CARING MEANS CHOOSING A SIDE: HUMAN RIGHTS, CRITICAL THINKING, AND THE REJECTION OF NEUTRALITY

Resumo

This short article proposes a reflection on care as an ethical and political practice inseparable from human rights and critical thinking, in the face of the growing processes of dehumanization that permeate contemporary societies. In contexts marked by structural inequalities, normalized violence, and institutional indifference, care risks being reduced to technical procedures or uninvolved actions, devoid of humanizing meaning. It argues that human rights constitute the non-negotiable foundation of care, while critical thinking operates as a condition for recognizing asymmetries, questioning neutralities, and resisting the naturalization of exclusion (FREIRE, 2019). Thus, caring is an act that demands positioning, responsibility, and the active refusal to transform lives into mere scenery, reaffirming humanity as a central value of any social project committed to justice and dignity. Therefore, it is necessary to say no to neutral listening.