The UN: United to do What Exactly?
When Donald Trump announced that the US would move it’s embassy to Jerusalem I thought an appropriate plaque for the front would be: “Here stands a memorial to the power of the United Nations”. It occurred to me though that there are already plenty of those. The graveyard of Syria comes to mind, or the people killed during the ongoing rioting in Iran.
The United Nations was dreamed up as a Utopian ideal created by political elites after World War Two dedicated to world peace. Like most Utopian ideals created by political elites, this was not the first try, and there were still working out some of the kinks. Clearly something was still off after the League of Nations ended with a World War. You can’t blame anyone for trying again though, kind of like a drunk who wakes up in the wreckage of ANOTHER world war bender and says “I’m never drinking again”.
And thus a second attempt at peace by committee was born. It’s mission statement, per it’s charter, is:
“To maintain international peace and security, and to that end: to take effective collective measures for the prevention and removal of threats to the peace, and for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of the peace, and to bring about by peaceful means, and in conformity with the principles of justice and international law, adjustment or settlement of international disputes or situations which might lead to a breach of the peace.”
Aside from the fact that this reads like a first draft of Vader’s pitch to Luke at the end of “Empire”, the language boils down to the UN being a group project: the project is to stop killing everyone all the time. This should have been a warning, we’ve all done group projects, nothing good ever comes from them. One person ends up doing all the work and you only hear from the rest of the group if they don’t like the grade. In this case, that person is the USA.
What was born out of the charter was the only thing that political elites love more than Utopian ideals: cumbersome bureaucracies. You could surmise then that someone thought that if ever there was a force that could be harnessed to tame the souls of men and temper the fires that inspire violence it’s paperwork. In reading the Charter you’ll come upon a chapter titled “Organs”. Perhaps the word was used to import a sense of biology and life to the organization but all that comes to me is high school biology and the authors may have forgotten that all living things share at least one feature: They all defecate. Indeed if producing shit is a sign of life, than the UN is very much alive. In trying to work out the anatomy of it all, we can at least discern that, based on the amount of useless waste that the Generally Assembly produces, it’s an asshole.
The supreme flaw of the UN is that it grants democratic powers to nations who do their citizens no such courtesy. Based on how democracy at the UN works why would they? Democracy at the UN is nothing more than an angry mob claiming that everyone deserves a fair show trial.
2017 was a banner year for “democracy” at the UN. Robert Mugabe was nearly appointed a “Goodwill Ambassador”, Qatar was elected to the Human Rights Council, and Saudi Arabia was appointed as head of the Women’s Rights Commission. Was Harvey Weinstein unavailable? With democracy like this who needs dictators?
The UN’s ability to grant dictators the vote means that it can effortlessly pass 18 resolutions against Israel before breaking for lunch, but has yet to pass even a non binding fart in the general direction of Syria for using Chlorine on his people when they were nowhere near a swimming pool. Iranians have been protesting their government for over a week, their government has responded by using them for target practice, the UN has yet to even send out a group text.
It’s almost like the Human Rights Council doesn’t take it’s job seriously.
It’s no surprise that in the last month or so such a group has only managed to come together to right the wrong of American acknowledging reality and moving it’s embassy. The measure brought before the emergency session of the General Assembly was sponsored by Yemen and Turkey. You just get the feeling that Yemen has more important things to worry about and it’s amazing that Turkey can even find the time between arresting journalists en mass and bombing the Kurds.
The list of nations that followed the US and Israel in speeches at the emergency session were a “who’s who” of who’s killing who?
Venezuela: I think I remember my FP 101 professor advising that no one take governing advice from a nation that recently recommended you eat your pets. Is Bob Barker the Minister of Agriculture? Venezuela was representing the “Non-Aligned Movement” which was odd considering the gaggle of non-democratic nations that make up the Non-Aligned Movement all seemed to be pointing in the same direction.
Syria: Really, Syria? The Syria that’s killed half a million people? The one flooding Europe with refugees? That Syria?
North Korea: What do you say about North Korean that hasn’t already been said in an Amnesty International report or the testimony of a defector? I feel inclined not to take advice on human rights from a country that requires that everyone have the same haircut…a bad one.
Cuba: All you really need to know about Cuba is that Cuban cigars are rationed in Cuba, and even the most ardent American socialist wasn’t threatening to move there if Donald Trump won the election.
The UN is the internet comments section brought to life: every conversation eventually devolves into anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and blaming the Jews. Was anyone in any doubt that the resolution would pass? Did anyone actually expect the UN to convene an emergency session on Iran?
Does it matter though?
The famous Israeli diplomat Abba Ebban once said “If Algeria introduced a resolution declaring that the earth was flat and that Israel had flattened it, it would pass by a vote of 164 to 13 with 26 abstentions.” today he would be proud. Last weeks vote passed by only 128 with 35 abstentions, it’s the kind of progress the UN can be proud of.
Nikki Haley is shaping up to be the UN’s worst nightmare: someone who’s not willing to foot the bill of her own show trial. Her speeches at the Security Council and General Assembly may go down in history as some of the best ever given in those chambers, even if the bar is set so low. She’s not done either, last week she said the US would cut funding to UNRWA if the Palestinians don’t come to the negotiating table.
For the moment though, it remains to be seen how the protests in Iran will turn out, however, being that the Iranians suffer the supreme misfortune of not being Palestinian, it’s unlikely that they should expect any help from the UN. They are literally, too busy praising Venezuela for…..I’m not sure what.
I’m not joking:
