According to Honkala, the concept for the human rights campaign originated on a cold October night in 1995, when at 2 a.m. blankets were removed from 60 homeless families camping out at the Pennsylvania capitol to protest their living conditions. He didn't get that we didn't have homes. From then on, the argument was about basic human dignity, Honkala says. Indeed, the marchers readily use the language of human rights to articulate their demands. And we worked.
Every person has the right to the pursuit of happiness.
But we are still below the poverty line. Poor people's advocates, too, appreciate the significance of the human rights argument. We want things like universal health care, for people to be able to eat. If you talk about those things today, a lot of people will dismiss you as overly idealistic, unrealistic. You can say, 'I'm not making this up.