Two Bills of Rights for Young People from FPS

[anarchist of love]

BILLS OF RIGHTS FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

The following are two different Bills of Rights outlines. The first is taken from a book whose title I don’t have.The second one was published in the appendix of an FPS organizing pamphlet, as "adapted from the program of the Wisconsin Student Union."
Both are mostly a listing of hopes that independent and organized young people once demanded their adults listen to. Both of these manifestos come from the national (at the time) young people's voice called ”FPS” (published from 1970 to 1980), which was the "mouthpiece" of the Cooperative Highschool Independent Press Syndicate (a national young peoples' liberation group formed when The Draft and the illegal Vietnam war was raging).


”We know there is a basic decision to make: either we stay quiet and become part of the system of oppression, or we seize control of our lives, take risks, and struggle to build something new.”


YOUTH LIBERATION OF ANN ARBOR, the “Fifteen Points”


“WHAT WE WANT”


1. WE WANT THE POWER TO DETERMINE OUR OWN DESTINY

2. WE WANT THE IMMEDIATE END OF ADULT CHAUVANISM.
We believe ideas should be judged on their merit and people on their wisdom and kindness. Age in itself deserves no recognition. Adults who want to support youth struggle or “improve communication” should allow their concern by providing concrete resources. Words alone are not enough. Age might once have led to wisdom, but the old have proved themselves unable to deal with present reality. If the human species is to survive, the young must take the lead.

3. WE WANT FULL CIVIL AND HUMAN RIGHTS.
We believe young people are necessary participants in democracy. We must have complete freedom of speech, press, assembly, and religion, and the right to vote. We believe that all people are created equal and are endowed with certain inalienable rights; among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

4. WE WANT THE RIGHT TO FORM OUR EDUCATION ACCORDING TO OUR NEEDS.
We believe that compulsory education is a form of imprisonment and must be abolished immediately. Grades and all forms of tracking must end, because they stimulate competition, divide us, and make us work for other people’s ends. All discipline procedures must be decided democratically within the school community. No school staff should be hired or fired without the democratic consent of students and teachers. Students and the community must have the right to use school facilities whenever they feel it necessary.

5. WE WANT THE FREEDOM TO FORM INTO COMMUNAL FAMILIES.
We believe that the nuclear family is not in the best interest of the people involved. Young people are now considered property –to be molded in the image of their parents. Since we demand self-determination for our lives, this is intolerable. In communal families children can grow up in the company of many people, both peers and adults. They can learn the co-operation of community rather than the oppression of ownership. Until communal families are a reality, some healthy provision must be made for young people whose present conditions of life force them to become cultural refugees.

6. WE WANT THE END OF MALE CHAUVANISM AND SEXISM.
We believe women must be free and equal. We recognize that sexism is all-pervasive and often subtle and demeans the humanity of everyone. All forms of sex-role stereotyping must end. Macho must go. Abortions must be free and legal. We consider the women’s movement our natural ally since both young people and women are systematically oppressed by male-supremacist society.

7. WE WANT THE OPPORTUNITY TO CREATE AN AUTHENTIC CULTURE WITH INSTITUTIONS OF OUR OWN MAKING.
We believe western culture is decadent and we refuse to continue it in our lives. People’s appearance must not affect their civil rights. All drugs must be legalized, as we see that it is not laws that govern people’s use of drugs, but societal conditions. We hope to create a society in which people will not need death drugs. Our music and cultural gatherings must be allowed to flourish in peace. We must be set free to begin living in the new age and begin to accept a responsibility for developing the plans and examples of institutions that build joy, justice, and a respect for life.

8. WE WANT SEXUAL SELF-DETERMINATION.
We believe all people must have the unhindered right to be heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, or transsexual.

9. WE WANT THE END OF CLASS ANTAGONISM AMONG YOUNG PEOPLE.
We believe that those in power cultivate elitism and class divisions among youth which only serve to weaken us. The survival of young people of all classes and races is threatened by the few who run this world. We condemn academic tracking, honors, and all other class divisions imposed upon us.

10. WE WANT THE END OF RACISM AND COLONIALISM IN THE UNITED STATES AND THE WORLD.
We believe America is an imperialist country. America uses over 50 per cent of the world’s resources for less than 7 per cent of the world’s population. Racism in schools is severely damaging to students, particularly minority students. Students must eliminate racism and stop fighting each other. We must unite to fight the real enemy until we have education that meets the needs of all races. We support the liberation struggles of colonized people of all colors everywhere.

11. WE WANT FREEDOM FOR ALL UNJUSTLY IMPRISONED PEOPLE.
All young people in juvenile homes, training schools, detention centers, mental institutions, and other penal institutions for minors must be set free. They did not receive a fair trial before a jury of their peers, and the society they offended is itself criminal. Young people must never receive discriminatory treatment before the law, whether in the courtroom, going to a movie, buying alcohol, or leaving home. The military draft must be abolished and the military made democratic.

12. WE WANT THE RIGHT TO BE ECONOMICALLY INDEPENDENT OF ADULTS.
We believe we are entitled to work or to unemployment benefits. Child-labor laws and extended schooling now force youth into the status of a dependent colony.

13. WE WANT THE RIGHT TO LIVE IN HARMONY WITH NATURE.
We believe that to survive we must have clean air to breathe, pure food to eat, water fit to drink, products built to last, free medical care, and an end to population growth. Life exists in balance and harmony, but greed and stupidity have now sent [this word is missing on my copy] disastrously out of balance with our environment and earth death seems certain. Each person must learn to live a sound psychological (right word?) life, and all people together must change the economic structure of the world until the needs of the earth and its people are met.

14. WE WANT TO REHUMANIZE EXISTENCE.
We believe that to do this we must recognize and deal with the invisible dictatorship of technocracy and bureaucracy. We are the crown of creation, and we announce that it is not our destiny to become robot parts of the Great Machine.

15. WE WANT TO DEVELOP COMMUNICATION AND SOLIDARITY WITH THE YOUNG PEOPLE OF THE WORLD IN OUR COMMON STRUGGLE FOR FREEDOM AND PEACE.
We believe national boundaries are artificial and must inevitably be abolished. In the new world, all resources and technology must be used for the benefit of all people.

Youth will make the revolution. Youth will keep it young!

It is essential that we view the rights of children in a world perspective. While it is entirely fitting that we, as Americans, address ourselves in the first instance to the oppression and destruction of children in this country, we should not forget that the vast majority of the world’s children live short and painful lives. To alleviate such conditions must be an unremitting concern and ultimate objective of any open-eyed commitment to children.

========================================================================

A Student Bill of Rights --long overdue (adapted from the program of the Wisconsin Student Union)


Under the present school system students are not allowed to control their own lives. This educational system is designed not to give students the best possible opportunity to develop their talents but to supply the quality and quantity of workers for the present economic system. The schools track minorities and poor people into menial and factory jobs, while tracking women into secretarial and domestic occupations and leaving a relatively small number of people to do professional jobs. Our schools teach us to passively accept authority rather than to question it. Schools emphasize and exaggerate the actions of the rich and powerful, while excluding the history of women, third world, and working people.

The school system induces competition, instead of cooperation; it divides us instead of allowing us to unite; it encourages us to adopt materialistic goals instead of human values. It encourages discrimination against people on the basis of sex, race, age, social classes, and supposed intellectual ability.

We believe that students are more important than this institution and therefore we wish to democratize and humanize our schools. In order to do this, the following rights must be guaranteed.

I. WE WANT SELF-DETERMINATION FOR ALL STUDENTS. THEREFORE, WE DEMAND:
1. All classroom decisions be made on the basis of one person one vote.
2. Students have control of school policy with all decisions made by direct referendum of the students.
3. Student determination of teaching methods and course content.
4. The abolition of the grading system and the institution of self-evaluation.
5. Student control over the hiring and firing of teachers
6. The abolition of the tracking system.
7. An end to compulsory class attendance and compulsory schooling.
8. The right for students to form political and social organizations in the school, regardless of the political views of the organization.
9. An end to all discrimination on the basis of race, sex, or political views.

II. STUDENTS, BOTH IN SCHOOL AND OUT, MUST BE GRANTED ALL RIGHTS ENUMERATED IN THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION, THE BILL OF RIGHTS, OTHER AMENDMENTS, AND THOSE ESTABLISHED BY THE COURTS. THESE MUST INCLUDE, BUT NOT BE LIMITED TO THE FOLLOWING:
1. The right to publish and distribute any leaflets, or other publications, without any prior authorization
2. Freedom from search of books, lockers, or person without the freely given consent of the student involved.
3. The right to due process, including a hearing for any student who is accused of disobeying a rule, with the right to counsel, the right to question witnesses, and the right to a jury of other students.
4. All rules which have been passed by a majority of students and are in force, must be made available in writing to any interested students.
5. Students may express their political beliefs through any symbols such as buttons, armbands, style of clothing and length of hair that they choose, for whatever reason they choose it.


III. SCHOOLS MUST SERVE THE COMMUNITY, NOT THE GOVERNMENT, MILITARY, OR OTHER INSTITUTIONS. THIS MEANS THAT:
1. Schools must be open to anyone from the community who wishes to attend them, regardless of age.
2. Students have the right to full use of school facilities, including bulletin boards, mimeograph (photocopy) machines, meeting rooms and auditoriums, layout equipment, projectors, and the public address system.
3. There shall be an end to all military programs such as ROTC in the schools and to all military recruiting.
4. Federal or other government officials shall not be given any information about students without written consent of that student.

[Creature Bipedal]

What is FPS anyway?