December is Recognized by the United Nations as Universal Human Rights Month. It is a time to reaffirm the importance of treating everyone around us with respect and dignity. It’s a call to act toward each other with greater kindness no matter what our gender, religion, race, or social status.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the United Nations’ General Assembly in 1948. In the aftermath of World War II, It was the first attempt to create a global standard of human rights, to define what human rights are and what they encompass.

It seems especially significant this year as we see people in other parts of the world who are standing up, and sometimes fighting, for their rights to live freely.  

We see it taking place in Iran where protests were ignited after the death of a young woman in police custody. Initial demonstrations, led mostly by other young women, demanded the end of mandatory hijabs. Demonstrations have since grown to demand wider societal change and expanded rights for women. 

We can see it in China where people have taken to the streets in defiance of their country’s zero Covid policy which has stripped many of their basic human dignity. 

We can see it in Ukraine where brave men and women are defending themselves every day against cruel and unjust aggression. We see them taking up arms to defend their homes, their way of life and their very national identity.

The struggle of ordinary people in other countries for greater rights and freedoms reminds us of all the good things we sometimes take for granted in our own country. It also reminds us of our responsibility to stand up for the same values here at home that we advocate for abroad. We must reject hate and extremism in all its forms.

“Where, after all, do universal human rights begin?” once asked Eleanor Roosevelt. “In small places, close to home — so close and so small they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere. Without concerted citizen action to uphold them close to home, we shall look in vain for progress in the larger world.”