jakurus said:All you hear from the news and political commentators these days is that the UN is weak, corrupt, and useless. International law is laughed at.
And from these beliefs, many of those people go on to say that the UN and International law should not exist. They get angry and lament how dirty, inefficient, or silly the practices seem.
I want to remind everyone that just because an institution fails to prevent a problem, that does not make it useless. Yes, the UN did not act in time to stop the genocide in Rwanda, but if the UN did not exist, it would been even worse.
Both the UN and Intl' law have positives that provide benefits far greater than an intl' system without them could provide. They have very few negatives, far outweighed by the good that having an orderly body to at least talk to other countries provides.
It really bothers me when I hear politicians and commentators say we should leave the UN and let it dissemble. They are making a simple flaw in logic.
MiamiFlorida said:The UN would be a good thing if it excluded totalitarian states. Do you know which countries comprise the UN Human Rights Commission?
ludahai said:I agree 100 percent. More than half of the members of the United Nations are NOT democratic states. No wonder the UN won't openly criticize some of the world's worst human rights abusers. They are on the committees that monitor such abuses. Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse!
MiamiFlorida said:The same goes for the International Tribunal. The Europeans criticize us for refusing to join....but I just can't see an American citizen being tried by a judge who receives his orders from the totalitarian state he represents.
MiamiFlorida said:The UN would be a good thing if it excluded totalitarian states. Do you know which countries comprise the UN Human Rights Commission?
How so?jakurus said:... but if the UN did not exist, it would been even worse.
Very few negatives? and far outweighed by the positives? I seriously doubt it.jakurus said:Both the UN and Intl' law have positives that provide benefits far greater than an intl' system without them could provide. They have very few negatives, far outweighed by the good that having an orderly body to at least talk to other countries provides.
I don't think it is at all.jakurus said:It really bothers me when I hear politicians and commentators say we should leave the UN and let it dissemble. They are making a simple flaw in logic.
So basically, he made a point, and your response is "no".Coolguy said:How so?
Very few negatives? and far outweighed by the positives? I seriously doubt it.
I don't think it is at all.
There is more to just disassembling it. Such as rebuilding it or creating a new organization that can do the job that the UN "seems" to fail at.
Kelzie said:I don't think this is such a good idea. One of the most important functions of the UN IMO, is that it provides a place for countries to meet and try to settle disagreement without force. If you exclude totalitarian states, who would presumably be the ones that people have the most problems with, than we would have no forum to talk with them. Not only that, but because they are members, we can put more pressure on them to change some of their policies. They would have no reason to listen to us if they weren't.
Right, and removing a forum for international discussion would remove a lot of potential things that could be done without violence.MiamiFlorida said:I disagree. I think the way to put more pressure on totalitarian states is to EXCLUDE them from the International Community. The UN has failed miserably (just as her predecessor, the League of Nations) at settling disagreements. A tyrant concedes nothing in a forum.
Those who de evil in the world are not as dangerous as those who look on and do nothing.
Kelzie said:You don't get the International Tribune at all. The judges are picked for their ability to uphold international law, much like our judges are picked to uphold our law. A persons own political feeling should not get in the way of their decisions as a judge. If an American breaks international law, what's wrong with trying him/her in an international court?
galenrox said:Right, and removing a forum for international discussion would remove a lot of potential things that could be done without violence.
diplomacy, discussion, you know, the purpose of the UNMiamiFlorida said:Such as...?
galenrox said:diplomacy, discussion, you know, the purpose of the UN
MiamiFlorida said:The International court can be used as a forum for politically motivated prosecutions. We have no shortage of enemies in the world. We should not place our citizens under the jurisdiction of that court. A court must be able to operate without being prejudiced by political motivations, and frankly, I don't know of an international organization, to date, that can make that claim.
I'll "get" the International Tribunal when all the judges who participate in it hail from Democratic states and receive the same scrutiny as say.....Supreme Court justices.
jakurus said:That is absolute nonsense.
The UN's purpose is not to provide a righteous governing body to solve the world's problems, it's a forum to include everyone in the discussion. That's why it doesn't have much real authority.
To say that we should not include dictatorships in any international forum is ridiculous.
Non-dictatorships are free to form any organization they want, in fact, I think that would be a great idea, but to say that because the UN doesn't do something it's not designed to do makes it poor functioning makes no sense.
Kelzie said:And what if our citizens are guilty of a politically motivated crime? Why are we so much superior that our citizens should not be tried by the same court?
And you obviously know nothing about how difficult it is to become a judge in the International Tribune. Just becoming a lawyer for it is incredibly difficult.
Kelzie said:You don't get the International Tribune at all. The judges are picked for their ability to uphold international law, much like our judges are picked to uphold our law. A persons own political feeling should not get in the way of their decisions as a judge. If an American breaks international law, what's wrong with trying him/her in an international court?
ludahai said:Talk about naive. THe President of the ICJ is from China. You don't think that if there were a case to come up regarding China that he would vote in favor of China rather than looking at the merits of the case? Of course these ICJ appointments are political, as will be ICC appointments.
Kelzie said:If you know of any cases where he unnecessarily favored China, please provide them. Otherwise you're just guessing.
ludahai said:There have been none involving China in his tenure. However, if you knew anything about so-called Chinese "academics", you know there are only two kinds of Chinese adacemics. 1) Favor everything supported by the ChiCom regime. 2) Academics either in prison or exiled overseas.
Coolguy said:Originally said by galenrox
So basically, he made a point, and your response is "no".
No?
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