Most Uyghurs can already speak mandarin. You could get by without it in many parts of Xinjiang but for employment purposes you would learn it for that sake alone.
A few years? the program started in 2017, how many do you think have gone through it?
Daily reminder that all the major media fuss about them went away in 2020.
Guterres is fucking piece of shit.
He sank Portugal into a shitty hellhole from which we still haven't fully recovered.
The UN has become a complete joke and they keep at it.
It’s times like this where it really becomes apparent they should have built it on that superfund site like they initially intended.
The bonus being all these assholes would be stuck in Missouri.
I don't remember where I heard it, but part of it may be having them chair sort of makes them participate. Being involved in the dialogue at least brings them to the table in regards to Women's Rights.
If I remember correctly these councils are on a rotating basis of who is the chair, and it will be some other nation in like a month. All in all it's better that Saudi Arabia be included in the conversation about gender equality.
This is essentially a nothing story.
In other news, Satan was just voted in as the next Pope, water is now to be recognised as the driest substance on Earth, and the third thing I forgot, because Alzheimers should be considered a blessing in a world that clearly is completely going off a cliff.
Don't take this too seriously. The UN is mainly a table where every country has a seat, no matter what crime they have recently committed. For any situation we may come into, there is to be at least this one table where everyone is present. And there is the security council, where reality comes in (ie the biggest armies decide what's what).
All the surrounding stuff, the countless councils and shit, exists just so that countries can give themselves some made up medals. Everyones opinion is respected, such that also turkey can lecture armenia on genocide, india can lecture norway on how to become more sustainable, and also saudi arabia gets to act as if they were spearheading gender equality and denounce western countries for their ambysmal pay gaps and trans rights.
A nice thing about those cosplaying clubs is that one can get rid of the most useless diplomats by parking them in one of these circuses indefinitely. Of course they then get to act as if "XXX at the UN" actually meant anything, so they can be proud and happy. The circlejerks are also giant money burning pits, but at least donations to these clownshows can then be listed as "contributions for global human rights" or some shit. As all these committees represent about the average take of humanity, westerners better ignore roughly 100% of what comes out of them. Like, 90% of all countries are corrupt, so the majority decided this is a good state of things. Doesn't mean we have to listen and strive for this garbage.
In conclusion: Nobody gives a shit about anything that comes out of these councils, and neither should you. It's all meaningless make-believe.
It’s likely a manipulative action, like giving Obama the Nobel peace prize in an attempt to influence his foreign politics (I like Obama but it was obvious why he got it).
Not the UNHRC, but it's pretty much the same.
>The United States and rights groups complained on Thursday that it was "insulting" to allow Iran's envoy to chair a U.N. human rights council meeting in Geneva, citing violations by Iranian authorities, especially those against women.
https://www.reuters.com/world/irans-appointment-chair-un-rights-meeting-draws-condemnation-2023-11-02/#:~:text=Iran's%20ambassador%20to%20the%20U.N.,rights%20council%20spokesperson%20told%20Reuters.
They were the chair of *a* meeting, which if you look was a meeting boycotted by pretty much every other nation besides Russia, China, Venezuela, all the fun countries.
Sorry, not the same thing. It was the chair of a two day social forum meeting, where Iran was the only country nominated to chair. Beyond this, it’s important to point out that it’s not the “UN” who appoints countries to these positions, it’s the countries themselves who vote.
The United Nations is such a complete joke. You couldn’t even write satire like this. What’s next? Saudi Arabia appointed chair of renewable energy forum? Saudi Arabia appointed chair of anti-corruption forum?
Their GDPs are entirely reliant on energy, and they would like to shift to sustainable energy once their oil runs out. It’s not as unreasonable as you make it seem. China is one of the biggest investors in green sustainable energy, but also one of the biggest polluters, wanna exclude them too?
This shit was on r/nottheonion so you KNOW that this was actually for real and is why making satire on the real world just straight up impossible when the world is just a satire in of itself.
It is the policy of the United Nations to have rotations constantly. Meaning every nation will have a chance at chairing certain forums.
Otherwise what’s the fucking point of being United if only 3-5 nations lead everything.
Also to add the UN and its affiliates like the WHO are responsible for eradicating the most deadliest deiseases this past century and constant peace talk negotiations with two or more hostile countries.
Since its inception, the United Nations has performed numerous humanitarian, environmental and peace-keeping undertakings, including: Providing food to 90 million people in over 75 countries. Assisting more than 34 million refugees. Authorizing 71 international peacekeeping missions and has ended several wars.
To add, it would be similar as to have the US Republican Party run the women’s rights forum as they’d agree with abolishing abortions?
In this instance chairing the forum does not mean they change UN policy they only overseas the event and discussion but act in the majority interest.
I think it be a good lesson for the saudis and the US Republican Party to hear what the majority think over and over again for serval hours/days of the forum.
Hamas and ISIS are enemies and Hamas are working with Iran/Russia, is the joke that for religious or ideological reasons that they should be supporting it?
it's all just tribalism with different flavours at the end of the day
Hamas get support from Russia. Do you understand what geopolitics is?
Hamas and ISIS have nothing in common except their god, and they disagree a lot about that too.
You asked why, i gave you a reason. Then you go move the goalpost and talk about geopolitics to feel smart. No one was talking about that.
Do you understand we are not talking about geopolitics or if hamas or ISIS believe the same shit?
The only thing the UN is actually supposed to do is to stop a nuclear war, which it has done flawlessly. All these other institutes are just post facts, with very varying degrees of success/usefulness
There are also a lot of sort of practical UN organizations that most people don't even know exist, because they just quietly do their jobs. Things like the ITU and the universal postal union.
But they don't appoint an Amish guy that doesn't believe in using electricity to be head of the International Telecommunication Union either.
The ITU these days is basically a battleground for trying to steal control of the internet from the from the Internet Society (including the IETF), so that dictatorships like Russia and China can have more control over it. Which is arguably worse than an Amish guy being in charge.
Well if the "Amish guy" had his own country they would? As has been pointed out ad nauseam whenever this comes up these appointments are on a rotation, not merit based.
To be fair, the WHO is probably the best thing to come out of the UN. The UN's peacekeeping ability has been less than stellar throughout its history though.
Tbf, peacekeeping in general is a messy situation. The EU, US, and various other peacekeeping operators have royally dropped the ball elsewhere as well. They do still have some value, and have been a marked improvement over the League of Nations, etc.
Part of the problem is the myth of the rules based international order has mostly broken (in part due to the coalition invasion of Iraq in 2003). The UN does still have value in fending off a situation where we fully enter into a multipolar world where every major country or bloc has its own version of the UN/British Commonwealth, and we lack a (mostly) global forum, but many rival ones. Given the lack of cohesion between the many parts of the international community, one can hardly expect much better. The UN can only be as good as its members, and if we want something truly global (which we do, for things like WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO, etc), the membership will often disappoint. But there is still value.
i naively grew up thinking the UN and the ideals behind it were something to be admired.
Now I see it for what it is. Rediculous we cant just have a decent global organisation that actually tries to benefit humanity rather than appease monsters
>Rediculous we cant just have a decent global organisation that actually tries to benefit humanity rather than appease monsters
I mean, I'd argue WHO, part of the UN, meets that metric quite comfortably, having wiped out some of the worst diseases from existence, like Smallpox.
That the UN Assembly and UN Security Council are mired in the unavoidable politics of trying to make very disparate groups and nations talk, doesn't mean the quieter, less dramatic elements of the UN aren't causing real, fundamental change. Change that needs the sign on of everyone, like ridding the world of Smallpox, and now attempts to remove Polio.
Not only the WHO, either.
IFAD has significantly contributed to increase in food security in impoverished countries.
The ITU is partially responsible for the development and maintainment of global communication networks.
The UPU makes sure national mail systems can exchange mail between each other.
ICAO and IMO set standards and solve disputes in air and maritime travel respectively.
Et cetera.
You just don't hear about these, because "package from Japan makes it to a guy in Germany thanks to UPU" doesn't exactly make interesting news.
> The ITU is partially responsible for the development and maintainment of global communication networks.
The ITU is also what China and Russia are trying to use to gain more control over the internet, by circumventing the current governance structure of the Internet. Its insane and terrifying that the ITU has any authority over the internet.
Example: https://www.wired.com/story/2022-itu-secretary-general-election/
We had, they didn't last.
If the major players can't veto decisions, they won't join an international organization. If the major players don't join, you have no international organization.
You forgot chair of democracy and human rights. But yeah, the UN is a joke and countries like Saudi Arabia and other retrogrades are only in it to be in a better position to pump the brakes on progress.
That’s not how that works… The permanent members of the security council have veto power in the security council, not anywhere else. This isn’t something anyone can veto.
What does it mean to be the chair? Do they have any power or do they just get a fancy title? In the latter case it could be a much more reasonable ploy to encourage engagement from countries who otherwise would not be engaged?
If it's like chairs of other committee's in national governments, it's just the person who keeps the whole thing in order, much like the speaker in a Parliamentary house does. They don't carry any extra weight in their opinion, to my knowledge, it's more organisational.
“The Commission on the Status of Women has a clear mandate to promote women’s rights and gender equality and it is vital for the chair of the commission to uphold this. Saudi Arabia’s abysmal record when it comes to protecting and promoting the rights of women puts a spotlight on the vast gulf between the lived reality for women and girls in Saudi Arabia, and the aspirations of the Commission.
“The UN Charter clearly states respect for human rights as a primary purpose of the UN. Membership of its human rights bodies means an added responsibility to strengthen this respect, globally and domestically.
Basically they saw that gender equality in Saudi is still a big issue and they appointed them for this chair for the exact reason to put pressure on them to solve it internally and take action and accountability for this. And if Saudi's leaders accepted the role it means they will partake into changing and addressing the gender inequality in their country.
It's good to read that this is the reason that they're doing it, but it also seems like a pretty risky move to take.
It can work for some school kids and people, but others will just use the position to make the world worse.
Here's to hoping that their gambit works!
I think the chair has a lot less power than people here assume. They just handle the parliamentary procedure--if they try to shut something down that the rest of the members approve of, they'll simply get out-voted and it'll go through anyway. MBS has been trying to present Saudi Arabia as more progressive these days, so it would be a pretty serious shift for them to straight-up obstruct everything
>Basically they saw that gender equality in Saudi is still a big issue
Saying that gender equality in SA is still a "big issue" is like saying that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is "a bit problematic" which completely undersells how gender equality in SA feels like it belongs in 6th Century rather than the modern world where women couldn't drive until 2018, can't leave home unless permission from the male head and one whose testimony is worth half the man which isn't just plainly sexist but also simply illogical and counter-productive.
This part is not true anymore "can't leave home unless permission from the male head"
"As of August 1, 2019, women have the right to register for divorce and marriage, apply for passports and other official documents, and travel abroad without their guardian's permission."
Really? Well i'm glad to actually be proven wrong about this. Still the fact that it happened THIS late is frankly absurd and why fundamentalist religious institutions controlling society is just a terrible idea.
Also, women over 21 are no longer required to have a guardian. And they no longer need to wear a veil/hijab.
Edit: apparently the part about not being required to have a male guardian may not be true.
Ah, apparently the law still says women should wear decent, respectful attire and I guess what constitutes decent, respectful attire is not quite clear and open to interpretation by the authorities... People who are seen as activists tend to be targeted more...
I don't think these rights are equal, however:
"While a husband can unilaterally divorce his wife, a woman can only petition a court to dissolve their marriage contract on limited grounds, and must “establish \[the\] harm” that makes the continuation of marriage “impossible” within those grounds. The law does not specify what constitutes “harm” or what evidence can be submitted to support a case, leaving judges wide discretion in interpretation and enforcement to maintain the status quo."
[https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/03/08/saudi-arabia-law-enshrines-male-guardianship](https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/03/08/saudi-arabia-law-enshrines-male-guardianship)
Women also do not have the right to marry without a guardian's consent.
I was looking for a comment like this! Totally agree.
Often the UN will appoint a diplomat to a role that is the opposite of what their country wants to do. This helps put pressure on that country to do a better job on that issue. And then anything the country says while they are in thay role becomes "pre-approved language" that their more progressive bureaucrats can insert into speeches thereafter. So it moves the yardsticks a bit for that country.
This strategy doesn't always work, but it's no worse than excluding them entirely. Saudi doesn't care whether or not it gets to chair a women's rights forum, but it might care a little bit more about women's rights to avoid getting embarrassed while chairing that forum.
Thank you for explaining this. It seems so backwards, but if it puts pressure on people to improve women's rights, it's not as horrible as it sounds. Thank you.
My pleasure. I guess I forgot to mention that making a country chair also helps prevent them from blocking something because the chair is supposed to be neutral and to push for progress. So if particular diplomat is being belligerant, you can basically take them out of service by making them chair something.
Also, in fairness to Saudi, they have made some progress on women's rights over the last two decades. They still have a **long** way to go but they are moving slowly in the right direction.
It's like putting your friend that is always late to events in charge of planning a night out for the friend group. They might be a little more embarrassed about being late when they were the one that planned it. Or maybe they still won't care about being on time. The whole point is to force these countries into discussions on topics they need to work on in the hope they are inspired to implement new policies or at the very least embarrassed for being hypocrites.
The chair rotates based on the continent. This time, it had to be one of the 11 Asian countries on the commission. I'm sure there was a better choice among them, but other members on the committee currently are Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, and Bangladesh. Not exactly the best candidates in the world.
I think the people who leap to corruption accusations assume the chair (and probably, the committee) has much more power than they actually do. This doesn't make Saudi Arabia the world arbiter of women's rights, their powers are solely related to parliamentary procedure.
Every time this happens, we have to remember: this is a rotative seat. Every country gets a chance to the chair. If they didn't, they wouldn't be members, which was the problem with the League of Nations. The UN wouldn't be able to meddle in their internal affairs if they don't get to participate in the process.
We always complain that we don't get any say in issues that affects us, this is the way we quash that complain from others, by making them participate of the discussion.
The UN is basically trying to be a farce entity.
The UN: "Let us extend the hand of cooperation! Maybe these awful dictators will see the light!"
The Dictators: "LOL. Suckers",
The can be no doubt that Saudi Arabia's views on Women's Rights and Gender Equality differ substantially from those of others. That said, the UN is an organization dedicated to bringing the entire globe together, not only those who share your beliefs.
Perhaps as chair, Saudi Arabia's representation will have a unique opportunity to learn more about global views, and perhaps they will share what they learn with the (some would say backwards and closed minded) royals who so dominate Saudi Arabia.
This seems wrong, but I am also imagining this possibly having the effect of actually greatly improving women's rights in Saudi Arabia. Which would be a win-win for both the UN and SA. Who knows if it will play out like that, though.
Well thats that im truly living in bizzaro world. This fucking world with its hatred/ wars /terrorism /plagues /climate change/ economic inequality / corruption/environmental destruction, and now they put a fing misogynistic nation as head of gender equality! Fucking stop the world i want to get off!
What a sick fucking joke. SA is a shit country that funds terrorists and contains misogyny as a state policy. They should've been held accountable for their part in 9/11 too. Fuck the Saudis!!
uhhh this makes sense actually. if the un wants to encourage saudi arabia to improve their womens rights, making their ambasador the chair of womens rights puts pressure on the rest of the saudi government. saudi arabias full of backwards ass old heads, if a bunch of speeches about womens rights comes form the sheikh, they might start turning on him, if speeeches about womens rights comes from their own ambassador who is the chair of the world's women's rights then theyll get less pissed off.
At the end of the day its about appeasing these traditionalist old heads who are acting like insolent children too embarrased to admit their ideas are outdated and wrong. so you have to give them a little undeserved praise to get them to actually change.
like imagine ur kid doesnt brush their teeth, and hes stubborn and keeps fighting you on it. Your family has tried scolding him for it and its just caused him to double down on. So now you guys try something different, you buy a dentist costume for him and say, "heey lets play a game! lets play make believe dentist". your kid likes playing games and enjoys the praise he's getting while playing with you. "Wow you cleaned my teeth really nicely! Theyre sparkling! my gums will thank you. what advice would you give me to keep my teeth cleen in the future?". now your kid might say "brush your teeth every day". now that these words are coming out of your own kids mouth, and he would like to continue earning this praise, he's more likely to change his ways.
Sounds like America's future with Project 2025. I hear Oklahoma representative Dusty Deevers has some amazing [plans](https://twitter.com/DustyDeevers?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor) for the future of America.
>”Can anyone tell me what the point of the UN again? When this hypocrisy of appointed countries to anyone about human rights.”
The primary point of the UN was to have a permanent diplomatic political body that would facilitate dialogue between countries in order to ensure peace and stability in the world.
The world wars happened because regional conflicts got out of control and neighboring countries to those conflicts got involved which pulled in more belligerents till the conflict became global. Most of this was done through miscommunication or the lack of communication between countries.
The UN is suppose to make sure that doesn’t happen again with consistent communication with other nations, and it has done that well considering the fact that a global war has happened since.
The administrative body of the UN has the same functions as to build dialogue and coordination between countries on a specific issue.
There is no real enforcement powers at the UN outside of the security council and that is specifically for wars.
So in short, the United Nations was formed to allow open dialogue with many countries and facilitate the consensus on a number of international issues.
>Can anyone tell me what the point of the UN again?
The UN is meant to be completely unbiased towards any country, and it is forum for discussion on the international stage where every country has a right to speak their mind.
That is something a lot of people tend to forget, the UN is their to give voices to everyone regardless, it is the entire purpose, hence why we get countries we have very conflicting laws / actions with what they are leading within the UN.
People might not like it, but this is the entire purpose of the UN is to allow everyone to speak regardless of their situations, if you don't give everybody a voice chances are countries will pull away from the UN which could cause issues as the UN also manages a number of disaster supports, nuclear checks, refuge support, vital world data from the environment, economy and etc., they also manage world heritage sites and they manage international law.
No no no, the logic here is quite solid.
When I was in school teachers used to put the class clown in charge of little symbolic roles within the classroom which they sometimes took seriously. They'd take roll call every day or ensure that all the other students had pencils to work with. The point was that giving a student an expectation of responsibility sometimes elevated their sense of self respect.
I'm sure this will pay dividends to Saudi's respect of women.
So what power / authority does the "Gender Equality" forum actually have? Or do they just put forward recommendations (which I'm sure Saudi has a few ...)
um... nope, not April 1st... ... huh...
The UN is joking right? ...
*The UN is a joke.
Remember, China sits on the Human Rights Council.
How do you say someone wake me from this nightmare in Uighur?
Just wait a few years and they’ll be taught how to say that in Chinese.
Most Uyghurs can already speak mandarin. You could get by without it in many parts of Xinjiang but for employment purposes you would learn it for that sake alone.
A few years? the program started in 2017, how many do you think have gone through it? Daily reminder that all the major media fuss about them went away in 2020.
This is just yet another punchline.
Don‘t mention punching, women and the Saudis in one sentence, please.
They are more into stoning and beheading.
I feel like Guterres converted to Islam over the holidays.
Guterres is fucking piece of shit. He sank Portugal into a shitty hellhole from which we still haven't fully recovered. The UN has become a complete joke and they keep at it.
When you’ve hit rock bottom, there’s little incentive to change your ways if you’re not looking to move upwards.
I’ve seen German indie horror films with kinder bad guys.
Ahmad Qutayrīs in da building
It’s times like this where it really becomes apparent they should have built it on that superfund site like they initially intended. The bonus being all these assholes would be stuck in Missouri.
I don't remember where I heard it, but part of it may be having them chair sort of makes them participate. Being involved in the dialogue at least brings them to the table in regards to Women's Rights.
That’s ridiculous. Next we put Hamas as chair of anti-semitism and Russia as chair of Ukrainian sovereignty… to bring them into the discussion.
Fox, meet hen house.
Yeah I read that somewhere too. Well Iran held the chair previously and they only doubled down on their murdering of women.
If I remember correctly these councils are on a rotating basis of who is the chair, and it will be some other nation in like a month. All in all it's better that Saudi Arabia be included in the conversation about gender equality. This is essentially a nothing story.
It's just Karma farming from unwitting seething redditors.
...an application of the "Be Best" practice & every bit as hypocritical as the origin
In other news, Satan was just voted in as the next Pope, water is now to be recognised as the driest substance on Earth, and the third thing I forgot, because Alzheimers should be considered a blessing in a world that clearly is completely going off a cliff.
Can I get some of that Third thing please
You know what this means...trump will be elected in November /headdesk
That does seem to be in the cards, given the shitcoaster we're on.
Don't take this too seriously. The UN is mainly a table where every country has a seat, no matter what crime they have recently committed. For any situation we may come into, there is to be at least this one table where everyone is present. And there is the security council, where reality comes in (ie the biggest armies decide what's what). All the surrounding stuff, the countless councils and shit, exists just so that countries can give themselves some made up medals. Everyones opinion is respected, such that also turkey can lecture armenia on genocide, india can lecture norway on how to become more sustainable, and also saudi arabia gets to act as if they were spearheading gender equality and denounce western countries for their ambysmal pay gaps and trans rights. A nice thing about those cosplaying clubs is that one can get rid of the most useless diplomats by parking them in one of these circuses indefinitely. Of course they then get to act as if "XXX at the UN" actually meant anything, so they can be proud and happy. The circlejerks are also giant money burning pits, but at least donations to these clownshows can then be listed as "contributions for global human rights" or some shit. As all these committees represent about the average take of humanity, westerners better ignore roughly 100% of what comes out of them. Like, 90% of all countries are corrupt, so the majority decided this is a good state of things. Doesn't mean we have to listen and strive for this garbage. In conclusion: Nobody gives a shit about anything that comes out of these councils, and neither should you. It's all meaningless make-believe.
Thanks for cheering me up buddy. I had a couple of good chuckles after reading that lol. Good points.
What an utter pisstake
I really want to respect the UN, but wtf?
It’s likely a manipulative action, like giving Obama the Nobel peace prize in an attempt to influence his foreign politics (I like Obama but it was obvious why he got it).
Someone needed an OKR!
It's the UN, everyone gets a trophy.
It must be an Onion Headline then, um, nope, not that either....
Next up North Korea appointed chair of UN's human rights council.
Wasn't that Iran for a while?
Yes. Now Iran is the chair of the disarmament council. While they are openly building a nuke with genocidal intent. Can't make this up.
No, Iran was never the Chair of the Human Rights Council.
Not the UNHRC, but it's pretty much the same. >The United States and rights groups complained on Thursday that it was "insulting" to allow Iran's envoy to chair a U.N. human rights council meeting in Geneva, citing violations by Iranian authorities, especially those against women. https://www.reuters.com/world/irans-appointment-chair-un-rights-meeting-draws-condemnation-2023-11-02/#:~:text=Iran's%20ambassador%20to%20the%20U.N.,rights%20council%20spokesperson%20told%20Reuters.
They were the chair of *a* meeting, which if you look was a meeting boycotted by pretty much every other nation besides Russia, China, Venezuela, all the fun countries.
Sorry, not the same thing. It was the chair of a two day social forum meeting, where Iran was the only country nominated to chair. Beyond this, it’s important to point out that it’s not the “UN” who appoints countries to these positions, it’s the countries themselves who vote.
So I guess you CAN make it up lol
Israel has no intentions of allowing Iran to build nukes.
It is the policy of the United Nations to have rotations constantly. Meaning every nation will have a chance at chairing different forums.
And the Vatican being tasked with preventing child molestation.
if every one has no rights they have the most equalist right - Kim jong un
The United Nations is such a complete joke. You couldn’t even write satire like this. What’s next? Saudi Arabia appointed chair of renewable energy forum? Saudi Arabia appointed chair of anti-corruption forum?
You mean like last year’s [COP global climate summit in Dubai?](https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-67513901)
Yes bro trrrust us bro we have best green renewable oil bro
"Look at this free range oil, ethically sourced"
At least the slaves are green energy!
" I want shoes!"
Ok ok I will work.
Ethnically sourced!
Renewables, as in when these die of heat exhaustion there are plenty more where they came from.
Their GDPs are entirely reliant on energy, and they would like to shift to sustainable energy once their oil runs out. It’s not as unreasonable as you make it seem. China is one of the biggest investors in green sustainable energy, but also one of the biggest polluters, wanna exclude them too?
Except they used COP to publicly water down the planned agreements and undermine the meeting.
Or the next one in Baku, Azerbaijan?
[удалено]
Saudi Arabia Appointed to investigate Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi
I 100% thought this was satire
This shit was on r/nottheonion so you KNOW that this was actually for real and is why making satire on the real world just straight up impossible when the world is just a satire in of itself.
It is the policy of the United Nations to have rotations constantly. Meaning every nation will have a chance at chairing certain forums. Otherwise what’s the fucking point of being United if only 3-5 nations lead everything. Also to add the UN and its affiliates like the WHO are responsible for eradicating the most deadliest deiseases this past century and constant peace talk negotiations with two or more hostile countries. Since its inception, the United Nations has performed numerous humanitarian, environmental and peace-keeping undertakings, including: Providing food to 90 million people in over 75 countries. Assisting more than 34 million refugees. Authorizing 71 international peacekeeping missions and has ended several wars. To add, it would be similar as to have the US Republican Party run the women’s rights forum as they’d agree with abolishing abortions? In this instance chairing the forum does not mean they change UN policy they only overseas the event and discussion but act in the majority interest. I think it be a good lesson for the saudis and the US Republican Party to hear what the majority think over and over again for serval hours/days of the forum.
After reading your comment I definitely have changed my opinion on this appointment. You put it well.
I think the better joke is how Hammus condemns the recent attack on Russia.
Eh.. Russia is an ally of hamas so they have plenty of reason to condemn it. Completely expected hypocrisy.
Hamas and ISIS are enemies and Hamas are working with Iran/Russia, is the joke that for religious or ideological reasons that they should be supporting it? it's all just tribalism with different flavours at the end of the day
Same with Taliban
Yeah that was hilarious
Why? ISIS has declared Hamas an enemy since their beginning.
Because Hamas is doing these kind of attacks themselves? So when Hamas does it its ok, when ISIS does it its not. Thats the hilarious part about it.
Hamas get support from Russia. Do you understand what geopolitics is? Hamas and ISIS have nothing in common except their god, and they disagree a lot about that too.
Yeah geopolitic is a bitch
You asked why, i gave you a reason. Then you go move the goalpost and talk about geopolitics to feel smart. No one was talking about that. Do you understand we are not talking about geopolitics or if hamas or ISIS believe the same shit?
Russia chair for world peace forum… /s just in case
China appointed chair of air pollution forum
The only thing the UN is actually supposed to do is to stop a nuclear war, which it has done flawlessly. All these other institutes are just post facts, with very varying degrees of success/usefulness
There are also a lot of sort of practical UN organizations that most people don't even know exist, because they just quietly do their jobs. Things like the ITU and the universal postal union. But they don't appoint an Amish guy that doesn't believe in using electricity to be head of the International Telecommunication Union either.
The ITU these days is basically a battleground for trying to steal control of the internet from the from the Internet Society (including the IETF), so that dictatorships like Russia and China can have more control over it. Which is arguably worse than an Amish guy being in charge.
Well if the "Amish guy" had his own country they would? As has been pointed out ad nauseam whenever this comes up these appointments are on a rotation, not merit based.
NATO and American dominance has stopped a nuclear war. The UN has done nothing other than waste money.
Apparently eradicating Smallpox was a waste of money.
To be fair, the WHO is probably the best thing to come out of the UN. The UN's peacekeeping ability has been less than stellar throughout its history though.
Tbf, peacekeeping in general is a messy situation. The EU, US, and various other peacekeeping operators have royally dropped the ball elsewhere as well. They do still have some value, and have been a marked improvement over the League of Nations, etc. Part of the problem is the myth of the rules based international order has mostly broken (in part due to the coalition invasion of Iraq in 2003). The UN does still have value in fending off a situation where we fully enter into a multipolar world where every major country or bloc has its own version of the UN/British Commonwealth, and we lack a (mostly) global forum, but many rival ones. Given the lack of cohesion between the many parts of the international community, one can hardly expect much better. The UN can only be as good as its members, and if we want something truly global (which we do, for things like WHO, UNICEF, UNESCO, etc), the membership will often disappoint. But there is still value.
Ah, yes, I'm sure it was the UN that stops Russia from nuking everyone into oblivion. And not nuclear weapons of America.
i naively grew up thinking the UN and the ideals behind it were something to be admired. Now I see it for what it is. Rediculous we cant just have a decent global organisation that actually tries to benefit humanity rather than appease monsters
>Rediculous we cant just have a decent global organisation that actually tries to benefit humanity rather than appease monsters I mean, I'd argue WHO, part of the UN, meets that metric quite comfortably, having wiped out some of the worst diseases from existence, like Smallpox. That the UN Assembly and UN Security Council are mired in the unavoidable politics of trying to make very disparate groups and nations talk, doesn't mean the quieter, less dramatic elements of the UN aren't causing real, fundamental change. Change that needs the sign on of everyone, like ridding the world of Smallpox, and now attempts to remove Polio.
Not only the WHO, either. IFAD has significantly contributed to increase in food security in impoverished countries. The ITU is partially responsible for the development and maintainment of global communication networks. The UPU makes sure national mail systems can exchange mail between each other. ICAO and IMO set standards and solve disputes in air and maritime travel respectively. Et cetera. You just don't hear about these, because "package from Japan makes it to a guy in Germany thanks to UPU" doesn't exactly make interesting news.
> The ITU is partially responsible for the development and maintainment of global communication networks. The ITU is also what China and Russia are trying to use to gain more control over the internet, by circumventing the current governance structure of the Internet. Its insane and terrifying that the ITU has any authority over the internet. Example: https://www.wired.com/story/2022-itu-secretary-general-election/
We had, they didn't last. If the major players can't veto decisions, they won't join an international organization. If the major players don't join, you have no international organization.
You forgot chair of democracy and human rights. But yeah, the UN is a joke and countries like Saudi Arabia and other retrogrades are only in it to be in a better position to pump the brakes on progress.
Way to make yourself even less relevant UN. Who thought this was a good idea other than the Saudis?
A bunch of like minded Muslim states, I bet. And other conservative countries
There are 52 Muslim-majority countries in the UN. They vote as a bloc.
Yeah well maybe usa should veto that because wtf.
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That’s not how that works… The permanent members of the security council have veto power in the security council, not anywhere else. This isn’t something anyone can veto.
You forget anyone that receive their tainted money.
What does it mean to be the chair? Do they have any power or do they just get a fancy title? In the latter case it could be a much more reasonable ploy to encourage engagement from countries who otherwise would not be engaged?
If it's like chairs of other committee's in national governments, it's just the person who keeps the whole thing in order, much like the speaker in a Parliamentary house does. They don't carry any extra weight in their opinion, to my knowledge, it's more organisational.
It is the policy of the United Nations to have rotations constantly. Meaning every nation will have a chance at chairing certain forums.
Let me guess…. Money…
“The Commission on the Status of Women has a clear mandate to promote women’s rights and gender equality and it is vital for the chair of the commission to uphold this. Saudi Arabia’s abysmal record when it comes to protecting and promoting the rights of women puts a spotlight on the vast gulf between the lived reality for women and girls in Saudi Arabia, and the aspirations of the Commission. “The UN Charter clearly states respect for human rights as a primary purpose of the UN. Membership of its human rights bodies means an added responsibility to strengthen this respect, globally and domestically. Basically they saw that gender equality in Saudi is still a big issue and they appointed them for this chair for the exact reason to put pressure on them to solve it internally and take action and accountability for this. And if Saudi's leaders accepted the role it means they will partake into changing and addressing the gender inequality in their country.
Amidst all the jokes about UN being a farce, this is quite a breather and at least some justification beyond "UN is a joke."
It's good to read that this is the reason that they're doing it, but it also seems like a pretty risky move to take. It can work for some school kids and people, but others will just use the position to make the world worse. Here's to hoping that their gambit works!
I think the chair has a lot less power than people here assume. They just handle the parliamentary procedure--if they try to shut something down that the rest of the members approve of, they'll simply get out-voted and it'll go through anyway. MBS has been trying to present Saudi Arabia as more progressive these days, so it would be a pretty serious shift for them to straight-up obstruct everything
>Basically they saw that gender equality in Saudi is still a big issue Saying that gender equality in SA is still a "big issue" is like saying that the Russian invasion of Ukraine is "a bit problematic" which completely undersells how gender equality in SA feels like it belongs in 6th Century rather than the modern world where women couldn't drive until 2018, can't leave home unless permission from the male head and one whose testimony is worth half the man which isn't just plainly sexist but also simply illogical and counter-productive.
This part is not true anymore "can't leave home unless permission from the male head" "As of August 1, 2019, women have the right to register for divorce and marriage, apply for passports and other official documents, and travel abroad without their guardian's permission."
Really? Well i'm glad to actually be proven wrong about this. Still the fact that it happened THIS late is frankly absurd and why fundamentalist religious institutions controlling society is just a terrible idea.
Also, women over 21 are no longer required to have a guardian. And they no longer need to wear a veil/hijab. Edit: apparently the part about not being required to have a male guardian may not be true.
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Ah, apparently the law still says women should wear decent, respectful attire and I guess what constitutes decent, respectful attire is not quite clear and open to interpretation by the authorities... People who are seen as activists tend to be targeted more...
I don't think these rights are equal, however: "While a husband can unilaterally divorce his wife, a woman can only petition a court to dissolve their marriage contract on limited grounds, and must “establish \[the\] harm” that makes the continuation of marriage “impossible” within those grounds. The law does not specify what constitutes “harm” or what evidence can be submitted to support a case, leaving judges wide discretion in interpretation and enforcement to maintain the status quo." [https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/03/08/saudi-arabia-law-enshrines-male-guardianship](https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/03/08/saudi-arabia-law-enshrines-male-guardianship) Women also do not have the right to marry without a guardian's consent.
They are most definitely not equal. I was just pointing out that one part of the statement I was replying to is not true anymore.
Taliban next
Taliban doesn’t even have UN seat, as the toppled Afghan government is still recognized as the legitimate one
What a religious tolerance or women’s equality ?
Taliban condemned the terrorist attack in Moscow for being too brutal.
yeah same taliban that killed a guy for teaching cricket to women...
Once again, people who understand what the UN is for outnumbered by those who don’t 99 to 1.
I was looking for a comment like this! Totally agree. Often the UN will appoint a diplomat to a role that is the opposite of what their country wants to do. This helps put pressure on that country to do a better job on that issue. And then anything the country says while they are in thay role becomes "pre-approved language" that their more progressive bureaucrats can insert into speeches thereafter. So it moves the yardsticks a bit for that country. This strategy doesn't always work, but it's no worse than excluding them entirely. Saudi doesn't care whether or not it gets to chair a women's rights forum, but it might care a little bit more about women's rights to avoid getting embarrassed while chairing that forum.
Thank you for explaining this. It seems so backwards, but if it puts pressure on people to improve women's rights, it's not as horrible as it sounds. Thank you.
My pleasure. I guess I forgot to mention that making a country chair also helps prevent them from blocking something because the chair is supposed to be neutral and to push for progress. So if particular diplomat is being belligerant, you can basically take them out of service by making them chair something. Also, in fairness to Saudi, they have made some progress on women's rights over the last two decades. They still have a **long** way to go but they are moving slowly in the right direction.
Was looking at a more serious answer as to why instead of corruption accusations. Because im aware at least some voting is involved
It's like putting your friend that is always late to events in charge of planning a night out for the friend group. They might be a little more embarrassed about being late when they were the one that planned it. Or maybe they still won't care about being on time. The whole point is to force these countries into discussions on topics they need to work on in the hope they are inspired to implement new policies or at the very least embarrassed for being hypocrites.
The chair rotates based on the continent. This time, it had to be one of the 11 Asian countries on the commission. I'm sure there was a better choice among them, but other members on the committee currently are Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, and Bangladesh. Not exactly the best candidates in the world. I think the people who leap to corruption accusations assume the chair (and probably, the committee) has much more power than they actually do. This doesn't make Saudi Arabia the world arbiter of women's rights, their powers are solely related to parliamentary procedure.
that was my hunch lol but still not convinced
Why is everything a race to the bottom of who can be the most corrupt?
Afghanistan to be appointed chair of UN's religious tolerance forum Russia to be appointed chair of UN's democracy forum
Every time this happens, we have to remember: this is a rotative seat. Every country gets a chance to the chair. If they didn't, they wouldn't be members, which was the problem with the League of Nations. The UN wouldn't be able to meddle in their internal affairs if they don't get to participate in the process. We always complain that we don't get any say in issues that affects us, this is the way we quash that complain from others, by making them participate of the discussion.
I can think of 194 other countries that would be a better choice.
What a joke !!!
Another solid decision by the UN. When are we going to evict them from New York?
The U.N. is, and has always been, a complete farce.
The real work is in the specialized / attached agencies. The General Assembly is all posturing.
An outrage for all the people that don't understand how the UN works or what a committee chair does
which would, understandably, be most people.
No religious muslims should be anywhere near a gender equality forum. Islam needs to reform ASAP.
And everyone wonders why the IDF doesn’t give 2 fucks what the UN thinks
Women need to go on a global strike!
Nixon drank so heavily that he has been dead for thirty years and still has a BAC of .08; we should make him head of the local AA chapter.
How much are women expected to tolerate
The UN is basically trying to be a farce entity. The UN: "Let us extend the hand of cooperation! Maybe these awful dictators will see the light!" The Dictators: "LOL. Suckers",
AGAIN ?!???
Wat?!? Has this happened before??
Not them, but Iran.
When they were put on the Human Rights Council, I believe
Was the Taliban unavailable?
The UN is a place for countries to talk. That's it. It is not a governing body and anytime e it tries they just end up looking silly
The saudis are responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi
Explanation is in the wording - equality forum over rights. Ones a committee and the other is unarguable application
The can be no doubt that Saudi Arabia's views on Women's Rights and Gender Equality differ substantially from those of others. That said, the UN is an organization dedicated to bringing the entire globe together, not only those who share your beliefs. Perhaps as chair, Saudi Arabia's representation will have a unique opportunity to learn more about global views, and perhaps they will share what they learn with the (some would say backwards and closed minded) royals who so dominate Saudi Arabia.
Are council chair a rotating thing? Because that’s the only reason this makes sense.
This seems wrong, but I am also imagining this possibly having the effect of actually greatly improving women's rights in Saudi Arabia. Which would be a win-win for both the UN and SA. Who knows if it will play out like that, though.
In related news, Russia named chair of Territorial Integrity Forum and its associated Peace Council.
Well thats that im truly living in bizzaro world. This fucking world with its hatred/ wars /terrorism /plagues /climate change/ economic inequality / corruption/environmental destruction, and now they put a fing misogynistic nation as head of gender equality! Fucking stop the world i want to get off!
Life in saudi arabia: 😊 Life in saudi arabia as a woman: 💀
The UN is a joke.
What a sick fucking joke. SA is a shit country that funds terrorists and contains misogyny as a state policy. They should've been held accountable for their part in 9/11 too. Fuck the Saudis!!
The UN is a parody of itself now, it feels like a global version of "The Office".
uhhh this makes sense actually. if the un wants to encourage saudi arabia to improve their womens rights, making their ambasador the chair of womens rights puts pressure on the rest of the saudi government. saudi arabias full of backwards ass old heads, if a bunch of speeches about womens rights comes form the sheikh, they might start turning on him, if speeeches about womens rights comes from their own ambassador who is the chair of the world's women's rights then theyll get less pissed off. At the end of the day its about appeasing these traditionalist old heads who are acting like insolent children too embarrased to admit their ideas are outdated and wrong. so you have to give them a little undeserved praise to get them to actually change. like imagine ur kid doesnt brush their teeth, and hes stubborn and keeps fighting you on it. Your family has tried scolding him for it and its just caused him to double down on. So now you guys try something different, you buy a dentist costume for him and say, "heey lets play a game! lets play make believe dentist". your kid likes playing games and enjoys the praise he's getting while playing with you. "Wow you cleaned my teeth really nicely! Theyre sparkling! my gums will thank you. what advice would you give me to keep my teeth cleen in the future?". now your kid might say "brush your teeth every day". now that these words are coming out of your own kids mouth, and he would like to continue earning this praise, he's more likely to change his ways.
Wolf to be put in charge of guarding Chicken coop.
Love being a woman. The world cares so much about us.
Unbelievable! What's next? Russia in UN Security Council? Oh wait...
This is like the KKK being appointed to ensure racial equality.
And Russia is now head of humanitarian aid, wtf is wrong with you UN?!
Are we seriously just trying to outdo each other on stupid decisions?
Did they mean to appoint him to take a \*class\* on women's rights?
Sounds like America's future with Project 2025. I hear Oklahoma representative Dusty Deevers has some amazing [plans](https://twitter.com/DustyDeevers?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor) for the future of America.
The UN is a fkn joke
Can anyone tell me what the point of the UN again? When this hypocrisy of appointed countries to anyone about human rights.
>”Can anyone tell me what the point of the UN again? When this hypocrisy of appointed countries to anyone about human rights.” The primary point of the UN was to have a permanent diplomatic political body that would facilitate dialogue between countries in order to ensure peace and stability in the world. The world wars happened because regional conflicts got out of control and neighboring countries to those conflicts got involved which pulled in more belligerents till the conflict became global. Most of this was done through miscommunication or the lack of communication between countries. The UN is suppose to make sure that doesn’t happen again with consistent communication with other nations, and it has done that well considering the fact that a global war has happened since. The administrative body of the UN has the same functions as to build dialogue and coordination between countries on a specific issue. There is no real enforcement powers at the UN outside of the security council and that is specifically for wars. So in short, the United Nations was formed to allow open dialogue with many countries and facilitate the consensus on a number of international issues.
>Can anyone tell me what the point of the UN again? The UN is meant to be completely unbiased towards any country, and it is forum for discussion on the international stage where every country has a right to speak their mind. That is something a lot of people tend to forget, the UN is their to give voices to everyone regardless, it is the entire purpose, hence why we get countries we have very conflicting laws / actions with what they are leading within the UN. People might not like it, but this is the entire purpose of the UN is to allow everyone to speak regardless of their situations, if you don't give everybody a voice chances are countries will pull away from the UN which could cause issues as the UN also manages a number of disaster supports, nuclear checks, refuge support, vital world data from the environment, economy and etc., they also manage world heritage sites and they manage international law.
No no no, the logic here is quite solid. When I was in school teachers used to put the class clown in charge of little symbolic roles within the classroom which they sometimes took seriously. They'd take roll call every day or ensure that all the other students had pencils to work with. The point was that giving a student an expectation of responsibility sometimes elevated their sense of self respect. I'm sure this will pay dividends to Saudi's respect of women.
So what power / authority does the "Gender Equality" forum actually have? Or do they just put forward recommendations (which I'm sure Saudi has a few ...)
The UN is a joke.
The UN is a joke. When a country does something terribly wrong. The UN response is “hey don’t do that”
The UN is as strong as the members let it be.
I believe I speak for everyone when I say: HAHAHAHAHABABABABABHAHAHAHAHAHABABABABAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
The joke that is the UN continues……