The Young Leaders – One Young World Stories
Mood: thought-provoking, galvanising, moving
They came, they saw, they inspired change!
A friend of mine said something recently that really stayed with me because it challenged some of my own beliefs. It rang especially true after watching the brand new One Young World documentary: The Young Leaders – One Young World Stories.
She noted that many people often claim that we’ve overcome an issue the moment stats start pointing upwards and then they declare that we should all move on to something else more pressing. The penny drops though when you realise that we often tend to live in our own bubble, but think that we’ve heard it all and we know it all. There are, however, other perspectives and unless we lived what these individuals lived, we could never truly comprehend the severity of the problems they face on a day to day basis.
It should still matter when even one life has been affected, and there’s always more work to be done. It’s very naïve, for instance, to say that we shouldn’t continue to focus on protecting animals because a certain species is no longer extinct. One is just a fraction of a much larger issue which still needs addressing.
The film produced by One Young World, together with Ovation TV, the US Arts Network tells the 6 heartbreaking stories of some of the world’s most impressive young activists. From human rights to refugees to post genocide conflict all narrated by the Michael Sheen, the documentary encompasses many struggles that people from across the globe experience even in what is now considered modern society.
If you might have been trying to find your own purpose in life, you should have a look at the video as it may at least give you a starting point and some great food for thought.
- YEONMI PARK – Yeonmi escaped the horrors of North Korea, only to be sold as a sex slave in China. She is now a leading Human Rights activist, with over 80 million hits on Social Media.
- HYPPOLITE NTIGURIRWA – Hyppolite survived the genocide in Rwanda, where over one million people were slaughtered. He is now leading the way for peace and reconciliation in his country. Founder of Be the Peace, an organization focusing on the use of art to halt the intergenerational transmission of hate and to promote the power of cross-generational healing.
- TABATA AMARAL – Tabata was brought up in poverty in the favelas of Sao Paulo, by her mother and her drug addict father. She went on to Harvard to study Astro-Physics and is now the youngest serving woman politician in the Brazilian Parliament.
- AMIR ASHOUR – Amir was a leading gay activist in Iraq. He had to flee for his life after the Police came looking to shut him up for good. He is studying to become an International Human Rights Lawyer at Harvard, and founder of IraQueer, Iraq’s first and only LGBT+ organization.
- LINA KHALIFEH – Lina comes from Jordan and was appalled when one of her friends was beaten up for her wage packet by the male members of her family. She formed SheFighter, the first Self-Defense studio for women-only started in the Middle East. She has trained over 20,000 women, self-defence in countries all around the Middle East.
- NICOLLE FAGAN – Nicolle came up with a brilliant idea that helped save the Pacific Island paradise of Palau. She co-created Palau Pledge – a groundbreaking environmental initiative that requires visitors to sign a passport pledge to act in an ecologically responsible way on the island, for the sake of Palau’s children and future generations of Palauans.
One Young World is the largest global network of young leaders backed by renowned global figures, including the late Kofi Annan, Mohammed Yunus, Emma Watson and Meghan Markle.
The documentary will be available online on Ovation TV, the Ovation Now apps ‘Art House’ and on Ovation’s JOURNY app from the 11th of November.
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt15475354/