Why Is Citizen Advocacy Important?
Let’s face it, we live in a world that is oppressive to people that don’t fit our image of health, wealth and brains. Many people prefer to think of the world as a kind, welcoming place, and if only we could fix things, it’d be a great world for everybody. Well, there’s been centuries of “fixing up” and we have just as much oppression, poverty, prejudice and hatred in the world as we ever had. The question, then, is not a matter of fixing things up, but is a moral choice of where each person stands in the face of dynamics that oppress and even destroy vulnerable people. Fortunately, there are people who will stand in the face of oppression, and will do the right thing in standing by, for, and with oppressed people. Citizen Advocacy provides very real opportunities for individuals to act upon that moral choice. “Moral” simply means having the ability to tell right from wrong. It is wrong to treat anyone as less than oneself. It is right to regard all people as of equal value and worth,
