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Article 25 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states the right of everyone to a standard of living adequate for the health and¬ well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing and medical care. Reading this, I’ve started to wonder how many people there are in my immediate surroundings that, despite article 25, have a problem with access to the things which seem so simple and normal to some others of us.
There are some human rights which are rather easy to agree on and implement. Some other - like education, access to health care, the right to work - are rights, which constantly challenge the community we are living in to act and look for solutions. Drugs and alcohol can often hinder important developments in the society and the issue of substance abuse needs to be addressed in the right way so that the human rights can be guaranteed for everyone.
So the clothes 4 all campaign is a good way to draw attention to all the human rights articles from the declaration that should be so elemental, but are not. With collecting clothes we can really help, but at the same time it’s a symbolic action to draw attention to all the cases where human rights are violated, where people have no chance to get a very necessary political asylum for example. In many countries torture is still used against prisoners; racism and discrimination are an everyday topic – and this is happening in countries that participated in putting together the draft for the Declaration many decades ago.
The best is we all can participate in this. Just bring a t-shirt to a seminar or the summer camp; if you’re not attending, send it with a friend or organize an activity in your own country where you collect clothes and give them where they’re needed. Take part of the SMS-campaign, have a movie evening or check the other ideas which are up on the web page. It doesn’t take much to make a difference, and this difference is needed very much.

The views on the blogs are the views of the blog writer, and not necessarily the organization. ACTIVE cannot be held responsible for any possible consequences.