How To Defend Your Rights

 Don’t take no for an answer. Stand up for what you believe in and fight against injustice.

 It’s time to be in charge of your own life. You know what’s right and wrong and you make your own choices. Too many arguments are lost because of communication failures.

 Human Rights are for everyone and if you are arguing against them you are going to lose. You are free and equal in dignity and rights. You are not a slave. You can’t accept torture or cruel treatment. You deserve equal protection from the Law. You are innocent until proven guilty. You have the right to be heard. You have the right to an attorney. You have the right to privacy and to defend yourself from attacks against your reputation and honor.

 You can travel anywhere you want. You have the right to asylum.  You have a nationality. You have the right to marry. You have the right to own property. You have freedom of thought, conscience and religion. You have freedom of expression. You have the right to belong to an association. You have the right to participate in government. You have equal access to public services. You have access to social security.

 You have the right to work and to choose your job. You have protection against unemployment. You deserve equal pay. You can join trade unions. You have the right to rest and to have holidays.

 You have the right to health, well-being, food, clothing and housing. Motherhood and childhood are entitled to special care and assistance. You have the right to education with full development of your personality.

 You can participate in the cultural life of your community. You have the right to authorship. Your identity is yours alone and you can protect it. You can’t accept discrimination, you are not inferior.

 And there is much more than that. And you have the right to be informed about any rules that apply to you.

 You have freedom of press. You can criticize. You can defend yourself from critiques. You can critique the criticizer. You can disagree. You can disagree with those who disagree with you. You can decide how you want to be treated. You can decide what is acceptable and what is trash.

 If others want to change your opinion they will have to come up with relevant information.

 In the case of disagreements someone has to be in charge of making that decision. If it’s your property, you are in charge.

 You have the right to make mistakes and learn from them without repercussions as long as you don’t bother anyone.

 You have the right to defend yourself against false accusations. There are three types of false accusations:

• Fabricated (entirely false)
• Mixed allegations (combining both truth and fabrications)
• Wrong perpetrator

 You have the right to ask for proof. If your proofs are not accepted you have to know why. If the other party refuses to show proof the issue must be closed.

 You have your own definition of success and quality and you don’t have to agree with the standards society imposes on you.

 You have the right to complain about any problems you encounter. You have the right to ask questions.

 You are not forced to work for free, you can refuse. You are not forced to work if you have health problems.

 Being in an argument with someone with more power than you sucks. You don’t have to prove yourself to others. You will need to defend your opinions to stop others from pushing you around. You are not forced to join discussions you don’t want to join.

 You have to understand and be understood. You have to communicate properly if you want to defend your opinions. Be direct. Accept that you might be wrong and accept when others are wrong. The goal of critiques is not to make you feel bad but to make you better. Ask for more information and use it to your benefit.

 You need to know the context, the motives, justifications, details and you can ask for examples.

 You don’t need to be defensive all the time. Think before you speak and make sure you have done your homework.

 If you are easily offended do some soul-searching and check if the problem might be you.

 Don’t let discussions happen for nothing. There should be a clear winner and a loser. But you don’t have to win every time. People might have good intentions behind the words they are speaking to you and their goal might not be to win, after all. The secret behind solving conflict without finding a winner is to find common ground.