Human rights groups close ranks after Pope urges UN resist Culture of Death.

international | rights, freedoms and repression | opinion/analysis Wednesday June 04, 2014 07:25 by Anthony Ravlich - Human Rights Council (New Zealand)

Leadership of human rights groups lack authenticity.

Human rights group members ignore posts in which Pope urges UN to resist a 'Culture of Death' and where UN Watch reports the rise of repressive States to prominent UN positions.

Human rights groups close ranks after Pope urges UN resist Culture of Death.

Anthony Ravlich
Human Rights Council (New Zealand)
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Auckland City.
Ph: (0064) (09) 940.9658

Faced with some ‘unsafe’ human rights truths human rights organizations on linkedin sites seemed to close ranks.

There was no response to a post on 30 May 2014 on about 42 human rights linkedin sites (only about 12 permitted its discussion) in which Pope Francis urged the United Nations (UN) to resist a Culture of Death.

Similarly, another post (by another member, see below) on 27 April, 2014, which includes a report by UN Watch on the rise of a number of repressive regimes to prominent UN positions, only elicited one brief response apart from my own.

It seems these posts, despite being of considerable human rights importance, may have been seen as ‘unsafe’ as many who are religious would be very likely concerned at the rise in global ideological power of communist countries such as China in addition to their growing economic strength.

Pope Francis’ comments can found in an article, ‘Pope urges UN leadership to resist 'culture of death', (Vatican City, May 9, 2014, CAN/EWTN News, http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/pope-urges-un-le...eath/ )”.

In the following I describe what I see as the most likely reasons for the Pope’s ‘Culture of Death’ comment. My post is as follows:

“UN urged to resist Culture of Death. Saw no mention on linkedin sites of comments by Pope Francis who urged UN leadership to resist Culture of Death, Economics of Exclusion, and Throw Away Society”.

“In my view, Pope Francis was most likely referring to the UN's creation of Neoliberal Absolutism i.e. the whole UDHR having to conform to the IMF's elitist policies, on the 10 December 2008.
It involves a 'near absolute' control of all behavior under the UDHR (see my article, 'Profound Arrogance at UN).
Also, I consider the consequences of Neoliberal Absolutism, which, in my experience, the leadership of global human rights establishment has gone to fantastic lengths to conceal from the mainstream, was the Global Financial Crisis 2008/9 and a rebalancing of global power away from the West to other regions which has seen the rise of repressive States.
In addition, I think Pope Francis may well have been referring to the involvement of the UN i.e. UNDP, in increasing police/security so far in 100 countries which I see is to ensure compliance with 'near absolute' control required for a One World Government which involves world domination by a secular, left-Western class i.e. liberal collectivists. Our council promotes a universal approach i.e. ethical human rights, development and globalization to replace Neoliberal Absolutism (see end of article, 'Comments on Helen Clark's refusal to discuss global ethical human rights', on internet)”.

A more full description of Pope Francis’ comments can be found in the above link but the following gives a brief description:

Briefly, the article states: “Pope Francis met with the secretary general and other leaders of the United Nations today, urging them to challenge both a “culture of death” and the “economy of exclusion.”
“In a meeting on May 9 with U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and other executives at the U.N., Pope Francis said that the institution should work towards goals which include providing “appropriate protection for the family, which is an essential element in sustainable human and social development.”
“Specifically, this involves challenging all forms of injustice and resisting the ‘economy of exclusion,’ the ‘throw-away culture’ and the ‘culture of death’ which nowadays sadly risk becoming passively accepted,” he continued.
Ban Ki-Moon is in Rome for a yearly meeting of all the heads of the U.N. agencies. Although the Secretary General met the pontiff last year, today’s meeting was unique in its inclusion of about 50 senior UN officials”.

The following post on 12 May 2014 refers to a recently released book, ‘The Optional Protocol (OP) to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights: A Commentary’, Edited by Malcolm Langford, Bruce Porter, Rebecca Brown and Julieta Rossi, Pretoria University Law Press (2014), http://www.jus.uio.no/smr/english/about/programmes/serp....html ).

The book describes the adoption of the OP on 10 December 2008 as ‘widely seen as an historic recognition by the UN of the equal status of economic, social and cultural rights with civil and political rights’.
The authors state the latter ‘holds out the promise of developing international jurisprudence on economic, social and cultural rights that will have widespread influence in domestic and regional systems..’.

My post states: “[The above recently published book is] for your interest, remembering that both sets of rights are made compatible with IMF elitist policies meaning human rights when implemented are elitist, a neoliberal absolutism - a near absolute 'top-down' control”.

Although I have yet to read the book the content (see above link) reveals little of what I see as the major global effects of the OP’s adoption – to my knowledge not yet made public in the mainstream – which would not be surprising because both sets of rights were at the centre of an ideological war between East and West during the Cold War.

The West promoted civil and political rights e.g. ‘freedom and democracy’, while the communists of Eastern Europe championed economic, social and cultural rights e.g. social justice.

In addition, another reason why it is so exceedingly surprising the OP’s adoption attracted virtually no controversy was that America, with some support from others in the American camp, opposed the OP throughout the four years of discussions (America has often seen economic, social and cultural rights as socialist although they were included in Rooselvelt’s proposed Second Bill of Rights. America is also one of the few countries not yet to have ratified the covenant on economic, social and cultural rights).

I give some of the major global effects of the OP’s adoption in the first post in this article as reasons for Pope Francis’ ‘Culture of Death’ comment.

However, I could have added another major global effect of the adoption of the OP.
While economic, social and cultural rights will require greater social responsibility on the part of the Corporations (e.g. to address climate change) the OP failed to protect against exploitation as the covenant on economic, social and cultural rights is meant to do (this is more fully explained in my article, ‘A Great World can be achieved by Great States which ensure a global ethical human rights, Aotearoa Indymedia, 9 Jan 2014, http://www.indymedia.org.nz/articles/1848 ).

Consequently, in my view, whereas before uncertainty surrounding how the covenant was to be interpreted prevented Corporations from relocating to countries where they are better able to exploit labour but now that exploitation is permitted the door is now wide open to them to relocate.

The failure to protect against exploitation in international human rights law means, in my view, the creation of a ‘global slave economy’ – an added dimension to the ‘Culture of Death’.

The following post on 9 May 2014 on the Amnesty International (AI) site is by Jack Sigman, MA International Relations, American Military University. He asks:

Why is AI silent on these appointments?
Iran appointed to humanitarian councils.

He provides a link to an article by UN Watch on 15 April 2014 entitled: “Iran sweeps coveted UN rights posts. Also elected: Russia, China, genocidal Sudan, Cuba, Pakistan, Turkey, slave-holding Mauritania…..NGOs protest “Black Day for Human Rights” (UN Watch, http://www.unwatch.org/site/apps/nlnet/content2.aspx?c=...66335

My response (there was only one other brief comment despite AI having 1,694 members) was as follows:

anthony ravlich Essentially, I followed the discussion on the Optional Protocol to the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural rights from 2004 to 2008. America was very much against it - wanted I think to retain status quo i.e. neoliberalism. My book was the only public dissent to the OP at the time [to my knowledge] because I did not think the poor would benefit.
[Virtually] all the human rights organizations including Amnesty supported the OP which got barely any publicity despite its enormous consequences and it dealt with economic, social and cultural rights which were at the center of major ideological struggle at UN during Cold War between East and West.
The OP established the equal status of the two sets of rights - however it meant that the whole UDHR would have to be compatible the IMF globalization policies which are elitist (i.e. focus on elites and Corporations) consequently in their application human rights were elitist – [thereby] ignoring the lessons of history and amounted to an act of profound arrogance.
Adoption of the OP on 10 Dec 2008 resulted in a rebalance of global power from the West to other regions which would mean the rise of authoritarian regimes. It also resulted in the GFC 2008/9 which, in my view, affected the West far worse and has been on-going (see European Union).
I consider the UN and the human rights establishment and the mainstream media have been taken over by a left-tribal middle class elite only, in my view, interested in furthering their class interests and use human rights for that purpose i.e. one world government (world domination no less). In my view, human rights have been hijacked. That is why, in my view, Edward Snowden reported that the US NSA were spying on human rights organizations - of course the US government was likely interested in the leadership of such organizations wanting to see greater influence by authoritarian regimes.
There would be many worthy activists, more independent thinkers within these organizations aware that unless something is done we could well be facing what seems to be part of human history - a battle between good versus evil. But I think these worthy activists (and I would say much more intelligent and greater character) have been sidelined - I see it as necessary to have them take over these organizations (and the UN) for the good of the UDHR and humanity.
I have promoted an ethical approach to human rights, development and globalization which would return the UDHR to its universal roots and very importantly emphasize individual rights i.e. people are not numbers. In my view these left-classes in leadership positions fear what they cannot control and America (and Israel) have often fallen into this category.
So not surprisingly the adoption of the OP meant that neoliberalism morphed into a neoliberal absolutism - a 'near absolute' control over all behavior covered under the UDHR. But the ethical approach provides a choice - promoted for 5 yrs - so it is unlikely that many will now be able to claim they had no choice re promoting human rights in class interests rather than humanity as a whole - so the future is in your hands”.

Avoidance of such ‘unsafe’ human rights truths indicates a lack of authenticity. I have been promoting global ethical human rights on the linkedin sites for about three years now and while a number have been supportive only one academic, an Islamic assistant professor of law has been prepared to discuss it and she now appears to agree with global ethical human rights (see my article, ‘Profound Arrogance at UN’, Scoop NZ, 30 March 2014, http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1403/S00405/profound-a...n.htm ).

But if human rights organizations and its members are not prepared to discuss hard human rights truths how can they expect others to?