HUMAN RIGHTS WORKING GROUP

PRIOR ACHIEVEMENTS FOR 2019-2022

US Immigration Policy:  HRWG held live (before COVID) and later Zoom presentations (called “Close the Camps”) about the destructive policies such as the forced detention of asylum seekers, separation of families, and the mistreatment of children at our southern border.  We began and continue to demonstrate on the steps of the church every Wednesday mornings to draw public attention to these issues.

Voting Rights:  During the Presidential campaign in October 2019, HRWG organized a March for Democracy to demand a fair election where constitutional rights to vote would be protected across the country.  Many other civic, social justice and labor organizations joined this march from the Mission to downtown San Francisco.

International Human Rights:  HRWG joined with other faith and justice groups to draw attention and protest actions and policies of the United States as a contributor to violations of human rights across the world.

Ending Racism:   HRWG conducted a variety of events explaining the roots of American racism and White Supremacy.  With the UUSF BIPOC committee, we produced and presented a video workshop entitled We Built People of Color Visibility at the UU General Assembly in 2019.  Our video was called the “Beloved Stories UUSF”, and we started with the Story Corps Toolkit. Also, included below are the questions we used in our interviews, the release form for the participants, and a flyer.

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2022

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Racial Justice

We will continue to support the Black Lives Matter movement and other related groups, along with other UUSF racial justice efforts, as we did in the past during the 2020 George Floyd demonstrations against police brutality throughout the country towards Black, Brown, Asian and Indigenous sisters and brothers. We will continue special projects about our unique American history of slavery such as the “1619 Project” readings.  We continue to work closely with our UUSF BIPOC group. (See videos below produced under the auspices of the HRWG.)

Immigrant Rights

We will continue to press for a sound immigration policy for asylum seekers and special DACA children of undocumented immigrants who were brought to the United States as children and deserve full citizenship. New immigrant groups are expected to be fleeing their homes due not only to on-going conflicts, at times perpetrated by our foreign and military policies, but also by the climate crisis.  Many HRWG UUs visited and worked at the southern border in El Paso, helping the asylum seekers there, and returned to report on that situation.

Voting Rights

We will work to promote the Constitutional right of all Americans to vote in a safe manner, without danger as happened in our prior history after the Civil War.  All acts to suppress the vote by any organizations will be exposed and special educational projects will be undertaken to advise all citizens of their rights to vote.

Climate Crisis

We will focus on how ordinary citizens can work in ways to stem the oncoming crisis, for example, by advocating that the City of San Francisco and state governments buy only electric vehicles (EV), and offer financial incentives to residents for the purchase of EV and the installation of solar panels on their homes.  We continue to work directly with environmental groups on special educational and advocacy projects.

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Women's Rights

Women’s Rights, was voted upon by our members in September 2021, after the state of Texas severely limited abortion rights, and the Supreme Court refused to interfere, thus denigrating the rights of women to control their bodily health.  As a result, the Women’s Group was organized, with Reproductive Rights its priority.  They have been very active in demonstrations and continue to work on new issues.  Lori Lai is the Coordinator.  See more on their latest activities (click here)