In my ongoing study of literature and organizing in the area of youth rights, I have finally constructed the analysis that I feel has been missing in my work with Freechild. The title of this post handily summarizes the thought: Youth Rights are Human Rights. While that might seem kind of simplistic and jingoistic, I think there is a beauty to developing a concise message.

Look at the individual definitions: The Human Rights Resource Center says that human rights are those basic standards without which people cannot live in dignity. National Youth Rights Association reports they fight for freedom for youth from oppression or discrimination by government, business, or other powers.

Within those definitions there is a lot of room for interpetation, and rightfully so. However, the two definitions are far from exclusive; instead, one seems to expand upon the other in an appropriate way. NYRA actually offers an expanded notion of human rights, where more than simply recognizing the absence of rights, they actually seek to hold the perpetuator accountable. That idea puts water to a 1999 article from the Third World Network, where the author proposes that without doing what NYRA is doing, the human rights movement could end up doing exactly what they think they are solving!

Its kind of ironic, because a lot of major national and international human rights organizations have webpages that seem very tokenizing of youth. Human Rights International (in Canada) and Amnesty International USA both make grandoise statements about youth on their website without speaking specifically about youth rights. The Wikipedia article on youth rights takes a stab at this hypocrisy in relationship to the children's rights movement. Lately I've felt that perspective to be a little misguided, but I don't want to invalidate it, because frankly, it bothered me for quite a while, too.

There are some missing pieces in the youth rights argument, as well. There is a bold statement on the NYRA website that they are not seeking special treatment for youth, or what they call "entitlement rights"; rather, they want equal treatment. I take exception to that, particularly because of the society-wide acceptance of adultism. Young people do not need equal treatment. After being subjected to inferior opportunities for civic participation and practical education for the majority of their lives, simply giving youth a seat at the table is not enough. Young people need equity; that is, they need to learn what the table is for, be given a chair that fits their needs (as they define them), be provided for in their learning style, and be engaged in a meaningful and substantive way. These are entitlement rights, and I believe they are exactly what is needed in order to affect rights for youth in a realistic and powerful way.

Put it this way: Just as the UN should not simply fly over a country, throw medicine from a plane, and fly away expecting disease to leave, neither should youth rights advocates seek only the vote. That's why I believe young people need opportunities for self-driven civic engagement, meaningful service to others, cultural activities, and other forms of responsible social interaction, which in turn begets the awareness among both youth and adults that, yes, young people do have and do need human rights.

Reflecting on a human rights project engaging youth, an Australian blogger recently wrote, "The subtlety of expression and the grasp these young people have on concepts that are often glossed over by adults is extraordinary as they exercise one of the rights given to them; the right to be express their ideas." Even though NYRA didn't stir up at this blogger to support youth rights this last weekend, I am determined, and I am sure they are more determined than ever, to keep this struggle moving forward. I will do it under this new banner - what do you think?

In my experience at dozens of schools, its hard to know what teachers criticisms about student voice ever are. But thanks to a gutsy online bulletin board in the UK, we can get a clue. A group of teachers are discussing why you wouldn't listen to students, and giving some pretty bold insights into general compliants:

Under what circumstances would you disallow the opinions of young people to not be heard?

If they put forward inappropriate things then yes they would be diasallowed.

I am in favour of student voice... it should be heard, even if the topic is "unacceptable"

Student voice is a forum for students to dicuss issues they are concerned with within the school

Sometimes they want to discuss issues that are beyond their remit ... why shouldn't they as long as they are aware of their sphere of influence

My problem with 'Student Voice' is the tw@ttiness of the term itself. It's stupid, ungrammatical, and affected - I can imagine some SMT twonk using the phrase and me feeling sick. If it means taking account of pupils' views - something good schools have always done - then let's just say that.

These teachers offer other insights, as well. Read more here. (The same boards also discuss the roles of students hiring teachers.)

This is the CommonAction blog, covering The Freechild Project and SoundOut. Learn more about CommonAction.

I was presenting at a conference in Arkansas a few weeks ago when a guy came up to me and introduced himself. After telling me that he subscribe to Freechild and had downloaded all of my publications and being very appreciative, he very sincerely said, "You are the best youth speaker in the world."

I couldn't help but think, "What do you mean 'youth'?" That's like saying you're the best woman speaker, or best African American speaker. There is a constant ghetto-ization of this work, and I am just not sure what to do with that.

For a long time I avoided any talk of "youth voice" for that very reason: We cannot and do not represent any one given characteristic of ourselves at any one given time. Any youth is also the product of her community, his school, their race, our society; but moreso than that, every youth is more than any of that!

We don't usually see it, but we have to start looking. Young people need to investigate youth and adults' perspectives of their voices. Youth and adults need to examine the differences in their perspectives on power and authority. We need to explore the differences between legitimate and tokenized youth voice. I need to identify youth who will mentor me to help CommonAction, The Freechild Project, and SoundOut stay grounded. There are so many nuances to this work - and ghettoizing young people is the last thing any of us should do.

De Doan arrives at Sacramento City Unified School District board meetings dressed in a dark suit, carrying his laptop computer, ready for business. The 17-year-old senior from West Campus High School is a student representative on the board.

His counterpart in the Folsom Cordova school district, Kendra Stanley, isn't afraid to speak her mind, even if it means arguing with the superintendent or the board president -- who happens to be her mother.

"My opinion represents other students. It's the only voice they have," said the 17-year-old Folsom High senior.

Check out this article from the Sacramento Bee (CA) where Walt Yost makes a powerful case for student representatives on the local school board. I am quoted talking about the national student school board member scene. Youth Authority

Society is usually schizophrenic in the ways it treats youth. But once in a while, it goes from being schizophrenic to actually telling the truth. That truth is hidden though, and today I want to expose it.

I usually try to leave these complicating exposures to the individuals and organizations that are very good at illustrating them - namely, many youth activists, adults like Mike Males, Henry Giroux, bell hooks, and orgs like the National Youth Rights Association. However, an article in the local newspaper leaves me with no choice. It is so frustrating to me how this ties together.

Here's the story: Society has moved from a general distrust of young people towards the mass incapacitation of all youth. The case in point comes from Seattle, where a youth recently died while in the hands of the juvenile (in)justice system.

James H. Whiteshield, 17, went into convulsions early Friday morning while being booked into King County juvenile detention center and died Sunday at Harborview Medical Center, authorities said. [Source]

This young person dieing is a travesty, especially in the hands of a system that is supposedly meant to keep him from harming himself. But the focus of my concern here is the way he is treated after life. Newspapers have an ethical obligation to leave the name of young people - minors - out of articles about them, particularly when there has not been a trial or legitimate charges brought against the youth; according to the article, the young person in this case was brought in on illegitimate drug charges.

Newspapers repeatedly violate the legal and social trust society has instilled in them to keep young people anonymous. In 2001, newspaper mogul Gannett issued a defensive statement about their exposure of teens' identities in a story about prostitution [source]. Their defense basically presumes that since these teens were guilty, the reporters were obligated to expose their names to the public.

Newspapers - and TV shows, and movies - have continuous influence over popular social perspectives of youth. What the stories here prove, along with so many others, is that popular media has effectively desensitized society from feeling sympathic about "youth" as a time of life. Gone is the right to the anonymity once granted by the news. Gone are the rights to be tried as a juvenile, to quality public school education, and to health care. Even social programs are being slashed, as society wakes up to a new way to treat young people.

Why are these basic human rights disappearing from the lives of children and youth today? While newspapers promote every perspective about young people from ephebiphobia to infantilization, somewhere in between another model of treatment is surfacing. Where adultist prejudice once guided society, in the form of judging any one's ability according to age, rather than ability, there is something new raging across the lands.

That's where I defer to the individuals and orgs I cited above. NYRA presents good arguments about the voting age and curfews; Males exposes the reality of the juvenile (in)justice system; Giroux identifies how government funding, the education system, and popular media are complicit; and bell hooks reveals how the treatment of parents and mainstream culture promotes negative perspectives of young people.

James Carville has pointed out that all of this seemingly-hypocritical treatment of youth is actually generational warfare, a "declared war on young people." [source] I know that's a powerful accusation, but ultimately, I agree with his assessment. However, there is something even more dubious at work. Giroux often suggests that the demonization of youth, the neoliberalism of schooling, and govenment's abandonment of youth are indications of new roles for youth in society: instead of being "the future" youth have become "the fault". [source: see p254]

For the last five years the Freechild Project has represented my commitment to expose the reality of youth today. With so many young people struggling to be heard, fighting for power, researching deep knowledge, and contesting hypocrisy throughout society, we luckily have more than a one-sided battle underway. For instance, another story from today's paper was about a young person in San Jose who is fighting the hypocrisy himself. That is a story Freechild is designed to highlight and encourage.

Thomas Paine was an American revolutionary writer and leader. While he was one of those privileged white men whose hypocrisy is apparent, Paine presented and fought for the most vibrant vision of democracy and universal kinship those colonial times knew. It was in his Common Sense where he wrote,

"Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph."

Let's move that vision forward, and create our own vision in order to fight these hypocrisies and grow this democracy. That is my future.

What do the nations of Somalia, Belarus, Croatia, China, Algeria, Vietnam, Lithuania, and Burkina Faso have that the United States of America does not? That's right: every country on that list, and dozens more, have a National Youth Union. These NYUs are buildling solidarity and connectivity among young people throughout their countries. In turn, these connections build political, economic, and popular support at local and national levels.

A National Youth Union could galvanize popular support for issues affecting young people in all areas of the USA. That includes swaying voters to support youth programs. That includes stemming the tide of ephebiphobic media targeted against youth. That includes helping young people see their personal and social connections to other young people across the country and beyond the boundaries that seperate youth today.

Communities could benefit from organized, trained local chapters that work together to advocate for funding, policy, and other support for young people. These chapters could create a national force that parallels the AARP or Grey Panthers, and offer a powerful perspective and voice among generations that have been previously segregated by popular media, politicians, and even the organizations designed to serve them.

A National Youth Union could help American youth organizations develop a true sense of unity, especially in these times when foundations, government agencies, and other funding sources pit these organizations against one another in an endless battle for financial support. The NYU could be a gathering among youth-serving organizations from all fields to help develop a mass concensus and political standing that reinforces the central roles young people and their adult allies must play throughout their communities. Moreover, a National Youth Union in the USA might bring together so many divergent minds to build a powerful, tangible movement that can affect all young people.

I stand with the USA National Youth Union, and CommonAction is commiting its resources to developing this idea. Learn more at http://www.nationalyouthunion.org

In the ongoing battle against ingnorance in psuedo-liberal journalism, yet another 20-something is smashing her generation by proudly proclaiming her new-found understanding that,

"...my generation missed political action class. Perhaps it fell through the public school cracks somewhere... and the current state of our own country was never mentioned."

Paige Doughty, a seemingly globe-trotting Master of Science candidate in Environmental Education with Lesley University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is the guilty party this time. If it weren't enough for elder activists to bash young people, Paige has taken it upon herself to carry the mantle. In her brutal assessment of her peers, she shares with a major lefty-news source that,

"The political action with which my generation is most familiar is point and click. It goes something like this: receive a barrage of "email alerts" in your inbox, follow the link to the pre-written letter to your congress person, enter your email address and click to send. Wash your hands after a hard day of work. You are a political activist and you didn't even leave your house! This is a paltry excuse for action."

Whenever I read these assessments, I have to think about where these opinions are being shared. In this case, the website is really popular among older radical-types - my own father-in-law put me onto the site several years ago. If Paige were reaming out her peers in a forum they actually read, like CampusActivism or even Freechild, I could readily appreciate a good, fair critical analysis. For instance, check out the Future 500 book. It is cheap, so young people can actually buy it, and it is accessible, being distributed all over the friggin' place. And goodness knows that book was critical, providing not just a rant but actually using examples of what should happen to spark ideas for what can happen.

The other consideration that I always bring to the table to who is sharing their opinions. Paige, in her wisdom as an adult grad student from an upscale private New England college, take the liberty of reaming her entire generation. Perhap's Paige's peers disappointed her, and perhaps the perceptions of the people overseas whom she met disappointed her, but neither of those perspectives give Paige the right to dismiss an entire generation, despite her membership within that group. But that's exactly what Paige does. That's too bad, because by doing that she immediately dismisses anything constructive about "her generation" that may be valuable for the audience who actually reads - and believes - what she wrote.

She might have recognized the work of youth organizers in NYC, who formed some of the most powerful activist campaigns that city has ever seen while Paige's friends may have been on the computer. Or she might have acknowledged Craig Kielburger, who was 12 when he founded the most-recognized global youth activist organization in the world - in 1995. Today he's still leading the effort - at 23. That's right around Paige's age. She might have recognized the ages of the folks who founded TakingITGlobal, or the folks who founded Youth for Environmental Sanity (YES) in 1990, when they were 16 and 18. Oh, and there's CommonAction.

Instead, Paige gives more fodder for the adultists and ephebiphobics among us. Despite what I will assume to be her best intentions, Doughty dismisses the power of young people today. Answering such a dismissive interview question recently, scholar Henry Giroux defended today's so-called "apathetic" youth, saying,

"...there is an oppositional youth culture that is rarely given a lot of play in the dominant media and that is doing all kinds of engaged political work, extending from the movement for environmental justice to getting corporations out of the public schools."

Paige, take some time to actually learn about the generation that you come from. Yours is the most civically engaged generation ever. Yours is the most proportionately generous generation ever. Yours may be the most powerful generation ever. Go to the Freechild website and learn about them. Read some good books about them. Go meet them. Then write a good article about them - because, as Walt Kelly once wrote, "We Have Met The Enemy and He Is Us."

Since last Tuesday I've been in Ruskin, Florida, just outside of Tampa. Working with Melissa Sherwood, a science teacher who I met through Earth Force, I have facilitated 15 workshops for almost 250 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade students at Cypress Creek Elementary, the entire staff at the school, and a group of Earth Force teachers from throughout the Tampa-area.

Melissa initially invited me out last fall, after I presented at an Earth Force institute in suburban DC. After my presentation on SoundOut and the Cycle of Engagement Melissa was determined to get me to her school. She got me good.

I started pretty rapidly, first leading a staff training session for 50 adults. That was pretty exciting, with teachers, the school administration, and support staff examining the meaningful student involvement frameworks, and then exploring their own experiences with student voice as students and as teachers. So many exciting conversations happened, and I had a good feeling going into the week.

Almost like student voice bulldozers, Melissa led me throughout the school and into so many classrooms. Students shared their ideas and perspectives about what is great in their school and what needs to change right away (translated: what sucks). There was a lot of feedback about teacher personalities, classroom management skills, and teaching habits. Then I had students examine their ideas about what the perfect school would look like.

I have a lot of critical concern about their perspectives, but what this particular stint* reminded me of is the necessity of allowing students the space to release, meaning that they sometimes just need to "dump." While its true that students do have valuable and powerful perspectives and ideas about what needs to happen and change in schools, it is also true that often they simply need to be able to just get their voices out - especially the first time its been intentionally engaged in that way. For many students at Cypress Creek, this was the first time any adult ever asked what they thought about school - particularly the low-income, migrant, and bilingual students in these classes. The numbers of Walmarts, McDonalds, and video games in their "dream schools" does cause me pause... but that's for a different post.

The adults' reception to the presentations was luke warm, as suspected. Melissa will definitely have her work cut out for her, particularly if anyone "bites" and wants more information or help engaging students in their classrooms. However, we keep churning out the butter, so folks like Melissa aren't standing alone in this effort.

Thanks to Melissa, Cypress Creek, and all the great folks I met down here for your commitment - and let me know if there's anything we can do to keep supporting you.

*Learn more about our past work here and here.

The latest edition of Harpers magazine, Donovan Hohn shares an essay called "Moby-Duck, or, the Synthetic Wilderness of Childhood". While telling the story of a load of rubber ducks that float across the oceans and around the world, Hohn explores society's perceptions of childhood today. There is an entire section on how the way society views childhood allows for generations of young people to be consumed by consumption and alienated from one another and their communities.

The article is not online yet, but I will look for it. In the meantime, scan the magazine at your local bookstore - it is definitely worthwhile.

This is the CommonAction blog, covering The Freechild Project and SoundOut. Learn more about CommonAction.

The following is from an article by Peter Babiak called “Manufactured Cynicism: A Review Interview of Against the New Authoritarianism.” It was printed in SubTerrain Magazine 5: 44 (2006) on pages 43-45.

Interviewer: Youth culture—perhaps even the broader mainstream culture—seems to have abdicated responsibility in the form of a big “whatever”. It’s not quite apathy, but rather a feeling that their thinking doesn’t matter in the larger scheme of things, that ideas will not change anything so why bother trying?

Giroux: If you mean commercial youth culture, you are probably right, but there is an oppositional youth culture that is rarely given a lot of play in the dominant media and that is doing all kinds of engaged political work, extending from the movement for environmental justice to getting corporations out of the public schools. For instance, the Free Child Project organizes and interfaces with youth groups all over North America and “seeks to advocate, inform, and celebrate social change led by and with young people around the world, particularly those who have been historically denied the right to participate.” Adam Fletcher started this group and it is only one of thousands of youth groups engaged in a range of political projects attempting to eliminate human suffering, massive inequality, and the destruction of the planet. Hence, I think that the perception that young people are docile, politically apathetic, and removed from any sense of ethical responsibility is quite false, although very useful to political conservatives, who, when they are not demonizing and criminalizing the behavior of youth, appear to delight in suggesting that they are morally irresponsible and political indifferent.

The response that Giroux provides here does two things: One, it situates the continued dissing of youth activism by neoliberal progressives within the conservative paradigm where their politics really are, and; Two, it clearly identifies the breadth of action out there by name-checking Freechild and acknowledging our role within the diaspora of youth activism. Thanks Henry - that's awesome.