The Humanist Movement

The Humanist Movement is an international volunteer organisation that promotes nonviolence and non-discrimination. It is not an institution and has no offices anywhere in the world. It takes its inspiration from the current of thought referred to as New or Universal Humanism that has been developed since 1969 by its founder Mario Rodríguez Cobos, pen name: Silo.

New Humanism focuses on the overcoming of pain and suffering at a personal, interpersonal and social level. It defines violence as anything that causes pain and suffering to human beings. In this way violence is seen to have many different aspects, not just the well-known physical form but also; economic, religious, psychological, sexual, ethnic, etc.

New Humanism is based on two basic points:

• Solidarity – defined as treating other people the way one would like to be treated and,
• Coherence – defined as thinking, feeling and acting in the same way.

The project of the Humanist Movement is to eradicate war, hunger, poverty and economic exploitation across the planet and develop a new system based on the value of human life as the central value, higher than money, power, prestige, etc. This vision of the future is called the Universal Human Nation. The methodology used is to work in groups and undertake personal development activities as well as social projects. Once sufficiently experienced, new groups develop according to their interests.

New Humanists share the following Humanist Attitude:

• Placing the human being as the central value and concern, in such a way that nothing is above the human being and no human being is above another.
• Affirming the equality of all human beings.
• Recognizing personal and cultural diversity, affirming the characteristics proper to each human group and condemning discrimination, whether motivated by economic, racial, ethnic, or cultural differences.
• Developing knowledge beyond the limitations imposed by prejudices accepted as absolute and immutable truths.
• Affirming the freedom of ideas and beliefs.
• Repudiating violence in all its forms.

History

Near the end of the 60s, Silo organized a group to study the personal and social crisis occurring in the world. This group, and others like it, organized around his writings, grew and developed into what later became known as the Humanist Movement.

The Humanist Movement is often said to have been started May 4, 1969, with the talk "The Healing of Suffering" by Silo at Punta de Vacas, Argentina. Because of the military dictatorship in place at that time, this talk was permitted on the condition that it would be held high in the Andes Mountains, far from the nearest town.

These initial groups faced repression and disinformation campaigns as they grew and spread throughout Latin America. This growth was reinforced when some of the members, freely or as political exiles, took up residence in various countries in Europe, Asia and the Americas.

In 1975 one hundred members from different countries met in Corfu, Greece, to agree on proposals, objectives and a rudimentary organisation that would be tested over the next four years.

By 1980 the Movement was functioning in forty two countries. In 1981 The Community for Human Development organised a lecture tour around Europe and Asia. The Look Within, The Internal Landscape and the Book of the Community started being published and translated into many languages.

In 1983 the Movement was articulated into Councils and a way of working was defined in a material called the Norms. In 1984 the Humanist Party was founded, followed by The Greens.

After the launch of the Humanist International in 1989, the strategy turned once more to the development of the Humanist Movement in a more general form and its organisation structure. A stage of putting down roots in communities, with the opening of Centres of Communication and the publication of hundreds of neighbourhood newspapers around the world was started.

In 1993 the Document of the Humanist Movement was published. The first Humanist Forum was held in Moscow, Russia, and The World Center of Humanist Studies was founded.

By 1995 the direction of the Humanist Movement went towards a phase of massive growth with the opening up of 10s of new countries across Africa, Asia and the Caribbean. This mostly was made possible through the launching of the Centre of Cultures

1999 saw the detachment of the first autonomous council (council 2) away from the original council (council 1) having fulfilled the requirements previously laid down in the Norms.

In December 2000, with the creation of a further nine autonomous councils, the conditions were met for the inaugural meeting of the Assembly of General Coordinators in Mar del Plata in January 2001: each General Coordinator as the orientator of an autonomous council.

In December 2001, all councils previously oriented by Silo had met the conditions for their autonomy and Silo became "hands-free" and having other plans in mind he took the opportunity in the meeting in January 2001 to retire from the Assembly of General Coordinators.

Since that time 358 councils have gained their autonomy.