[Drew]

Originally Posted by elstatec

i think this is the dumb ideology which see's america disliked so much around the world.


beer: to what ninty said

It's the same thing as a convicted murderer on death row being permitted to vote for a President.

When citizens commit atrocities, they are revoked some of their rights. Freedom. Free speech. The right to vote.

This is how it should be. When you commit horrible, horrible crimes, you should be denied a voice in whatever governing body is over you, in the case of a nation, the UN.

However, this is not the case. Syria, who slaughtered the people of Lebanon and export terror around the world, actually sat on the security council. One of the most violent and oppressive governments in recent history was given the right to obtain sensitive knowledge and to influence UN security policy. Meanwhile slaughtering its own people and the people of neighboring nations.

The problem with the world today is that no one wants to punish anyone. They don't want to punish anyone because they fear that someone innocent might be caught up in that punishment. But, as we all learned back in grade school, the world is never that fair. Sometimes innocent people must be punished in order to bring about a greater good. This is the basis of utilitarian theories of ethics. The UN refuses to enforce its sanctions and restrictions. It hesitates to send peacekeeping forces to prevent a slaughter, costing thousands of lives. It delays in sending aid to disaster-stricken countries.

The UN is sick. It is sick and it is dying, its weakness becoming more and more evident with each passing day. Each day it refuses to validate itself, it dies that much more.

And I'm not saying the US should be exempt from anything. So long as we choose to be a member of the UN, we should be vulnerable to the same punishments as others should we choose to defy the UN.

But I maintain that giving voice to governments which are brutal, oppressive and responsible for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of their own people is even greater a crime, because the UN is simply telling that government that they can continue to do as they are with absolute impunity.

Anyway, maybe one of you folks will get elected and we can have serial killers and child rapists voting in the next election. They do, indeed, deserve to have a voice in such matters. They'll probably vote for a Liberal who will take them off death row in preference of living in a nicely decorated mental institution.