Be a witness for human rights

March 8 is International Women’s Day. Johnson County United Nations Association (JCUNA) commemorates this occasion every year by hosting a fundraiser for local nonprofits led by women and for a U.N. agency pursuing related work.

This year we are highlighting Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) #3, Good Health and well-being, and we are honoring and fundraising for the Free Medical and Dental Clinic, Prairielands Freedom Fund, and the U.N.’s Healthy Start for Kids.

In December, in preparation for 2025, JCUNA hosted a roundtable discussion with local nonprofit partners about the state of human rights in our local community. Our goal was to listen, learn, and ensure that our work in 2025 was responsive to our community and grounded in the human rights articulated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights that is foundational to our values as advocates for the United Nations. Local groups working in support of unhoused people, formerly incarcerated people, African American women and girls, victims and survivors of domestic abuse, refugees and immigrants, and food insecure people participated in those roundtable discussions.

We learned and relearned a great deal. Stereotypes and prejudices I was taught, in school, to recognize and resist, persist today, emerging whenever and wherever conditions foster their growth. Among these prejudices are demeaning assumptions attached to a person’s use of a language other than English or the use of English with an “accent” or in a dialect marked by stereotype. To counter these misperceptions, the program of this year’s International Women’s Day celebration will be in a rich array of languages spoken by members of JCUNA — Arabic, Hindi, Spanish, Swahili, Kikuyu, Farsi. (English subtitles will appear on screens and be printed in the program.) We have chosen to honor the Free Medical Clinic, Prairielands Freedom Fund, and Healthy Start because our celebration is particularly focused on the Health and well-being of refugees and immigrants.

The Free Medical Clinic puts into practice every day a belief we share: access to health care is a basic human right for everyone. Prairielands contributes to the well-being of immigrant and refugee people in our community by providing bonds that keep them out of prison and with family as they navigate the United States legal system. Healthy Start aims to bring crucial vaccinations to 1 million children in refugee camps in East Africa, the site of the highest concentration of displaced children in the world. The violence in Sudan and in the Congo have had devastating effects on civilians, including children. In addition to our three featured organizations, we will be giving a special award to the Coralville Public Library for its programming in service to the immigrant and refugee community.

JCUNA’s calls its International Women’s Day event “Night of a Thousand Dinners.” More than 25 years ago, the first event, hosted by IowaUNA, was part of a large-scale coordination of a thousand dinners to raise money for the clearance of land mines. Though JCUNA has since become the host of Night of a Thousand Dinners, broadened the scope of our fundraising, and forged ahead without our 999 far-flung partners, we are no less dedicated to the security of all people.

We invite you to join us for Night of a Thousand Dinners on March 6, from 6 to 8 p.m., at the Unitarian Universalist Society in Coralville. Enjoy Togolese food and be a witness for human rights. Tickets are on sale until March 1 via Eventbrite by typing in Night of a Thousand Dinners. You can also obtain information about the event from our website and Facebook page. Tickets will not be sold at the door.

Barbara Eckstein is president of the Johnson County United Nations Association.