Desautels: Human Rights Activist with

Mission to Educate

By Tawni Swanson

Life's Work

Kathleen Desautels has been able to successfully commit to anumber of important roles: a speaker for Voices Exchange, a Staff Member at the 8th Day Center and long-time Sister of Providence for the Catholic Church. Desautel’s commitmet to humanitarian rights officially began with her choice to attend St. Mary of the Woods College in Indianapolis, where she studied education and theology. This education helped to develop the aura of curiosity and will to change that still surrounds her decades later.

“I have a strong passion for humanitarian issues, and I try to look through the prism of those that have been marginalized,” said Desautels.

Desautels refrains from using exciting titles and simply considers herself a “staff member” at the 8th Day Center, and has done so since 1986. The mission of the religiously based organization states: “As religious communities of men and women grounded in the hope of the Scriptures and our Christian faith tradition, we collaborate in the struggle to provide a critical alternative voice to the systems that suppress the human community and environment and to work for the structural changes which will hasten the arrival of a more just world.”

The organization has been advocating change since 1974 and has roughly 6,000 supporters worldwide. The main goal of the staff is to create equality for many different groups that have a history of marginalization. This frame of mind is apparent in everyday decisions made at the center according to Desautels.

“We work out of a different model; it’s more circular and feminist. Decisions come about by consensus in which we don’t vote,” she said.

Global Trouble

Through her work as a human rights activist, Desautels has partaken in nonviolent protests on the local and national levels, which have lead to many incidents with the law.

“She has so many exciting stories to tell and is an extremely interesting woman,” said Voices Exchange co-founder Jean Darling. Every protest has a story, from action in Nicaragua, Haiti, Bolivia, El Salvador, and Beijing; she has been arrested multiple times and even asked to leave the country.

While protesting unfair government policies in El Salvador, Desautels and the group of activists she was traveling with were asked to leave the country by the Salvadorian government. The group was asked to board a nearby plane and return to the United States. However “we walked real slow towards the plane until it couldn’t wait any longer and took off,” said the unstoppable Desautels.  

Delivery

In addition to numerous live action experiences with human rights issues, Desautels has taken part in the educational aspect of human rights as well. Her background in education has helped her to work with high school students, more commonly college students who have a stronger knowledge of today’s issues.

Desautels feels education of young people is very important to secure a future in human rights activism, in a “knowledge is power” sense. The ideal plan of attack in her opinion is to “bring to light an issue, educate, and call to action," she said. In the past she has worked closely with host groups in order to form speeches and presentations for an audience. “It’s not a canned speech that I deliver,” she said about past experiences.

She feels the main purposes of speeches given with Voices Exchange in particular, is to acquire knowledge on her part as much as the audience. In this idea, Desautels sees her speeches as a fair trade.

“I always have an exchange to learn what are their fears, anxieties, and questions. I want to create an environment that feels safe to say whatever you feel,” she said. The education cycle continues through the activism that is provoked in her speeches.

Desautels continues to thrive on her curiosity and passion for new humanitarian issues.

“I cannot not know,” she said.

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