We are less than one month into 2024, as this blog is written. But the Humanity Project already has earned a 2024 Candid Gold Seal of Transparency from GuideStar, the highly respected national nonprofit information service. This means the Humanity Project is open about our practices and our finances. It means our organization operates with integrity. And it means you can have confidence when donating to our work to “inspire greater respect for the goodness and inherent value of humanity”… our mission. The Humanity Project is now in our 19th year, founded in 2005. During this entire period we’ve taken pride in maintaining high ethical standards. We use the money from our wonderful sponsors and individual donors in ways that further our mission. That’s one reason we get funding from important organizations such as State Farm and The Our Fund Foundation, among others. A big thank you, then, to GuideStar for this 2024 demonstration of support for the Humanity Project. We will do our best to justify their opinion of our nonprofit and the vital work we do. “Equality for each, respect for all.”
Welcome 2024
Yes… A hearty welcome indeed to 2024. (Can it really be we’re nearly a quarter century into this millennium?) The Humanity Project enters our new year hopeful. And excited on many fronts.
You’ll be hearing in the coming months about some of our latest efforts, which include bold new additions to our State Farm-sponsored I Care program. We’ll unveil those changes early in 2024. Then there’s our planned Humanity Park. We’ve been working on this project for several months in partnership with our good friends at the Hollywood LGBTQ Council. Since it’s not a done deal quite yet, we’ll save most of the details for later. But we now have very strong support from key officials and neighbors in Hollywood, Florida … and we expect to receive final approvals for our renamed city park within a few weeks. We’ll keep you posted. For now, just know that we plan to transform a large city park into something very special for all residents and visitors alike — a welcoming, warm, safe refuge from our troubled world for everyone who enters Humanity Park.
Our Humanity Club and Antibullying Through The Arts programs have expanded in the 2023-24 school year with vital support from the Our Fund Foundation and Floatarama, among others. Those programs resume as soon as the kids return to classes. And we’ll be out and about in the community more in 2024 as well, with speaking engagements, event appearances and other outreach efforts. These are only some of the reasons we’re hopeful and excited as 2024 begins. Please join our work to promote “equality for each, respect for all” by signing our Pledge for Humanity on this website. May this new year bring all of us more peace, more health, more compassion and more hope.
Beyond Human Color
This is another in a series of blogs written for our website by Humanity Project Founder, Bob Knotts, a playwright, poet and author of the book “Beyond Me: Dissecting Ego To Find The Innate Love At Humanity’s Core.” These blogs offer a more personal perspective on ideas that lay at the foundation of the Humanity Project’s work.
“America, of all the Western nations, has been best placed to prove the uselessness and the obsolescence of the concept of color.”
James Baldwin, “The Fire Next Time”
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What does color mean?
Like everything engaged by the human mind, color acquires significance through our experience with it. And our experience with color begins at our earliest ages. Think about common perceptions of colors picked up by children. Even infants soon learn about sunny optimistic yellow, or dynamic and daring red. Or earthy ordinary brown. They also understand colors through a vast array of personal experiences. The approach of black forbidding storm clouds, followed by the relief of puffy welcoming white cloudshapes. Children focus their imaginations on those white clouds, this one shaped like a camel, that like a clown. Black storm clouds are never seen as suitable for youthful daydreams.
The meaning of colors also comes through stories. Cliches, of course, from cowboys in their white and black hats to shining knights on white steeds and cartoon villains with black capes and curly black moustaches. To every kid, to everyone throughout our lives, those colors mean something real. They’ve gained powerful and unshakable connotations of which we’re almost entirely unaware. Whether we know it or consciously agree, things in this world that are colored white carry positive meanings for most of us. And things colored black? Not as much. Too often our mental associations with black, and even brown, are unpleasant, frightening or hostile. Yellow and red are somewhat more complicated. Naturally, there are exceptions: Many of us believe black clothing, for instance, appears more flattering than white attire. But these exceptions prove the rule. Black clothes also are more provocative, sexier. They have become cool precisely because of their otherwise negative connotations.
Enter humanity.
The white man and black man and brown man, the yellow woman and red woman. How nice that more enlightened folks often portray our species as a pretty palette of colors, a happy rainbow of equality. Except that we’re not. As a society, we don’t view the white man and black man and brown man as equals, the yellow and red women. Far from it. We remain a divided humanity, in no small part thanks to our insistence on labeling each other by color.
And this is my point.
We need to understand the problems inherent with color-coded references to other human beings. There is no getting away from the meaning of black storm clouds and white unthreatening cloudshapes. But there is an escape from attaching such meanings to our neighbors, friends and family.
I am, by common standards, a white man. Why should anyone associate positive feelings with me more than with my Black colleagues? They shouldn’t. But they do, unavoidably.
So I’m suggesting that we explore alternatives. We do need basic descriptions of one another: If I’m sending a handyman to work on your kitchen, you’ll want to know who to expect at your door. Skin tone and so-called “racial characteristics” are important parts of our appearance. But we can describe people without the distorted connotations of color.
How might we accomplish that? Allow me to outline one simple idea offered with all humility – and in full recognition of my own social categorization by whiteness. I understand these are highly sensitive topics for many, especially many people of color, as this group is typically described today. Yet as a writer of whatever hue, I believe my job includes both pinpointing problems and proposing solutions. With this notion in mind, I make the following suggestion.
Perhaps we should use references to our regional origins, much as we do now when avoiding skin-color descriptions. But instead of the awkward “African American” and “Asian American,” “Latin American” and “Native American” we might simply refer to the Black person as “African.” We can eliminate the loaded word “Black” while providing key information about that individual. For the white woman or man, we might be identified as “European.” “Latin” and “Asian” and “Native” may suffice for the conventional brown, yellow and red peoples. That’s all the racial description that seems necessary. In the everyday world, we only require broad information about a person’s looks. You’ll recognize the recommended handyman without color coding. (If our handyman is a white person from South Africa, “European” offers the necessary physical specifics. Nationality is something else. Any confusion about regional identification is easily resolved, as we already do with “Asian.” Are we referring only to physical characteristics or to region of birth? We simply clarify with a few words: “She’s Asian, born in Peru.” The identifiers I suggest could become associated primarily with a person’s appearance.)
Humanity should eliminate color from our descriptions of individuals. It’s not necessary. And it’s demonstrably inaccurate: My skin is nothing like white. Nor is my Asian girlfriend remotely yellow nor are my African American friends actually black. Ask a talented artist. She’ll explain that skin tones require a careful mix of colors. That’s the colorful truth of our humanity – every one of us is a vibrant blend.
The simple description “African” may offer a clear concise replacement for “Black” when referring to people. Along with those other regional descriptions, African at least carries more sensible meaning than attaching color to our humanity. Colors convey relatively simplistic meanings in our minds. Human beings should not suffer from those misleading concepts.
Back To School
It’s nearly that time. Another school year is just ahead, hard as that may be to believe. The summer has raced by, it seems. But as the 2023-24 term begins, we want to ask for your help: Please spread the word about the Humanity Project to any school counselors, administrators or teachers you may know. Our programs are free, proven effective … and fun for the students.
On our own, we can’t connect with all the schools that need our help to prevent bullying and instill stronger feelings in students about values such as respect, equality and self-worth. Broward County alone is home to the nation’s sixth largest school district — and we don’t have the resources to call or visit every school. So we’re looking for your assistance, please.
Here’s how you can make sure more kids get our Humanity Project positive message:
Call, email or visit your local elementary school.
(We have programs for older students too but need help with elementary schools only.)
Give the elementary school this information:
Email: info@thehumanityproject.com
Phone: 954-205-2722
Contact: Bob Knotts, President & Founder
Website: www.thehumanityproject.com
That’s it. Just copy and paste those four bullet points and share them however you can. After they contact us, we’ll do the rest.
And if you’d like to volunteer for the Humanity Project this school year, please let us know. We’d love to talk with you. Thank you so much! With your help, we will reach more students than ever this year with our core message: “Equality For Each, Respect For All.” It’s needed now more than ever.
The Humanity Project
In Defense Of Human Dignity
On April 20, 2023, the Humanity Project Board of Directors posted a public statement in defense of human dignity. The statement was unanimously approved by all ten directors as a direct response to attacks on educational freedoms as well as against the right of individuals to live as they believe best.
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On Human Dignity: Public Statement by the Humanity Project Board of Directors
April 20, 2023
As a nonprofit organization devoted to promoting “equality for each, respect for all,” the Humanity Project is deeply disturbed by the many recent attacks on human dignity in Florida and around the country. Our home state, Florida, has passed several legislative actions that limit what and how teachers can teach. We believe this infringes on educators’ ability to effectively apply their training and experience. We also believe efforts to ban lessons on gender diversity, sexual orientation and racial issues are antithetical to promoting a more just and peaceful world. Thoughtful, age-appropriate information allows young people to better understand themselves and to form compassionate bonds with others. Beyond these attacks on education, politicians in Florida and elsewhere continue to vilify our rich cultural heritage and gender non-conforming art, enacting laws that criminalize drag performance. History shows us that drag is a unique art form, long a staple of the theatrical world. We deplore the misrepresentation of drag performers as unhealthy influences on our society. And we stand by our friends in the drag entertainment community. Equally disturbing to us are efforts to restrict the reproductive freedom of Florida women. We believe that denying people control over their own bodies and health amounts to government bullying. The Humanity Project cannot idly witness the bullying of any human beings who ask only the opportunity to be who they are. Nor can we accept the undermining of school curricula in ways that diminish a realistic understanding of our world. By law, the Humanity Project is a non-political, non-religious organization. Our mission remains “instilling greater respect for the goodness and inherent value of humanity.” We hope this statement of support for our schools and our fellow community members may contribute to that goal.
The statement also is available as a video read by Humanity Project Board members: Watch the video
Finding Unity In Humanity
Today we officially welcome the talented Silvana Sanchez to our Humanity Project team. She is an award-winning graphic and web designer who lives in Costa Rica, working for an American design company based in Minnesota. Silvana and her colleagues just won a prestigious World Brand Design Society competition for their “Not on My Watch” campaign, which was launched to educate people about defunding the police following the murder of George Floyd.
Recently Silvana contacted the Humanity Project to offer us her services. “I LOVE what you are doing!” she wrote in her first email. Silvana also discovered something that had eluded us during our entire 17+ year existence: the letters for the word “unity” are included in the word “humanity.” Her original design for the Humanity Project below shows how cleverly and effectively she used that observation.
Silvana stresses that she wants no payment for helping the Humanity Project. With nearly all our funds going toward program-related expenses, we greatly appreciate her enthusiastic volunteer spirit. And we look forward to an ongoing and exciting creative relationship with Silvana Sanchez. We think our partnership can inspire more people to work for a world with “equality for each, respect for all.” Thank you, Silvana … and welcome aboard!
The Giving Season -- Please Help
Since at least the time of Dickens, this has been the season of giving. To quote that master writer’s A Christmas Carol: “At this festive season of the year … it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the Poor and destitute.” We couldn’t agree more. But with the passing of many years, the holidays have become a season of helping other kinds of charities and nonprofits as well. Now there’s even a day dedicated to charitable donations, “Giving Tuesday.” This year Giving Tuesday happens on November 29.
We hope you will consider the Humanity Project as you mull your holiday contributions.
You may already know that we have earned the Gold Seal of Transparency from GuideStar/Candid, the highly respected nonprofit information service. And perhaps you’re also aware that our acclaimed programs help both kids and adults for free — we never charge for our programs or other materials. You may not realize, though, that nearly 100% of our funding goes toward program-related expenses. That’s very unusual in the nonprofit world and we’re proud of it.
You might like to read a few of the many many testimonials the Humanity Project has accumulated during our 17-year history: Read testimonials. Or look over our programs, videos, writings, blogs and more on this website. Maybe you’d also like to sign our popular Pledge for Humanity. Then, we hope, you may consider visiting our safe secure online Donate page: Visit our Donate page.
We believe the Humanity Project is a special organization of dedicated and experienced individuals working toward a highly valuable goal: “Equality For Each, Respect For All.” And we are deeply grateful to the companies and foundations and other organizations as well as all the people who make our work possible through their contributions. If you can, we hope you’ll join us.
How To Spread The Humanity Project Message
We’ll keep this short & sweet. Folks sometimes wonder, “How can I best explain to others what the Humanity Project is really about?” Here’s our suggestion for a good elevator speech, something you can say in 30 seconds to anyone who might be interested in our nonprofit:
“The Humanity Project believes no human being should ever have to prove their value. So the group offers a wide variety of programs that promote equality and self-worth or prevent disrespectful bullying behavior. All programs for kids and adults are free. And those programs are widely recognized for their innovative, effective lessons.”
Then perhaps refer them to our website here at www.thehumanityproject.com … We can take it from there.
If you’re a supporter of the Humanity Project, or even just a casual online follower, you can remember those few words to help connect us with others who may need our extensive resources. We want to get our values, our message and our programs to as many people as possible. And as you already know, word of mouth often is the best way to reach the public. We hope you’ll take opportunities that may come up in your daily life to tell friends, family or even strangers about the Humanity Project. In advance, we thank you!
Community and Corporate Responsibility -- With Thanks!
Today we applaud a caring and loyal friend of the Humanity Project — a friend celebrating their 100th birthday in 2022. We’re talking about our very good neighbors at State Farm. Yes, this is the centennial anniversary of that community-minded company’s founding. We are proud to call them one of our major sponsors.
And we hope you may want to listen to our new podcast with two wonderful representatives of State Farm: Jose Soto, Corporate Responsibility Analyst, and longtime State Farm agent Melba Ballard. You’ll hear a wide-ranging conversation about ways that this highly regarded corporation can help your community — and help you too. You’ll also learn that State Farm has just renewed their sponsorship of the Humanity Project with another generous grant, funding that allows us to provide our programs to both kids and adults for free. Thank you so much, State Farm! We can’t do it without you. Listen to the podcast.
One of State Farm’s annual efforts is called Neighborhood Assist. And this year, their program is bigger and better than ever. Anyone can submit an idea for a much-needed improvement in their community, with a real chance to win $25,000 to make it happen. Submit your pitch for whatever you feel is most needed locally — food for the homeless, maybe, or a community garden. Help for a school or care for the elderly. Find the details at www.neighborhoodassist.com.
Many many corporations talk about responsibility to the community. But State Farm is among the few that actually put their talk into action. We are deeply gratified to continue our long association with this quality company, which supports in tangible ways our work toward “Equality For Each, Respect For All.” We must say it again, then: Thank you, State Farm!
Back In The Classroom
We’ve persevered during a pandemic, keeping our work moving forward through programs, presentations and panel discussions at parks and libraries… sometimes virtually, sometimes in person as we deemed safe. Now the Humanity Project is back in the classroom, both virtually and in person. So far, our Humanity Club sessions are going well.
We’re working with 12 hand-picked student leaders at Pembroke Pines Charter Elementary School in Pembroke Pines, Florida. These are bright, engaged kids who want to make a difference in this challenged world. Our wonderful Humanity Project Board of Directors VP, Piper Spencer, is a teacher there, working for us in person to help our young folks understand the importance of “Equality For Each, Respect For All.” Other knowledgeable Board members offer virtual lessons during our one-hour sessions.
As always, we plan to involve the entire school in promoting respect — and stopping bullying. We’re also going to build another “Humanity Garden” as a place of rest and reflection and inspiration at this 700-student facility. We’ll tell you more about all that in the coming weeks … and our other efforts to contribute to a society where every human being feels valuable. For now, we want to thank Piper Spencer and Pembroke Pines Charter Elementary School. We’re very glad to get back inside the classroom.
Our New Team Member
Gail Johnson, Humanity Project Leadership Council
Today, we welcome a new member of the Humanity Project team. Gail Johnson joins our distinguished Humanity Project Leadership Council, a hand-picked group of community leaders who assist our efforts in a variety of ways.
Gail is a 28-year-old college graduate who is pursuing a career in special needs education. She believes in educating all children in ways that offer a compassionate and welcoming environment. A family-oriented mother of one girl, Gail strives to make sure every child’s voice can be heard, regardless of race, religion, sexual orientation or personal beliefs. Now she will head up our work on racial equality, taking over for Gabby Bendel. (Thank you, Gabby, for your help! We look forward to working with you on other projects soon!)
We met Gail Johnson during our Humanity Club sessions with young girls this summer at Delevoe Park, where she serves as Recreation Director. Our Humanity Club inspires kids of color to believe in themselves and to lead their peers toward greater social equality and respect-for-all people. Gail was engaged and energetic each week and she clearly cared about making a difference. We knew she’d be a good fit for our Leadership Council.
Welcome, Gail, on behalf of everyone at the Humanity Project! We’re excited to keep making a difference …together.
Humanity Club -- Live Again
Humanity Club: Summer 2021
We’re back! Our acclaimed Humanity Club program is working with kids again … in person! No Zoom, no frozen video or inaudible audio. And it’s great!
Yes, some things are still different than when we last were live. Masks are needed for instance — worn by everyone in the room but lowered or removed briefly when the moment seemed safe. And all of us on the Humanity Project team of course are fully vaccinated. We’re doing our best to make sure the children, their teachers and our own Humanity Project folks all stay healthy.
Take a look at a few pics from yesterday’s first non-Zoom Humanity Club session in 16 months. This was at Reverend Samuel Delevoe Memorial Park, beside the African American Research Library in Fort Lauderdale. We began teaching these smart girls of color what we mean by “Equality For Each, Respect For All,” using art projects, games, music, stories and more to connect with their young minds. We plan to help them build a Humanity Garden by the end of the summer: a lovely spot that celebrates our collective humanity by expressing respect for each individual. Check out the photos below. The kids seemed just as happy as we were to be back in the classroom again.
Notice the car… respect even on our roads!
And notice the rainbow with two girls… Equality For Each, Respect For All!
Having fun, all together again!
