The UN has Voted to Remove Gays from Execution Protection

Original resolution A/C.3/65/L.29/Rev.1

Item 6b

[The general assembly] Urges all state :

To ensure the effective protection of the right to life of all persons under their jurisdiction and to investigate promptly and thoroughly all killings, including those targeted at specific groups of persons, such as racially motivated violence leading to the death of the victim, killings of persons belonging to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, killings of persons affected by terrorism or hostage-taking or living under foreign occupation, killings of refugees, internally displaced persons, migrants, street children or members of indigenous communities, killings of persons for reasons related to their activities as human rights defenders, lawyers, journalists or demonstrators, killings committed in the name of passion or in the name of honour, all killings committed for any discriminatory reason, including sexual orientation, as well as all other cases where a person’s right to life has been violated, and to bring those responsible to justice before a competent, independent and impartial judiciary at the national or, where appropriate, international level, and to ensure that such killings, including those committed by security forces, police and law enforcement agents, paramilitary groups or private forces, are neither condoned nor sanctioned by State officials or personnel;

Amendment

In operative paragraph 6 (b), replace any discriminatory reason, including sexual orientation with discriminatory reasons on any basis

Press release

During action on the draft resolution on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, the Committee engaged in a debate over and ultimately approved by a vote of 79 in favour to 70 against with 17 abstentions an amendment removing “sexual orientation” as one of the discriminatory reasons that killings had been committed and warranted investigation.

The representative of Benin, on behalf of the African Group, the main sponsor of the amendment, said that sexual orientation had no legal foundation in any international human rights instruments and there was no legal justification to highlight it. St. Lucia stated that listing specific groups was dangerous because it could lead to the omission of some people and legal manipulation by following the letter of the law in an unintended way, while Morocco asserted that such selectivity should be avoided because it accommodated particular interests and groups over others. South Africa added that a formal process to define sexual orientation and its parameters under human rights law was needed to prevent future division on the issue.

On the other hand, the representative of Sweden stated that sexual orientation had often been the motive for extrajudicial killings, and the deletion of the reference would amount to the Committee looking the other way concerning arbitrary executions based on sexual orientation. Both Finland and France noted that the reference to sexual orientation had been included in the resolution since 1999, based on the Special Rapporteur’s concern for homosexuals that had been victims of such crimes – a concern that still persisted. Switzerland pointed out that homophobic violence was still a reality caused by law enforcement forces in many countries.

In the end, the draft resolution, by which the General Assembly would strongly condemn all extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions that continued throughout the world and demand that all States ensure the practice of such executions be brought to an end, had sufficient agreement to be approved by a vote of 165 in favour to 0 against, with 10 abstentions.

So the final wording doesn't exclude sexual orientation, it's only not singled out.

The final wording was sufficiently satisfying for 165 members out of 175.

It certainly doesn't allow killings on sexual orientation discrimination.

A resolution is not a law but, say, a declaration of goodwill.
Only Security Council resolutions permit that actions be taken to enforce them and actions are actually rarely taken.

A few countries probably had ideological motives to coin in 'sexual orientation' and a few countries had ideological motives to remove it.
An active lobby takes it, distorts it and spins it in the news.

We shall move on or we will become like our mighty senior politicians bickering endlessly over trivial issues while completely overlooking the emergencies and important topics.

The only conclusion that the UN should have drawn from this vote is that there are 79 countries whose leaders are not working towards peace, but rather toward a calloused agenda that supports only their own ideals and not those of the inhabitants of the country. All 79 of these countries are obviously not on the bandwagon for peace, yet they still receive all the other benefits of being a part of the UN.... why?

The UN should give these countries "the boot".

reply to post by arpgme


No, the UN is not an oligarchy.

However, most of their member countries are oligarchies, making the voting in the assembly not democratic.

If all the member countries were rule-by-educated-populace, then the UN would be a democratic institution.

The UN reflects and possibly amplifies the broken state of its member countries. It can be ruled by the oligarchies. In this case it is.

reply to post by Manouche


Right. Those countries want it out because many of them do not consider that to be discrimation. They consider it ALLAH'S LAW and a crime.

A crime isn't discrimination. Its just a crime. And in those countries being gay is a CRIME. A crime against God, a crime against nature, a crime against society. Individuals are not protected from society. Society is proected from individuals.

The word games MATTER, when the word games are about life and death.

I was very disturbed when I read the title of the thread and now even more so since reading the contents. One only has to look at Uganda to see that if we ignore the problem we do nothing but cause suffering to those who need it the most.

It is times like these that make we wish we allowed for profanity on the board but I will have to settle to cursing the UN in my head and under my breath.



Jerks.

reply to post by Manouche

A resolution is not a law but, say, a declaration of goodwill.
Only Security Council resolutions permit that actions be taken to enforce them and actions are actually rarely taken.

Thanks for sharing the information.

But this seems like an exercise in futility. They spend all this time voting on guidelines that they don't even enforce! Well then why do it at all? There must be some motives behind what UN officials are doing, it can't be all just theater? Can it?

reply to post by AnteBellum


No. It isn't theatre. The group with the plan wins.

Originally posted by Manouche

So the final wording doesn't exclude sexual orientation, it's only not singled out.

"Gay rights? Who said gays have rights? Point to where it exclaims that sexual orientation is not an arbitrary means of execution!"

You actually think nobody is going to try and pull this crap? Because they already did it when it WAS in writing... as you just told me . Hows your foot feeling after that gunshot?

Alright, we got a good list of countries to bomb. Seems like a solid, objective measure imo.

Too bad really, it seems progress has been made in the last couple years. But then again change in some of those countries is going to be close to impossible.

reply to post by Aeons


Had the amendment not be voted, nothing would have changed nowhere. It's only a declaration.
The final text was approved by 165 countries out of 175 not only by Muslim coutries like you are trying to make believe.

The UN has no right to define a crime for a sovereign country.
You probably wouldn't like the UN promulgating laws in your home country, am I right ?

You won't instill what you deem as progress by force. In the long run, only the spread of knowledge and education will achieve this aim.
A little bit of understanding might help, your people whichever it is was not always so 'enlightened'.

Originally posted by Manouche
reply to post by Aeons

 

Had the amendment not be voted, nothing would have changed nowhere. It's only a declaration.
The final text was approved by 165 countries out of 175 not only by Muslim coutries like you are trying to make believe.

The UN has no right to define a crime for a sovereign country.
You probably wouldn't like the UN promulgating laws in your home country, am I right ?

You won't instill what you deem as progress by force. In the long run, only the spread of knowledge and education will achieve this aim.
A little bit of understanding might help, your people whichever it is was not always so 'enlightened'.

Perhaps your "enlightenedness" could explain why we pay for people to sit around and change things like this if the only defense you can come up with for the amendment is that "it doesn't change anything"? So why was it changed? For absolutely no reason? Sorry, not buying that tripe.

reply to post by AnteBellum


It's very much theater but the UN is the only place where almost all countries send representatives who meet other countries representatives. There is a need for a place like this one. It is not perfect, it's even really malfunctioning but it's a chance to have countries discussing and cooperating.

Idiotic comparison, think of it like ATS, most content is below stupidity but once in a while, brillance strike in a thread. It happens because there is a large community encouraged to exchange even if in most threads, nothing will come out of it.

That said, I believe the UN is broken, still there is a need for an organisation where countries can meet.

reply to post by TheOrangeBrood


I am not going to explain anything, you can easily find information on the UN and its functioning if you are genuinely interested in finding answers to your questions.

I didn't say it was changed for absolutely no reason, I actually said there were ideological motives.
I said the General Assembly members are not bound by the text but they all love bickering, everybody likes to bicker, look around

the true failure is that prior to this ammendment , the UN claimed that gays were " protected " - but didnt actually do anything to protect them - sure they said it was wrong - cringed and wrung thier hands when it happened

but took no action - no sanction - nothing

the only thing thats changed is now the UN will no longer be obliged to feign outrage when gays are executed

Why is anybody surprised by this?

The UN is a democracy. In a democracy, the majority can outlaw the minority, its the nature of the beast.


Aren't we all glad that Wilson fought WWI to make the whole world safe for democracy?

reply to post by AnteBellum


Well you want Democracy, there you have it, don't complain about it.

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters

I don't get what your problem with this is, they are just making them equal to the rest of us, their sexual orientation shouldn't exclude them from being executed if required, while me not being gay doesn't exclude me.

That what I take from this, they are just saying your sexual orientation doesn't make you special, you are still a human being like the rest of us.

that said, I don't agree with execution, but I do agree with equality.

I like how the above post has more stars than this one:

Originally posted by phishyblankwaters
Actually ignore what I said, I had to re-read the entire article to actually "get it" yup, it is literally saying:

Being Gay is no longer considered an illegal reason to be executed. I took it competely backwards.

It's a little insight into the validity of looking at stared comments at a glance. Also a little insight into ATS members who star comments. I'm not bashing you for being confused at first, because reading it quickly I can see how you could have gotten that initial mistaken impression, but the number of people who stared that post, coupled with the lack of stars on the correction post makes me mourn the death of informed discussion.

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What is even more depressing is the number of countries that voted for this.

Originally posted by SG-17
Well this is monumentally stupid. At least though we now have a list of all nations that are loose with human rights.

Most of the nations that voted for it are also Muslim states which have been using the UN to push there beliefs and views on other nations for a while. I gave up on the UN when they allowed the human rights commission to be chaired by countries with horrific human rights abuses.

Yes well...

Technically it was not about gays, it was about "sexual orientation" and that works both ways... so, gays and heterosexuals are both off the "execution protection" based on "sexual orientation". So maybe theres a little country of gay ppl who as of now can accuse someone of being "heterosexual" and execute them based on that someone's sexual orientation..

If I care? No I don't... I just came here to state the fact that this isnt about homosexuality but about "sexual orientation".

Oh and you ppl who like to get intimate with sheep or chickens, you can now be executed for it also.

This just proves that gays really like to be different and think they deserve a "special place" in society... well thats too bad... someone call rainbow-man to the rescue of gay "rights" (or whatever gays think they're entitled to just because of their "sexual orientation")

Originally posted by FraternitasSaturni
well thats too bad... someone call rainbow-man to the rescue of gay "rights" (or whatever gays think they're entitled to just because of their "sexual orientation")

How about life?

You, sir, need to stop being such a shallow little.... let's say "biggot" for politeness' sake.

Cute, but simply shallow.

Where have you ever heard of discrimination against people solely because they are heterosexual? Never. I guess you're arguing with nonexistent data... maybe you should stick to the PS3 when you want to gurgitate childish tripe like this.

I would much prefer people kill us heterosexuals for the fun of it. We seem to have nothing better to do but make up reasons to kill eachother over completely illogical nonsense in the name of "morals". MORALS. I kill people, but at least I stick my penis in a vagina when I'm horny... or I would have serious ethical problems