• ButtigiegMineralMap@lemmygrad.ml
      391·
      1 year ago

      Smh so disappointing they’re like “well we have agricultural safety concerns and we aren’t sure that the policy would work as intended…so let them starve instead nothing we can do so sad”

      • DamarcusArt@lemmygrad.ml
        18·
        1 year ago

        Mask slipping moment there. I think their real motivation is more like this:

        “We would lose global influence if food were a human right, as we heavily subsidise our food industry so we can export it for cheap, destroying local food production in other countries and forcing them to be reliant on our “humanitarian” aid.”

        • ButtigiegMineralMap@lemmygrad.ml
          9·
          1 year ago

          Oh no doubt, but they can’t go out and say that, I just mean their “official” statement is extremely disappointing because they’d only release a statement on a UN vote like that if they know it’s fucked up. Obviously they give the most professional sounding excuse but that “professional” excuse of theirs is especially disrespectful given the fact that we all know they’re lying on top of being just legitimately evil

    • TheGamingLuddite [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
      424·
      1 year ago

      Taiwan has a limited status in some international organizations under the name “Chinese Taipei” (this name greatly angers Taiwanese ultranationalists so I use it whenever possible), but the UN recognizes it as part of China.

      There’s a video of the UN voting on the PRC’s membership to the exclusion of Taiwan, the entire room laughs when America casts its vote and there’s an interview somewhere with a RoC diplomat whining about their “true democracy and freedom” despite the RoC being a one-party white terror regime.

          • ∞🏳️‍⚧️Edie [it/its]@lemmygrad.ml
            72·
            1 year ago

            I looked into it a little. The meeting records (see A/PV.1976 below the video) states that they are voting on A/L.632, which is:

            The General Assembly,
            Recalling the provisions of the Charter of the United Nations,
            Decides that any proposal in the General Assembly which would result in depriving the Republic of China of representation in the United Nations is an important question under Article 18 of the Charter.

            Article 18, §2:

            Decisions of the General Assembly on important questions shall be made by a two-thirds majority of the member present and voting.

            So, indirectly they are trying to split them. But the vote is not directly on that.

              • MelianPretext@lemmygrad.ml
                5·
                1 year ago

                @ComradeEd@lemmygrad.ml @satori@hexbear.net Having gone through my own reading rabbit-hole on UN diplomacy in the past, I can clarify: The vote was on passing the “important question” scheme that the US first devised in 1961. Every time a motion in the UNGA was put forth to restore the UN seat to China, the US inserted a preliminary amendment to have the motion considered a “important question,” which would require a supermajority rather than a simple majority for it to then pass. This blocked China’s membership for 10 years until 1971. This is why the vote in the video has the US and its underlings voting in the affirmative and why the Assembly laughed, because by the US’ turn to vote, it was already clear that the UNGA majority would reject the supermajority amendment and thus be able to restore China’s membership.

                The end came abruptly for the Taiwanese delegation. On October 26, 1971, the General Assembly narrowly rejected the “important question” resolution, which would have required a two-thirds majority to replace Taiwan with the Communist government. Anticipating the inevitable next step, the Taiwanese delegation walked out of the General Assembly moments before the lopsided vote that formally evicted them. In that instant, Chiang Kai-shek’s government lost all rights at the United Nations, including the coveted council seat. It was just as well that the Taiwanese had left. Many delegations broke into wild applause—and even dancing—as the results were announced. Finally, after twenty-five years of exclusion. Communist China would be in the inner sanctum.

                Bosco, D. 2009. Five to Rule Them All: The UN Security Council and the Making of the Modern World. Oxford.

              • ∞🏳️‍⚧️Edie [it/its]@lemmygrad.ml
                22·
                1 year ago

                the eleventh hour american proposal

                Not exactly “eleventh hour”, it was submitted on the 29th of Sept, 4 days after the Albanian (et al.) proposal on the 25th of Sept. A truely eleventh hour proposal can be seen with the Saudi Arabian A/L.638 submitted on the day of the vote (25 Oct.)

                Also… From A/PV.1976:

                Mr. MALILE (Albania):
                […]
                73. The explanations we have heard here concerning draft resolution A/L.632 are completely unfounded. This draft is basically an integral part of the anti-Chinese attempt of the United States of America to legalize its “two Chinas” plot and is designed to sabotage the approval of the draft resolution of the 23 States, including Albania [referring to A/L.630, which would expel the RoC and invite the PRC. It became the draft that was adopted]. The content of such a draft is illegal. It seeks to open the way to the United States manoeuvre aimed at involving the United Nations in the domestic affairs of the Chinese people, which is the aim of draft resolution A/L.633 [keeping the RoC in the UN, but replacing it with PRC on Security Council]. As has been clearly pointed out, that draft resolution is in flagrant contradiction with Article 18 of the Charter. It goes without saying that the Article cannot be applied to our draft resolution.

  • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
    10103·
    1 year ago

    This is one of the greatest examples of virtue signaling I think I have ever seen. I’ll ask three questions. If you can answer all three, I think the problem with this is very obvious.

    1. Who among these countries do you think would be responsible for footing the bill on this one?

    2. Which of these countries is currently the greatest contributor of global humanitarian aid the world has ever known?

    3. What is stopping any of these countries from banding together without the US and making their beautiful dream a reality without this pointless resolution?

    Smear campaigns work better when they’re not completely transparent.

      • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
        159·
        1 year ago

        1. I refer to #3, why don’t they just do it then?

        2. I didn’t say per capita. You love that oil money don’t you?

        3. Yes, the US is purposely starving the world.

        You’re lying to yourself and everyone else. Stop being a bad person.

        • New0@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
          107·
          1 year ago

          Yes, the US is purposely starving the world.

          Yep. I doubt you’ll care to read the following but I’m putting it here for others to see.

          The United States is the world leader in imposing economic sanctions and supports sanctions regimes affecting nearly 200 million people. … Targeted countries experience economic contractions and, in many cases, are unable to import sufficient essential goods, including essential medicines, medical equipment, infrastructure necessary for clean water and for health care, and food. … While on paper most sanctions have some humanitarian exemptions for food, necessary medicines and medical supplies, in practice these exemptions are not sufficient to ensure access to these goods within the targeted country. (Center for Economic and Policy Research)

          It’s well known that sanctions are ineffective for pressuring governments, but very effective at waging siege warfare by starving and killing ordinary citizens by disease and infrastructural failures. Continuing to use sanctions in this way and to this extent, when this is well known, is definitely “purposely starving the world”. An independent expert appointed by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in 2019 that US sanctions violate human rights and international code of conduct and can lead to starvation. Why does the US continue to be the world leader in imposing sanctions, increasing its use of sanctions by 933% over the last 20 years, when this is well known? It’s because they know the effect, and they’re doing it on purpose.

          We can also look at some US internal memorandums from before it was more politically incorrect to talk about starving people in other countries. In 1960, U.S. officials wrote that creating “disenchantment and disaffection based on economic dissatisfaction and hardship” through denying money and supplies to Cuba would be a method they should pursue in order to “bring about hunger, desperation and overthrow of government” in Cuba.

          In other countries, we see a pattern of US officials and US-backed institutions purposely denying aid and loans to governments they don’t approve of, and then suddenly approving aid and opening up loans when a coup brings a leader they’re happy with into power. When Ghana was requesting aid under an administration that the West’s bourgeoisie didn’t like, U.S. officials said this: “We and other Western countries (including France) have been helping to set up the situation by ignoring Nkrumah’s pleas for economic aid. The new OCAM (Francophone) group’s refusal to attend any OAU meeting in Accra (because of Nkrumah’s plotting) will further isolate him. All in all, looks good.” The “situation” they were helping to set up was a coup they knew was going to happen. After a US-friendly coup took place, suddenly it was time to give the “almost pathetically pro-Western” government a gift of “few thousand tons of surplus wheat or rice”, knowing that giving little gifts like this “whets their appetites” for further collaboration with the US. You will find the same song and dance in numerous other countries, Chile being a well-documented example, if you simply look for it.

          The US imposes starvation and depravation of other countries on purpose, using it as an economic wrecking ball, then pats itself on the back for giving “aid” to the countries which have been hollowed out by such tactics.

          The loans which magically become available to countries that meet the US approval standards are not so pretty either, as a former IMF senior economist said, he may only hope “to wash my hands of what in my mind’s eye is the blood of millions of poor and starving peoples”, there not being “enough soap in the world” to wash away what has been done to the global south through the calculated fraud of the IMF, whose tactics are designed to accomplish the same kind of goals as the sanctions are–to prevent the economic rise of any country but the US by wrecking its competitors economically, tearing apart their local manufacturing capacity and transforming them into mere resource extraction projects, redirecting their agricultural industries into exports to make sure they reach a level where they are more reliant on imports to feed themselves, and reliant on foreign aid which is ripped away whenever they do not do what the US approves of or make friends with who the US wants them to.

          I refer to #3, why don’t they just do it then?

          This is what secondary sanctions and the US’s various protection rackets have always been designed to prevent, which has definitely been a powerful tool for them, but it seems with the rise of the new non-aligned movement and de-dollarization its becoming a less successful one and we can see countries “just doing” what they want more and more while the US leadership waves around, as usual, more sanctions and military threats in response.

        • Cyber Ghost@lemmygrad.mlOP
          77·
          1 year ago

          The USA starves the world because desperate and hungry people are easier to exploit. Starving people and preventing people from getting accessible food serves their corporate interest because they can keep rising food prices.

          • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
            246·
            1 year ago

            Then why the hell is the US the largest contributor of global humanitarian aid? They’re not just evil right? They’re even bad at being evil.

            Your life must be so simple. Never had to form a complex thought, eh?

            • Gay_Tomato [they/them, it/its]@hexbear.netEnglish
              59·
              1 year ago

              Your life must be so simple. Never had to form a complex thought, eh?

              The level of projection is real. It must be so simple for you to just follow the status quo right? Just have to keep your head empty and mindlessly repeat state department talking points. No commie propaganda can enter if you keep filing your skull with imaginary accomplishments and a constant reminder that being American definitely makes you very, very, special. freedom-and-democracy

            • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
              57·
              1 year ago

              I literally have this link bookmarked for dipshits like you.

              Aid in reverse: how poor countries develop rich countries

              We have long been told a compelling story about the relationship between rich countries and poor countries. The story holds that the rich nations of the OECD give generously of their wealth to the poorer nations of the global south, to help them eradicate poverty and push them up the development ladder. Yes, during colonialism western powers may have enriched themselves by extracting resources and slave labour from their colonies – but that’s all in the past. These days, they give more than $125bn (£102bn) in aid each year – solid evidence of their benevolent goodwill.

              This story is so widely propagated by the aid industry and the governments of the rich world that we have come to take it for granted. But it may not be as simple as it appears.

              The US-based Global Financial Integrity (GFI) and the Centre for Applied Research at the Norwegian School of Economics recently published some fascinating data. They tallied up all of the financial resources that get transferred between rich countries and poor countries each year: not just aid, foreign investment and trade flows (as previous studies have done) but also non-financial transfers such as debt cancellation, unrequited transfers like workers’ remittances, and unrecorded capital flight (more of this later). As far as I am aware, it is the most comprehensive assessment of resource transfers ever undertaken.

              What they discovered is that the flow of money from rich countries to poor countries pales in comparison to the flow that runs in the other direction.

              In 2012, the last year of recorded data, developing countries received a total of $1.3tn, including all aid, investment, and income from abroad. But that same year some $3.3tn flowed out of them. In other words, developing countries sent $2tn more to the rest of the world than they received. If we look at all years since 1980, these net outflows add up to an eye-popping total of $16.3tn – that’s how much money has been drained out of the global south over the past few decades. To get a sense for the scale of this, $16.3tn is roughly the GDP of the United States.

              What this means is that the usual development narrative has it backwards. Aid is effectively flowing in reverse. Rich countries aren’t developing poor countries; poor countries are developing rich ones.

              Foreign aid from the West is literally a scam to cover up vast flows of money and resources away from the developing world and towards developed countries. It is the equivalent of the Gates’ of the world donating 0.00000001% of their daily income to charity and the media getting on their knees and fellating them for it. And, as others have said, even the absolutely paltry sums of money donated in foreign aid by the West merely ends up back in the hands of their own investors, because developing countries exist merely as debt peons to be endlessly harvested, without meaningfully developing them.

              This is the face of modern imperialism.

            • Flyberius [comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
              56·
              1 year ago

              It’s PR to fool people like you. The US is a fucking cancer, and even their foreign aid is mostly used to employ US citizens and to perform PR for image conscious billionaires. I actually work in foreign aid and it disgusts me how much of the budgets we are assigned goes straight back to Western companies.

            • Cyber Ghost@lemmygrad.mlOP
              572·
              1 year ago

              The USA is the most evil country in the world. No other country comes close it. And most of the “aid” goes back to the same pockets of the investors who give it, but now it is all tax free. Just check out all the tax evasion for millionaires that the Gates Foundation and many others have done! The USA fucks over every single country, especially poor ones!

            • sicaniv@lemmygrad.ml
              51·
              1 year ago

              https://english.news.cn/20220923/c3265b00ba9d4538a25e35060b3103e5/c.html

              https://m.economictimes.com/news/company/corporate-trends/ugly-truths-of-ngo-funding-helping-hand-vs-foreign-hand/articleshow/12125056.cms

              You have to be so fucking shitlib to acknowledge that USA provide humanitarian aid to some country without any ulterior motives. They are not just aids but debt traps, that those countries repay by giving USA the access to their country’s resources and market at any cost. And if those countries don’t comply then USA starts providing more aid to groups opposit to govt and ultimately topple the govt.

              • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
                223·
                1 year ago

                The solipsism is sounding here. The world was not always as it is now. Conquest was the way the world worked for a very long time. You think these people had any concept of the damage they were doing? All you have to do is take the one extra conceptual step. Don’t be so lazy.

                • TarkovSurvivor@lemmygrad.ml
                  56·
                  1 year ago

                  Even in the earliest days of European colonialism, there was very much a concept of the damage being done, look up Bartolomé de las Casas and educate yourself.

        • WhatWouldKarlDo@lemmygrad.ml
          601·
          1 year ago
          1. Why do you think they didn’t? They just voted for it at the UN.
          2. Okay then, China if you want most overall.
          3. Yes

          Stop lying and be a better person.

          • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
            231·
            1 year ago

            1. If they had, why isn’t the world completely fed? Surely if every other country donated half their GDP, then the world is solved.

            2. Developmental aid is not humanitarian aid. Maybe learn, instead of googling for facts that support your position, then trying to pass them off as your own ideas. Have you ever read a book?

            3. History has context, leave your bubble just for a second and try to be more than a parrot. I wish you could see the absurdity of mentioning China’s nation building efforts, then citing this article at me. You’re clearly a stooge. Congratulations.

            • WhatWouldKarlDo@lemmygrad.ml
              53·
              1 year ago
              1. Because shit happens. Why isn’t everyone in the US fed? Half of your GDP should surely feed the people.
              2. I read in a book once that if you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach him to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.
              3. You’re a fucking idiot.
              • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
                127·
                1 year ago

                1. Because saying that people need food doesn’t magically put it in their mouths. It’s nice that you believe a UN resolution would though.

                2. How would you split it? Just fuck the natural disaster victims, right?

                3. You’ve really proven your intellect with this one.

                • silent_water [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
                  41·
                  1 year ago
                  1. we literally pay farmers to destroy food - enough food to feed every starving person in the country. we do so solely to prop up the ag lobby.

                  the rest of your post makes no sense.

        • Addfwyn@lemmygrad.ml
          503·
          1 year ago

          Yes, the US is purposely starving the world.

          Unironically yes. While the US is particularly fond of bombs and drones, another favourite weapon of theirs is starving the countries of people who have the audacity to disagree with them. See: Cuba*, DPRK. As a bonus, they even get to blame the countries they are starving for the lack of food.

          Not even only other countries, the US is happy to do it to their own people because the hungry are easier to exploit. The US has an absolute staggering amount of food waste, it is the largest component of most US landfills. They’d sooner throw away food before giving it to the needy. In many cases, they will punish you for giving it to the needy (see the charitable organizations repeatedly fined in Texas for feeding the homeless).

          *Incidentally this exact same map can be used for countries voting to end the US sanctions of Cuba.

          • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
            127·
            1 year ago

            Take a look at what uralsolo had to say. The US is starving the world by forcing them to grow certain crops. And you say the US is starving the world by not trading with them. The cognitive dissonance is astounding.

              • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
                124·
                1 year ago

                Right, but you can’t have it both ways. Are countries better off of their agriculture is dictated, or not? Why is it the responsibility of the US?

                • sicaniv@lemmygrad.ml
                  40·
                  1 year ago

                  USA is shit. No one gives any responsibility to US. US can’t even take the responsibility of their own people. Because if it could, there won’t be so much deaths due to health care system failure in COVID. You have to be so bright bourgeois ass licker to ignore any thing critical to US, so shamelessly.

          • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
            127·
            1 year ago

            I’m sure China would abide by this if it passed. This is definitely not a bad faith argument.

              • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
                123·
                1 year ago

                Fair, I shouldn’t have speculated like that. However, my argument is that the whole vote was a charade. If China knew the US was going to veto this, then their vote is meaningless.

                • ∞🏳️‍⚧️Edie [it/its]@lemmygrad.ml
                  462·
                  1 year ago

                  This isn’t the security council, or anywhere else, where the U.S. has veto rights. This (the Third Committee) seems to run on “majority yes” voting (i.e. if enough vote yes, it is adopted).

    • aaaaaaadjsf [he/him, comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
      871·
      1 year ago

      parenti " foreign aid is when the poor people of a rich country give money to the rich people of a poor country." parenti

      Myths of “Humanitarian” Intervention

      CONTRARY TO POPULAR belief, U.S. leaders are no different from those of most other countries in that they have a dismal humanitarian record.

      True, many nations including this one have sent relief abroad in response to particular disasters.But these sporadic actions are limited in scope, do not represent an essential policy commitment, and obscure the many occasions when governments choose to do absolutely nothing for other peoples in dire straits.

      In addition, most U.S. aid missions serve as pretexts for hidden political agendas. They are intended to bolster conservative procapitalist regimes, build infrastructures (roads, ports, office complexes) that assist big investors, lend a cover for counterinsurgency programs, and undermine local agrarian self-sufficiency by driving independent farmers off lands that are then taken over by corporate agribusiness.

    • Anarcho-Bolshevik@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
      78·
      1 year ago

      I don’t understand why everybody is downvoting you. It’s a well known fact that throughout its 247 years of existence, the United States has literally never committed a single atrocity. I’m not saying the United States is perfect; maybe it committed an atrocity or two a couple of times, but nothing that was a big deal.

      • sinovictorchan@lemmygrad.ml
        24·
        1 year ago

        There are the Indian Residential fake school genocide that continued after the Cold War, the subjugation of communities of freed slaves, the Black Wall Street massacre, the Cold War massacre against a mass of peaceful workers who demand meritocracy on the excuse that human rights advocate are evil Soviet agents, and the current planned illegal dumping of hazardous landfills and industrial chemical waste (which contains components of the chemical weapons by British in WW1) onto to the lands of First Nations and African American communities to poison the water and food sources.

    • CannotSleep420@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
      76·
      1 year ago

      Would you look at that: a brainless NPC wandered into the thread. You’re even more confidently wrong than the average redditor. That’s almost impressive.

    • monobot@lemmygrad.ml
      711·
      1 year ago

      Only about 2.

      US doesn’t have ‘aid’, they call it ‘aid’ but is usually corruption money or loan.

      For example, take a look at what is Ukraine getting. Not aid, most of it is some kind of loan.

      I think definition of aid is that they don’t own anything in return, but US is not using it like that.

      • YoungBelden [any]@hexbear.netEnglish
        14·
        1 year ago

        Also this thread is a good summary: https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1493599447904931847.html

        In 2015, the North’s net appropriation from the South included:

        • 12 billion tons of embodied raw material equivalents
        • 822 million hectares of embodied land
        • 21 Exajoules of embodied energy
        • 188 million person-years of embodied labour

        To put these figures in perspective:

        • 12 billion tons of raw material equivalents is 43% of the North’s annual material consumption. In other words, nearly half of the North’s material consumption is net appropriated from the South.
        • 822 million hectares of land (more than twice the size of India), would in theory be enough to provide nutritious food for up to 6 billion people, depending on land productivity and diet.
        • 21 Exajoules of energy would be enough to cover the annual energy requirements of building infrastructure to ensure that all 6.5 billion people in the global South have access to decent housing, public transport, healthcare, education, sanitation, communication, etc.

        In other words, all of this productive capacity could be used to provide for local human needs, but instead it is roped into servicing capital accumulation in the North. Patterns of net appropriation reproduce deprivation in the South.

    • comradePuffin@lemmygrad.ml
      59·
      1 year ago

      What bill needs to be footed? The vote was to make food a right, not force a single country to pay for the cost of food. Please learn to read and understand what you are reading. Worrying about a non-existent “bill” is purely ideological.

      • Cyber Ghost@lemmygrad.mlOP
        55·
        1 year ago

        That is what right wingers do. They get too emotional to read and they argue to death based on their own created misinformation.

        • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
          131·
          1 year ago

          This is what children do, they look for a boogie man and demonize them without evidence.

          You have no idea what you’re talking about.

      • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
        224·
        1 year ago

        Then what’s the point? Why even have this vote? Could it be that they’re trying to signal how virtuous they are?

        • comradePuffin@lemmygrad.ml
          46·
          1 year ago

          The point is to limit the ability of multinational corporations, and the countries that act as their muscle, to create famines though prioritizeing exports and price gouging. This makes food something that people have a right to, rather than a commodity that should be sold only to whom it can make the most profit from. Check out what happened to push bottled water over public water fountains.

        • Platomus@lemm.ee
          25·
          1 year ago

          Have you learned anything from these comments and responses you’ve gotten?

          Like I need to know. I need to know if you’ve reflected at all.

      • BossColo@lemmy.sdf.org
        132·
        1 year ago

        Stick your head in the sand just a little deeper and maybe you can shut out rational thought completely.

            • Cyber Ghost@lemmygrad.mlOP
              39·
              1 year ago

              I am not a thought zombie. But being that is better than being at constant war with information. Since you seem to be in a exclusive romantic relationship with misinformation.

              • redtea@lemmygrad.ml
                13·
                1 year ago

                Since you seem to be in a exclusive romantic relationship with misinformation.

                Cyber Ghost of Marxist Dunkers Past

        • sicaniv@lemmygrad.ml
          29·
          1 year ago

          So much of rational thought build up from consuming too much bourgeois propaganda aka liberal media bullshit. Keep doing that and try to reply to every comment made here instead of nit picking the name calling ones. Good luck.

    • HellAwaits@lemm.eeEnglish
      29·
      1 year ago

      virtue signaling was the “woke” word before “woke”.

      You can’t even use that word in the correct context, so kindly delete your lemmy account.