Yesterday, a Declaration of the trafficking of enslaved Africans and Racialized Chattel Enslavement of Africans as the Gravest Crime against Humanity was voted at UNO. As usual, Israel and the USA voted against. How did your country vote? Any thoughts about it?
So the US voted against so it didn’t pass, yet again, I presume?
Fuck veto voting
This isn’t the Security Council. Nobody gets a veto.
There’s a pattern lead by the US, but they are all different, in my opinion. Where are you from? How did your country vote? How do you feel about it?
“against :3” they’re using that emote in UN votes now?
India said yes. We were kind of enslaved by the Britishers.
I guess there is some good in Serbistan.
Need to make sure it stays that way.
I got 3 things to say on this:
If the vote was to recognize it as the worst thing humanity has done, I’d vote against. I feel like there are a couple other things that were even worse. Even only considering enslavement, out of all of history, I would have reservations against saying this was the absolute worst of it.
Every country that abstained was just against it, and didn’t have the balls to vote it.
Yeah, the US is an asshole. They’re screwing it all up across the globe and they’re also why Cuba is still fucked. Eat the rich.
Considering that the death toll caused by the triangle trade is estimated to be between 6 million and 60 million Africans with a general consensus of ~17 million, I think you may need to re-evaluate just how brutal it was.
Many people will point out correctly that Africa already had a slave trade structure before America and Europe got involved; but the fact is the Western slavery was far worse than the slavery in Africa. For example, the fact that slaves’ children were born into slavery was uniquely American slavery. Basically, African nations did not dehumanize their slaves, and it’s incredible what brutal things humans can do to each other the moment one side doesn’t view the other side as thinking human beings, but rather cattle to be done with as they please.
As bad as African slavery was, I kinda agree with you that it might not actually be the worst thing humans have done to each other.
Specifically, how many native populations were genocided by colonizers the world over?
South Korea voting in favor of the resolution is surprising. They are team America and they were enslaved, but are not included in the resolution because they were not shipped to the Americas. Seeing one’s own enslavement as not as grave as the African one is a statement.
The ROK has a more complicated geopolitical position. They are actively colonized by the US Empire, and have a government that carried over many of the former colonial elements under Japan. They voted the same way the DPRK did.
“Actively colonized”, “US Empire”, boy you use a lot of propaganda-charged phrases.
What do you mean by “propaganda-charged?” We all speak in manners that conform to our present views. The USFK occupies the ROK and meddles in their internal and external affairs in a manner that supercedes domestic law and rights, and the US Empire is actively terrorizing the world and plundering the global south of the value created by them.
For what it’s worth, the current ROK president is the equivalent of a socdem who seems to be trying to improve relations with China and the DPRK
Yep, though contradictions in the ROK are extremely sharp. The oil crisis is only going to make them sharper. I see a lot of revolutionary potential in the ROK, but they do have extensive fascist elements as well.
Another victory for Democracy!
USA veto, sorry, hands are tied we don’t make the rules
That’s not a vote that can vetoed.
For! And would you look at that… Practically all of europe abstaining, color me shocked (¬_¬)
Also… Argentina? YUCK! Sadly not a surprise either.
If you know who Milei is the Argentina vote makes sense.
the UK:
Abstention might as well be an against vote
USA I made a little poem
Our president is child Making our reputation be defiled Seen as a big whiny bully While hiding his crimes obscurely
Trump is just confirming the reputation US already had
Part of the EU explanation:
We were prepared to support a text that emphasises the scale of the atrocity of the transatlantic slave trade, the importance of remembrance, and the need to continue combating slavery in its contemporary forms. Instead, the text before us raises a number of legal and factual concerns that we cannot overlook.
3 arguments
First, the use of superlatives in the context of crimes against humanity is not legally accurate, such as the use of “gravest” in the title and throughout the text, which implies a hierarchy among atrocity crimes, when no legal hierarchy between crimes against humanity exists. It risks undermining the harm suffered by all victims of these crimes and lacks legal clarity crucial for ensuring accountability. We firmly reject introducing ambiguity in this respect.
Second, the selective inclusion of lengthy, historical, and contentious references to regional jurisprudence and selective and unbalanced interpretation of historical events - such as in Preambular Paragraphs 21 and 23 - is at odds with accepted UN practice, as well as the stated universal and forward looking objective of this initiative. It risks creating divisions when unity is both necessary and achievable. The role of the General Assembly is not to substitute itself to the academic debate amongst historians.
Third, we are also concerned by certain legal references and assertions that are either inaccurate or inconsistent with international law. This includes suggestions of a retroactive application of international rules which was non-existent at the time and claims for reparations, which is incompatible with established principles of international law. The principle of non-retroactivity, a fundamental cornerstone of the international legal order, must be strictly upheld. References to claims for reparations also lack a sound legal basis. Any framework for reparatory justice must be grounded in existing multilateral instruments.
Ok, so the first two sound reasonable, but blabbering about “non-retroactivity” and being against reparations is fucking pathetic. Imagine taking that legal position during Nuremberg.
They were against that position during Nuremberg. Reparations from WW1 are what led to WW2.
Wrong
There’s normally a reason when that assortment of countries chooses to abstain (the no voters are normally just evil). In this case it’s likely the use of the word “gravest”. I’d say the holocaust was worse, at least in the slave trade the people were just a means to an end. The holocaust involved torture by design and aimed to erase an entire religion.
Others may disagree, but there’s at least room for doubt on the declaration that it’s the “gravest”.
EU’s stated reason for abstaining is
1, use of superlatives
2, bias in presentation, against UN charter
3, they’re against reparations
I dunno man, it really just smells like they don’t want to pay up for their crimes against humanity. When your first two points are nit picking and your last one is “and we were told we wouldn’t have to answer for shitty things before we made rules about it”, it’s kinda giving away why you’re against it.
Ireland abstained too, and they didn’t really have a recent slave trade.
I dunno man, it really just smells like they don’t want to pay up for their crimes against humanity
Why does it counts only from 17th century onwards? Why only for 1 specific situation?
because the wealth generated by those crimes is still extremely influential today.
and that “1 specific situation” was the industrialised destruction of culture, people, families and minds for centuries.
So, it’s about influence on the current day? Silly me, to think the holocaust has more impact on the current world order than the slavery that finished in the 19th century.
and that “1 specific situation” was the industrialised destruction of culture, people, families and minds for centuries.
So it’s about duration? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trans-Saharan_slave_trade This lasted long, wouldn’t this had more impact in the destruction of culture, people and minds?
It’s nothing to do with the wording, really. This is about countries refusing to acknowledge the historic dimension of their racial supremacy doctrine, and denying reparations. It really doesn’t matter if it’s the gravest or not, which is, just by the span of four centuries of practice.
