What does dignity mean to you??

I feel across this on facebook and thought I would post it here for all to see!  Think about this question...what DOES dignity mean to you??...of course wikipedia and online dictionaries will define this word for you...but what does it actually look like in real life?? ...think about it...and then read on to hear how others answer this question.


What does dignity mean to you? We (the Acumen Fund) asked our community this question, and posted the answers here. CLICK HERE to check out the full blog post and hear an inspiring video from Acumen Fund entrepreneurs.

Here are some bits straight from the Acumen Fund blog.

We often say we believe in dignity, not dependence. Choice, not charity. And we’ve seen dignity in many different forms. We’ve seen it flow through the currents of electrical wires lighting rural villages deemed impossible to reach. We’ve watched it emerge from drip irrigation channels, quenching fields that were too dry to cultivate. We’ve heard it in stories of mothers who, for the first times in their lives, found out there was an affordable, clean hospital in which they could give birth.

We’ve seen dignity expressed in all of these ways and more, but we were curious — What does dignity mean to you? Some of our entrepreneurs answered this question, and were awed by their responses. You can watch them in the video above.

We turned this question to our community of followers,  and collected your answers via Twitter and Facebook.  Now we would like to share some of these inspiring responses with you: (I, Malia, shortened this list - to see the full list, visit the blog post!!)

• Ceasing to see developing nations as charity projects and begin serving through relationships, not handouts.
• Dignity is giving the poor the opportunity to have their own say in how to improve livelihoods and better their communities.
• Dignity means being able to decide for yourself how to live your life
• an outward display of ones integral humanity.
• Being able to live in decent housing, eat healthy food, get medical care, send your kids to school or go to school yourself, be treated like human beings and truly have an opportunity to be self sufficient.
• Dignity means access to basic public services, opportunity to realize one’s potential, freedom and ability to support and provide for one’s family – simply because one is human.
• For me dignity equates to value.  If we value ourselves, and others value us, we have dignity.  The greatest achievement can be that we create a society where everyone is valued equally…in that, we can all have dignity in who we are, what we believe, what we do, and how we live our life.  For me, the truest sense of the word dignity is equality!
• For me dignity is a mindset. It is first and foremost about having self-respect, self-awareness of the possibility to pursue happiness with your own means given your life conditions and the possibility to improve them. Secondly, but also very important, it is receiving respect from society.  Dignity is to continue to be a man when the whole system around you is designed to deprive you of your humanity, to make you hopeless and helpless, to lose self respect. It all starts with simple care for oneself. 
• Dignity = Liberty + Equality 

So I pose the question to all of you...what does dignity mean to you???