#should be classified as a geneva convention violation

[tower-of-gay]

okay yeah no worst part of tower of god to date is definitely the giant spider woman with 6 breasts who refers to herself as “mommy”

[bpdohwhatajoy]

I really really really really I did not experience that fucking relationship I really wish I never fucking met him he did so much fucking damage to me I had to deal with interpersonal shit so bad it should be classified as a violation of the Geneva Conventions

[they-are-a-prolife-autist]

Countries where abortion is heavily restricted or illegal have higher rates of maternal mortality than countries where abortion is legal and available.

Incidentally, those same countries where the government violates women's bodily autonomy without a second thought also have higher rates of unwanted pregnancies and teen pregnancies (much more dangerous) due to lack of education.

You support death more than any pro-choicer ever would.

And of course you support what several human rights organizations (the Center for Victims of Torture being one of them) consider torture.

Being autistic and disabled (as I and many pro-choicers are! shocker!) doesn't make you entitled to someone else's body.

Bodily autonomy > right to life in any situation we can think if from a legal standpoint.

Abortion is an extension of bodily autonomy and should be legal and readily available.

Well since you brought it up, countries where abortion is either totally or mostly illegal also tend to not have good healthcare systems. Countries where abortion is legal have more advanced medicine in general. Correlation is not causation.

In fact there was a study in Finland where the risk of death from legal induced abortion was reported to be almost four times greater than the risk of death from childbirth.

Mortality after a birth 28.2/100,000

After a miscarriage 51.9/100,000

After an abortion 83.1/100,000

Lack of education is unfortunate. That should be rectified. I assume you’re referring to forced pregnancy which is classified as a crime against humanity in the Geneva Convention of 1949 right along side “Extermination,” “Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity,” and “Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health.” (Considering the fact that human life has been proven to begin at conception, I’d say actively and intentionally causing serious bodily harm to an unborn child by exterminating him/her qualifies.)

I do not advocate for forcing anybody to get pregnant. That would be rape. Having experienced it, I’m profoundly against it. I do however belief that once you engage in reproductive activity and reproduction has occurred, no mother has any “right” to then intentionally destroy her offspring, regardless of its location.

Bodily autonomy does not and has never trumped right to life (the right to not be actively and intentionally attacked and killed.)

“1. Everyone’s right to life shall be protected by law. No one shall be deprived of his life intentionally save in the execution of a sentence of a court following his conviction of a crime for which the penalty is provided by law.”

The right to life “means that nobody, including the Government, can try to end your life. It also means the Government should take appropriate measures to safeguard life by making laws to protect you and, in some circumstances, by taking steps to protect you if your life is at risk.”

[ashley-slashley]

preparing meat by boiling it should be classified as a crime against humanity and a violation of the geneva conventions

[transgenderboobs]

rapidly approaching my absolute limit folks

[underwoodlawsociety]

“Walk a Mile” Series Article 1: International Law and North Korean Defectors

- Jeaneyoung (Jen) Kim, Yonsei University (International Studies)

On November 13th, 2017, a soldier from the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (hereinafter, DPRK) was shot multiple times crossing the border into the Republic of Korea (hereinafter, ROK). It is estimated that the number of North Korean defectors (hereinafter, NK defectors) since 1953 is somewhere between 100,000 and 300,000.[1] These defectors risk their lives running away from their motherland for reasons such as extreme poverty, ideological persecution, and oppression in various areas of life. They are risking their lives in all senses of the term because not only is escaping the territorial boundaries of DPRK almost impossible and dangerous, but finding a shelter—permanent or temporary—elsewhere is also a punishing task. The obstacles NK defectors face once they escape DPRK are rooted in two major issues by nature: 1) the lack of a universal classification of NK defectors that leave room for independent interpretation by nations, and 2) the varying ways in which different systems of law perceive and deal with NK defectors.

Through the four articles, this series will delineate the incoherency and inconsistency of the definition of North Korean defectors throughout different legal systems and examine how this makes the defectors vulnerable to arbitrary treatment by the hosting state. Following this review, it will make the argument that NK defectors should be universally and legally considered as refugees or at least refugees sur place. For this purpose, the actors investigated will be the People’s Republic of China (hereinafter, China), ROK, DPRK, and the international community.[2] To clarify, the review of the international community will include not only international treaties and conventions regarding NK defectors, but also that of the legal frameworks of neighbouring states of the Korean peninsula such as Thailand, Mongolia, Vietnam, and Cambodia which serve as transit countries in the defection routes of the NK defectors.

This first article reviews the international legal framework on refugees, mainly focusing on the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. The second article explores the legal and political aspects of China’s way of dealing with NK defectors, and the dilemma between China’s national sovereignty and its commitment to international law. The third article takes a close look at the two main legal and political problems in South Korean legislations that put NK defectors in a precarious state: their legal citizenship and their term of address. The fourth and final article problematizes the lack of domestic laws in neighbouring states of the Korean peninsula such as Thailand, Mongolia, Vietnam, and Cambodia which serve as transit countries in the defection routes of the NK defectors that make the defectors vulnerable to arbitrary interpretation of their legal status based on individual political interests. It also offers recommendations for future actions to better protect NK defectors and provide a safe environment for them to recommence their lives.

International Legal Frameworks on Refugees

The most overarching international legal framework on refugees is the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (hereinafter, 1951 Refugee Convention).

With 144 signatories as of 2019, the convention serves as an outline for who qualifies as a refugee is, the rights of those who are given asylum, and the obligations of nations to grant and after granting asylum. Article 1 of the Convention demarcates the definition of the term “refugee” to a person who is unable or unwilling to return to his or her country of his or her nationality “owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.”[3] On the subject of refugees who have entered or are staying in a country unlawfully, Article 31 dictates that signatory states “shall not impose penalties… on refugees who, coming directly from a territory where their life or freedom was threatened in the sense of Article 1, enter or are present in their territory without authorization” as long as they present the justified reasons for their “illegal entry or presence.” The above two articles highlights the international perception of refugees and how they should be treated under difficult circumstances considering their situation. Moreover, Article 33: Prohibition of Expulsion or Return articulates the principle of non-refoulement which comes from the French term refouler which means to make people surrender or repel them, and bars states from expelling refugees from within their jurisdiction or forcefully returning them to their places of origin when it is highly likely that he or she would be subjected to severe punishment or even violations of human rights.[4] The principle of non-refoulement, along with the aforementioned two articles, is a significant element of the international legal framework on refugees in the conversation on NK defectors.

Presenting the Issue of Definition

As previously mentioned, this series will discuss the issue of inconsistency in the categorization of NK defectors internationally. The following articles expand on how different states classify NK defectors; through the series, the authors will illustrate why the universal definition of NK defectors should be from now on, refugees sur place. According to the handbook issued by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, a “refugee sur place” is “a person who was not a refugee when he left his country, but who becomes a refugee at a later date.”[5] Refugees sur place are not necessarily refugees when they expatriate; they become a refugee during their time abroad due to a justifiable sense of fear that they will be persecuted if they return to their country of origin. This is precisely the situation of NK defectors that is often overlooked. Article 233 of the Criminal Law of DPRK dictates that anyone who illegally crosses DPRK borders will be punished by “short-term labour” from two years to five years. Article 245 adds that if a North Korean citizen were to have “[damaged] the prestige of the Republic in foreign countries,” they would be sentenced to “reform through labour” for a period between three years and eight years. According to anecdotes from NK defectors, defectors are put into perilous positions if they were to return—forcefully or voluntarily—as they would subject to punishments in the forms of forced labour, torture, or even capital punishment in detention centers, labour camps, or political prisons.[6] These laws clearly stating the intent to legally penalise defectors and the stories from defectors regarding their difficult circumstances should serve as evidence for “well-founded fear” of persecution in an assessment of persons attempting to determine whether they qualify as refugees sur place.[7] That being the case, the authors strongly argue that in order to protect NK defectors from threats such as displacement, exploitation, and persecution, the international society and its laws should declare NK defectors to be classified as refugees sur place.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

[1] “Why This NGO Was Founded,” North Korean Refugees, accessed on August 1st, 2019, http://www.northkoreanrefugees.com/aboutus.html.

[2] China, ROK, and the international society as a whole are the actors that play the largest roles in the defecting routes of NK defectors and in the process of NK defectors finding a place of refuge outside DPRK.

[3] Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees, Geneva, July 28, 1951, United Nations Treaty Series vol. 189, no. 2545, Article 1, available at https://www.refworld.org/docid/3be01b964.html.

[4] United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), UNHCR Note on the Principle of Non-Refoulement, November 1997, available at https://www.refworld.org/docid/438c6d972.html.

[5] United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), Handbook on Procedures and Criteria for Determining Refugee Status Under the 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees, reedited on January 1992, Paragraph 94, available at https://www.unhcr.org/4d93528a9.pdf.

[6] Harrison Jacobs and Pat Ralph, “‘Treated Like Animals’: A North Korean Defectors Tells the Brutal Story of What Happened to Him After He Was Caught Trying to Escape,” Business Insider, published on January 15, 2018, https://www.businessinsider.com/what-happened-when-north-korean-defector-tried-to-escape-2018-6.

[7] UNHCR, Handbook, Paragraph 83.

[ostonaut]

"Crime" is too light, forcing someone to see Bigmouth every time they open Netflix should be classified as a war crime

absolutely, a violation of the geneva convention

[strike-back-now-info]

Dear Americans: This Law Makes It Possible to Arrest and Jail You Indefinitely Anytime

Steve Mariotti, Contributor Steve Mariotti is the founder of the Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE) and an advocate for entrepreneurs worldwide. Dear Americans: This Law Makes It Possible to Arrest and Jail You Indefinitely Anytime Terrorism may not be the worst threat to freedom that we face. 09/02/2016 02:25 pm ET Updated Sep 27, 2016 The frightening implications of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) In 2014 alone, terrorism killed nearly 30,000 men, women and children. As horrible as this is, terrorism may not be the worst threat to freedom that we face. The real threat is how quickly we Americans have given our government carte blanche to fight the War on Terror. This has already caused far greater damage to our civil liberties than the terrorists themselves could ever hope to achieve. In 2012, the U.S. Congress passed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) with relatively little attention from the media―despite the freedoms it obliterated. The NDAA was enacted to empower the U.S. military to fight the war on terror. But buried in this law are two provisions (Sections 1021 and 1022) that authorize the indefinite military detention, without charge or trial, of any person labeled a “belligerent”―including an American citizen. These NDAA provisions (which have been re-approved by Congress and signed by President Obama every year since 2012) override habeas corpus―the essence of our justice system. Habeas corpus is the vital legal procedure that prevents the government from detaining you indefinitely without showing just cause. When you challenge your detention by filing a writ of habeas corpus, you must be promptly brought before a judge or into court, where lawful grounds must be shown for your detention or you must be released. Under Section 1021, however, anyone who has committed a “belligerent act,” can be detained indefinitely, without charges or trial, as a “suspected terrorist.” This is a direct violation of the U.S. Constitution and our Bill or Rights. In the Federalist No. 84, Alexander Hamilton stressed the importance of the writ of habeas corpus to protect against “the favorite and most formidable instruments of tyranny.” Only 13 senators voted against the NDAA in 2012, including Bernie Sanders (I-VT), Al Franken (D-Minn) and Rand Paul (I-KY). According to Dan Johnson, the 23-year-old founder of People Against the NDAA (PANDA), our current presidential candidates do not seem concerned about it either. “Hillary Clinton has been entirely silent about it, while Donald Trump has come dangerously close to endorsing it, approving of military trials for American citizens at Guantanamo Bay just this month,” Johnson notes.  A protester questions the NDAA’s place in American law (source) I asked Johnson to explain how the NDAA was passed and what implications it holds for a free America. Steve Mariotti: How did you learn about this little-known law, the NDAA? Dan Johnson: Five years ago, I came across a video, 61 senators betrayed you today. A curious political science major, I clicked to find Senator Lindsey Graham on the Senate floor vehemently promoting the idea that “enemy combatants” should not be entitled to due process. Senator Graham was speaking in support of the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which was signed into law by President Obama on New Year’s Eve in 2011. The NDAA authorizes the President to order the U.S. military to detain anyone in the United States without charges or a trial, until the war on terror ends. During that detention, the detainee is classified as an enemy spy, a belligerent. Even if you are an American citizen, you could be tried in military court, transferred to another country, or even executed... all without charges or a trial. For these reasons, the NDAA is being opposed by groups that span the political spectrum―from the ACLU to Rush Limbaugh. It has been the subject of a lawsuit in Hedges v. Obama and is formally banned in several places. Senator Lindsay Graham promoting the NDAA on the Senate floor. SM: What is so scary about the NDAA? DJ: The NDAA’s detention section harkens back to one of the worst civil rights violations in U.S. history: when the U.S. government detained over 120,000 Japanese-Americans, and a few thousand German- and Italian- Americans, without charge or trial. This abuse was allowed only because of Executive Order 9066, signed into law by President Roosevelt in post-Pearl Harbor 1942. The order authorized the Secretary of War and his commanders to re-designate parts of the United States as military battlefields.  Men, women and children were incarcerated in the U.S. due to their ethnic heritage during WWII (Source) The NDAA also applies the laws of war on American soil―except under this law, everyone, whether an American citizen or not, is robbed of their rights. Under Section 1021, anyone who has committed a belligerent act, which even the government could not define when questioned in court, can be detained indefinitely, without charges or trial, as a “suspected terrorist.” In essence, the 2012 NDAA brought the war on terror home. It is the authority used to kill American citizens abroad and justify the abuses at Guantanamo Bay. And now it applies on American soil. SM: Who are the “covered persons” in the 2012 NDAA? DJ: The 2012 NDAA’s detention provisions apply to anyone, anywhere. But who is most likely to have the NDAA used against them? It depends on how you define the word terrorist. The Department of Homeland Security said that individuals or organizations “reverent of individual liberty” and “suspicious of centralized federal authority” pose a threat. The state of Georgia calls publishing “public records” terrorism. The FBI added the director of an anti-fracking film to the terror watchlist; and tells business owners to look for terrorists via “strange odors,” “ordering a specific hotel room,” and demanding “identity ‘privacy’ in dozens of their documents. The government won’t define “terrorist” in order to keep their options flexible. So, it means whatever they want it to mean, at any point. And under the 2012 NDAA, the term “terrorist” can be applied to whomever they want to apply it to, at any point. SM: Does that really mean American citizens could be treated like POWs (prisoners of war) by the military?Subscribe to the Politics email. How will Trump's administration impact you? DJ: If only we were so lucky. It’s actually worse than that. The Geneva Conventions created in 1949 were a set of treaties that established international law standards for the humanitarian treatment of people involved in war. The Geneva Conventions split people on a battlefield into two categories: combatants (soldiers) and non-combatants (civilians). Under the Geneva Conventions, POWs are captured combatants protected by international law from torture, starvation and the denial of medical care. After 9-11, the U.S. government wanted to get around the Geneva Convention’s ban on torture of combatants, so it created a new category: unlawful enemy combatant, i.e. a “terrorist.” This is a person who took up arms on a battlefield but is not entitled to POW protections. As Department of Defense General Counsel William Haynes wrote in a letter to the Council on Foreign Relations, regarding Guantanamo Bay: “All of the detainees are unlawful combatants and thus do not as a matter of law receive the protections of the Third Geneva Convention.” In 2009, Congress passed the second Military Commissions Act, which quietly replaced unlawful enemy combatant with unprivileged enemy belligerent. Both noncombatants and civilians could then be categorized as “enemy belligerents,” and denied their Geneva Conventions rights. When the United States executed American citizen Anwar-al-Awlaki and his son in Yemen via drone strike on September 30, 2011, the rationale for the attack was that al-Awlaki had been labeled “an unprivileged enemy belligerent.” Under the 2012 NDAA, any American citizen can now be labeled the same. A 2013 protest of the NDAA and detention of prisoners in Guantanamo, led by Amnesty International (source) SM: Who is making the decision to implement this? DJ: The 2012 NDAA grants one person in particular, the president of the United States, the authority to determine who is and is not considered a “suspected terrorist.” But he can designate that authority to anyone he would like, and we would not know because it would be considered a State Secret. It was introduced in the Senate by Senator Carl Levin (D-MI) and a concurrent version was introduced in the House by Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA). It was bipartisan legislation, passing 93-7 in the Senate and 283-136 in the House. A previous champion of the fight against the NDAA was Rep. Justin Amash, but recently, no representative in either house has introduced legislation to curb the NDAA. It is the realization of one of my greatest fears: once Americans forget about this legislation, that’s when it will be used en masse. SM: Are American civilians currently being detained under NDAA? DJ: The scary thing is that we do not actually know. Why? • The government does not need a warrant to detain you. • The government does not have to produce any record of your detention. • The military, unlike the police, does not need to take record of your arrest. Congress tried and failed to pass a provision that would have required the Secretary of Defense to submit a list of detainees under the NDAA to Congress every year. In Hedges v. Obama, a case brought by journalists and activists who believed the NDAA’s detention provisions could be used to detain them, the government refused to confirm or deny that these provisions were in play right now. Judge Katherine Forrest agreed that the NDAA “does not pass muster under the First Amendment itself” and issued a permanent injunction preventing the enforcement of the NDAA. In response, the Federal government immediately applied for an emergency stay to delay the case This very fact hints that the government is probably holding American civilians under the NDAA. We just don’t know where.  SM: When will this bill expire? DJ: When will the war on terror end? That’s when the NDAA powers expire. America entered this war with the Authorization for Use of Military Force in 2001, which authorized “necessary and appropriate force” to go after Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, and to go to war in Afghanistan. It is also the same bill quoted by the 2012 NDAA. So, when the war on terror ends, that’s when these extraordinary military powers will end. And in all probability, the answer is never.

[bountyofbeads]

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/17/opinion/family-separation-border-trump.html#click=https%3A%2F%2Ft.co%2FzHms4ubahd

A few comments from the American people regarding the Trump Administration and their policy of separating children from there parents at the southern border and children who remain separated from their families. What are your thoughts:

"Cruelty to immigrant children is one of Trump's objectives. He is feeding the ire of the segment of the population who believes that immigrants are not as valuable as citizens and can be treated with casual cruelty. Cruelty is the point, not an unintended consequence"

"For sure the answer to your rhetorical question, "Why can't the government account for how many children it separates from their parents at the border?" is a simple one. It can't account for them because it simply does not care to do so. The children and their parents, who are for the most part fleeing horrendous environments and simply searching for a better life, don't really count as human in the eyes of our government. But really they can't count for much to the rest of us either. In a democracy WE are the government. It is acting in our name, representing us and our interests and choices. If we truly think something our government is doing is this inhumane what are we doing about it? Where are the protests in the streets? How many of us has even picked up a phone or set pen to paper to petition our representatives to do something about it. These people are political pawns to us, not Moms, Dads, sons, daughters - the people who should remind us through their struggles of our own great-grandparents. Honor the stranger? We don't even see them as people."

" During the Bush administration, the use of torture was for me the unforgivable act. It violated the Geneva Conventions and put the United States in the category of various dictatorships around the world that use torture as a norm. The separation of immigrant children from their families by the Trump administration falls into the same category for me. There is a cruelty, a malevolence and a vacuum not just in moral leadership but in perverting law enforcement to commit these crimes against humanity. The indifference to the suffering of the children and their families, the lifelong trauma, and the potential nearterm harm from unlicensed facilities, lack of medical treatment, schooling or appropriate daycare is horrific. It debases everything America stands for. The crimes of the Trump campaign and administration may well include conspiracy with Russia and corruption but few can reach the depths of harming innocent children. Turning children, immigrants, government workers, or Congress people travelling to a war zone all into hostages or pawns to get your way is not governance. It is extortion and despotism."

" I can’t help but think that this zero tolerance policy should literally be classified as a crime against humanity. If we had anything approaching a functional society at this point, Trump and his cronies would immediately be indicted and removed from office for this offense alone. Thousands of innocent children have been, and still are, being exposed to devastating trauma as a result of these separations, and they will spend the rest of their lives struggling to recover. Just read up on, for example, Adverse Childhood Experiences. (And, of course, their parents will suffer, too.) How is it that 40% of voters approve of Trump? Are so many of us so cruel?"

" From committing adultery over and over, to not paying his contractors or suppliers, to his promoting violence at his rallies, Trump proves daily that he is incapable of caring about human life. He makes decisions about the air we breath and the water we drink without caring if it's clean or not. He makes human rights decisions without caring about humans. He has the nuclear code without caring about life on earth."

" The Trump administration, Secretary Nielsen and the other accomplices are beyond cruel. They are criminals."

The Lost Children of the Trump Administration

Why can’t the government account for how many children it separated from their parents at the border?

By The Editorial Board

The editorial board represents the opinions of the board, its editor and the publisher. It is separate from the newsroom and the Op-Ed section.

Jan. 17, 2019

Last summer, a federal judge in San Diego said the Trump administration treated immigrant children detained at the border worse than chattel.

“The unfortunate reality,” wrote Judge Dana Sabraw in ordering a halt to President Trump’s policy of separating the children from their parents, “is that under the present system, migrant children are not accounted for with the same efficiency and accuracy as property.”

That was underscored on Thursday when the inspector general of the Department of Health and Human Services released a report revealing that thousands more children than previouslydisclosed may have been torn from their parents for months before the policy was even announced. The report confirmed that, as the number of families seeking asylum has soared, the true crisis on the border was a humanitarian one that the administration’s actions have made far worse.

The report said department officials who care for immigrant children seized at the border realized by August 2017 that the proportion of children separated from their parents was 10 times greater than had previously been the case, when families were usually broken up only if there were safety concerns for the children. It was not until the following April that the administration announced a zero-tolerance approach, under which families would be pulled apart because all adults crossing the border without authorization would be criminally charged and jailed.

In an accounting that resulted from Judge Sabraw’s order, stemming from a legal challengebrought by the American Civil Liberties Union, the government acknowledged that nearly 3,000 children had been separated from their parents since the policy was announced. But on top of that, the inspector general said, thousands more may not have been counted.

Over all, the total number of children separated at the border is “unknown,” according to the report. Nor was it clear how many of these children had yet to be reunited with their families.

Judge Sabraw was right when he wrote that the government’s responses to the chaos it caused “belie measured and ordered governance, which is central to the concept of due process enshrined in our Constitution. This is particularly so in the treatment of migrants, many of whom are asylum seekers and small children.”

The report describes department officials essentially grasping in the dark to come to terms with what had happened. “Because the tracking systems in use at that time were informal and designed for operational purposes,” according to the report, immigration officials were “unable to provide a more precise estimate or specific information about these children’s placements.”

Department officials had to search more than 60 databases “to identify indicators of possible separation, such as an adult and child with the same last name apprehended on the same day at the same location.” Officials also had to review 12,000 case files and contact the department’s shelters to find children who had been separated from their families.

In a report released in October, the Department of Homeland Security's inspector general found its computers had been unable to track family members who had been separated.

Such dysfunction goes beyond mere incompetence. To have so little regard for the damage done to so many children, for the heartache caused to so many parents, is to indulge in callousness, if not deliberate cruelty. President Trump doesn’t need a wall. He needs a heart.