Oof. Where do we begin with this one?

We'd love to tell you that everything's gotten better in the seven decades since Eleanor Roosevelt gave this speech. But we've also learned our lesson from Pinocchio: never tell a lie.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights was supposed to guarantee certain fundamental rights for people from all cultures and backgrounds. In a perfect world, there wouldn't have been any more genocide, famine, and war.

But we don't live in a perfect world.

The day after Roosevelt delivered "On the Adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights," the General Assembly formally approved the document. It wasn't international law, but it was the first step toward creating and maintaining peace throughout the world.

Unfortunately, what followed was literally four decades of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union. While there wasn't any official fighting between the two countries, most of the conflicts throughout this time period had their roots in the fight between communism and Western democracy.

And, of course, what's a war without human rights violations?

Both the Korean War and the Vietnam War saw lots of violence against POWs and civilian populations, the kind everyone thought wouldn't happen in a post-Holocaust world.

And we can't forget the fight for civil rights within the United States. It was violent and messy, and while some significant strides were made, it didn't completely fix the problem of racial inequality in America.

Then, toward the end of the 20th century, many countries in Africa and the Middle East underwent regime changes that resulted in genocides and massive refugee crises we're still dealing with today. Northern Ireland dealt with violent altercations between Catholics and Protestants up until the Good Friday Agreement under President Clinton in 1998.

And we can't forget to invite the 21st century to the party, where we've seen an uptick in violence since the September 11th attacks, which resulted in two different wars to combat terrorism around the world. To make matters worse, terrorists don't play by the same rules, and their playbook is entirely made up of plans targeting innocent civilians and obliterating basic human rights.

Not to mention all the human rights violations that continue to occur around the world on a daily basis. Even in the United States, Blacks and Muslims face prejudice in all facets of their lives, simply because of skin color and their religious beliefs. Those groups of people, along with members of the LGBTQ community, deal with violence and discrimination just because they're different, and some folks feel those differences are enough of a reason to target them.

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is supposed to protect against all that stuff—but somehow, it still happens anyway.

As a result, everyone is walking around on eggshells, suspicious and afraid of things they don't know. It's like living in a haunted house full time, knowing something is going to jump out at you.

We're all going prematurely gray from the stress of it all.

It's hard to believe this is where we've ended up 70 years after "On the Adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights." Many of the things Roosevelt was trying to accomplish with the declaration have sort of been lost in translation, and we don't blame you for wondering when we're all going to learn to just get along.