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HUMAN RIGHTS FOR EACH PERSON REGARDLESS OF AGE, RACE, RELIGION OR POLITICS
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A warm welcome to our "Celebrity Campaigners" who have sent us their messages to support our latest
initiative in raising public awareness about human rights issues and anti-drugs campaigns.
If you are a celebrity and wish to add your voice, please email us. Click here.
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PRISON IS NO PLACE TO BE |
(You can do NO ONE, friends, family, yourself any good by being incarcerated)
While doing research for the HBO movie "Stranger Inside" I learned a few things. One, The biggest reason women were in prison, (The ones I visited) were because of DRUGS. Whether it was due to usage, selling, or being caught trafficking them for self, more so for others. Drugs were number one. Second, was the "THREE STRIKES" law, and third, THEFT.
The reality of all these unfortunate situations is, if you end up in prison it's hard. It's hard on you, and everyone around you. Life is hard enough on the outside WITH possibilities of change. Being locked up WITHOUT possibilities, losing years of your life, is tragic. I don't want to be a statistic. You should think more of yourself as to not become another one either. As hard as some of the women I met were, a few that worked on the set with me had been in and out of prison a good majority of their lives and they wished to God they had gone in a different direction. Sometimes the hardest choice you may have to make is cutting off, or moving away from what you know, and who you know. And this could be difficult for monetary reasons, or just difficulty adjusting somewhere else. It may seem scary, you may not see the choices, but they are there and will present themselves. You may have to just make a jump to get away, and keep running from it. In the end that choice could open you up to a world of endless possibilities, and a future instead of being imprisoned without possibilities.
I say this because the majority of women I talked to knew EXACTLY when that moment was, when they could have turned away. "They knew when they were making that mistake that would change their lives". They felt it, yet went forward. LISTEN TO YOU FIRST INSTINCT. It's usually right. On a visit to a prison in LA, a group of us got off the elevator and I saw a small room crammed with 10-12 women in it. They were different races, yet all of them looked like ghosts. I asked the guard "What were they in there for"? He told me those women were waiting to see if they were going to be granted parole. I would be scared to death too if others had the control of MY LIFE. Don't let them control you.
YOU TAKE CONTROL OF YOUR LIFE!!
Hopeful,
Yolonda Ross
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Paul McIntyre |
Paul graduated from the Centre for Performing Arts in Tasmania in 1993 and began
working for ABC Radio in 1995. He became a prison activist completely by accident when he discovered a prison pen pal webpage while surfing the net one evening in 2003. Through writing to inmates in the US, Paul discovered the true meaning of friendship and humanity and now does his best to educate anyone who will listen about prison and inmate issues.
Paul started writing to inmates because he believes good people can make bad choices but that through support, friendship and encouragement, people can turn their life around and should be given an opportunity to do so. Paul also believes that too much emphasis is placed on retribution when the real need for society is to rehabilitate individuals and to give them hope. "As an Australian citizen I am greatly concerned for all Australians imprisoned overseas - most of whom are in their predicament due to drug smuggling. Don't smuggle drugs - it's just not worth it."
ABC Local Radio, Tasmania
http://www.abc.net.au/hobart/
Notice: Further pages are currently under construction and will be added as time permits.
Let us know of Celebrity Campaigners for Human Rights.
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