Showing posts with label Amnesty International. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Amnesty International. Show all posts
Michael Nugent ✒ Amnesty Ireland has falsely denied that it called on the media and politicians to deny legitimate representation to people promoting the sex-based rights of women and LGB people.
 

 Amnesty signed a letter that says:

We repudiate their beliefs, and call for an end in giving airtime to (them)… We call on media, and politicians to no longer provide legitimate representation for (them).

In response to criticism led by Iseult White, Amnesty then falsely claimed that the letter says something different: 

For example, the letter asks for media and politicians to not grant legitimacy to (them), or to present them as legitimate.

But that is simply not what the letter says. The letter plainly calls for an end to giving them airtime, which must include being banned from the State’s national airwaves.

It refers to denying legitimate “representation for” them, not to “presentation of” them. The different meanings of these words are clear and unambiguous.

Also, even the false denial is damaging. Amnesty should not even be asking the media and politicians to deny legitimacy to democratic activists and advocacy groups.

Amnesty was established to do the precise opposite — to defend democratic activists and advocacy groups when others try to deny them legitimacy.

Who is Amnesty seeking to silence?

The letter uses various terms to target people, without explicitly naming them, as: 

“Pseudo-feminists” who “do not represent the wider LGBTI+ community nor feminists in Ireland,” and “newly launched organisations that seek to defend biology or fight gender identity and expression.”

The letter attributes malign motivations to these people, saying that they are: 

“Discriminatory organisations and vocal transgender exclusionary activists,” who “call for division based on falsities and bigotry,” who “fear and hate (an inclusive Ireland) and do anything in their power to tear it down,” and who “align themselves with far-right tropes and stances.”

The letter also makes claims about them that are irrelevant to democratic engagement, saying that they:

“Do not represent the wider LGBTI+ community nor feminists in Ireland” and “are not supported by the wider Irish community,” that their ideas “are not native to the queer and feminist communities of Ireland” and “are representative of outsiders that have not worked, laboured, or known the trans community in Ireland,” and that they “are not organisations at all, and have no governance or accountability.”

One of the targets is LGB Alliance Ireland

Colm O’Gorman, Executive Director of Amnesty Ireland, later identified the “outsiders” reference as meaning from the UK.

While the letter targets people and groups in the plural, Colm identified one of the groups as being LGB Alliance Ireland.

LGB Alliance Ireland recently wrote an article in the Irish Independent explaining who they are. They said:

They campaign for the rights of same-sex-attracted people, based on their sexuality. All their committee members live in Ireland, with representation in each of the four provinces. They believe the needs of lesbian, gay and bisexual people are different to the needs of transgender people. They respect the rights of other organisations to campaign for trans rights, and they do not hate or abuse them. They want to resolve differences of beliefs through open debate, and in a civilised fashion.

Whether or not you agree with them, these are legitimate aims for a democratic lobby group in a pluralist republic. We have moved beyond the authoritarian Ireland of de Valera and McQuaid, and we will not return to it.

What Amnesty should do

Amnesty Ireland is a human rights organisation. It should remove its endorsement from this letter, because it undermines the reason that the organisation exists.

If Amnesty genuinely did not realise what it was signing, then it should say that, instead of falsely claiming that the letter says something different than it does.

It should actively support the sex-based rights of women and LGB people, the gender-based rights of transgender people, and the protection of children.

It should support everybody’s right to democratically promote any or all of these positions, including through legitimate representation from the media and politicians.

And where there are competing claims of human rights, Amnesty should lobby the government to legally balance these claims consistently with human rights principles.

Michael Nugent is Chair of Atheist Ireland

Amnesty Falsely Denies Its Call To Remove Rights

Michael NugentI agree with Iseult White that Amnesty Ireland should not seek to deny media and political representation to people promoting the sex-based rights of women and LGB people.


Nor should they caricature people with one sincere belief as arbiters of truth and virtue, and people with another sincere belief as toxic bigots and haters.

In the real world, reasonable and ethical people promote the sex-based rights of women and LGB people, the gender-based rights of transgender people, and the protection of children. And a democratic pluralist society must sometimes balance competing claims of human rights.

Amnesty Ireland should instead oppose calls for the media and politicians to censor and disenfranchise people who peacefully express their beliefs on issues of public concern. It should support equally everybody’s rights under the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

These rights include freedom of thought, conscience, belief, opinion, and expression, which includes seeking, receiving and imparting information and ideas through any media, and the right to take part in government directly or through freely chosen representatives.

These rights extend to people with whom we strongly disagree. As an example, when I campaigned against IRA and loyalist terrorism, I also opposed Section 31 that prevented Sinn Fein and the UDA from promoting their political aims democratically.

People have a right to express ideas that offend, shock, or disturb us, once they are not inciting crime or being defamatory. We should engage with the content of ideas we disagree with, not accuse the people who express them of being foreign or motivated by hate.

The Venice Commission for Democracy through Law says that persuasion through open debate, as opposed to ban or repression, is the best way to preserve fundamental values and achieve mutual understanding and respect.

Amnesty Ireland, as a human rights organisation, should return to defending the equal right of everyone to express their different beliefs, and should lobby the government to legally balance competing claims consistently with human rights principles.

Michael Nugent is Chair of Atheist Ireland

Amnesty Ireland Rejects Equal Rights For All


From Amnesty International:

Saudi Arabia: Categorizing feminism, atheism, homosexuality as crimes exposes the Kingdom’s dangerous intolerance.

Responding to an official announcement and a promotional video published by Saudi Arabia’s state security agency which categorizes feminism, homosexuality and atheism as ‘extremist ideas’, Heba Morayef, Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Director, said:

The Saudi state security agency’s announcement which labels feminism, atheism and homosexuality as extremist ideas punishable by jail and flogging is outrageous - clearly contradicting the Kingdom’s bogus reformist image which Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman continues to flaunt internationally.


Feminism, atheism and homosexuality are not criminal acts. This announcement is extremely dangerous and has serious implications for the rights to freedom of expression and life, liberty and security in the country. It peels away the veneer of progress under Mohammed bin Salman and reveals the Kingdom’s true intolerant face which criminalizes people’s identities, as well as progressive and reformist thoughts and ideas at home.

Continue reading @ Amnesty International.

Saudi Arabia's Dangerous Intolerance