no propaganda please Loc: moon orbiting the third rock from the sun

Emilie Kao is director of the Richard and Helen DeVos Center for Religion & Civil Society at The Heritage Foundation.
Portrait of Grace Melton

Grace Melton

Grace Melton is an associate for social issues at the United Nations.

A dangerous alliance between United Nations bureaucrats and LGBT activists poses a new danger to free speech, free exercise of religion, and parental rights—not just for Americans but for people around the world.

Under the leadership of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Ambassador Nikki Haley, the Trump administration should strengthen protections of the fundamental human rights of Americans that are guaranteed in the U.S. Constitution and international treaties.

That would mark a significant break from the approach of the Obama administration, which joined forces with a handful of Western nations, the U.N. bureaucracy, and progressive activists to push policies based on rapidly changing ideas about sexual orientation and gender identity.

They did so with zero authority: None of these concepts are contained in any of the international treaties that the U.N. is authorized to enforce.

Now these policies are threatening to cost our rights—and the U.S. could foot the bill. The U.S. is responsible for 22 percent of the United Nations’ total budget and contributed $10 billion to the U.N. in 2016 alone.

American taxpayer money should not go toward an illiberal agenda that could undermine fundamental human rights.

UN Bureaucracy Run Amok

One of the most egregious examples of bureaucratic overreach occurred in the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Rather than focus on the U.N. General Assembly’s mandate to “promote and protect” the effective enjoyment of fundamental human rights that are in the texts of treaties, this U.N. office launched the Free and Equal campaign.

This highly visible and well-funded global campaign aims to socialize same-sex marriage, criminalize so-called “hate speech,” and normalize transgender ideology, even though the terms sexual orientation and gender identity are not in the text of any U.N. treaties.

This campaign is not only a massive overreach by U.N. bureaucracy, but it threatens to silence public debate on controversial topics like marriage and sexuality throughout the world.

Unfortunately, this campaign is just the beginning. Charles Radcliffe, Free and Equal’s founding director, has stated that a dozen U.N. agencies have made public commitments to advance sexual orientation and gender identity policies in individual member states and that more than 100 countries have implemented changes in their domestic laws in response to U.N. sexual orientation and gender identity recommendations.

Who pays for this bureaucratic overreach? Well, the U.N. Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights provides a leadership and coordination role for these policies about sexual orientation and gender identity. Its annual budget was $201.6 million, with 40 percent of its funding from the U.N. Of course, the U.N. gets over a fifth of its budget from the United States. Now the U.S. must leverage its funding to bring an end to these drastic ideologically-driven policies.

UN Policies Threaten Religious Freedom

Activists at the U.N. are attempting to impose their ideology in subtler ways, too. The addition of the sexual orientation and gender identity categories to interpretations of the term “nondiscrimination” in U.N. treaties may seem innocuous, but it is fraught with the potential to harm fundamental rights.

In Europe and the United States, progressives have used such nondiscrimination laws to force individuals to endorse a new sexual orthodoxy, including same-sex marriage, under threat of economic punishment.

The European Court of Human Rights upheld the United Kingdom government’s terminations of civil servants and private employees for refusing to perform services for same-sex marriages.

The United States Supreme Court is currently considering the case of a Christian cake artist whom Colorado ordered to endorse same-sex marriage by designing a custom wedding cake despite his religious objections.

The U.K. Supreme Court is hearing a similar case. None of these individuals turned someone away because they identify as LGBT; rather, the conflicts were all the result of disagreement over the definition of marriage.

No state, much less the unelected U.N. bureaucracy, should compel a person who believes that marriage is between one man and one woman to endorse something they believe is untrue because of pressure from a politically powerful identity group.

Free Speech Under Attack

Sexual orientation and gender identity nondiscrimination policies also threaten free speech.

European governments that are pressing for new sexual orientation and gender identity rights at the U.N. have used their domestic hate speech laws to enforce the new sexual orthodoxy. Belgium, Spain, Switzerland, and the U.K. have launched police investigations into “hate speech” based on statements made by clergy.

The Obama administration endorsed this approach by issuing a United States Agency for International Development document, “LGBT Vision for Action,” that explicitly endorsed the dangerous concept of “hate speech.”

Although 165 of 193 countries recognize only a marriage between a man and a woman and not a single U.N. treaty recognizes same-sex marriage, in 2014, then-U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon stated that the U.N. Secretariat would start recognizing same-sex marriages of U.N. employees.

Even more concerning and with implications for what constitutes “hate speech,” Ban made it clear that opposition to same-sex marriage is rooted in “homophobia.”

This is simply untrue. Reasonable people of good will have held the belief that marriage is between one man and one woman for thousands of years. There is nothing inherent to this belief that necessitates bigotry.

People should be free to hold a traditional view of marriage without punishment.

Parents’ Rights Also at Stake

Sexual orientation and gender identity ideology has implications for families, too.

This ideology directly conflicts with the fundamental right of parents to educate their children in accordance with their religious and moral beliefs as protected by Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

U.N. independent expert and LGBT activist Vitit Muntarbhorn has called on all states “to develop inclusive curriculums and learning materials … nurturing respect and understanding for gender diversity.”

In the U.S. and other nations, Orthodox Jews, Christians, and parents of other faiths have balked at government efforts to teach their children transgender ideology. The best science, medicine, and psychology do not support the treatment of gender dysphoria with the socialization, hormone therapies, and surgeries that the transgender community advocates.

Despite this, activists at the U.N. continue to pursue a radical agenda even at the cost of family integrity and parental rights.

In every case where sexual orientation and gender identity ideology conflicts with the established rights to freedom of religion, free speech, and parental rights, the U.N. bureaucracy treats the fundamental human right as an obstacle to the ideology rather than the other way around.

The U.N. bureaucracy has it backward. If it can downgrade one fundamental human right because of one cultural orthodoxy, what is to stop it from downgrading other rights to promote other ideologies?

American Legal Decisions Could Also Be Affected

Radical ideas, which unfortunately infect some aspects of international law, can also influence the U.S. legal system. Supreme Court Associate Justice Stephen Breyer argues that U.S. judges should cite foreign law in interpreting the U.S. Constitution.

The Trump administration should reject the U.N. and activists’ attempts to impose extremist ideology through bureaucratic overreach that will affect people all over the world.

The U.S. should lead at the U.N. by supporting the fundamental rights of all individuals that sovereign member states of the U.N. have recognized in treaties.

lpnmajor Loc: Arkansas

You cannot be serious. The Trump administration has done nothing except attempt to impose extremist ideology here and around the world. I know that those who agree with such ideology, cannot see that it is an extreme view, inconsistent with the US Constitution and it's precepts, and have incentive to reconsider those views.

Extremists reject any and all evidence that is inconsistent with their viewpoint, scientific findings included, wish to force their views onto everyone, at gun point if necessary. Extremists reject the notion that every human has equal value, will therefor support discrimination against those persons they deem "less than", and in many countries, will even assist in developing pogroms to eliminate those who are different, judging them a threat.

The danger to free speech are the attempts to stifle or eliminate the expression of viewpoints, beliefs, or religions that are inconsistent with the ruling Juntas/party's extremist views.

bggamers Loc: georgia

Move to another country with your delusions where you come up with this BS is beyond me and its tiresome.

youngwilliam Loc: Deep in the heart

Amen

Carol Kelly

This is Obama’s legacy. Same sex everything, same sex toilets, same sexmarriage. You are unhappy as a man, join the army and get your sexchange free. Or just announce that you’re a girl, or an American Indian or a negro. Anything goes.

bggamers Loc: georgia

what are you talking about??????????

Singularity

Fundamental human rights should override the imposition upon others of cultural orthodoxy, even or especially religious ones.

maximus Loc: Chattanooga, Tennessee

If I may make a point against you saying that all people are of equal value. We are NOT all of equal value. If we were, I would have the secret service that Trump does. If we were, I would have the fantastic insurance that congress does. If we were, I would make as much money as those NFL players that kneel for the national anthem. If it were, I would be as valuable as an astronaut. If it were, I would be respected as well as the best brain surgeon in the world.If it were, the media would be beating my door down because I would be as important as Trump. If it were, no one would be living in poverty.
Now, strip all the titles, positions, possessions, talents, money, or anything else that makes us more or less valuable, THEN, and only THEN, would you have a world where every person is equally valuable.
I assume that you are a pretty decent guy, so the great majority of people would agree that you are worth much more that the Texas school shooter. On the other hand, most would agree that the country needs jet fighter pilots more than you, making you less valuable. I'm sure that you can see where I am coming from.

bggamers Loc: georgia