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Clean environment could become U.N. human right

reuters.com

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Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#111

Post by commandlinefan »

mcdonje wrote: post #109
a_diplomat wrote: post #73

Hi. Diplomat working with UN issues here. The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such. So it's basically about using one set of issues, which in substance are hard to fight,…

Confused about how that works. I believe the part about authoritarians trying to trojan horse bills that erode our rights disguised as unobjectionable bills. We see it all the time with bills that restrict our right to privacy disguised as anti-child porn legislation. People who come out in favor of the 4th amendment are painted as vile criminals. That said, I don't see how it works in this instance. Care to elaborat…

My thought was that the "right" to a "clean environment" is, itself, a gift to authoritarians who will immediately use it to enact more taxes and restrict movement.

Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#113

Post by zohch »

breckenedge wrote: post #107
smoldesu wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I had to guess, it's because China is one of the most notoriously polluted countries that are also on the security council that will oversee this bill. While the United States and UK are pretty much guaranteed to veto, I think a lot of people are interpreting China as the swing vote here.

According to the article, Russia also opposes it in the current form. Doesn’t really matter since it’s non binding and there’s no hope of this being ratified by the US Congress.

Russia does not do anything of consequence without China's consent.

Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#114

Post by Kilonzus »

otrahuevada wrote: post #99
a_diplomat wrote: post #73

Hi. Diplomat working with UN issues here. The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such. So it's basically about using one set of issues, which in substance are hard to fight,…

I do not understand this framing. Not joking, it's just... how exactly does proposing a right to not live drenched in poison present a slippery slope like the one you're proposing? Procedurally, I mean. Presumably the same mechanisms used to vote for/against this could be used to prevent terrible people from pushing for terrible things?

Hey I'm not a diplomat but I believe the problem with this specific problem is that in the the case of 'right to clean environment' how to you protect your rights? Do you sue your neighbor for litter or the company down the street for emissions? How do you prove that emissions are out of control? Also how do developing nations who may not have the legal strength who are just as affected by pollution from developed nations exercise their rights?

Now the question of a slippery slope could be that with a right to clean environment developed nations could stifle growth and innovation in developing nations citing clean environment worries (maybe Nigeria and oil). This could go way deeper than oil however as any country trying to harvest any sort of natural resource can face scrutiny and potential action. In an extreme example developed nations could then say 'we will mine these resources because we can do it less intensively' robbing nations of potential nation building revenue. How would you combat this? Maybe a 'right to develop' and boom rights dilution and authoritative in nature. Perhaps am extreme example but extreme isn't too far with people involved.

Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#116

Post by puglr »

a_diplomat wrote: post #73

Hi. Diplomat working with UN issues here. The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such. So it's basically about using one set of issues, which in substance are hard to fight,…

> The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such.

It occurs to me that this same argument can be used against anything that ought to be enshrined at the UN as a human right. An obvious example being loving who you want without regard to sex or gender.

Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#117

Post by refurb »

mcdonje wrote: post #109
a_diplomat wrote: post #73

Hi. Diplomat working with UN issues here. The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such. So it's basically about using one set of issues, which in substance are hard to fight,…

Confused about how that works. I believe the part about authoritarians trying to trojan horse bills that erode our rights disguised as unobjectionable bills. We see it all the time with bills that restrict our right to privacy disguised as anti-child porn legislation. People who come out in favor of the 4th amendment are painted as vile criminals. That said, I don't see how it works in this instance. Care to elaborat…

Democracies criticize authoritarian country for torture which violates human rights.

Authoritarian country criticizes democracies for environmental “crimes” which violates human rights. Says they have no right to criticize since they also violate human rights.

Massive whatsboutism that detracts from the important issues.

Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#118

Post by mgbmtl »

shock-value wrote: post #101
mgbmtl wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All rights subjective and temporal. Just take the question of freedom of speech, and how that evolves in time, how it varies between countries (even between allied countries, such as the US and Canada). One could argue that the desire for an increased level of comfort of one set of people should not happen at the detriment of the right to clean water, for example, of another set of people. Many countries will have th…

As in this case, the "right" to clean water (or any other exhaustible resource) makes no sense -- at least if described in such blunt terms. Hypothetically, what happens in a drought, when there is no water for anyone? Have your rights been violated? If so, by whom? If it's rather described as a right to nondiscrimination in the distribution of clean water (with respect to some set of properties, which could include…

You're raising interesting questions. It's a hard topic, but I think it's inevitable that we will have to tackle some of those questions. Sometimes we want to avoid a debate because we don't know the solution, but a good debate helps us find a solution.

Not trying to deflect, just disagreeing with the OP's comment that such debates are BS.

Re: Clean environment could become U.N. human right

#119

Post by abduhl »

puglr wrote: post #116
a_diplomat wrote: post #73

Hi. Diplomat working with UN issues here. The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such. So it's basically about using one set of issues, which in substance are hard to fight,…

> The issue at hand here is not this resolution in itself. It's the fact that opening up human rights to "new" rights sets a precedent. And that precedent will be used by other countries to shift the language on human rights in a more authoritarian direction - or dilute human rights as such. It occurs to me that this same argument can be used against anything that ought to be enshrined at the UN as a human right. An…

Take the right you just proposed. Why is it limited to a “who”? Why is it linked to sex or gender? Is this a singular love or is polygamy a human right? Does love need to be reciprocated?

What’s the fundamental human right? Shouldn’t we be worried that these so-called human rights are being newly discovered relatively recently?

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