Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Jerry Mander: Answertext will be available soon.

by Jerry Mander

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Jesper Green: The basic dignity that human beings deserve is respect. It’s very simple. If you don’t give them respect or when you as a person don’t deal respect or respect other people then you can’t expect them to respect you. They can respect you in a fearful kind of way but that’s not kind of real respect, I guess.

by Jesper Green

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Jodie Evans: Self-respect, to be seen, to be heard, to be allowed to have the basic needs so that they can have a fulfilling life. The right to just be alive. Basic human shelter and food. I love that the question included the word dignities because I think that's something that's so missing and at least in the culture that surrounds me is a sense of dignity. And that's the word that creates why we allow people to go without it. That we lack our own dignity of humanity, we lack our own sense of value and self-love and that somehow life as sacred, life in all its forms, the earth, animals, ourselves. We have been so contorted and we've lost our connection to that very essence that we could live in a time, you know basic human dignities, I mean that we, for me as being someone from the United States, how easily we can read that 300,000 innocent Iraqis have died is a total lack of any dignity of humanity much less that we let some huge number on this planet live in poverty, live in abject poverty, live without any consideration. In my travels, though, I find that in those situations, I find much more human dignity in people who are living closer to the ground with less than we have in our bloated economy and desolate landscape in the West. So it would be nice if we learned that dignity or went back to that dignity for ourselves.

by Jodie Evans

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

John Gage: Basic dignities for all human beings begin at the beginning with life, with the sense of freedom from constraint. We find globally patterns established over millennia of inequalities of those who have found an advantage, finding increasing and always more and more powerful ways to maintain those advantages. So, your question, how can we let so many people go without these basic human rights results -– the results you are referring to stem from patterns of inequality that have been created in law, created in regulation, created in family structure, created in patterns of discrimination and prejudice, created in patterns of exclusion. Those that have attempt to exclude those that do not have; those that believe their group has the truth do not give respect to other groups because they know what those other groups do not possess, the truth that they have. So, your question, why do we let so many people go without human dignities, a question at the bottom of what individuals have in their minds, how do they view other people, do they view them as members of their family, of their tribe, as equals, as someone that they can listen to, share something with, or do they view them as something not human, other different? That view of other human beings, as those excluded, those beyond a boundary, leads to the denial of essential human dignities to everyone. One cannot deny to an individual one feels in your family, the rights, the dignities of a human being. You can, if you are able to exclude someone by putting them in the category of other, you can say to yourself, they are not human, they do not deserve the dignity and treatment that all of those in my family are enabled. So, I think at the bottom, we alter the way we consider the human family that alters the way that dignities are distributed among all [audio ends].

by John Gage

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Jonathan Granoff: The basic human dignity that every human being deserves is to be treated the way you, yourself, want to be treated. Those basic human dignities are beyond verbal expression. They reside within your own conscience. The way in which you yourself would want to be treated is the way in which others want to be treated. And we in fact treat others the way we treat ourselves. When we have a divided heart within ourselves, when we have anger witching ourselves, we treat others in that divisive, angry fashion. So the first way of understanding how others want to be treated, the first way to understanding human dignity, is to understand the dignity within oneself. The capacity of caring, the capacity of service, the capacity that every mother has when she gets up at three in the morning to feed a crying child, that everyone experiences when they have love for another, these dignify us. The sacrifices we make for those whom we care about and for whom we have love. The issue now is not - you know whether people have love and caring, 'cause they do - soldiers have love and caring for their nations, on all sides in conflicts. The issue is developing the sense of universal caring, and the sense of the unity of the human family. We let people go without them because we're in denial of our human unity. And denying our human unity is a diminution of our own personal treasure, which is our own humanity. If we have a heart without those treasures, what value do we have.

by Jonathan Granoff

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Jonathan Meese: What is a basic element? What is dignified? What does every human deserve? What does it mean, if people have to live without something? Aren't we those arrogant ones who claim that people are not able to live without anything? This question is full of question marks, I cannot answer anything, I cannot recognise anything. This question is based on our own haughtiness. People does not deserve anything. Dignity does not need human. Elements obey themselves. The fundaments are to be found in the universe. Life is not the human, human is not the total life. The total revolution lives without humans as well. Is this evil, is this good? Is it possible that the most dignified existence is the total revolution itself and shouldn't we let it live as it wants to? What is the spirit of economic? Those who are able to define existence full of dignity are just followers. Those who specifies the definition life full of dignity are tyrants. Those who define the dignified life is only mean. Nobody knows what human dignity is. Only the human dignity knows itself. Human dignity is defined by itself. It is an inherent principle. The arbitrariness of the beauty and the mood of nature will follow its path as it wishes. This is art.

by Jonathan Meese

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

José Manuel Prieto: What does man need to live with dignity? To live with dignity , I think that man needs more than anything all that what allows him to develop all his possibilities, his opportunities. I believe, that a dignified life can be a life of richness, a life where we submerge ourselves in our destiny, the way that allows us to put into practice all those opportunities and to [catch] those dreams. I think that this would be the pattern, would be the the way I defined a dignified life. About the issue of allowing or not to allowing other people to live without these values, well, I don’t think that these should be imposed on anybody. I believe that everybody should understand their importance and should fight for them. We can discuss with the people about these values, we can discuss about what a dignified life is, from our point of view, but never strive for imposing our view of what is a dignified life, never strive for imposing our view of how to achieve a dignified life. I think this is something to think about in a public discussion, in public consideration, always having in mind what ought to be a principle: a dignified life is a life that allows to advance all the opportunities, to put into practice all the dreams. I think, that is a dignified life.

by José Manuel Prieto

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Jwan M. Aziz: Miss Clara, the basic dignities are to have the right in education, good health, expressing opinions freely, residence, free moving and others. Egoism and tendency for dominance make people lose their dignities, so let us all try to love the others as we love ourselves, to give the freedom for everyone and to stop the enslavement.

by Jwan M. Aziz

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Kailash Satyarthi: The basic dignity according to me is that all of us should have a very strong belief that we are the same children of one God. So, we enjoy the birth right to be equal, we should -- we have been given equal opportunities by our father. Secondly, we have to ignore that we cannot live without each other because we are born with freedom and independence. But, on the other hand, there is some sort of interdependency. Our survival depends on the nature, our survival depends on our society and our neighborhood. And, that's why the togetherness is one of that value which we have to inculcate and we have to know because it is something which is needed. So, the basic dignity is the dignity of being equal human being with equal opportunities, freedom and justice. And, that has to be translated into action. Without that, it is not possible. And, that brings us respect. If you feel that the whole world is created -- the whole universe is created by one God, then all of us are equal and we have to enjoy that freedom and equality. And, if we are interfering and dismantling that basic dignity of human being, that will go against the nature, that will go against the God.

by Kailash Satyarthi

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Kigge Hvid: Hi, Claire. Sorry, I’m just a little late. What are the basic dignities? Basically, I think the dignities that all humans need is the right and possibility to care for themselves, their family, their communities, and their societies. This would mean that they would have the right to education, to a job, to freedom of speech, to cover their basic needs, to food, to a place to sleep, stuff like that. This is basically covered in the Bills of Human Rights, the UN Bills of Human Rights. So, that is one part of it. What are the needs? Basically, it’s the right to provide for yourself and care for yourself, your family, your communities. So -- and why do we let so many people go without them? It’s true that we do. It’s true that so many freedom rights are oppressed many places in the world. But, do we just let them go without it? Now, I think there’s a big emphasis in the world, in the UN, in a lot of governments around the world, in a lot of activist movements, in a lot of NGOs to have this fact changed. I see a lot of people, and you can just look around this table being very deeply engaged in seeing to that all people have the basic rights of living. When we don’t do that, places where the human rights are not obeyed, it would be a question of fear, of egoism, of money, of religion, and of tradition. And, that would mean that somewhere, some places, the work against this will be a very very long walk, but it is a walk that started and it is the walk that would continue.

by Kigge Hvid

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Kurt Weidemann: The basic elements of dignified human existence have to be determined by humans and humans have to uphold them. Communication has to be practiced in a better way. Communication is a difficult process. Konrad Lorenz once said, we have to consider that said is not heard, heard is not understood, understood is not approved, approved is not applied and applied is not maintained. From these six steps of communication, if five are fulfilled but the sixth is not fulfilled, if something is applied but not maintained, then communication is disrupted and isn’t taking place. This means the maintenance of dignity, of respect and all these things has to be mastered by communication and communication has to bring these things into the world.

by Kurt Weidemann

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Lesego Rampolokeng: If we need to even start by defining what basic human dignities are, then I think this world is in a worse state than I thought at the very beginning, because I wouldn't think that any human being on this planet needs to be told that. Respect for that which is life is the ultimate human basic whatever you want to call it. If I’m called upon to define those, to enumerate them, to line them up one after the other, then I think I’m in the wrong place altogether. We said at the beginning that certain sectors of humanity see themselves as being in a position to dictate the lives of others. And if that is indeed so, then it is very simple to let other people slide beyond the life, slope beyond the human plain and be comfortable with watching them rive and wriggle at your feet or in the midst of your own refutes, your own feces, your own body waste, it becomes easy then to want to feed the people atomic waste, to want to feed people that which will see them riving in contortions at the feet of the Bushes of the world, at the feet of the capital monsters of the world, at the feet of the houses of finance. So, this “we” that allows us to let others do that is very comfortable indeed and very happy. But then again, I refuse to see the entire human-scape as being one we all agreed upon, we all exist within, because they are those who stand in positions of power and they are those who die because of what those in positions of power visit upon them. So, I don't belong to any "we" out there.

by Lesego Rampolokeng

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Leung Ping-Kwan: The question as to why do we consider our lives to be worth more than others. I don’t consider this life to be worth more than others. But I do see that in our rosier days, there are all kinds of discrimination. There are people who are prejudiced, particular class, gender, race over others, and there are people who consider to have lives more worthy than the others. Of course, we don’t agree with that. The problem and the reason in all kinds of prejudice is seeing something as more valuable than the other, either because of class, because of race, because of wealth, somebody more wealthy than the other. Somebody are more favored than the others and some of the people would consider some life worth more than others and I think in order to go against that idea, we have to re-examine our values and see the needs of particular society. There are particular value adjustment system. They are frivolous to some people over other and see some people whose life worth more than the others.

by Leung Ping-Kwan

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Lijun Fang: We must consider the diversity of human society. People living in different regions at different times have different definitions of basic dignities. We also need to consider the differences between various groups. People from different groups understand dignity in different ways. Hence, we can hardly give a standarized or quantitated description of basic dignity so as to measure people's dignities.

by Lijun Fang

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Lillian Holt: I suppose I could say this exactly in two words: respect and tolerance. I'm a bit worried about those words because I think tolerance - I mean I as an indigenous Australian, this question is from an Australian. I don’t wish to be tolerated, actually because that says I am actually a problem. But on the other hand, I’d rather be tolerated than trampled upon. I would rather be understood and tolerated and in terms of respected, I would rather be accepted than respected. So, you know, acceptance as supposed to rejection; being understood as opposed to being tolerated. When I say understood that requires communication. And it requires the basic dignity of listening, I believe. So the society has become so hasty and quick that I think we tend to, we have our own agenda and everybody has that. I'm not saying that I'm [inaudible]. I'm talking about myself when I answer these questions. The basic dignities I would like to have are that I'd be part of the community and be accepted and that I'd be understood in one sense, and it's impossible for everybody to understand everybody, even me. I'm not asking for huge deal here. What I'm asking for is we need to know this the [Oracle at Dip Farse] and that the first commandment is know thyself. And then to be true to thyself, but to know thyself, and I think that once we know ourselves we actually don't have to ask these kinds of questions. What are the basic dignities? I mean really I think what we know deeply and truly within our souls what is required and it's the same thing, it's like to do unto others as we would have them do unto us. I’ll tell you what - sometimes that's a big request for some of us. And it means actually overcoming self from time to time in order to respect the dignity of others because when we exclude and reject, we're in great trouble.

by Lillian Holt

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Livingstone Maluleke: To my understanding is that all those things that the basic dignities that each human being deserve include amongst others respect, freedom of actions, the rights and access to resources, and the rights to live. These are some of the aspects which are very important and pertinent to the whole fundamental package of human rights. But then, we also need to say we should not have ignorance. We should not do away with illiteracy. We need not have arrogance. People should have as much as things which are driving forces, which are developmental in nature, which will drive this world forward, so that at the end of the day the ethics and this possibility is taken by all and therefore respect, freedom of actions, the rights and access to resources, and the right to live are the aspects which are very fundamental and being the basic dignities that each human being deserve to have and this is what we should keep in mind and promote all the time.

by Livingstone Maluleke

Sep 9, 2006 11:30:00 AM cite

Mae-Wan Ho: I have to think about this one, you know. That’s a very good question and I guess I come down to being heard and being recognized, I think these are the basic human dignities. And why do we let so many people go without them, well, people -- many indigenous people for example, are denied a voice, in global forums, in their national forums and they are not heard. And, the political system does not recognize. They see them as a threat to the nation instead of being an asset. And I think that's got to do -- that really is one of the most serious problems of today, it is a violation of the basic human rights. We after all, we have laws protecting animals that are in danger of extinction, but we do not have laws protecting indigenous people from extinction, protecting them from the mining, logging, and other industries that destroy and devastate them and livelihood.

by Mae-Wan Ho