Amnesty International is a joke

[Sky]

Amnesty International press release, 19 September 2006 9:58 AM; prefaced by a comment by Francis A. Boyle

This is a pathetic joke and a fraud by Amnesty International. They never adopted Mandela as a Prisoner of Conscience and never worked for his release while he was imprisoned that I am aware of. Indeed, while he was imprisoned I am not aware that AI did diddlysquat for Mandela or any imprisoned ANC guerillas, except perhaps token efforts when they were about to be executed and it was already too late.

To the contrary, Amnesty International obstinately refused to condemn apartheid in South Africa. And this despite the fact that when Winston Nagan and I were on the Board of AIUSA, we strove mightily against enormous opposition to get AI to condemn apartheid—and failed.

To the best of my knowledge, Amnesty International was the only human rights organization in the entire world that refused and failed to condemn apartheid in South Africa, Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), and Southwest Africa (now Namibia). AI is simply trying to rehabilitate itself and its lack of credibility in Black southern Africa. just a bunch of middle class white people now trying to trade off of Mandela's good name. Where were AI when Mandela and the ANC needed them? Nowhere to be found!

Francis A. Boyle
Board of Directors, Amnesty International USA (1988-92)


http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/27a/202.html (http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/27a/202.html)

[Dros]

Yes they are.

[Dean]

http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/27a/202.html (http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/27a/202.html)

Adopt whatever position you want on the organization; there have been clear problems with it in the past. This doesn't justify the Taliban's wanton murder and oppression, nor discredit AI as a source of information on the issue, the only reason you choose to attack them.

It is completely reductivist and defeatist to call any anti-U.S. organization progressive, and further to call AI - a leading watchdog on human rights abuses and oppression in the world - a joke based on one clear mistake. Just because AI has not adopted a distinctly communist rhetoric, you people think it should be ignored. In reality, this is an attempt to isolate your ideas from the horrors of real - world inhumanity; you didn't say a word on Apartheid, for instance, until it could be used to discredit a source proving that the Taliban is indeed fucked up.

I'm sorry for you folks that don't like AI, but I prefer to live in the real world and respond to it, not just ideological purity. I proudly give money to AI every month, participate in their letter-writing and telephone campaigns, and I won't stop because I care more that they are fighting global injustice than that they made a mistake on Apartheid, or that they aren't distinctly communist.

[Dean]

Here's all the dirt on AI (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Amnesty_International#Not_Challeng ing_Apartheid)

I considered not posting this, because I know how many here will take it, but I am not one to withhold information. Since I have read AI for a long time, I know full well that many of these claims have implications which are not accurate, others ignore the dearth of knowledge when criticising AI's statememts (ala criticism of Chomsky on Laos) and others take a full historical context to condemn AI for criticising / not criticising certain tactics. The fact is, an organization needs to be tactful when it considers what to say, and a few of these criticisms are fair and justified when AI gets it wrong on this moral dilemma.

However, these cirticisms appear to be the extent of AI's indiscretion (as a person who is very wary of who I do and don't help out when giving to charities, I researched AI a lot before I supported them). Of course, most criticism of AI is base (you were the first to ever post a distinct, sourced criticism of AI my entire time posting here, and I'm willing to bet you looked that up just to refute their work on the Taliban's violence) and I don't expect the facts to change anyone here who has already decided either way.

[RGacky3]

It could very well be that AI did not condemn apartaid because they did not want to be involved in political issues, but rather focus on their Humanitarian efforts.

[Dros]

It is completely reductivist and defeatist to call any anti-U.S. organization progressive, and further to call AI - a leading watchdog on human rights abuses and oppression in the world - a joke based on one clear mistake. Just because AI has not adopted a distinctly communist rhetoric, you people think it should be ignored. In reality, this is an attempt to isolate your ideas from the horrors of real - world inhumanity; you didn't say a word on Apartheid, for instance, until it could be used to discredit a source proving that the Taliban is indeed fucked up.

You only say that because you misunderstand the meaning of the word "progressive". Or because you support imperialism. The Taliban is progressive in the sense that, right now, in the current material conditions, they exist as a national liberation movement. I support their struggle against imperialism. I denounce their policies against women. That does not mean they aren't progressive in the sense that they are opperating in a way that advances the historical aims of the working class. I support the Maoists in Afghanistan who are building a movement around revolution by protracted people's war.


I'm sorry for you folks that don't like AI, but I prefer to live in the real world and respond to it, not just ideological purity. I proudly give money to AI every month, participate in their letter-writing and telephone campaigns, and I won't stop because I care more that they are fighting global injustice than that they made a mistake on Apartheid, or that they aren't distinctly communist.

Congratulations on supporting imperialism. AI is a disgusting orginization of idealist liberals who perpetuate the bourgeois constructed myth of "human rights" as a justification for imperialism and Eurocentrism.

[Dean]

You only say that because you misunderstand the meaning of the word "progressive". Or because you support imperialism. The Taliban is progressive in the sense that, right now, in the current material conditions, they exist as a national liberation movement. I support their struggle against imperialism. I denounce their policies against women. That does not mean they aren't progressive in the sense that they are opperating in a way that advances the historical aims of the working class. I support the Maoists in Afghanistan who are building a movement around revolution by protracted people's war.
No, I say it because Sky claimed that the Taliban's record against women's rights was false.




Congratulations on supporting imperialism. AI is a disgusting orginization of idealist liberals who perpetuate the bourgeois constructed myth of "human rights" as a justification for imperialism and Eurocentrism.
Lovely. All the good they do is reduced to a "bourgeois myth." I should be giving money to the Taliban, then?

[Dros]

Lovely. All the good they do is reduced to a "bourgeois myth." I should be giving money to the Taliban, then?

Don't be thick. They are imperialisms happy sock puppet. If by "good", you mean exploit the doctrine of human rights to justify imperialism than yes.


And what is this good? They are the most pathetic, ineffective orginization out there. Go write another letter and see if anyone gives a flying fuck.

[RGacky3]

Congratulations on supporting imperialism. AI is a disgusting orginization of idealist liberals who perpetuate the bourgeois constructed myth of "human rights" as a justification for imperialism and Eurocentrism.

I love this, Lenninists split everything up into bourgeois thinking and Communist thinking. Human rights have nothing to do with bourgeois thinking, or proletarian thinkingm its human thinking. A justification for Imperialism??? It reminds me of the old Middle ages Churches that labeled anything they disagreed with as Heretical.

IF you really believe that Human rights are just a bourgeois myth, try tell working people that really they have no rights, and no one else does, and anything can be done to them or anyone else in the name of progress.

AI, whether or not you agree with them, are a group of people trying to help other people, calling them discusting simply because they may be wrong is rediculous, which is more I can say for most Maoist groups.

[Ele'ill]

It sort of looks like this thread was created out of elitism and jealousy. :D

[Dros]

It sort of looks like this thread was created out of elitism and jealousy. :D

errr... no.

We are not jealous of that joke. AI is a JOKE!!! Ineffective, idealistic, letter writing liberals, who play into the hands of imperialism.

[LSD]

Yeah, I went to a few Amnesty International meetings back in High School. Mostly it seemed to consist of writing letters to people who I'd never heard of, encouraging them to do things they didn't want to. I'll be honest, I didn't show up that often... :rolleyes:

Insofar as independent NGO human rights groups, though, they're good, and we should have as many of them as possible; indeed, they should be especially diligent in checking their competitors' conclusions.

I wouldn't trust one organization to represent human rights. But a chorus of voices is certainly needed and AI is hardly in a position to limit protest.

That Amnesty International didn't oppose appartheid is despicable. Let's hope its members have learned from that mistake. If not, there are always alternatives.

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

It's a bourgeois organization, and it's politics reflect that.

The claim of pursuing "human rights" has been used by bourgeoisie government for decades as a battering ram against workers' states. Of course, "human rights" don't matter to people who propped up Trujillo and Pinochet, but it works good to win over liberal dupes to their program of imperialist war.