The original group of 13 Freedom Riders - seven African Americans and six whites - left Washington, D.C., on a Greyhound bus on May 4th, 1961. Their plan was to reach New Orleans, Louisiana, on May 17th to commemorate the seventh anniversary of the Supreme Court’s decision, which ruled that segregation of the nation’s public schools ...
They want you to be Poor / Sie möchten, dass du arm bist / Eles querem que você seja Pobre / Quieren que seas Pobre
An ancient piece of common wisdom says the poor get poorer and the rich get richer. The wealth of the rich is the ignorance of the people; in fact, the rich profits from the ignorance of the poor. There is no man that is poor; every man is rich in something. The ‘rich’ are rich in ideas ...
1983-04-27 Rheydt, Germany / Life out of Balance / Leben aus dem Gleichgewicht / Vida fora de Equilíbrio / Vida fuera de Balance
Koyaanisqatsi attempts to reveal the beauty of the beast! We perceive our World, our way of living, as beautiful because there is nothing else to perceive. If one lives in this World, the globalized World of high technology, all one can see is one layer of commodity piled upon another. In our World the original is the ...
The web of Life / Das Netz des Lebens / A teia da Vida / La web de la Vida
Over billions of years of evolution, the Earth's ecosystems have evolved certain principles of organization to sustain the web of life. In the coming decades, the survival of humanity will depend on our ecological literacy – our ability to understand the basic principles of ecology and to live accordingly. Ecoliteracy must become a critical skill for politicians, ...
Stuck in the Box / Gefangen im Karton / Preso na Caixa / Preso en la Caja
More than half of the World’s 60 million displaced people are under the age of 18. Once they have been displaced for six months, a refugee is likely to remain displaced for at least three years, with the average length of displacement estimated at 17 years – almost an entire childhood. Support for displaced children is stuck ...
Stop at Nothing / Stop vor Nichts / Pare em Nada / Pare en Nada
Women are expected to be beautiful and attractive. This has sadly created a culture where women are not taken seriously. They have been objectified as being less than men, which is seen from the treatment of young girls to the treatment of powerful women in office. It is difficult for women to be taken seriously because ...
How terribly short your life Is / Wie schrecklich kurz dein Leben Ist / Quão terrivelmente curta sua vida É / Cuan terriblemente corta es tu Vida
Remember how short your life is and enjoy it. You can work hard, but at least work hard for something you love. You get one life to live, so I suggest you live it well. The universe does not care what kind of car you drive or how much your shoes cost. It does not care ...
One breath around the World / Ein Atemzug um die Welt / Uma respiração ao redor do Mundo / Un aliento alrededor del Mundo
If you are one of the 3.9 billion people around the World living in a city, the air in your lungs is very likely hurting you. More than 80% of those who live in cities with more than 100,000 that monitor air pollution are exposed to air quality levels that exceed WHO limits. 98% of cities in ...
You Are Never Too Small / Du bist nie zu Klein / Você nunca é pequeno Demais / Nunca eres demasiado Pequeño
My name is Greta Thunberg. I am 15 years old. I am from Sweden. I speak on behalf of Climate Justice Now. Many people say that Sweden is just a small country and it doesn’t matter what we do. But I’ve learned you are never too small to make a difference. And if a few ...
I love the whole World / Ich liebe die ganze Welt / Eu amo o mundo Inteiro / Amo el mundo Entero
Peace only springs from Love. And Love does not kill. Love does not destroy. Love does not know borders. Love does not even protect or defend itself. Love only loves. Love is. We say that we love the whole world. But true Love does not destroy the environment and its animal living. We call ourselves civilized.But a ...
1994-02-26 Little Rock, USA / It’s just a Ride / Es ist nur eine Fahrt / É apenas um Passeio / Es sólo un Paseo
The World is like a ride in an amusement park, and when you choose to go on it you think it’s real because that’s how powerful our minds are. The ride goes up and down, around and around, it has thrills and chills, and it’s very brightly colored, and it’s very loud, and it’s fun for ...
She used to be Mine / Sie war früher Mein / Ela costumava ser Minha / Ella solia ser Mia
Child brides face huge challenges because they are married as children. Child brides are neither physically nor emotionally ready to become wives and mothers. Isolated and with limited freedom, married girls often feel disempowered. They are deprived of their fundamental rights to health, education and safety. Their personal development and wellbeing is put at risk. They face more ...
Remembrance Day / Tag des Gedenkens / Dia da Lembrança / Giorno della Memoria
International Holocaust Remembrance Day, is an international memorial day on 27th of January commemorating the tragedy of the Holocaust that occurred during the Second World War. It commemorates the genocide that resulted in the death of 6 million Jewish people, 5 million Slavs, 3 million Poles, 2000.000 Romani people, 250.000 mentally and physically disabled, and 9.000 homosexual men by the Nazi regime and ...
Eyes on the Road / Augen auf die Straße / Olhos na estrada / Ojos en el Camino
Today, nine people will not come home as a result of distracted driving. More than 1,000 people will have been injured because they or someone else did not pay attention behind the wheel. Keep your hands on the wheel, your eyes on the road and your mind on driving. There are three main types of distractions. The ...
1942-01-20 Berlin, Germany / Final Solution / Endlösung / Solução Final / Solución Final
The plans to exterminate all the Jews of Europe was formalized at the Wannsee Conference, held at an SS guesthouse near Berlin, on 20th January 1942. The conference was chaired by Heydrich and attended by 15 senior officials of the Nazi Party and the German government. Most of those attending were representatives of the Interior Ministry, the Foreign Ministry, and ...
What is wrong with our Culture / Was ist falsch mit unserer Kultur / O que está errado com a nossa Cultura / Qué está mal con nuestra Cultura
Why is it that we don’t seem to be able to adjust ourselves to the physical environment without destroying it? Why is it that in a way this culture represents in a unique fashion the law of diminishing returns. That our success is a failure. That we are building up in other words, an enormous ...
1969-01-16 Prague, Czechoslovakia / Burning Bush / Brennender Busch / Sarça Ardente / Zarza Ardiente
The fight for freedom, for moral principles, self-sacrifice and protest in those desperate times led to the moral unification of a repressed nation, which twenty years later defeated the totalitarian regime. The anniversary of Jan Palach’s death inspired a new generation of students to start protests that led to the eventual fall of communism in Czechoslovakia, ...
We can Change / Wir können es Ändern / Nós podemos Mudar / Podemos Cambiar
We can change. But we can not just snap our fingers and say goodbye to our well-established patterns, even when those patterns result in bad consequences. We wish it could be easier. We do not change just because someone (even ourselves) wants us to. 'It is too hard, it is not in our DNA, it requires excessive ...
1750-01-13 São Miguel das Missões, Brazil / Gabriel’s Oboe / In My Fantasy / Em minha Fantasia / Nella Fantasia
The Mission is based on events surrounding the Spanish - Portuguese treaty of 1750 or 'Treaty of Madrid'. The document was signed in the Spanish capital by Ferdinand VI of Spain and John V of Portugal on 13th January 1750. Spain ceded part of Jesuit Paraguay to Portugal, to end to the armed conflict between the Spanish and Portuguese empires in South America. The 'Treaty of Madrid' was significant because ...
2013-01-11 New York, USA / You can make a Difference / Du kannst einen Unterschied Machen / Você pode fazer a Diferença / Tu puedes hacer la Diferencia
I feel very strongly, that it is not enough to just live in the World as it is and just take what you are given, to follow the things that adults told you to do … and that Society tells you to do. I think you should always be questioning. I take this very scientific attitude ...
Turn promises into Reality / Verwandle Versprechen in Realität / Transformar promessas em Realidade / Convierte promesas en Realidad
More than 90% of all children are enrolled in school, even in developing countries. Thanks to digitalization we are more interconnected with each other than ever before. Knowledge and ideas flow throughout the World and transcend all previous boundaries. At the same time, the World is younger than ever. Almost half of the World’s population is younger ...
I do not like the human Race / Ich mag die Menschheit Nicht / Eu não gosto da raça Humana / No me gusta la raza Humana
Short-sighted with our planet Earth, dominated by natural instincts that are no longer productive, neophobic, vulnerable to irrationalism and cognitive errors in thinking and statistics, led by an instinctive Love of salty and fatty foods: We are also massively overpopulated. Far too many individuals, in a species that could do with a little more self-reflection, and a ...
We can make a change in the World / Wir können die Welt Verändern / Podemos fazer uma mudança no Mundo / Podemos hacer un cambio en el Mundo
We all get frustrated and upset, but the energy that you put out into the universe has a domino effect. The person you yelled at will take their frustrations out on another, who will then go home and yell at his kids. And the kids will fight with one another because they do not know how to ...
1988-12-22 Xapuri, Brazil / When the angels Cry / Wenn die Engel Weinen / Quando os anjos Choram / Cuando los ángeles Lloran
Francisco Alves Mendes Filho, better known as Chico Mendes, was a Brazilian rubber tapper, trade union leader and environmentalist. He fought to preserve the Amazon rainforest, and advocated for the Human rights of Brazilian peasants and indigenous peoples. Chico Mendes had the vision of the need for an alliance between people and forest conservation built on maintaining the necessary ecological balance and not ...
If all the ice Melted / Wenn alles Eis geschmolzen Wäre / Se todo o gelo Derretesse / Si todo el hielo se Derritiera
If we keep burning fossil fuels indefinitely, global warming will eventually melt all the ice at the poles and on mountaintops, raising sea level by 216 feet. There are more than five million cubic miles of ice on Earth, and some scientists say it would take more than 5,000 years to melt it all. If we continue ...