Support Separation Between Religion and State: A Petition to Human Rights Watch

Nick Cohen's blog in the Spectator, Whatever Happened to Human RIghts? Human rights campaigners need to follow a self-denying ordinance if they are not to become enemies of the values they espouse. Like a civil servant or judge, they must leave their passions at the office door, and oppose the oppressive, whoever they are and whatever the consequences. It is easy for me to say that, but the record of Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International tells you that it is hard for them to do so. To their politically committed workers impartiality can feel a thin and bloodless doctrine. It requires them to criticise people they regard as friends and provide inadvertent comfort to enemies. The effort required in maintaining universal principles is too much for them, and explains why human rights organisations have gone off the rails. If you need convincing, look at the introduction to the Human Rights Watch’s World Report 2012 by...

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Though I have been doing international human rights work for the last twenty years, I have no degree in law or international affairs; I started as a writer and feminist acting in solidarity with women who faced forms of gender-based censorship ranging from intimidation and trashing to death threats.  As founding chair of the International PEN Women Writers Committee and, later, President of Women’s WORLD, I learned how to organize international campaigns, put out urgent action appeals, and help people seeking asylum, but this skill-set was largely self-acquired, because the professional human rights workers I asked for help were often too busy to share their knowledge.    Since I come out of a movement-building culture in which sharing skills is an obligation, this way of looking at things was quite foreign to me.  In addition, the most urgent crises always seemed to happen on weekends or national...

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