Enforcing Worldwide human rights (split from 'No Words' thread)

[Big Don]

How about making human rights issues a paramount deciding factor when it comes to aid and trade?

We lack the will to do that. We fed the Soviet Union DURING the Cold War! Our need to be seen as the "Good Guys" interferes with our ability to ignore the suffering of others.
As to the "Hearts and Minds" meme, When you've got them by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow. Clear?

 

[MA-Caver]

"If you dont feed your people we will stop sending you aid?"


That will teach em.

A bit of a joke there but that is an issue with that strategy isnt it? Who gets punished worse?

I find it ironic that peace-mongers are actually funding the warlords by sending food that the (intended) poor never get. Pretty ironic wouldn't you think?

 

[MA-Caver]

I think eventually a people oppressed long enough will rise up against their oppressors and bring them down. It would happen sooner if left alone and without humanitarian aid. Or if the aid were guns/weapons instead of food which is usually stolen... excuse me "claimed" by one or more of the warlords. It'll be a vicious cycle and I think the warlords will eventually start warring amongst themselves (if they're not already) until one of them is last one standing and becomes the new dictator... then it starts again.

 

[Big Don]

I think eventually a people oppressed long enough will rise up against their oppressors and bring them down. It would happen sooner if left alone and without humanitarian aid.

The example of Islam, a (roughly) 1400 year old religion belies that notion.

 

[Makalakumu]

The example of Islam, a (roughly) 1400 year old religion belies that notion.

The history of Islam is full of examples where the practice of Islam has changed. These kinds of practices will not last. They never have. This is why most Muslims do not do these things.

 

[MA-Caver]

The example of Islam, a (roughly) 1400 year old religion belies that notion.

I don't think religion will factor into this... as the ones oppressing them are not religious leaders and they know it. They may go under a flag of jihad or some other holy mission or another but they (the Somalian warlords) are not of any consequence by their faith.
So, I don't honestly believe the people will for long accept the theft, bullying, killing and whatever horrors they're living through under these warlords. Might be another 10 or 20 years or even longer but eventually... they'll rise up. It'll be bloody, messy and yeah lots and lots of people will die... but thousands are dying already anyway.

 

[MA-Caver]

This atrocity isn't just a different justice system at work and it isn't a religion that must be honored.... rather it is a tortured perversion of both.

I must admit, though, how easy it was for the story to bring out savage feelings in this reader. Maybe its because I am the parent of a 13 year old girl, but my honest first emotions upon reading it were that anyone doing this to her would last taste a severed part of themselves and would last experience fire.

Could be we have the same savagery just beneath the surface.... or could be that fire is what it will take to burn this scourge in Somalia off the planet.

If not Somalia then Saudi Arabia, isolated parts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, and just about any Muslim state/country. They've been doing it that way for thousands of years. Are we so suddenly right and they're so wrong.
It IS horrifying to read/hear about things like this... but they thought differently. Just as we think nothing of girls going around in bikini's in their own front yards mowing the lawn they think it's scandalous. Perception.

But it is sad, very sad that they didn't take the girl's word for it that she was raped and jumped to the worse conclusion. I'd felt better if they at least had given her an investigation and an R-kit to confirm her story before taking her out and stoning her to death... not that I think stoning to death is right and not the death of a child. It's primitive but it is what is prescribed in their Koran.
True they do however, need to move out of the dark ages of the past and into the present.

So what are we going to do about it? Go to war with them? Police their religious beliefs? Call them terrorists? Invade their country and tell them how to live to OUR beliefs?

Somalia is among the world's most violent and impoverished countries. The nation of some 8 million people has not had a functioning government since warlords overthrew a dictator in 1991 then turned on each other.

A quarter of Somali children die before age 5; nearly every public institution has collapsed. Fighting is a daily occurrence, with violent deaths reported nearly every day.

Last time we tried policing this country U.S. service men were humiliated.
Eventually the people will get tired of their warlords and rise up themselves. If they want our help... they'll know who to ask.

 

[shesulsa]

Admin Note:

This discussion has been moved from the "There are no words" thread.

G Ketchmark / shesulsa
MT Assist. Administrator