Idaho might remind the geography brains about some place in the United States of America, but it is obviously not the Idaho that the Sports Working Group (SWG) will bring to AEGEE.
Lately, the SWG has been working with two policy officers on two different, but yet a bit similar subjects; organising events combating homophobia and racism in AEGEE. Recently, the SWG were the leaders in the project and Skype meeting with the aim of gathering the Human Rights Working Group (HRWG), SWG members and Policy officer E.G. The topic of the meeting and project is to create an easy concept that antennae all across the AEGEE Network can adapt to and organise events in connection with the international day against homophobia which takes place yearly on May 17th. The day is also referred as IDAHO, and after a fruitful Skype meeting the possibilities to create a lot of awareness about a great cause and at the same time make AEGEE reach beyond where it has reached before are looking very good.
Are you yellow, blue or violet?
“What rainbow color are you?” was the question recently on the SWG Facebook page which made has created confusion amongst many people, but it is linked to the IDAHO campaign. A campaign that the SWG will continue working on together with Eline with the aim of getting as many antennae across Europe to join the rainbow flash mobs dancing and raising awareness about the fight against homophobia together with other national movements. This way youth participation and inclusion of minorities are both involved in the event.
Dancing is a sports activity that is easy to organise and furthermore sport is considered a universal language that brings people together. The aim with our involvement in IDAHO is to create awareness about the fight against homophobia and raise the interest in AEGEE and beyond, hopefully raising an even greater interest in organising many more events against homophobia in AEGEE both in and outside of the SWG after May 17th as well.
As mentioned, the SWG will continue the work together with the HRWG and Eline on the topic in order to specify the project even more. However, any member with an idea about how AEGEE can become visible in the flash mobs is more than welcome to contact the SWG.
Combating racism as well
The policy officers have before been introduced in The AEGEEan, but it can still be a confusing reading about what exactly the policy officers are doing, so while in contact with policy officer Stephanie Müller, the SWG had the time to ask a few questions about her work so far.
SWG: What have you been working on as a policy officer so far?
Stephanie: The topic I work on is “Racism and Xenophobia”, so far I have collected information on the topic, about its relevance for Europe and how racism & xenophobia is experienced in different countries in Europe. Therefore, at the beginning of December I send a questionnaire to the Network and got very interesting answers, which I will share with the Network soon.
It is very sad to see in how many European countries nationalists are raising and turning against foreigners, mostly immigrants from Africa and the Middle East. Particularly, in Southern European countries strong national and sometimes racist parties are raising and gaining more and more supporters.
SWG: What are your upcoming projects as a policy officer?
Stephanie: Like the other Policy Officers I will write a position paper against racism and xenophobia, for which I like to involve the Network as much as possible. I hope the Skype meeting about the international day against racism is just the beginning. I hope to be able to motive some locals to organise some events which are raising awareness of the fact that many people in Europe are discriminated because of their country of birth, religion, nationality or appearance. This is a very important topic we should not close our eyes to. Furthermore, I hope to raise the topic during the Agora Rhein-Neckar in a progress meeting and talk to some people of what could come next.
The Skype meeting that Stephanie is talking about is a project between the SWG and Stephanie aiming to gather AEGEE members and ask the question “What would you do in the International Day United against Racism?” If you want to join the discussion, then contact the SWG.
Written by Patricia Anthony, AEGEE-København