Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by jlgreco 4743 days ago
There are no signatories to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, since it is not a legally binding document. There is however the list of countries that voted for it, and the US is among those countries.

I wonder if this is still a country that would vote for such a document. We plainly have no respect for the ideas that it represents.

2 comments

Do you wonder if the people would vote for it or the government? Because I see those as two different things.
Well, the government did vote for it, we know that much from history. I think the people would vote for it, I am optimistic and think that most people have their hearts in the right places.

Would the government vote for it again, if voting for it was anything other than a meaningless gesture? I suspect not. Not if it actually had teeth.

It's worth noting that there's a big difference between appreciating and agreeing with the ideals in the UNDoHR and being willing to vote in an election or poll that explicitly or implicitly legitimizes the UN's authority to govern.