Political Asylum for Persecuted Homosexuals

[Pumpkin Seeds]

 No, really isn’t.  Neither is the definition of a child or how children are viewed across many different cultures.

[Silk]

Besides legal mandates ages, may you give some examples?

[Pumpkin Seeds]

The difference in age mandated by laws is a fairly important distinction to simply place aside.  One culture or country views age of consent at 18 while another might view this age at 15.  That is a large difference to blanket over when crafting a human right dealing with sexuality.  I doubt there are many parents in the United States that would enjoy being reprimanded by the police for violating their daughter’s human right to have sex with her boyfriend.  Some cultures view a woman at the age of puberty as being ready for marriage.  The Yemen have set that age as low as nine. 

There are children in El Salvador that work in dangerous mines.  They smoke, drink and work instead of going to school.  Not so long ago children would work in factories in the United States under near slave like conditions.  The modern view of childhood did not come about till this past century and late into that century.  From one state to the next in the United States the laws regarding age of consent vary greatly and can differ based on conditions, such as if the woman has had a baby.  So if the age of consent varies so wildly in one country, a reasonable assumption is to assume that across vastly different cultures there is the same variation.

[mystictiger]

We in the west treat it as axiomatic that freedom is a good thing. We do this because one of the fundamental norms of our societal-legal structures are that we generally believe that democratic liberalism and respect for human rights is a Good Thing (tm).

Our laws, though, are only laws because they have a legitimising force behind them - that of the due process of law-formation. In the UK this is an act of parliament as discussed and voted on by our elected representatives.

What happens when the legislature of another country does something that we don't approve of? A legislature can do anything they want, provided that their domestic constitutional system mandates it. In a culture as rampantly homophobic as Uganda, this will include outlawing acts such as sodomy, male-male or female-female intercourse. It is therefore possible to be homosexual, just not to practice it.

Telling another country how to run itself is the height of 1st world arrogance. We might as well recolonize people.

[Oniya]

In regard to children, that depends on the country.  Notice the marriage clause in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights does not mention age.

Regardless, it's not proper to conflate homosexuality with pedophilia or bestiality, as the post above mine appeared to do.

[Zakharra]

Telling another country how to run itself is the height of 1st world arrogance. We might as well recolonize people.

Some places are so bad, it would be an improvement.

[mystictiger]

Some places are so bad, it would be an improvement.

How dare you say that? Why are you right and why is conforming to your views an improvement?

I thought it was my job to tell people how they should run their countries as white British male lawyer ;)

[Florence]

How dare you say that? Why are you right and why is conforming to your views an improvement?

I thought it was my job to tell people how they should run their countries as white British male lawyer ;)

Well, in countries where innocent people are being killed thanks to bigotry, religious extremism... I'm pretty sure they could use a few pointers. Yes, morals are shaped by culture and circumstance, but are we really going to entertain the idea that perhaps freedom and ethnic cleansing are on the same moral grounds just because their culture says it's good?

[Jude]

Who are we to say that the Germans shouldn't be killing Jews.  What they're doing might be what's right for their culture in that time and place.  Maybe when you shoot them in the back of the head while they're on their knees in front of a grave they dug for themselves the gunshot wound spouts out golden coins, precious stones, and candy!  After all, jew is the first 3 letters in jewel.

/Godwin

(Please don't take this post too seriously)

[Xenophile]

Who are we to say that the Germans shouldn't be killing Jews.  What they're doing might be what's right for their culture in that time and place.  Maybe when you shoot them in the back of the head while they're on their knees in front of a grave they dug for themselves the gunshot wound spouts out golden coins, precious stones, and candy!  After all, jew is the first 3 letters in jewel.

/Godwin

But in all seriousness, back to the topic.

Isn't it fairly assumed that sending someone back to the country of their origins, and for -whatever- reason they will face death and torture on their return, isn't the guilt on the hands of the people who deports the immigrant? Especially if the individual in question has "committed a despicable act" that is protected by international laws, such as the United Nation's resolution concerning sexual disposition?

[Braioch]

I fail to see how this resembles policing another country at all. (my country is seducing that oh so delicate line with the middle east right now >.>)

She sought asylum in a country that didn't see anything wrong with the way she was. The alternative was going back to a country where her neighbors could have very well killed her because they despised her love of the female genitals. Oh not to mention the corrective rape going on for lesbians, that totally isn't illegal.

I would view it less as policing, as they aren't swooping in and taking all of GLBT people out of Uganda and locking down the whole place while slapping the hands of the leaders with squirt bottles in hand saying 'bad, bad!' They allowed this woman to be somewhere where she would have somewhere safe to live where she wouldn't have to worry about being beaten or raped. If I were to stretch it a bit, I'd say they gave the woman her basic human rights by giving her this new place, preventing bodily harm down to her and her life being made miserable by hateful communities.

[mystictiger]

Who are we to say that the Germans shouldn't be killing Jews.  What they're doing might be what's right for their culture in that time and place.  Maybe when you shoot them in the back of the head while they're on their knees in front of a grave they dug for themselves the gunshot wound spouts out golden coins, precious stones, and candy!  After all, jew is the first 3 letters in jewel.

Well, America and Britain did let the Jewish people die. The massive slaughter of Jews, homosexuals, gypsies, and the mentally deficient was not the reason for WW2. Do not kid yourself, or adopt your smug hindsight sense of superiority about this. The reason there was WW2 is because of the invasion of Poland.

This is also why we, the first world intervened to stop the genocide in Rwanda, to stop the exterminations going on Cambodia. And female genital mutilation in Africa. Or political repression in North Korea.

Oh wait.

We didn't.

Now, if the first world had had the stones to intervene then and say "Stop, what you are doing is wrong" then they would have the right to tell other countries how to act now. Instead the choice to only intervene in the easy cases makes your argument morally bankrupt.

Further, extermination based on religious-ethnic grounds is not the same thing as outlawing certain practices. It is an utterly invalid comparator - the choice to do so is pathetic. Why? Because I refuse to succumb to any easy 'get-out-of-debate-free' card based on my religion and heritage.

There are two choices. Complain or do something about it. When NATO bombed Serbia, it was the choice to try and do something about it, and this was met with international outcry.

[Xenophile]

Well, America and Britain did let the Jewish people die. The massive slaughter of Jews, homosexuals, gypsies, and the mentally deficient was not the reason for WW2. Do not kid yourself, or adopt your smug hindsight sense of superiority about this.

This is also why we, the first world intervened to stop the genocide in Rwanda, to stop the exterminations going on Cambodia. And female genital mutilation in Africa. Or political repression in North Korea.

Oh wait.

We didn't.

Now, if the first world had had the stones to intervene then and say "Stop, what you are doing is wrong" then they would have the right to tell other countries how to act now. Instead the choice to only intervene in the easy cases makes your argument morally bankrupt and indeed pathetic

Way to be hypocritical, boyo. Don't kid yourself to think that you're alone in noticing the simple fact that no one does anything without making sure they'll benefit from it on the international stage.

[mystictiger]

How am I being hypocritical?

I am adopting a position of non-intervention, because that is the only one borne out by international practice.

When states intervene, they do so because there is oil, because there is a chance to mangle a client-state of another power, not because human rights are being violated.

[Xenophile]

How am I being hypocritical?

I am adopting a position of non-intervention, because that is the only one borne out by international practice.

When states intervene, they do so because there is oil, because there is a chance to mangle a client-state of another power, not because human rights are being violated.

You attempted to point out perceived smugness Jude's post, and then you adopt a smug language yourself. That is hypocritical, and unnecessary on this forum.

[mystictiger]

The smugness is a natural feature of my approach.

What I was objecting to was the hindsight-ness of Jude's approach, not the smugness. His approach is one in which past events are treated with a morality not existent at that time.

Do we regard slavery as wrong now? Yes. Clearly it wasn't always perceived as universally wrong though.

At the time, Nazi extermination efforts were not a sufficient ill to provoke armed intervention. You cannot separte a historical event from its context.

[Xenophile]

The smugness is a natural feature of my approach.

What I was objecting to was the hindsight-ness of Jude's approach, not the smugness. His approach is one in which past events are treated with a morality not existent at that time.

Do we regard slavery as wrong now? Yes. Clearly it wasn't always perceived as universally wrong though.

At the time, Nazi extermination efforts were not a sufficient ill to provoke armed intervention. You cannot separate a historical event from its context.

You assume that the Nazi Extermination was well known. It only became wide-spread and common knowledge after the war. Before, and during, it was only know to the public that there had been a policy that restricted the freedoms of Jews (and other minorities). So it is very obvious that there had to be other causes to spark an intervention, as a policy that was only marginally more strict than the policies that they themselves used against the Negroes in the USA wouldn't be enough.

Still, Jude made a good point. It being sarcastic had nothing to do with smugness, as far as I'm willing to look at it.

[Zakharra]

The smugness is a natural feature of my approach.

What I was objecting to was the hindsight-ness of Jude's approach, not the smugness. His approach is one in which past events are treated with a morality not existent at that time.

Do we regard slavery as wrong now? Yes. Clearly it wasn't always perceived as universally wrong though.

At the time, Nazi extermination efforts were not a sufficient ill to provoke armed intervention. You cannot separte a historical event from its context.

I was under the impression that the Germans did not start extermninating the Jews, gypsies and other 'undesirables'  until several years after WWII started.

[Xenophile]

I was under the impression that the Germans did not start extermninating the Jews, gypsies and other 'undesirables'  until several years after WWII started.

There where discussions on how to deal with ze Jews. But the technical genocide began as soon as the Nazis came into power, and the first of the camps (though more for political dissidents) where built in as early as 1933. The first Death Camps, built specifically to be part of the Final Solution, where built in 1942.

But plenty of people where killed in camps before the war, like invalids and communists. Hell, there where even plenty of people that just died conveniently after medical check-ups.

[Valerian]

*nudges topic back on track*

Please be careful with the accusations.  No one should be resorting to sarcasm, insults, or even extreme smugness.  All you're doing is distracting people from the content of your message (which is what we should be concerned with) by encouraging them to focus instead on the way in which you present your ideas.

[Jude]

I wasn't trying to be a jerk, I was just trying to have a little good-natured humor, I apologize :(

You make a good point Mystic even if I disagree.

EDIT:  And I was working on that before Val posted... I feel the need to emphasize this, because I like you a lot Mystic and don't want you thinking I just posted that apology because a moderator stepped in.

[Oniya]

Quirk's Exception:
Intentional invocation of Godwin's Law is ineffectual.


Back to the topic at hand, I think that the problem is that - rather than entering the UK and immediately seeking asylum, the woman in question entered the UK and waited until she was caught as an illegal immigrant before seeking asylum.  I still believe that she should be able to apply somewhere (maybe the UK might not be the best idea for her at the moment) to avoid being sent back to a place where she could suffer severe bodily harm and/or death.

[Xenophile]

Quirk's Exception:
Intentional invocation of Godwin's Law is ineffectual.


Back to the topic at hand, I think that the problem is that - rather than entering the UK and immediately seeking asylum, the woman in question entered the UK and waited until she was caught as an illegal immigrant before seeking asylum.  I still believe that she should be able to apply somewhere (maybe the UK might not be the best idea for her at the moment) to avoid being sent back to a place where she could suffer severe bodily harm and/or death.

Sweden would make for a good option. That country already accept about 50% of all immigrants moving into Europe.

[Sure]

Sweden would make for a good option. That country already accept about 50% of all immigrants moving into Europe.

If you're denied asylum into one EU country, none of the others can take you. It's to prevent people from applying for asylum again and again until they're accepted, then moving to a country that rejected them.

Anyway, I'm not sure if the US would let her in, but the US does accept more refugees than any other country (in fact, if you take the top ten refugee accepting countries, the US accepts more than twice the amount of the other nine combined, if I recall). The thing is that it is notoriously random to get chosen since there's a cap on the amount of people let in and the guidelines are somewhat vague.

[Serephino]

I honestly don't see how this can be tied to trying to police other countries.  By giving this woman asylum, the country wouldn't be telling Uganda that they can't have such laws, only giving the woman a safe place to go.  At most, it would be a statement that the country in question doesn't agree with Uganda's laws, which I don't see as a horrible thing. 

This woman is in fear for life.  She doesn't want to live in Uganda because of their laws.  This is only my opinion of course, but I think it should be a basic human right to be able to leave a country where you don't feel safe, and seek protection in a country where you will be protected, regardless of why you don't feel safe.

Of course, that's not to say people should be able to seek asylum for any silly reason, but if they have just cause to believe they are in danger...