Stand Up Story: Students gathered in Norway ask “Discrimination, why?”

14 February 2017

Over 450 students from around the world gather every other year in Trondheim, Norway, to discuss social and political topics relevant to the world.

For its 2017 edition, the International Student Festival in Trondheim (ISFIT), invited the UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human Rights, Kate Gilmore, to speak at their plenary session.

This was an opportunity for Gilmore to recognize the role of students and the youth in building bridges for diversity, tolerance, engagement and acceptance of everyone’s dignity and rights.

At ISFIT 2017, youth engagement through social media and online stories widely disseminated the “Stand Up for Someone’s Rights” messages.

Citing the African-American singer and activist Billie Holiday, who with her song “Strange Fruit” stood up in the late thirties against the lynching of African-Americans in the southern states of the United States of America, Gilmore recalled the casualties of discrimination.

“On the trees of a world that flourishes xenophobia and bigotry, strange fruit hangs. Strange fruit budding on populist trees – assassinations of human rights defenders and of journalists; arbitrary detention of political dissidents; removal of activists’ passports; rejection of the refugee in flight; daily, banal cruelties of discriminations passing unremarked,” she said.

“Come on - Stand up! Every day, in any way – stand up.”

---