Should the recent anti-gay behavior of the UN worry us or is it just a blip?

It seems as the voices pushing for gay rights get stronger, the reaction against it ratchets up too. I think/hope this was just a blip, but how upsetting it is. Gay rights are an idea whose time has more than come; I see this move as a pandering to the more restrictive countries.

We talked about it some here but let me tell you – what a fucking blip it is if it’s a blip – a blip that will cost people’s lives. OTOH, my partner and I were talking about this and UN has no business trying to come up with standards that in any way can satisfy all of its members – of course to the homophobic countries, murdering gays isn’t ‘without cause’ or arbitrary. If UN had any cajones, they would understand the effects of their decision but they’re powerless cowards

I think we should be worried. The homophobic nations are in the majority and I don’t see that changing any time soon. I don’t know if the US could have vetoed this amendment or not. If they could have, they must have traded the gays for something else. At least, I hope they got something for screwing over a whole class of people and making it easier to kill gay people all over the world.

If the US could have vetoed it, then shame on us. It is a horribly wrong move, and I can’t believe the Obama administration would have gone for it.

It’s very worrisome to any LGBTQ person who lives in one of countries that either advocates the killing of gays or offers no protection for them. It’s also worrisome to travelers. It’s worrisome to me because the world seems to be backpedaling on protection for non-heterosexuals. What’s the most worrisome is the influence of Americans on African politics.

@psychocandy Agreed on that last point, especially.

@Simone_De_Beauvoir agreed, it is some fucking BLIP, but I couldn’t think of another way of simply putting across “it slipped through while no one was paying attention”, there were 26 absent.

This is sickening.

It’s already sickening enough that it’s an issue at all whether being non-straight is grounds for being freaking killed. No sane adult should even need to think before saying “of course not”. Is that a one-sided exaggeration? I’m not sure, but I don’t think it is.
Not approving of homosexuality is one thing. Believing it’s always a conscious choice is one thing. Thinking it’s a disgrace and a sin is one thing. But sentencing people to death or denying them protection because they have the wrong feelings is insane. INSANE.

And now, this hateful insanity turns out to be so widespread it can effect a decisive influence on what does and does not count as a human rights violation.
Should this worry us? Hm, maybe a bit.

I’m completely with @Fyrius. It’s not mildly troubling, it truly is COMPLETELY fucking insane.

@Fyrius But sentencing people to death or denying them protection because they have the wrong feelings is insane. INSANE I can agree with you there. However all this type of antigay agenda starts from the little things like religion and sin however and seems to grow like a destructive fire. I would say until the root causes of antigay agenda are addressed these situations will always continue because the fuel will keep feeding the fire.

We should always be worried of prejudice of anykind anywhere. It is not just a gay thing, this is an all people thing. The UN has let countries slaughter christians, jews, muslims, Hindu, ethnic cleansing all over the world.

Anyone remember Bali, should we be worried damn right. Not only should we be worried but we should never succumb to the authority of such a governing body.

This is fucking horrible!
It’s analogous to a UN resolution approving the Holocaust.

The United Nations is a joke. It isn’t an issue of LGBT rights, which is another discussion all together IMHO. Look at the members of their Human Rights Council…it includes Libya, Angola, Malaysia, Qatar, and Uganda. These are the UN human-rights policymakers? People need to wake-up, growup and get serious about preserving their liberties and freedom.

Oh, well of course it’s worrisome. So if the U.S.A. one day wanted to start using military action to plow down the doors of known homosexuals within the country and open fire – the U.N. would approve of our executions? No one would intervene?

Sickening, horrifying, insane, disturbing, obscene, etc.

This is a sad example, but I am concerned that there’s more hysteria in the reaction against it than the power of a UNGA Resolution warrants. The UDHR has for years set out the right to life as fundamental. As long as the death penalty exists in the U.S., our government abstains from these votes, and therefore should be working here before we yell about the U.N. Further, the GA’s Resolution are mere expressions of general attitudes – they have minimal binding effect, and are products of diplomacy rather than law.

What’s disgusting is the Uganda death penalty for gays bill, and the hand that Evangelical Christians in the U.S. had in spreading the seeds of the “gay agenda” fear that lead to the anti-gay push in that country.

Before we address the actions of a body that has little legal effect, we should be looking at where and which domestic institutions are causing the real problems.

The problem is Africa and the Arab peninsula. Look at this map

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_by_country_or_territory

The problem is that modern thinking is not pervasive in this part of the world. Anti-gay laws and sentiment is just one of several serious issues. Female genital cutting is widespread too.

Laws can be changed, but it takes longer for mindsets to change. Globalization and the Internet can speed up this process.

Everyone ranting about globallization and worried about world-wide agendas. Think about this…If you can’t hold onto your own individual freedoms and liberties in your own state in a free country like America, how do you expect to have a voice or any influence in a global world?

I think @bkcunningham1 has it right – the UN can do little. Those of us in nominally participatory democracies should be doing more.

@iamthemob
What you’re saying makes sense, but I think the general attitude this census reveals is disturbing enough in its own right, even if their being the majority by a small margin doesn’t have significant consequences.
Like I said, it’s already sickening that the proportion of people who think gay people should die is anywhere remotely near half of the world. It’s the sort of insanity you would expect of a small fringe group of lunatics that nobody listens to, up there with neo-Nazis and suicide cults.

Maybe I’m stating the obvious. Never mind if I am.

@Fyrius – Having worked on the drafting of some UN resolutions, I’ll tell you that a lot of the drafting is about not saying something that will get the resolution defeated. It’s a diplomatic adventure.

In many ways, the behavior of the UN is only the mildest reflection of the tyranny under which many gay and lesbian people have to live. As suggested by your discussion of the trends, looking at the UN as an example is superfluous when we need only look at what the countries are doing out in the open domestically to determine that the concern is warranted.