The child of two active NAACP members, Danny Glover is no stranger to advocacy. As early as junior high school, he started a group to combat the prejudice against marginalized populations in his San Francisco neighborhood. Glover continues to hold social justice issues close to his heart.

He began his film career with Escape from Alcatraz in 1979. Subsequent roles in Places in the Heart (1984), Witness, (1985), The Color Purple (1984), Mandela (1987) and Lonesome Dove (1989) highlight his versatility, as he played both hero and villain, criminal and savior.

Although he plays a wide range of parts, he is careful not to sacrifice his values of nonviolence and social justice. When asked whether his most famous movie, Lethal Weapon 1,2,3 and 4, was a departure from his activism, he stated that the movie financiers agreed to fund half of the budget for his television or film ventures that are non-violent, such as Buffalo Soldiers (1997) and Beloved (1998).

Such dedication to human rights earned him many awards, including the Amnesty International USA Lifetime Achievement Award for his role in Namibia’s civil rights movement. In 1998, Glover was appointed the first Global Goodwill Ambassador to UN Development Programme (UNDP).

Now in his fourth year as a Goodwill Ambassador, Glover travels all over the world visiting projects and publicizing the fight against AIDS. His most recent trip was to Trinidad & Tobago in the Caribbean to visit the Cyril Ross Nursery for children with HIV/AIDS.

"Meeting the kids at Cyril Ross was painful and exhilarating at the same time," says Glover. "I was mournful of the fact that, in their short life, these children had to deal with HIV/AIDS and have it permeate their lives. At the same time, Cyril Ross symbolizes the type of physical and psychological care we should provide to kids with the disease."

The plight of children infected with HIV/AIDS has been at the core of Glover's advocacy efforts. The virus doubly affects children: it steals their lives and robs them of their parents. There are more than 13 million children worldwide orphaned by AIDS. These children will grow up without the emotional guidance of parents, not to mention education, health care and the financial support that build a stable society.

Glover speaks out about HIV/AIDS around the world, but the root of his activism begins close to home. His brother has AIDS. He has also lost friends to the disease, including his "little buddy" Nkosi Johnson, the 12-year-old South African AIDS activist who he met and befriended while at the AIDS conference in Durban, South Africa. Before he died, Nkosi asked Glover to fight against the stigma that is attached to those affected by HIV/AIDS, especially teenagers and children.

As part of his effort to fulfill his promise to Nkosi, Glover met with Shawn, a Trinidadian teenager living with HIV/AIDS who was reluctant to reveal his status to his classmates for fear of rejection.

With support from Glover and his Cyril Ross family, Shawn was finally able to confront his fears and let his friends know he carried the HIV virus.

"The issue was not just about Shawn opening up about his battle with HIV/AIDS," says Glover, "It was also about his classmates — many of which are immersed in fear, uncertainty, and disinformation — opening up and allowing Shawn's life to come in."

Knowing children like Nkosi and Shawn gives Danny Glover hope. "There is a lot we can do to help people with HIV/AIDS," he says. "We can support research to find new HIV drugs, we can encourage the development of a vaccine and we can create caring communities that face up to the disease and meet it head on."