Apparently, Freedom of Speech is a hate crime, nowadays...

[Stark]

People have raised the structural issues with the resolution, but it's hilarious to laugh at all the OMG BAD UN stuff.

[Ryan Thunder]

I love how this thread seems to have completely ignored the fact that a UN resolution not supported by all five permanent security council members is non-binding and can be ignored.

I think it was mentioned at least once. Maybe twice, actually.

[Stark]

Is it cruel to point out you just repeated what I said a full seven minutes later?

[Ryan Thunder]

Is it cruel to point out you just repeated what I said a full seven minutes later?

I must've hit "most recent unread post". My bad.

[Darth Wong]

You forgot Article 29, part 3

(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

If the UN doesn't like what you are doing with your rights, then you don't get to have them anymore. Basically, the entire Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a joke.

What exactly do you think it would take for the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights not to be a joke? Black helicopters come down and kick your ass if you don't observe it?

[YT300000]

A worthless rag that I bet you never read. Neither do I, hence being unaware of it's political affiliations. Either way, teachers being unwilling to teach the Holocaust is a story corroborated by The Times, which supported Labour in the last two elections, so bias is effectively a non-issue.

Are you honestly so goddamned dense that you couldn't tell it was a right-wing muck-raking rag by just looking at it? And why the fuck are you reporting it at news when it's such an old article? Did you get linked to it by a blog or some other shit-disturber? Right-wing muck-rakers are always ranting about political correctness in schools; it's one of their favourite hobby-horses. Is this show of ignorance a deliberate affectation in order to cover up being hoodwinked by right-wing bullshit, or are you actually so slow that you can't see these things until somebody spells them out for you?

It was just an adjunct to my post of the Associated Press article, the one reminded me of the other. And yes, I definitely should have looked for more sources before I used it as a reference, I've already conceded that.

For the record, I had the school prayer too, back in elementary during the early-mid 90's. It was the end point of a daily ritual beginning with the singing of O Canada and followed by an American-style salute to the flag. This definitely isn't a new problem, but I'm utterly taken aback by its scope, as revealed by this resolution.

Nice backpedal from your "What the hell is the world coming to" bullshit. And don't tell me you're actually "taken aback" to learn that Muslim countries think religion should be protected from criticism. What are you, fucking retarded? Have you been living in a cave for your entire life? They tried to kill Salman Rushdie, moron. How the fuck does this declaration of "people should not be allowed to attack religion" shock you?

The point though, is that it's not just Muslim countries; enough western ones voted in favour to pass it. And quite the number abstained as well, for fear of causing offense. I suppose many have debatable motives in providing a show of support for the Muslim nations in this, but it still bothers me.

[Samuel]

You forgot Article 29, part 3

(3) These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

If the UN doesn't like what you are doing with your rights, then you don't get to have them anymore. Basically, the entire Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a joke.

What exactly do you think it would take for the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights not to be a joke? Black helicopters come down and kick your ass if you don't observe it?

Embargos work. What was the origional League of Nations plan before its members decided to sell it out to the fascists?

[Sea Skimmer]

Embargos work. What was the origional League of Nations plan before its members decided to sell it out to the fascists?

When? Really now, virtually every embargo in the last 100 years has failed to accomplish anything except to make everyday life for the citizens of the targeted nation harder. Its also a good way to kill babies That usually increases support for regimes, very rarely does it weaken them. In fact Serbia and Iraq and Cuba are all perfect examples of embargoes strengthening regimes, and certainly failing to do a thing to undermine them. Indeed the UN weapons embargo on Bosina was a huge factor in making the civil war last longer. Embargos are worthless unless they are a prelude to much stronger action, which almost never happens. If the will exists for stronger action then the embargo will be a mere formality anyway because a military blockade would be imposed. We've had an arms embargo on Sudan for several years now, when was the last time you heard about Sudan running out of ammo?

League of Nations did try embargoes before it just plain fell apart BTW; they sure didn’t do a damn thing to keep Italy from mustard gassing Ethiopia and Japan simply walked out of the legal framework over Manchuria.

[Hillary]

Are you aware that the BBC article doesn't support your point? It clearly states that the concerns of the Historical Association, the body that issued the report, are that

Right, let's re-read the relevant bit of my post before I respond to this. "Here's the same thing from The Times, and according to the Beeb, Alan Johnson has already handled the issue, which is a good thing."

Notice how all I said about the BBC was that they mentioned the issue had already been dealt with. But I'll concede the semantic argument, since I did call the curriculum remark up from memory (I'd read about it in several places some time ago, but forgotten the details), and only checked it against the first source that came up.

The fact that you linked the BBC article for a different reason does not take away the fact that it blows your "the Holocaust being dropped from history courses in the U.K. for fear of offending Muslims" argument out of the water.

Secondly, the article DOESN'T back up the point you were trying to make. Alan Johnson DID NOT deal with the issue as he didn't have to.

a) The curiculum already included the Holocaust as compulsory and there were no plans to change this.

b) It was one school breaking the rules - so it isn't really a big issue in the first place.

The basic fact is that you used your Daily Mail link to show that Britain was changing the way it taught history to its children in order to avoid offending Muslims.

That I have shown this to be utter bollocks (and old news to boot) is hardly fucking semantics.

[Samuel]

Embargos work. What was the origional League of Nations plan before its members decided to sell it out to the fascists?

When? Really now, virtually every embargo in the last 100 years has failed to accomplish anything except to make everyday life for the citizens of the targeted nation harder. Its also a good way to kill babies That usually increases support for regimes, very rarely does it weaken them. In fact Serbia and Iraq and Cuba are all perfect examples of embargoes strengthening regimes, and certainly failing to do a thing to undermine them. Indeed the UN weapons embargo on Bosina was a huge factor in making the civil war last longer. Embargos are worthless unless they are a prelude to much stronger action, which almost never happens. If the will exists for stronger action then the embargo will be a mere formality anyway because a military blockade would be imposed. We've had an arms embargo on Sudan for several years now, when was the last time you heard about Sudan running out of ammo?

League of Nations did try embargoes before it just plain fell apart BTW; they sure didn’t do a damn thing to keep Italy from mustard gassing Ethiopia and Japan simply walked out of the legal framework over Manchuria.

In the case of Italy keeping the canal open and not embargoing things like oil might have had something to do with its ineffectiveness. The US didn't embargo Japan until 1941 and so all it got for invading Manchuria was condemnation.

They aren't good for a regime change, but they are useful in neutralizing a countries ability to be a threat to the rest of the world.

[Darth Wong]

They aren't good for a regime change, but they are useful in neutralizing a countries ability to be a threat to the rest of the world.

And of what relevance is that to a discussion of human rights, which is an internal matter to each country? When discussing human rights, the situation is very similar to that of internal unrest. You claimed that "embargoes work" on domestic issues such as human rights abuses (that's the subject of this thread, remember?), and they don't.

[Stark]

More importantly than proving Samuel wrong is the point made by Skimmer that embargoes often make things WORSE from a conflict or human rights perspective. The privation always hits the regular people most harshly, while the military and government ticks along and reminds everyone how it was the US/UN/white people who did this to them - so it's economically fucking them and providing an obvious target for hatred, but somehow it 'works'.