THE LOGIC OF VICTIMHOOD: STRATEGIC HUMAN RIGHTS LITIGATION & THE USE OF SYMPATHETIC VICTIMS TO FURTHER HUMAN RIGHTS.

This Article addresses the problem of innocent victims within strategic human rights litigation. Advocates assert that human rights are universal and apply equally to all actors. But, in practice, advocates are often pressed to pursue the cases of innocent, sympathetic victims because they are more likely to garner the needed public support for success. The practice of predominantly pursuing cases of passive, innocent victims delegitimizes the causes and suffering of victims who are seen as complicit, bad actors, or perpetrators. When told that a former terrorist is a victim of torture, one may respond that the terrorist is clearly a perpetrator instead because they are active and complicit. However, the delineation of the world into neat categories--mutually exclusive "victims" and "perpetrators"--fails to capture the complexities of reality. I propose a change of language within strategic litigation towards a conception of "survivorhood," which allows for the complexities of complicity and activity while still advocating that the person in question deserves help. Beyond the question of how to strategically deploy language in human rights advocacy, I argue that the utility of pursuing rights more broadly through strategic victim choice does not negate our ethical duty to advocate for complicit victims. When you say that you're a victim, that's sickening. Okay. What can I say? I lived a miserable life. I was imprisoned. I was tortured. I lived in fear. . . . It was my own fault for going, yeah, but I didn't come out of it as a winner in any way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]