Berger Spoke At Lights4Liberty Vigil

On Friday evening, July 12th, at Levis Square in down­town Toledo, the Secular Humanists of Western Lake Erie (SHoWLE) co-sponsored the Lights For Liberty vig­il to End Human Concentration Camps.

Lights for Liberty part­nered with inter­na­tion­al, nation­al, region­al and local com­mu­ni­ties and orga­ni­za­tions who believe that human rights are fun­da­men­tal rights, are not nego­tiable, and are will­ing to pro­tect them.

President Douglas Berger was one of sev­er­al speak­ers, at the event in Levis square, who high­light­ed the human rights issue with the immi­gra­tion deten­tion camps set­up around the coun­try.

Other groups co-sponsoring the event includ­ed: Indivisible Toledo, NOFA Indivisible, Glass City Indivisible, Indivisible Maumee River Progressives, People Called Women LLC, The Greyhound Connection, The Toledo Area Chapter of National Organization for Women, UT Department of Women’s Studies, Transform Network, InterReligious Task Force On Central America, and The Fellowship of Reconciliation USA.

Here is the text of Douglas’ remarks as writ­ten:

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I am here today because I am angry. All peo­ple, no mat­ter your gen­der, nation­al­i­ty, reli­gion, or immi­gra­tion sta­tus are due basic dig­ni­ty and worth as human beings.

It has been expect­ed that no mat­ter who you are, even if you were not a cit­i­zen of this coun­try, the Bill of Rights applied to you.

The US has signed on to treaty after treaty not to treat asy­lum seek­ers like crim­i­nals, but our cur­rent admin­is­tra­tion has thrown those treaties out in the name of pol­i­tics — cru­el pol­i­tics.

In fact, our cur­rent admin­is­tra­tion is treat­ing asy­lum seek­ers worse than com­mon crim­i­nals. Where is their due process? Where is their appoint­ed attor­neys?

Most of the peo­ple seek­ing asy­lum are flee­ing polit­i­cal insta­bil­i­ty and vio­lence that was caused by the actions of past admin­is­tra­tions. We are respon­si­ble for the immi­gra­tion. We owe the peo­ple a chance to stay here.

We have bor­der patrol agents board­ing bus­es and trains right here in Toledo ille­gal­ly chal­leng­ing cit­i­zen­ship. They are also seen on the free­ways and turn­pike in the area. What is hap­pen­ing along the south­ern board­er can hap­pen here in Toledo and Northwest Ohio.

I am extreme­ly dis­ap­point­ed that many of our local elect­ed offi­cials seem not to care about the self-inflicted crises at the south­ern bor­der. Some who have spo­ken up want to dis­cuss the issue to come up with some com­pro­mise that will look good for them at the next elec­tion.

Human rights are not debat­able. You either believe we all have basic rights, or you don’t. THERE IS NO MIDDLE GROUND! I say CLOSE THE CAMPS!

Any elect­ed offi­cial who stays silent or tries to bar­gain against human rights needs to pay for their inac­tion and indif­fer­ence at the bal­lot box.

The same peo­ple who fight to deny a wom­an’s right to her own body don’t care if chil­dren are liv­ing in cages and filthy con­di­tions or even dying. They don’t care about the sys­tem­at­ic and ille­gal sep­a­ra­tion of fam­i­lies. They don’t care if the gov­ern­ment is vio­lat­ing treaties con­cern­ing asy­lum seek­ers.

Humanists are nat­u­ral­ly com­mit­ted to social jus­tice as a foun­da­tion to peace and hap­pi­ness for the great­est num­ber and see it as a moral fail­ing to stand by while oth­ers are denied their civ­il and human rights. Humanistic social jus­tice advo­ca­cy involves respect for the equal­i­ty of all peo­ple, com­pas­sion for their dig­ni­ty and wel­fare, and a con­vic­tion that pos­i­tive change requires human inter­ven­tion.

Regardless of race, eth­nic­i­ty, eco­nom­ic sta­tus, abil­i­ty, sex­u­al ori­en­ta­tion, gen­der iden­ti­ty, reli­gious beliefs or non­be­lief, or cit­i­zen­ship, all indi­vid­u­als have uni­ver­sal human rights that must be respect­ed and pro­tect­ed.

I can’t imag­ine the pain and suf­fer­ing going on right now in those con­cen­tra­tion camps. I can’t imag­ine hav­ing to flee one’s home due to polit­i­cal upheaval and vio­lence. I can’t imag­ine trav­el­ing thou­sands of miles in the hope of hav­ing a bet­ter life and then being caged like an ani­mal.

I do know our gov­ern­men­t’s cur­rent pol­i­cy is wrong, it goes against my Humanist prin­ci­ples, and is inhu­mane.

I say CLOSE THE CAMPS!

Thank you…