Activism Guide – Fall 2020
Amnesty International is built on the idea that people coming together against injustice can be a game-changer! The sum of each of our actions creates a powerful force that has proven to be effective in igniting positive social change. Use this guide to take action this year, and check back frequently for updates and new actions!
View Tools for Virtual Amnesty Groups to support your activism during COVID-19.
Check out the AIUSA Events Calendar for opportunities in the coming months.
In conjunction with National Banned Books Week (Sep 27-Oct 3) Amnesty International draws attention to writers, editors, librarians, publishers and readers who suffer human rights violations because of their work. Due to the proverbial “power of the word”, many journalists and artists are under attack around the world — by governments or by opposition groups.
Amnesty International USA released a distressing new report, The World is Watching: Mass Violations by U.S. Police of Black Lives Matter Protesters’ Rights, exposing gross human rights violations by U.S. law enforcement officers against Black people, Black Lives Matter protesters, journalists, legal observers, and medics across the country, over several weeks between May and June 2020. We’re moving quickly to distribute the report to local police and government officials on the local, state, and federal levels — and to demand an official response to the report’s key recommendations.
Over twenty thousand immigrants and asylum-seekers continue to be needlessly detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) during the COVID-19 global health pandemic, including families with children forced to flee their home countries because their lives were in danger. Instead of prioritizing their health and releasing individuals and families together so they can be safe, ICE has kept them locked up in detention to face these turbulent times alone, in detention facilities with inadequate medical care and crowded, tinderbox-like conditions. They are in extreme danger, with disease outbreaks and rapid spread already occurring. People have tragically died from COVID-19 related complications while in ICE custody. Every death that occurs in immigration detention is a preventable one. ICE must release immigrants and asylum-seekers from detention.
Communities of color that are already disproportionately impacted by gun violence are also being hit the hardest by COVID-19, and the organizations designed to stop gun violence before it happens are critically endangered at a time when they are needed most. Community based organizations like Cure Violence, Cease Fire, Good Kids Mad City and others depend on funding from local and state governments. The passage of Break the Cycle of Violence Act will ensure funding for these local community-based programs that are working to end gun violence.
I am asking you to sponsor Break the Cycle of Violence Act (include either HB 4836 or Senate 2671 (depending on whether the video is being sent to your House Rep or Senate)
Write For Rights is Amnesty International’s largest annual human rights campaign. People like you around the world write letters on behalf of people who need urgent help. People like Nassima, who has been locked up since 2018 for protesting against the ‘male guardianship’ system in Saudi Arabia. Through the power of collective action, your letters will help convince government officials to free Nassima and other people unjustly imprisoned or facing abuses.