WEBVTT Kind: captions Language: en 00:00:09.320 --> 00:00:14.260 In Pakistan, it is very different to be humanist, because Pakistan is a country 00:00:14.270 --> 00:00:19.189 which is very conservative; human rights violations are deeply rooted in the 00:00:19.189 --> 00:00:26.419 culture; and, most importantly, Pakistan is not a secular country. The political 00:00:26.419 --> 00:00:31.369 religion has a huge control over the policies of the country. The religious 00:00:31.369 --> 00:00:35.360 clerics and the religious segment of the society, they define the narrative of 00:00:35.360 --> 00:00:40.730 the society, which leaves, really, less space for people who are 00:00:40.730 --> 00:00:46.940 humanists or people who are atheists. If I'm a humanist, it means that someone can 00:00:46.940 --> 00:00:52.600 kill me, just because they think I'm different. I can be persecuted by the lawmakers. 00:00:52.600 --> 00:00:59.000 As per law, I can be persecuted. Laws such as blasphemy laws can be used against me 00:00:59.000 --> 00:01:01.789 and, on the top of it, if I am a humanist and also a human 00:01:01.789 --> 00:01:07.280 rights activist, it means that my human rights work can easily be discredited by 00:01:07.280 --> 00:01:12.350 making the propaganda against me, that I am a humanist, an atheist, and, therefore 00:01:12.350 --> 00:01:16.250 the work that I do for the protection of human rights is also prejudiced, and that 00:01:16.250 --> 00:01:22.100 the human rights work is actually a game plan to bring Western 00:01:22.100 --> 00:01:26.750 ideas to Pakistan. So thus, being a humanist and living in Pakistan means 00:01:26.750 --> 00:01:33.260 putting your life at risk every day, just because you have certain kind of beliefs, 00:01:33.260 --> 00:01:36.880 which are way different than the mainstream society. 00:01:47.600 --> 00:01:53.420 We established 'Youth Peace Network' and while the militant organisations in 2009 00:01:53.420 --> 00:01:57.860 were recruiting young people as suicide bombers, we were recruiting young people 00:01:57.860 --> 00:02:04.220 as peace-builders. We identified the key factors which make young people 00:02:04.220 --> 00:02:08.240 vulnerable to the militant organisations and we started using those 00:02:08.240 --> 00:02:12.230 key factors as a tool to prevent young people from joining militant 00:02:12.230 --> 00:02:16.610 organisations. We have 500 volunteers who have reached out to more than 10,000 00:02:16.610 --> 00:02:20.840 young people in the previous ten years and this is a big achievement, 00:02:20.840 --> 00:02:28.040 saving the lives of 10,000 young people, preventing them from becoming vulnerable 00:02:28.040 --> 00:02:31.060 to the narrative of the extremist organisations. 00:02:36.420 --> 00:02:42.680 So 'Aware Girls' is a young-woman-led organisation that we, that I and my 00:02:42.680 --> 00:02:48.890 sister, Saba Ismail, we started it when I was 16 and she was 15, around 15 00:02:48.890 --> 00:02:53.510 years ago. We started this organisation and the aim of the organisation was to 00:02:53.510 --> 00:02:57.830 provide a platform to young women and girls, where they can learn about their 00:02:57.830 --> 00:03:02.239 human rights, they can discuss about the issues they are facing, and together they 00:03:02.239 --> 00:03:06.590 can build a strategy for changing their communities. Now we are working on 00:03:06.590 --> 00:03:10.790 girls' rights to education. We are advocating at the policy level, we are 00:03:10.790 --> 00:03:15.620 advocating at the community level, so that all girls can go to school. We're 00:03:15.620 --> 00:03:19.670 also working on political empowerment of young women because we believe that if 00:03:19.670 --> 00:03:24.319 women are not at the policy table, then their rights will not be saved, their 00:03:24.319 --> 00:03:28.870 rights will be protected. Many young women now, they are politically aware. 00:03:28.870 --> 00:03:33.769 Hundreds of women have been using their right to vote, they have been standing up 00:03:33.769 --> 00:03:37.670 for their right to vote. Many women have run for local elections in Pakistan 00:03:37.670 --> 00:03:42.109 after they became part of our programmes and at least 10 of them have actually 00:03:42.109 --> 00:03:47.090 won local elections. Those women would have never been able to run for 00:03:47.090 --> 00:03:51.560 elections, if they had not been engaged in our programme. So, because of the work 00:03:51.560 --> 00:03:57.290 that I am doing, young people and young women are becoming more empowered, they 00:03:57.290 --> 00:04:01.190 are taking charge of their own lives, they are making decisions about their 00:04:01.190 --> 00:04:03.580 selves, and they're changing their own communities. 00:04:09.100 --> 00:04:14.780 One achievement of being a humanist and being open about it, and then working 00:04:14.780 --> 00:04:19.340 as a human rights activist and then [being] known in my community is that it creates 00:04:19.340 --> 00:04:24.000 a safe space for other humanists, especially for the emerging and young ones 00:04:24.000 --> 00:04:27.810 who don't have connections to the world, who don't have 00:04:27.810 --> 00:04:32.160 any global connections. They know that they are not alone and they know that 00:04:32.160 --> 00:04:37.980 their humanistic beliefs, their humanistic life stance is not a sin. 00:04:43.220 --> 00:04:47.380 One of my humanistic values which has inspired me to work for human rights is 00:04:47.389 --> 00:04:51.830 that when I leave the world, I want to leave it in a better shape. 00:04:51.830 --> 00:04:56.629 I don't want the generations that would come after me to face the same kind of 00:04:56.629 --> 00:05:02.720 challenges that my generation has been facing; and if I don't work to make this 00:05:02.720 --> 00:05:07.009 world a better place, it means that I am failing. My other 00:05:07.009 --> 00:05:12.080 humanistic value which inspires me to work with young people - I believe in 00:05:12.080 --> 00:05:18.590 celebrating life. I believe all of us should celebrate life to the maximum. I believe 00:05:18.590 --> 00:05:22.250 in happiness. I want to explore the culture, I want to explore the beauty 00:05:22.250 --> 00:05:28.220 that exists in this world, and I believe every person has this right to explore 00:05:28.220 --> 00:05:32.509 the beauty and not wait for an uncertain time which will never come. 00:05:32.509 --> 00:05:35.120 This is our life and we should enjoy it!