral bleaching, and overfishing which can allow algae to overtake and smother reefs.

Oceans make up 97% the world’s water, produce half of its oxygen, provide food and livelihoods, and regulate climate. But we’re damaging reefs and polluting the water. It’s important that we work towards restoring our oceans and reefs to preserve marine life and return balance to the system.

The benefits of creating artificial reefs from retired subway cars are two-fold. Sinking these cars is a great way to recycle them, without sinking the MTA’s budget, and goes a long way toward restoring reefs.

It looks like an environmental nightmare: Dumping old subway cars to rust away on the ocean floor. But the MTA says it creates new marine ecosystems. Read more at http://www.onearth.org/multimedia/video/subways-go-submarine

It’s worked so well that Turkey just put a plane into the water in the hopes of creating a thriving artificial reef and capturing the attention of experienced divers.

A municipality in western Turkey sunk a 47-ton, $93,000 Airbus A300 Saturday in the Aegean Sea off the shore of Kusadasi. Authorities hope the sunken jet will become artificial reef, boosting underwater diving and reviving tourism in the area.

Now don’t you wish you could get a little subway car or plane for your fishbowl?

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON GLOBAL CITIZEN

ZAIMAH ABBAS

Zaimah Abbas is a social media associate at Global Citizen.

DANIELE SELBY

Daniele Selby is a freelance writer for Global Citizen. She is currently a Master's of International Affairs candidate focusing on human rights and humanitarian policy at Columbia's University's School of International and Public Affairs. She believes that education and equal provision of human rights will empower change. 

These $2 Birth Kits Could Save Millions of Lives

Around 830 women die every day because of childbirths that go wrong. For every woman who dies, 20 to 30 more women incur long-term health consequences.

99% of these health problems occur in the developing world. The vast majority could be avoided if basic resources were made available and skilled health providers were more common.

Oftentimes, women acquire fatal infections from unsanitary medical supplies or environments. Other leading causes of maternal mortality include excessive bleeding and hypertensive disorders.

Reducing maternal mortality rates requires more health professionals and improved health infrastructure.

Progress also requires cheap supplies such as soap, clean towels, sterile medical equipment, gloves and rudimentary medicine.

When Zubaida Bai explored this problem she realized that the latter part was, theoretically, an easy fix.

Her background is in product engineering with a focus on social enterprise. She first started to think about maternal mortality when she contracted an infection after giving birth to her son.

Had Bai lived in a country without an adequate health care system, the infection could have become far worse. Millions of women with similar infections do not receive proper care and regularly die.

Bai created an organization to address this injustice. She named it ayzh, an acronym for the initials of her family members’ names. Ayzh is pronounced “eyes,” to convey how the organization looks at the world from a different angle.

She designed a biodegradable clean birth kit called Janma that sells for $2 to $5 USD and contains, “a soft, blood-absorbent sheet that provides a clean surface for birth; medicinal soap for the birth attendant; disposable gloves; a sterile blade to cut the umbilical cord and a sterile clamp to secure it.”

Photo credit: ayzh

The kits are sold to nonprofits that focus on improving maternal health outcomes and to hospitals and health providers around the world.

In some instances, the kits are assembled in local communities, potentially creating an opportunity for employment and enterprise.

Azyh has so far sold more than 100,000 kits in more than 11 countries. After their initial use, the kits can even be used as purses.

They’re working on a newborn kit to accompany the birth kit that will include, “a clean receiving blanket, infant hat, antibiotic eye cream, umbilical cord medication and gauze to apply it, that will retail for less than $5.”

The organization aims to distribute millions of health kits around the world, potentially saving millions of lives.

Large-scale investments in infrastructure and the training of medical professionals are obviously still needed and will have a much larger role to play in reducing maternal mortality. In the short term, with millions of women giving birth in unsafe environments every year, it may take entrepreneurs like Bai to save people through the simplest of innovations like an affordable birth kit.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON GLOBAL CITIZEN 

JOE MCCARTHY

@mccarthyj71

Joe McCarthy is a Content Creator at Global Citizen. He believes apathy is the biggest threat to creating a more just world and tries his hardest to stay open-minded and curious. Living in New York keeps him aware of how interconnected our world is, how every action has ripples.

VIDEO: Schoolgirls For Sale in Japan

This Thursday at 12pm EDT, Simon Ostrovsky and Jake Adelstein will join 'On The Line' to discuss this story. Ask your questions on Twitter @VICENews with #OnTheLine: http://bit.ly/1Sgvvn2 Japan's obsession with cutesy culture has taken a dark turn, with schoolgirls now offering themselves for "walking dates" with adult men.

In an effort to understand a growing underground trade of school-aged girls, Vice News interviews women who have been caught up in this sinister business. 

VIDEO: E-Waste Tsunami in Delhi

A film to accompany the E-Waste Tsunami project. This film explores the industrialized landscape of the urban poor in a developing world metropolis. The urban poor are the community and sector of society to which the waste-picker and e-waste worker belong. The journey begins at the Bhalswa Landfill and associated communities in northwestern Delhi and then moves through the rapidly expanding infrastructure of the city. It concludes with a passage through unregulated housing developments that form a large part of this 21st century metropolis.

Turning Tears to Power in Nepal

Young girls share their life stories with photographer Katie Orlinsky at a rescue center in Nepal that helps victims of sex trafficking regain their freedom and happiness.

Regularly described as one of the poorest and least developed countries in the world, Nepal is a ‘source’ country for traffickers, and its most marginalised people are also the most frequently targeted. While its capital Kathmandu benefits from a growing tourist economy, in general the country’s economic potential (for example, through opportunities to develop hydropower) is stunted by continued political instability, as well as very poor infrastructure.

Rural Nepalese — some 80% of its people — rely on subsistence farming, which frequently does not provide a stable or sufficient income to feed a family. It is under these already difficult circumstances that the sweet-talking and cajoling of sex traffickers infiltrate and take hold.

Passing through the India-Nepal border in Gaur, Nepal. Nepal’s border police have been notoriously lax in stopping suspected traffickers and are known to be susceptible to bribery. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Narayani, Central Region, Nepal

Fake migration schemes are one of the most common ways girls end up trafficked. Job options are scarce in Nepal, and around 200,000 women leave to work abroad every year, mostly as domestic servants. Poor, rural women think they are going to be domestic workers in Dubai, but instead end up working as prostitutes in Delhi.

Seeking migration paperwork at the district administration office in Haidera. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Narayani, Central Region, Nepal

The sex traffickers methods are varied and unpredictable, which is why so many people fall victim to trafficking in this region, despite the initiatives and interventions of extraordinary agencies on the ground.

 Shakti Kendra in Kathmandu is one such shelter, managing to educate hundreds of girls. I met fifteen current residents during my stay, all survivors of trafficking to brothels in India or of rape within Nepal itself.

Founded by Charimaya Tamang — the first trafficking survivor in Nepal to press charges against her traffickers and win — all of the staff at the shelter are also formerly trafficked women, some of whom have been specially trained by Shakti Samuha in Japan on how to run workshops and look after their young charges.

Young sex trafficking survivors at the Shakti Kendra shelter in Kathmandu, Nepal holds up their favorite drawings. From left to right, “an angel helping a girl in need”, “an imaginary house”, “going shopping”, “a house in the mountains” (Photographs: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

The children living at Shakti Kendra take classes at the centre and are also involved in drama, weaving and jewellery making programmes.

A young survivor at Shakti Kendra traces a scene from an anti-trafficking awareness cartoon. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

As a photographer, the Shakti Kendra shelter was an extremely challenging place to work. It has a strict media policy to protect the identities of all of its members. Still, I wanted to document the girls’ world, but it meant I had to be patient, and make a lot of images with turned backs, blurred faces and deep shadows.

An underage trafficking survivor rehearsing a play about trafficking at Shakti Kendra shelter. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

In time, some of the adults opened up and let me tell their stories, but for the children, the policy was non-negotiable. Although frustrating from the point of view of documenting this issue, I respected this choice.

Trafficking survivors face huge stigma in Nepal, where the shame associated with the sex industry is so great that most survivors’ families don’t even want their own daughters to return home if they have been rescued.

A photograph discovered on the internet identifying a trafficked girl or woman could have repercussions — from an employer not wanting to hire them to a man not wanting to marry them.

Drawing class at the arts and crafts centre at Shakti Kendra Shelter. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

I was by no means the first foreign visitor to the shelter, but it was hard to tell judging by how excited they were to see me. Some nights I would stay late to watch TV with them, and those were probably some of my most relaxing and memorable evenings in Nepal. I stopped thinking about the pictures and interviews and would just enjoy the company of the sweetest girls in the world as they tried to teach me Nepali and asked me a million questions on every last detail of my life.

[1] A sex trafficking survivor who works at the Shakti central office as a receptionist. [2] A sex trafficking survivor, who now works at Shakti Kendra shelter as a recreation officer and teaches weaving. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

Growing close to women and girls who have experienced such a level trauma was difficult and emotionally exhausting at times. 

It was particularly hard with the children, like thirteen-year-old Sabina who had been rescued from a brothel in India just six months ago. She had a bright smile and so much love to give it seemed she might burst.

A Shakti Samuha adolescent group meeting in a slum area of Kathmandu, where staff members raise awareness about trafficking related issues with at-risk youth. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

She loved pop music and called me ‘Katy Perry’. I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that she was the same age as my niece in New York, and how Sabina has already lived a life filled with more pain than I hope my niece would experience in a lifetime. Sabina dreamed of travelling, studying and getting a good job to help her family, who lived close by. She missed them, and talked about them constantly. What she had yet to understand was that it was her own family who sold her into trafficking.

Residents and staff at Shakti Kendra perform a play they wrote and directed themselves. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

Trafficking in Nepal is not only something that can be managed and prevented, it can end, and it can happen within our lifetime.

It starts with the work of anti-trafficking survivor-run organisations like Shakti Kendra. These women have the motivation, ability, sensitivity and understanding to tackle the issue from all angles, from prevention and rescue, to prosecution and rehabilitation. They will not shy away from fighting to identify and imprison traffickers and their collaborators, from small-time pimps to local police to family members.

One day these young girls at the centre will take their place as the next generation’s leaders in the fight against trafficking.

Young residents dancing at the Shakti Kendra shelter. (Photograph: Katie Orlinsky) Kathmandu, Nepal

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON MAPTIA 

WRITTEN BY THE LEGATUM FOUNDATION

Clown Without Borders Go Into War Zones Armed Only with a Smile

In July 1993, a clown from Barcelona named Tortell Poltrona traveled to war-torn Croatia to do his act at a refugee camp. He had his doubts about how his performance would be received, but after an unexpectedly massive crowd of over 700 rapt children showed up to watch him, he left convinced of the value of comedy in crisis and conflict areas. That trip inspired Poltrona to found Clowns Without Borders, an organization devoted to bringing humor into lands where clowns usually dare not tread.

A year later, the internationally renowned clown Moshe Cohen, who had been bringing men and women with red noses and oversized shoes into dangerous places since 1990, opened an American chapter of Clowns Without Borders. Although it remains one of the organization’s smaller chapters (CWB has a presence in nine countries and is especially well established in France, Spain, and Sweden) and has only one part-time paid staffer, Clowns Without Borders USA now includes a board of 13 clowns, four logistical volunteers, and 30 active performers, some amateur and some professional.

Palestine, 2013. Photo by Baruch Rafiach.

One of the earliest American Clowns Without Borders was David Lichtenstein, who had been clowning with Moshe in areas of Chiapas, Mexico affected by the Zapatista uprising since 1990. He went on to serve as a board member until, after returning from a tour in Palestine last October, he was promoted to president of the board—or the “Chief of Clown,” as he calls himself. He took over for Tim Cunningham, a graduate of the Dell’arte School of Physical Theater who got hooked on clowning when, at the invitation of fellow clown Rudy Galindo, he joined CWB on a 2003 trip to Chiapas. He later performed in Colombia, Ecuador, Haiti, Lesotho, Peru, South Africa, and Swaziland, and has promoted the organization in Brazil and America. In 2007, Tim became an emergency nurse and this year began research on the impact of clowns in crisis zones as part of a doctorate in public health at Columbia University.

Using juggling clubs and seltzer water to cheer up refugees who have lost their homes and family members is a pretty unique way to spend one’s time, so I called up David and Tim to ask them why they do what they do, and how.

Haiti, 2013. Photo by Bobby Kintz.

Your organization is built around the concept of walking into places that have just suffered major disasters or are in the midst of armed conflict. As clowns. Isn’t that dangerous?
David Lichtenstein: We try to target the neediest people in the world. And yeah, a lot of these places are dangerous. Some of them are dangerous for the boring things like transportation issues—problems with cars and roads. Although we have been in war zones, we haven’t been too close to heated war. Still, there is often random violence in those places.

What are some of the most dangerous situations you’ve been in?
David: I’ve just been to Haiti, Guatemala, Palestine, and Chiapas, Mexico, during the [Zapatista uprisings].
Tim Cunningham: We’ve sent teams to work in Bhutanese refugee camps. I think [that we mainly ship clowns to] places that are proximal to war. In Colombia, we recently did a project along the Ecuador border and one of the towns we worked in was about 100 yards away from a FARC camp. But that [presence of violence] is in the background.
David: On that first trip to Chiapas, though, [Tim and another clown] were both robbed by Mexican police, or at least we thought they were police—we’ve been unable to find out whether they were real cops or thieves in uniforms. And during a show, Tim was lassoed by somebody and dragged by his feet on horseback. That was his first trip and he still came back for more.
Tim: I was hooked. I was like, This is real performance. This is engagement with my audience.

Haiti, 2013. Photo by Caitlyn Larsson.

Why did the guy lasso you?
Tim: We were in a really rural area and he was known as the regional drunk. We were doing a slapstick piece where I was working with this other clown, this really beautiful, sweet performer. And you could tell from the beginning he had his eyes set on her. He followed everything she did and was laughing really loud. In the slapstick routine we hit each other with this newspaper. She takes it from me, hits me; I take it from her… we go back and forth. Really classic slapstick. I think he decided he needed to save her, so he let out a yell during the bit and reared back on his horse like the Lone Ranger. The crowd split and I guess I was too dumb to split with everybody else. I was like, Great, I’ve touched this guy. And he touched me with his lasso. And dragged me down the road.

A lot of the places you go are very rural and have had little exposure to foreigners, much less to foreign clowns. Do you consider security risks when you travel? Like guys with lassos? 
Tim: We go where we’re invited. If we have connections with other NGOs that have bases on the ground, that gives us some security. Or we have friends and family who are doing work in a place and know where we could do a show. We rarely say, “Hey guys, I think we should pack up and go to Ecuador this week and do clown work because we think it’s needed.” Haiti’s a good example of that. We’ve been working there since 2006 and wanted to go back down after the earthquake. As an organization we decided not to go until people started asking us to come. We didn’t think it was appropriate for us to go right after the catastrophe because people needed food, shelter, water… they needed life basics. We thought they would send for us six months, maybe a year later, but within a month of the earthquake we started getting calls.

It’s partially for security, but also I don’t think clowns are always appropriate. When we connect with other NGOs, where we’re welcomed and where people know we’re coming, I think it’s more ethical and effective.

Colombia, 2013. Photo by Mauro Rebolledo.

Clowns must seem really trivial sometimes in such hard-hit areas. Are you ever criticized for what you do?
Tim: A couple of years ago I got an email from a donor who was very upset with us for what we do. He said, “You’re going to these places and you’re not bringing food, you’re not bringing shoes… what are you doing?”And I wrote back and said, “Hey, I appreciate your email and if you want to support those groups, here is a list of them that are doing exactly what you say.” But we’ve also met people who have had their minds changed after they see us with the kids, and see what a space is like when we come in, and then the change that has happened when we leave.

Is it trivial when you have people who are starving and have no medicine and you go in and clown for them? That’s a good question to ask. It’s a hard question and we certainly get a lot of pushback. We should, though. If everyone agrees with what you do, you’re probably doing something wrong.
David: As an aid group, we are a side dish. We come after medicine and water and food [aid] is underway. We’re also a volunteer-only organization. We just come in for a few weeks and do a few shows. We’re not affecting the economy. We’re doing ten major projects a year and a few small domestic projects on an annual budget of $40,000. We’re just a li’l guy in the aid world.

Haiti, 2013. Photo by Caitlyn Larsson

Have you had an experience where you were like, Oh, this is why I do this. This makes it all worthwhile?
Tim: In Haiti in 2006 we were working in a small, rural community called Torbeck. The kids there loved us, and one night when I was exhausted after a long day I suddenly felt this weight on my back. Before I could figure out what was going on this kid was standing on my shoulders. It was this clear night and we were looking up at the moon and I said, “Hey, hey, Jo-Jo, you and I, we’re going to go climb up to the moon.” And he laughed and looked down at me and said, “No no no, nous manger la lune [we’re going to eat the moon].”

So during this imaginary game it struck me that this kid was really malnourished. He was constantly asking us for food, but after the show and while playing with us he still had this fire of imagination that every kid in the world is capable of having. And to see his imagination explode like that just showed some really amazing resilience. I think we see that resilience with kids all over the world.

Haiti, 2013. Photo by Menley Mazile.

I imagine a lot of the people you are performing for havegone through serious trauma. And while there are some universal comedy truths—I’ve been laughed at all over the world for falling on my ass—your particular brand of performance must be unfamiliar sometimes. Do your acts ever upset people or fall flat?
David: One of the fun things for us as performers is that we get to work on a very basic, elemental version of clowning. In the US, maybe people would want something more sophisticated, but basic clowning generally works everywhere.
Tim: For example, we’ve got a bit that involves a clown finding a balloon. The clown finds the balloon, picks it up, stretches it out, slaps himself in the face by accident, and tries to blow it up. He’s not able to do it and we do all these funny things trying to figure out how to blow up the balloon. Then the bit ends with the clowns bringing a child up on stage. One of the clowns is holding the balloon in his mouth and his arm is out to the side making a half-T shape. The kid pumps his arm up and down, and that blows up the balloon. So the kid keeps pumping the arm and everyone’s laughing, but then the balloon pops. All of the clowns look at these balloon shards that are on the ground and they start crying and bawling and we have this balloon funeral.

In Haiti, we were talking with one of our sponsors about the program that we do. We told him about this funeral bit and he said, “You know, this is how women cry.” And he showed us this little hand-waving thing that women do when they wail. So we said, “OK, we’ll add that into our crying bit.”

So at the performance the female clown starts crying like that, and the kids all giggle. Then the male clowns look over to the female clown and go like, Oh, OK, that’s how we cry. So the male clowns start doing it. But in Haiti, when a male does that it’s a symbol of being gay, which is taboo—but the crowd loved it. It was one of their favorite parts on that tour because they saw us as people who didn’t know these taboos, demonstrating them in a very safe way and allowing people to laugh at them. In a way, I think we have some license through the form that you wouldn’t have if you didn’t have the nose or the character or the situation that you’re in.

Haiti, 2013. Photo by Menley Mazile.

Have you always been that lucky with taboos? Has it ever just fallen apart?
David: In Palestine last week we developed a little checkpoint clown piece, and that worked really well there because checkpoints are a part of their daily life—not being let through, not being let out. When we started the checkpoint clowning the crowd just went quiet, but then they would laugh at the gags. Also, it’s a Muslim area and we were a mixed male and female group of clowns, as usual. We had prepared for a Muslim audience, though. We took out a lot of touching and a couple of parts where there was hip-swinging dancing because we wanted to be safe. But then we wound up putting a lot of that back in because we realized that clowns can get away with breaking the rules. It’s OK for a male and female clown to touch each other, to bang into each other or whatever, in slapstick. Clowns have different rules.

Why do you think clowns can get away with breaking taboos in so many different cultures?
David: Making fun of life is a pretty universal phenomenon. I watched a video of a Brazilian clowning troupe that went into the Amazon jungle to clown for an indigenous group. The locals had a guy who was like a clown, who made his living just going around being silly and making fun of the daily tasks that everybody else did, and the clown troupe just went in and improvised with this guy.

Speaking of universal, have you ever had any issues with coulrophobia, the fear of clowns that’s such a trope in the West, during your travels?
David: It’s the big white face and clown costume that sets it off. We’re in fairly normal costumes—goofy clothes but natural faces, with perhaps a clown nose.

Tim: In Haiti we had a clown who wore stilts. We opened the show and the kids were cheering, but as soon as the clown on stilts came around the corner they freaked out—everyone was crying and trying to back away. So the clown kind of eased off and we quieted down the music. She got the stilts off in a really funny way. Then, after about three or four minutes, they were back to sitting there, laughing with us. So there was a fear of this big thing, but I wouldn’t call it a fear of clowns.

Haiti, 2013. Photo by Bobby Kintz.

Tim, you recently started a project at Columbia to measure the impact of clowning fieldwork. What have you learned so far?
Tim: There is not a lot of evidence out there at all. People have explored clowns in hospitals and done somewhat rigorous studies looking at the benefits of stress relief for preoperative patients, as well as reducing the stress of doctors and nurses in some cases. But really very little has been done examining what Clowns Without Borders does in refugee camps, conflict zones, and zones in crisis.

There was one study where they were saying, I guess, that you can increase your chance of success with in vitro fertilization if you’re entertained by a clown while they’re doing the IVF. People say you’re less stressed and your body is more accepting of what’s going on.

Well, that’s an image.
Tim: Yeah, I don’t think I’d want to be watching a clown while I… but I guess they’ll never do that to me.

What I’d like to see, though, is if you’d have lower levels of stress in conflict zones. I’d guess there might be better community adherence. We know that using performing arts and art therapy is a whole other way for people to work with psychological trauma and find creative spaces to do something positive. I’d like to build a body of evidence that shows that. Or doesn’t show that. Who knows? Maybe what we’re doing isn’t right. That should be examined as well.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON VICE

MARK HAY

@GoraLadka 

Mark Hay is a sometimes-freelance write, sometimes-blogger, and former graduate student at the University of Oxford. His work appears in Asoko News, Capital New York, Esquire, The Economist, Foreign Service Journal, GOOD Magazine, Men’s Journal, Roads & Kingdoms, Slate, and VICE, among numerous other minor publications. He writes about anything under the big tent of culture, faith, identity, politics, and sexuality — basically anything human beings will fight over.

The True Cost

Rent or own the film today! Visit http://truecostmovie.com for more details. Available on DVD, Blu-Ray, iTunes, Amazon, or VHX. Available on iTunes: http://apple.co/1EONAlN The True Cost is a groundbreaking documentary film that pulls back the curtain on the untold story and asks us to consider, who really pays the price for our clothing?

'The True Cost' is a story about clothing. It's about the clothes we wear, the people who make them, and the impact the industry is having on our world. Check out the trailer for this groundbreaking documentary that pulls back the curtain on untold stories of workers along the supply chain, leading the viewer to consider: who really pays the price for our clothing? 

Somalia: Daily Life

At 8:30 am the streets are crowded after the Islamic call to prayer. The echo of gunfire in the distance is a normal, and seemingly daily occurrence, in present day Mogadishu. Pick up trucks armed with groups of men carrying machine guns firing rounds to hurry along busy traffic is common, and it carries on throughout the day and into the bat-studded night sky. Mogadishu has been called the most dangerous city on earth and the country has been wrought with civil war between Islamist extremists and a failing government since 1991. Since then there has been no central government control over the country’s territory and the region has been stricken with devastating violence and famine. There are an estimated 3.7 million Somali’s living without enough food and the rate of malnutrition is approximately 50%, the highest in the world. It’s difficult for aid agencies to gain access into Somalia because many have been blocked by al-Shabab—the Somali cell of al-Qaeda—leaving nearly a quarter million people trapped without access to food. Photographer Anthony Karen ventured to Somalia’s capital in January 2012 to document the daily life of the people who call the war-torn country home and to visit the the Dadaab refugee camp on the Kenyan-Somali border.

Famine in Somalia

The United Nations declares a famine when 20% of households face severe food shortages. more than 30 % of the population is malnourished, and two out of every 10,000 people die from hunger each day. In July 2011, in the midst of the worst drought the country had seen in more than 60 years, the UN officially declared a famine in Somalia. The anti-Western, al-Qaeda linked militant group, al-Shabab made the situation worse, banning Western aid agencies from entering the territory and subsequently blocking starving individuals from gaining access to food. Al-Shabab has accused foreign aid workers of being spies as well as killed and kidnapped workers. The group has also diverted food supplies for themselves, leaving starving Somalis without any options and aid organizations in a tricky spot.

In February 2012, the UN declared the famine in Somalia to be over, but the country still remains in crisis with widespread hunger and violence. Since the collapse of its central government two decades ago and the civil war that ensued in 1991, Somalia has been faced with myriad disasters and has ranked as one of the poorest, most violent countries on earth. Last year, a drought killed livestock and farms which spiked death and malnutrition rates. Desperate Somalis trekked across the desert in search of aid and some arrived in Kenyan refugee camps while the few hospitals in Mogadishu were overcrowded with malnourished people affected by famine and violence.

The United Nations helped to raise more than $1 billion for relief efforts across Somalia and organizations such as the Turkish Red Crescent Society and The World Food Program have been working towards providing humanitarian relief in the country. Also, with the help of heavy rains in November, famine conditions began to subside in some parts of the country. However, the crisis is far from over and violence, instability and hunger is still widespread across Somalia.

Doctors Without Borders/Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) is a leading humanitarian organization that provides medical care to people caught in crises. They work within over 60 countries and remain the main provider for free medical services in central and southern Somalia.

The World Food Programme reaches up to 1.3 million peopole with food relief to areas of Somalia which they have access to including, Mogadishu, Puntland, Somaliland, central regions and some border areas of the south. They have increased their nutrition programs to treat and prevent malnutrition.

AFGHANISTAN: No Burqas Behind Bars

In this upcoming, feature-length documentary by Nima Sarvestani, the viewer is taken inside one of the world's most restricted environments: an Afghan women's prison. Through the prisoners' stories we explore how "moral crimes" are used to control women in post-Taliban Afghanistan. And no — full burqas are not allowed inside the prison gates! 

CONFLICT

Watch the following 5 episodes of Conflict free at http://thisisconflict.com. What happens off the front lines, when the combat concludes or has not yet begun, but guns and poverty abound? Pete Muller is an award-winning photojournalist whose work and life serve as enduring provocations on the tensions that lie beneath cycles of conflict. He was named by TIME Magazine as the 2010 Wire Photographer of the Year. At 29 years old he was the youngest person ever to receive the honor. Through his work he aims to illustrate broader issues through individual stories. He strives to create images that ask viewers to give emotional and intellectual consideration to the lives and experiences of those depicted.

What happens off the front lines, when the combat concludes (or has not yet begun), but guns and poverty abound? Pete Muller is an award-winning photojournalist whose work work provides insight into the tensions that lie beneath conflict cycles. 

Billions in Change Solution: Free Electric Overview

Access to electrical power is the first step toward economic advancement for billions of people living in poverty. Free Electric can light their homes and shops, make food storage possible, and usher them into the 21st century. #BillionsinChange Join us & learn more at: www.BillionsInChange.com Let's chat: https://www.facebook.com/billionsinch... https://twitter.com/billionsnchange https://instagram.com/billionsinchange

Access to electric power is the first step toward economic advancement for billions of people in poverty. Free Electric can light their homes and shops, make food storage possible, and usher them into the 21st century. 

MEET: Amber J Lawson, Founder and CEO of Good Amplified

Amber J Lawson is an American producer, entrepreneur, and online content and development executive. In another step toward her goal to “do good to scale,” Amber J. is the founder and CEO of Good Amplified, a YouTube Network solely focused on helping nonprofits evolve their donor engagement and retention via storytelling. In anticipation of Good Amplified’s launch, CATALYST connected with Amber J. to find out more about her new project and the future of content marketing.

Amber J Lawson founded Internetnetworksstudio.com in 1999 (after focusing on the performing arts at the University of Missouri). What motivated the transition from acting to developing online content and producing? 

When I first moved to L.A. (a few years after college), I loved performing. However, I disliked the way in which an acting career often left my fate to the whims and demands of other people. I wanted to make my own opportunities! So I became a producer and started writing my own content in order to have the roles I was interested in playing. This transition was taking place during the first Internet boom, and my friend said to me: “You know, I think this Internet thing is here to stay.” My initial reaction was, “What? That’s crazy!” Yet he and I (along with an 18 year-old stock market genius we worked with at a restaurant) set out to create Internetworksstudios.com. 

Our first show invited people from around the world to submit videotapes of them singing and dancing; the online community then voted for its favorites. We were a little ahead of our time — it was like our own American Idol — but after burning through the initial seed money, we created an hour-long pilot called Alyx. We partnered with Madonna on this program, which helped us sell the show to ABC/ Touchstone. 

It was all just a little ahead of its time — a notion that I’d say has defined my career so far. I’ve been involved in multiple projects that were ahead of their time, but hopefully right now (with Good Amplified) we’ll be perfectly aligned with the coming-of-age, millennial generation.  

What inspired you to create Good Amplified?

I worked as the head of programming at AOL. It was my dream job! I absolutely lived, ate, slept and breathed it. When I left my position, I thought, ‘I love doing these kinds of things.’ I believe that you can do good for the world and make money, so I contemplated how to strike that balance. I thought about what I love (entertainment), which led me to the idea of helping nonprofits across platforms to raise money through storytelling. 

I started looking for a way to do good to scale: a way that would build upon itself. I wanted to help leverage what nonprofit organizations are already doing through a platform (YouTube) that the millennial generation utilizes to consume content. And that’s when I concocted Good Amplified. 

What do you think the benefits are for a nonprofit to focus its media campaign on video production/sharing over traditional forms of digital content (e.g. articles)?

A potent form of marketing is storytelling, and every nonprofit has stories to tell. So they already have the key, potent pieces. The piece that’s missing, though, is leveraging the largest video platform (and second largest search engine) on the planet: YouTube. If you’re not there, it’s kind of like you don’t exist. 

By optimizing content that nonprofits are already making on YouTube, they can deliver their mission to the next generation. The reason I say it’s critical to be on YouTube is because millennials donate through views. If you monetize your video, and people watch it, they are (in essence) donating through their viewership. The next step in showing their commitment is becoming a subscriber. I look at this as a new donor-retention program: subscribers receive notifications about updates, which helps maintain their connection. 

According to standard marketing technique, it takes six to eight “touchpoints” for brand recognition to stick. With YouTube, this is something nonprofits would never have to think about again. All they need to do is continue telling their story to create those touchpoints in an organic way. So both the content and future viewers are present: nonprofits just have to facilitate the connection on a familiar platform. It’s an easier conversion than asking potential donors go to a website, or a new app, or something that’s completely different. 

How is Good Amplified being funded?

At first, we set ourselves up to work as a tradition Multi-Channel Network (MCN). Most MCNs operate in three steps: there is a content creator; the creator monetizes its content; when revenue is produced, the profit is shared among creator, YouTube and the MCN. This works for some companies, but with a lot of nonprofits, we found that this was a difficult system to adopt. First off, there needed to be a value in the services we (GA) are giving — it’s human nature to pay more attention to something that costs money. 

The second piece is that some nonprofits can’t take what is called Unrelated Business Income Tax (UBIT). It’s costly (and an accounting headache) to resolve this legality, which is why we have elected to give the nonprofits the option to pay a monthly fee to manage nonprofits’ YouTube channels. We run every aspect of it — titling, tagging, optimizing search algorithms — but we also educate the organization in the process. Over time, the nonprofit builds up a case for its team to start turning on the monetization (through ads) and collecting that revenue. 

Has working on Good Amplified changed your perspective at all with respect to digital media and technology consultancy? 

I feel like it has because there’s been a bit of an education process. For me, storytelling is the most powerful medium, period. While talking with nonprofits, we have found that they are waking up to the power of YouTube, but they need assistance. Quite frankly, some of the most successful nonprofits on YouTube have been the smallest organizations. In the absence of a complex, institutional process that drives internal operations, these organizations are more receptive to change. I think this is what our social media landscape demands: real-time interaction. This is how lasting relationships with online audiences are formed. 

It doesn’t cost a lot of money to get in the game, but it does cost time. A lot of organizations lack the time to curate their YouTube presence, and that’s when they bring Good Amplified onboard. Our goal is to get into the DNA of an organization: every time they create a piece of content, YouTube should be a part of its checklist for sharing. 

Most organizations use YouTube as a library or repository for past content. In reality, this material could be doing all the work for them! I use the example of Kobe Bryant, who granted a wish for Make-A-Wish Foundation a while ago. Contrary to popular belief, celebrity videos don’t always get a lot of views. Rather, a video has to be optimized on its platform in order to be picked up by the search algorithm. Once the video of LeBron got picked up, it started to generate 50,000 more views per week. That’s Kobe more people reached with your message! It’s all about the optimization and getting picked up in the algorithm. I know those things sound tedious, but they make all the difference in the world for getting your word out.

What advice can you offer people and organizations that are trying to utilize online platforms for social good? 

Number one is that you have to engage with social platforms. This is where the next generation of givers can be found, and the old techniques don’t work for them. I believe that older institutions have to disrupt what they’re doing in order to survive. Every year, we lose various nonprofits because they aren’t receiving enough funding. These organizations were doing great work, but they weren’t reaching that generation of future supporters and advocates. 

In addition to social platforms, content marketing is everything right now. What we’re talking about (brand recognition through storytelling) is exactly like branding for companies like Taco Bell or Target. Given that the commercial is going away, brands have to find different ways to engage with an audience through content that is entertaining and relatable. Why should the task of nonprofits be any different?

Good Amplified is committed to doing good to scale. We are looking forward to working with any nonprofit that has an appetite for content, and I think that is the distinction for how we can help. We are committed to making nonprofits successful — that’s our goal — but they have to have the desire for storytelling and content creation. I truly believe storytelling is the way of the future, which is why nonprofits have to embrace it now. 

SARAH SUTPHIN

sarah.sutphin@mission.tv

Sarah is an undergraduate at Yale University and a content editor for CATALYST. As a traveler who has visited 30 countries (and counting!), she feels passionate about international development through sustainable mechanisms. Sarah has taken an interest in the intersection between public health and theater, and hopes to create a program that utilizes these disciplines for community empowerment. She is a fluent Spanish speaker with plans to take residence in Latin American after graduation. 

NEPAL: Invisible Farmers

In the southern lowlands of Nepal, where the cold still bites harshly in winter, lives a voiceless, landless community of marginalized ethnic groups who have spent their whole lives working for others. With no piece of land in their names, and no opportunities, they are Nepal’s invisible farmers.

NO LAND FOR US

“I have worked on farms for more than forty years for landlords, and yet I don’t have a piece of land. What else can I do?”

— Jaga Majhi

Above: Jaga Majhi, a landless inhabitant of Bagaiya village.

Meet Jaga Majhi, an elderly inhabitant from the small village of Bagaiya in the Bara District, located in the southern lowlands of Nepal. Like many of the older generation here, Jaga tells me that he can’t remember exact year of his birth, although his citizenship card states 1938. He died of old age in August 2015.

Jaga's grandchildren play within their home.

Over the last few decades landless squatters in this region have built meagre huts to house their families. They have been here for all or most of their lives, and yet have no formal title to the land they live on, and most of them work on farms for their landlords, on a daily wage basis.

Above: [1] Locals struggle with the cold in the early winter morning. Poor housing and lack of sufficient clothing make life difficult during winters. [2] Shyam Chaudhari works in the field for a daily wage. [3] Keeping goats can help earn a living. [4] Daily wage workers. 

Most of the inhabitants here belong to marginalized ethnic groups such as Tharu, Musahar, Chamar, and Majhi. These ethnic groups are also viewed as ‘untouchables’ by the traditional and complex caste system, that is still present in many parts of Nepal.

Above: [1] Children inside a classroom at the local primary school. The school has two rooms with no furniture inside. They were able to make this school building at the end of 2010. Around 60 children come to study here. [2] An old man walks into a village of landless squatters. 

With no piece of land in their name and an utter lack of opportunity, they remain as impoverished as ever. This is the story of those who have spent their entire lives working for others — they are Nepal’s invisible farmers.

Above: The women also work in the fields on a daily wage basis, but receive a lesser payment than men for an equal day’s work. 

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON MAPTIA 

KISHOR SHARMA

@Kishor_ksg 

Kishor is a freelance documentary photographer based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He studied Photojournalism at the Danish School of Media and Journalism and is interested in using photography as a means of storytelling.

8 People Who Broke the Law to Change the World

1. Nelson Mandela

Nelson Mandela is, hands down, one of the most important and celebrated figures of our lifetime.

Mandela represents equality, fairness, democracy and freedom in an often unequal, unfair and undemocratic world. But he wasn’t always seen like this…

Twenty-five years ago he was getting his first taste of freedom after being imprisoned for 27 years. Yes, you read that right. For what? What could he have done to get such a long sentence? Well, he stood up for what he believed. In 1942 he joined the African National Congress and fought against apartheid in South Africa, and was imprisoned for sabotage.

Without Nelson Mandela’s commitment to the abolition of apartheid in the face of oppression and imprisonment, the world could be a very different place. It is because of Mandela, and others like him, many more people live a free and fair life. 

To honor his bravery and determination, we take a look at 7 other brave and committed people who have been prosecuted or persecuted for standing up for what they believe in:

2. Aung San Suu Kyi

Aung San Suu Kyi has become an international symbol of peaceful resistance in the face of oppression.

Now the Burmese opposition politician and chairperson of the National League for Democracy in Burma, she spent 15 years under house arrest for advocating for democracy.

Suu Kyi, who was heavily influenced by Gandhi’s philosophy of non-violent protest,  helped to found the National League for Democracy. Because of her campaign for democracy in military-ruled Myanmar (Burma), she was detained and kept imprisoned by the government, as it viewed her as someone “likely to undermine the community peace and stability” of the country.

She was offered freedom if she left the country, but she refused to let her party down and stayed in Mynanmar.

In one of her most famous speeches, she said: “It is not power that corrupts, but fear. Fear of losing power corrupts those who wield it and fear of the scourge of power corrupts those who are subject to it.”

3. Liu Xiaobo

Liu Xiaobo is a Chinese writer, professor, and human rights activist who called for political reforms and the end of communist single-party rule. He is a political prisoner.

Liu was detained in 2008 because of his work with the Charter 08 manifesto, which called for an independent legal system, freedom of association and the end of one-party rule.

He was arrested in 2009 on suspicion of “inciting subversion of state power”. He was sentenced to eleven years’ in jail and two years’ deprivation of political rights.

During his fourth prison term, he was awarded the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize for “his long and non-violent struggle for fundamental human rights in China.”

He is the first Chinese citizen to be awarded a Nobel Prize of any kind while residing in China and is the third person to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize while in prison or detention, after Germany’s Carl von Ossietzky (1935) and Aung San Suu Kyi (1991).

4. Mahatma Gandhi

India’s great independence leader first went to prison in 1922 for civil disobedience and sedition after a protest march turned violent, and resulted in the deaths of 22 people. The incident deeply affected Gandhi, who called it a “divine warning’.

He was released from prison after serving 5 years of his 6 year sentence, and went on to become the most famous advocate of peaceful protest and campaigning in the world.

Gandhi famously led Indians in challenging the British-imposed salt tax with the 400 km Dandi Salt March in 1930, for which he was imprisoned for a year without trial, and later lead the Quit India Movement, calling for Britain’s withdrawal.  He was arrested many times but never gave up. An advocate until the end, Gandhi sadly paid for his beliefs with his life when he was assassinated by a militant nationalist in 1948.

5. Martin Luther King Jr.

Martin Luther King had a seismic impact on race relations in the United States, as the face of the Civil-Rights movement in the 1950’s.

Through his activism, he played a pivotal role in ending the legal segregation of African-American citizens, as well as the creation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. King received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1964, among several other honors.

King was arrested 5 times, and wrote his second most influential speech whilst in prison in 1963 for protesting against the treatment of the black community in Birmingham, Alabama. Letter From Birmingham Jail, which was written on the margins of a newspaper and smuggled out of the prison, defends the strategy of nonviolent resistance to racism, arguing that people have a moral responsibility to break unjust laws.

Tragically, in 1968 he was assassinated in his hotel at the age of just 39.

6. Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks was an African-American Civil Rights activist who became famous when she stood up for what she believed – by sitting down. On the evening of December 1, 1955, Parks was sat on a bus in Alabama, heading home after a long day of work.

During her journey she was asked by a conductor to give up her seat to a white passenger, but she refused, and she was arrested for disobeying an Alabama law requiring black people to relinquish seats to white people when the bus was full. Her arrest sparked a 381-day boycott of the Montgomery bus system. It also led to a 1956 Supreme Court decision banning segregation on public transportation.

7. Susan Brownell Anthony

Or Susan B as some gender studies students know her as, was an American social reformer and feminist who played a pivotal role in the women’s suffrage movement.

Actively involved in social justice from a young age, Anthony and friend Elizabeth Cady Stanton, founded the Women’s Loyal National League, which conducted the largest petition drive in the nation’s history up to that time, collecting nearly 400,000 signatures in support of the abolition of slavery.

In 1866, they initiated the American Equal Rights Association, which campaigned for equal rights for both women and African Americans, and in 1872, Anthony was arrested for voting in her hometown of Rochester, New York, and convicted in a widely publicised trial. Although she refused to pay the fine, the authorities declined to take further action. In 1878, Anthony and Stanton arranged for Congress to be presented with an amendment giving women the right to vote. Popularly known as the Anthony Amendment, it became the Nineteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution in 1920!

8. Roxana Saberi

Roxana Saberi is an American journalist who was arrested in Iran and detained for 100 days after being falsely accused of espionage. She had been living in Iran for six years, doing research for a book that she hoped would show a more complete and balanced picture of Iranian society. Under pressure and being threatened with a 10-20 year sentence or even execution, Roxana falsely confessed to being a spy. She quickly realized this was a mistake and recanted her confession – knowing this would jeopardize her freedom. Instead of freeing her, her case was sent to trial, sentencing her in eight years of prison.

 “I would rather tell the truth and stay in prison instead of telling lies to be free.”

After her trial, she began her hunger strike – only drinking water with sugar. After two weeks, Roxana’s attorney appealed her conviction. She was released from prison after an appeals court cut her jail term to a two-year suspended sentence.

 “I learned that maybe other people can hurt my body, maybe they could imprison me, but I did not need to fear those who hurt my body, because they could not hurt my soul, unless I let them.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON ONE.ORG 

CLEA GUY-ALLEN

@PerfectlyClea

Clea hails from Brighton, United Kingdom and was the UK Global Citizen Editor. Now she works as the digital coordinator for ONE, a campaigning and advocacy organization to end extreme poverty and preventable disease. 

Education of Girls in the Developing World & How Le Dessein Helps

If women in the developing countries completed secondary education, 3 million children under the age of 5 would be saved every year.

This unfortunate statistic by the I.M.F. is just one the many plights young girls and women in general are facing in parts of Africa, Asia and Latin America. 

Here are some more startling facts:

1) More than 115 million 6 to 12-year old children are not in school in the developing world; three-fifths of them are girls.

2) When a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children.

3) A woman with six or more years of education is more likely to seek prenatal care, assisted childbirth, and postnatal care, reducing the risk of maternal and child mortality and illness.

4) When women and girls earn income, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man.

5) Today, the U.S. invests in its future by spending about $6,800 a year per primary student on public education. In Iran the figure is $156 per student per year, in India $64, in Laos $30, and in Rwanda, $30.

6) An extra year of primary school boosts girls’ eventual wages by 10 to 20 percent. An extra year of secondary school: 15 to 25 percent.

Young girls in developing nations have not been given the attention they highly deserve in education. Yet they have the undeniable power to help uplift their communities out of poverty through education and the earning power it will generate. 

Through fashion, art, and socially responsible actions, we’ve designed a way to get involved. Le Dessein is a fashion line aimed at funding the education of underprivileged girls around the world by featuring their designs on our fashion. We then contribute 25% of our proceeds to the girls’ yearly school tuition.

The nature of our effort is not just monetary – our ultimate vision is to create independence and freedom through the empowerment of our girls. A critical component of this whole vision being self esteem – we were adamant on making sure that our girls would be intimately tied to the creation of the designs which would end up on garments. The success of their artistic journey through their participation and engagement would create a profound sense of OWNERSHIP, which is essential in affecting one’s self-esteem. Indeed, we wanted to demark ourselves from the traditional form of aid towards developing countries, which has consisted mainly of charity, and instead have “ownership” be the driving factor in maintaining this self-sustaining endeavor.

Creating an impact in these young girls’ lives will take collective effort from various committed parties. Inculcating the notion of “Ownership” though noble, can be an arduous task and required collaboration. And we’ve had the fortune and pleasure of being aligned with the More Than Me Foundation – “The More Than Me Foundation is on a mission to make sure education and opportunity, not exploitation and poverty, define the lives of the most vulnerable girls from the West Point Slum of Liberia.” Its motto is: “When she graduates, she will decide what comes next for her life.”

Indeed, for our girls, this is about reclaiming and redefining their own sense of self. For far too long, girls and women from the developing world have been subjected to a strongly patriarchal society – a society where their “value” was unilaterally decided by men – So “Ownership” to us is simply the final destination defined by an effort that consists of arming our girls and presenting them with opportunities susceptible to make this journey a worthy one.

Our fashion linehiis elegant and sophisticated and aims at serving a market that for too long has had to sacrifice quality and design for purpose and mission.

Learn more about Le Dessein. 

ERIC COLY

@Le_Dessein

Eric is the founder and CEO of Le Dessien. Eric grew up in Dakar, Senegal, where he was influenced by his mother's passion, drive, and fashion sense at a young age. His mother would eventually inspire him to start Le Dessein. He attended UCLA Business School and began his career in investment banking.

IRAN: A Commitment to Provide Universal Public Healthcare to Refugees

In an announcement from the United Nation mission in Iran, the Iranian government will include all of its registered refugees into its Salamat Insurance Scheme. This is a collaboration between the Ministry of Interior, responsible for immigrant affairs, the Iranian Health Insurance Organization and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). This plan is targeted at Iran's Afghan and Iraqi refugee population.

Iran's English daily Tehran Times, part of the Mehr News Agency owned by the Islamic Ideology Dissemination Organisation, described the “gratitude” of Sivanka Dhanapala, the UNHCR Representative in Iran, for the program:

“UNHCR’s Representative in Iran acknowledged the Iranian Government’s contribution, expressed UNHCR’s gratitude towards the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran for all the services it has rendered to the largest protracted urban refugee population in the world for over three decades, and inclusion of the refugees in this Universal Insurance Scheme which is exemplary not only regionally but also globally, and added that such a services haven’t been provided before and I sincerely hope other countries will follow this example.
”

Half of the coverage for the program will come from the Iranian government, while the UNHCR will contribute with US $8.3 million. The program will be available to all registered refugees, who will receive access to a health insurance package for “hospitalization and temporary hospitalization”, as available to Iranian nationals.

According to the UNHCR website, Iran is home to one of “the world's largest and most protracted refugee populations.” Iran's Afghan refugee population nears 1 million, with an additional estimated 1.4 to 2 million unregistered refugees living and working in the country.

Iran's treatment of this demographic has been subject to past criticism, however, most notable in the 2013 Human Rights Watch report that detailed the mistreatment and sometimes abuse Afghans faced from both Iranian society and the government.

For their 2015 projection, the UNHCR detailed their expectations for Iran's intake for mostly Afghan, Iraqi and Pakistani refugees as outlined in the image below.

Iran has been criticized for not taking in any Syrian refugees throughout the civil war there. This reproach comes amidst the fact that it is heavily involved in the Syrian conflict as an ally and supporter of the Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad.

Indeed, this development in instating universal public healthcare for refugee populations is a notable milestone for both Iran and the region. Iran can, however, still improve its image in bolstering its role in alleviating the neighbouring Syrian refugee crisis.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON GLOBALVOICES

Mahsa Alimardani

@maasalan

Mahsa Alimardani is an Iranian-Canadian Internet researcher. Her focus in on the intersection of technology and human rights, especially as it pertains to freedom of expression and access to information inside Iran. She holds an Honours Bachelor in Political Science from the University of Toronto and is completing her Masters degree in New Media and Digital Culture at the University of Amsterdam.

SOUTH KOREA: Surfing the Demilitarized Zone

38th Parallel Beach is located just 50 kilometres south of one of the most dangerous places on Earth — the line dividing North and South Korea. 

Known as sahm-parl in Korean (the numbers 3 and 8), 38th Parallel Beach is a harbour, military base, beach and a highway rest stop. Weary travelers can stop for strong, sweet coffee, spicy food and tacky souvenirs. They can inspect the coastline and enjoy the rare beauty of the Gangwando coastline. Today it is also a rather unusual surfing spot.

While living in Seoul working as a university teacher, I spent three years photographing and surfing with the Korean and foreign surfers who were establishing the area as a legitimate surfing community.

I was drawn in by bar tales spun by roughish Australians who said they had surfed with local Koreans in blizzards, but pre-Facebook and iPhones, proof was murky. Poor photos of clean waves in deep snow and a complex myriad of forecasting and unreliable local bus info made it even more confusing. Eventually these rumours led me down a three-hour stretch of highway from Seoul to the 38th Parallel on Korea’s east coast.

As I left, my Korean co-workers giggled at me for coming to the country with a surfboard, but a peninsula must have wind I thought — and where there is wind and water, well, there must be waves.

Arriving at a protected harbour I could immediately see some small but nicely shaped waves, peeling intermittently down a well-defined bank. I was impressed and could see its potential, so we jumped in.

It was a fun spot. Surprisingly, when we came in a film camera was shooting us as we came up the beach together. Turns out they were filming a commercial for nuclear waste storage and our water exit appealed to them. I posed for a photo with the bespectacled producer and later learned that we had made it into the commercial.

38th Parallel beach felt special from day one and this slightly surreal first experience would set the tone for my future visits.

In the months to come, I discovered some of the best waves I had seen in the country, and to my surprise there were a lot of surfers, too. Koreans, Kiwi surf rats, and even some wobbly Nova Scotians, all hunting for peaks to break the grind of Korean ex-pat life. The good surf days remain particularly vivid in my mind because my lowered expectations only amplified my ‘stoke’. The surf and culture on the east coast of Korea surprised me and my experiences were in a word, unique.

Surfing in Korea is tinged with madness and magic. Koreans tend to go full throttle with everything they do, and surfing is no different.

On a weekend, the line-up resembles a chaotic Korean market place with people and boards going every direction. Korea is small country with an enormous amount of people, so fighting for your position is a way of life and the surfing line-up is no different. Luckily, over 3ft Mother Nature takes control of the space politics and the line-up clears out significantly.

South Korea has gotten the surf bug badly, and 38th Parallel Beach has fast become a hub for Seoul’s young jet-setting surfer class, traveling down through scenic Gangwando to reach this barbed wired bay.

On any given day, and in any of Korea’s four distinct and extreme seasons, you will see trendies, gangsters, Hongdae hipsters, Gangnam DJs, and foreign English teachers all jostling for a wave.

The car park overflows on every swell with Seoul surfers chain-smoking in the latest gear and waxing up only the hippest of shapes. Koreans love to do things together, be it banquet-style eating, all night drinking, or raucous socialising. Surfing has become another activity to share and the entire culture is geared up for it with various surf stores and camps along the coast catering to the dedicated Seoul surfing clique.

With some of the most consistent and powerful waves in the country and with ever improving forecasting technology, modern social media and South Korean connectivity, the short lived swells that originate in the East Sea are no longer left un-surfed, even in the deepest of winter.

Koreans adore trends, and the newest trend, surfing is red hot. The surf community at 38th Parallel Beach has grown rapidly, enjoying a strange co-existence with the local fishing community and the ever-present ROK (Republic of Korea) defence force, who have been protecting South Korea from the distant threat of a North Korean attack or DPRK defectors since the 1950s.  

Being a lifelong surfer, the mixture of this semi-remote location, the exotic culture, and these three dramatically different groups all occupying the same space is incredible to me. Over the next few years I tried to spend as much time as I could out at 38th Parallel Beach, getting my surf fix and capturing the amazing and strange things I saw.

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED ON MAPTIA

Shannon Aston

www.shannonaston.com

Shannon Aston is a world traveler, surfer, and photographer from New Zealand. 

USA: Skateboarding with Lakota Youth

‘Skateboarding In Pine Ridge’ chronicles a skatepark build and the life of the Lakota youth in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. After watching it, we hope you are moved by the incredible work of the Stronghold Society - an organization dedicated to empowering youth through skateboarding, art and music. #skateboardingsaveslives www.levi.com/skateboarding Directed by Greg Hunt Original Score by David Pajo Additional Track by Cat Power Special thanks to Imprint Projects http://strongholdsociety.org

'Skateboarding in Pine Ridge' chronicles a skatepark build and the lives of Lakota youth in Pine Ridge, South Dakota. The director hopes to put a spotlight the hard work of the Stronghold Society, an organization dedicated to empowering youth through skateboarding, art, and music.

LEARN MORE HERE