https://uk.yahoo.com/news/gay-sex-punishable-death-brunei-beginning-april-124016587.html
Bastards.
The UK should never have granted them independence, I don't care what a bunch of goody-goody anti-colonialist idiots say. Gay people are going to be stoned to death FFS!
To be fair Brunei is not the only country with death penalty codes for LGBT/Q, other countries across Africa and Asia have them, and the same death penalty codes apply to females found guilty of adultery.
Nothing can be done when the Republican-controlled government really does not care (in 2017 the US voted against a UN Resolution condemning those very laws in Brunei). The previous administration used every diplomatic weapon at its disposal to not only promote LGBT/Q equal rights/protections but to use trade negotiation pressure and US aid pressure and UN pressure to deal with countries like Brunei. Brunei's barbaric codes were brought to the attention of the Obama Administration because Brunei was a member of the TPP and involved in the negotiations, there was big blowback against the Obama Administration to either exclude Brunei and some other countries from the TPP because of human rights issues, or use the TPP negotiations to force countries to gut barbaric laws in exchange for a seat at the trade table. Nobody will ever know the impact the TPP could have had on forcing countries to pass laws eliminating barbaric criminal codes and enacting new laws providing equal rights and protections for all persons. Everybody screamed bloody murder against the TPP (and other multi-global trade pacts) when they should have screamed for trade negotiators to mandate a standard minimum of civil rights protections for all the countries involved in the deals, to mandate increased human rights protects across the board, in addition to the labour rights and environmental protections that were already on the table. The Obama Administration was at least trying.
https://medium.com/the-trans-pacific-partnership-intellectual/the-trans-pacific-partnership-brunei-trade-and-human-rights-67a665fd3342
In theory what you're saying sounds great, but do you honestly think the TPP would have resulted in greater pressure on states like Brunei to abide by civilised human rights practices, or do you think it would simply have led towards us building closer trade relations with countries that continue to brutalise its citizens on the basis of their sexuality and gender?
As an aside, I am a Remainer/supporter of the EU, because of it had developed into a political, as well as economic, union, that requires certain minimum human rights standards of its members (hence why Turkey has no chance in hell of joining anytime soon), but TPP was envisioned simply as a trading pact with very little political teeth.
I definitely think global trade pacts and general international pressure works, the international blowback against the Obama Administration I referred to forced Brunei to delay the implementation of the very laws they're now implementing. (Obama's trade negotiators did not "reward" Sharia Law like the TPP critics claimed....)
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-brunei-lgbt-laws/brunei-urged-to-halt-introduction-of-strict-new-anti-lgbt-laws-idUSKCN1R61M9
I definitely think an intelligent government that wields the Clinton/Obama Smart Power model the way Clinton/Obama did, turns the UN into their "b!tch" like Obama and Clinton and Samantha Powers did, engages all-year-round in global trade pacts (like Obama's people did) because doing so gives the US the upper-hand over the countries involved in trade talks, and quietly spends money like Obama did (Smart Power) financing organizations that specialize in the on-the-ground international combatting of discrimination/violence/etc against LGBT/Q (and other persecuted groups) in regions across Asia/Africa, does force countries that both want and need to be part of those global trade pacts (or wants/needs to be on the intentional stage) to get transparent and adhere to a minimum standard of civilised human rights practices in order to remain a trade partner and win all the economic benefits. Countries will not change unless they have an incentive to do so, a trade incentive, a seat at the UN, a chair at the World Bank, etc. Without the US leading the way, countries like Brunei (and institutions like the UN.........) revert backwards. You have to negotiate with human rights abusers (including the al-Qaida, the Taliban, the ISIS, etc) to get them to change. Obama did have success with Saudi Arabia for a while, Saudi Arabia did upgrade their laws regarding women's rights, but Saudi has regressed with Trump/Republicans in power.
https://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/07/world/united-states-to-use-aid-to-promote-gay-rights-abroad.html
Multinational corporations do not care about human rights. How can you let yourself be deluded into thinking these deals are about protecting homos rather than dominating heteros and homos alike?
share"Everybody screamed bloody murder against the TPP (and other multi-global trade pacts) when they should have screamed for trade negotiators to mandate a standard minimum of civil rights protections for all the countries involved in the deals, to mandate increased human rights protects across the board, in addition to the labour rights and environmental protections that were already on the table. The Obama Administration was at least trying."
I agree, and this is where I really fault Obama in that he wasn't a good communicator once he'd get elected. Instead of keeping his base informed he kept the TPP negotiations opaque. The rank and file left that should have been his natural allies were left in the dark to assume the worst about TPP from leaks. It really is a shame. Perhaps he felt publicly explaining his reasoning might sound too condescending, but the idea of having to do so seemed to really turn him off.
^ Yep
"New law" from a few thousand years ago, blinged up a bit with a 24 hour hotline where you can report un-Islamic behaviour or any behaviour against public or national interests
In September the government announced it had set up a hotline to encourage people to report fake or malicious information circulated on social media that involved public or national interests.
https://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/hrrpt/2018/eap/289031.htm
When Uganda did the same thing (encouraging violence against LGBT/Q) during the Obama Years: The United States imposed economic sanctions against Uganda in June 2014 in response to the law, the World Bank indefinitely postponed a $90 million aid loan to Uganda and the governments of Denmark, the Netherlands, Sweden and Norway halted aid to Uganda in opposition to the law; the Ugandan government defended the bill and rejected condemnation of it, with the country's authorities stating President Museveni wanted "to demonstrate Uganda's independence in the face of Western pressure and provocation".
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/religion/us-evangelicals-on-the-defense-over-ugandas-new-anti-homosexuality-act/2014/03/04/e91c3b56-a3e9-11e3-b865-38b254d92063_story.html?utm_term=.896a9c539194
Have you considered the TPP was kept secret for a reason? I've never heard anyone else ever criticize Obama for not being a good communicator. He had an entire staff and complicit media for that.
Leaks weren't the problem, nor are they ever.
You missed the point. After all the details of TPP came out, it turned out to be a far better agreement than the left was imagining. That's a failure by Obama to communicate and allay the fears of his base. Instead TPP was so unpopular because of the secret nature of the negotiations that Hillary had to take a position against it before the primaries even started because of how popular Bernie was for opposing it.
That's just a failure to communicate on Obama's part.
Nothing can be done when the Republican-controlled government
So why weren't you in Iraq?
shareLovely country...
shareIt's their country. If you don't like it, you can always invade them any time you want.
Pssst... they have oil!