Rights & Wrongs

13 children in America are killed each day, and while that number may seem shocking, it's minuscule compared to the abuses children suffer worldwide. Hosted by MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour correspondent Charlayne Hunter-Gault, the Rights & Wrongs series is a video newsmagazine, primarily aimed at junior and senior high school aged viewers, which offers an introduction to human rights issues worldwide. The Power of Human Rights, the series opener, provides an overview of the human rights situation, and includes an in-depth interview with mediator Adam Curle, who explains how the combination of ignorance, greed, and hatred in people creates a breeding ground for violations of human rights. Viewers also visit the El Puente Academy in Brooklyn, a high school specializing in human rights studies. The second tape, The World's Children, focuses specifically on the nearly 2 billion children in the world under age 16 whose rights rarely even figure--especially if they are girls. Interviews with an inner-city Washington, D.C. youth who worries about violence, and a 15-year-old girl in India who has little say about her life plans (because of arranged marriages), highlight the sad realities, while a rap song about human rights performed by El Puente students, and a music video by Judy Collins invoke the hopes of the future. The three other titles in the series are: Women Under Attack, U.S. & Canada, and Around the World. Recommended. (R. Pitman)