Difference between revisions of "Talk:Human Rights Watch"

Latest revision as of 16:29, August 29, 2007

22:30, 11 July 2007 Ed Poor (Talk | contribs) (→Founders - all Jewish sounding names, what does that mean? Anything?)

Well, Ed, it could mean nothing, or it could point to the American Jewish community's long history of commitment to human rights, progressive politics, and democracy - dating back from before their involvement with the struggle of economically and racially marginalised African Americans during the Civil Rights era, to the longstanding Jewish commitment to persecuted minorities arising from the Jewish experience of the pogroms and the Holocaust. PFoster 23:08, 11 July 2007 (EDT)

US or not US

I've removed the US for now, stating that an organisation is biased against an entire nation is a very serious accusation, which must be supported by a citation (even if it is true it must be supported because of its nature). However, after doing a bit of research it seems a lot of opinion is directed the other way, that HRW is biased in favour of the US, this is just one example. EQ 09:11, 18 August 2007 (EDT)

Call for a substantial rewrite

This article is too "balanced" in the wishy-washy Wikipedia style. On top of that, it doesn't even flow well.

Let's determine what percent of their efforts is dedicated to criticizing the two best countries in the world for human rights: America and Israel. Then let's decide determine how much they criticize those with the worst human rights records.

If it's clearly disproportionate, then let's expose them. --Ed Poor ^Talk 21:13, 28 August 2007 (EDT)

• Human Rights Watch purports to be "strictly non-partisan" in orientation and maintains that it "does not favor any political force." In practice, HRW has often operated as a partisan organization, dressing up its decidedly leftwing political preferences in the language of human rights. [1]

Or, seen in a different light, the left wing of the political spectrum puts more value on human rights than the right wing. Which is not to say that the right wing has no respect for human rights, but it tends to allow things like national security to be superior.

I'm not trying to judge anybody's opinion, except for the opinion that HRW is "clearly" not what it says it is, "by all accounts." Sorry for the wishy-washyness, but sometimes there really are two sides no matter how distasteful the other side is. Aziraphale 21:59, 28 August 2007 (EDT) <-doesn't taste very good either...

That is not the point of the article or even supported by any evidence you have shown. It simply is not true that the left puts more value on human rights than the right, if by "left" you mean U.S. Liberals and by "right" you mean U.S. Conservatives. It is actually just the other way around!

The left (or Liberals) are inconsistent and hypocritical in their statements on human rights. They over-emphasize (or even fabricate) atrocities by democratic countries while minimizing or denying atrocities by dictatorships.

The whole point of the article is that HRW pretends to care about human rights, but is actually distorting the situation to score political points against America and its chief Middle Eastern ally, Israel.

Not to make this personal, but if you (or anyone) really cares about human rights they ought to have one consistent standard that they apply to all countries. --Ed Poor ^Talk 10:54, 29 August 2007 (EDT)

Well you've got me there, I haven't presented any evidence so I certainly haven't supported myself with any. :) As for making this personal, I'm happy to share my beliefs with you. I do believe in a consistent standard, one that isn't mitigated by political expedience. I don't let terrorists and oppressive regimes off the hook (albeit my personal hook is a tiny one).

Where I see the problem, and this likewise isn't meant to be personal, is that the facts are hardly as conclusive as you make them out to be. Take, for example, your source for the David Horowitz quote (footnote #45). The quote itself is accurate, I'm not accusing you of "quote-mining", but the article quotes Horowitz as an example of over-blown criticism with which the article's author disagrees. There are people in this world, and I'll freely admit that I'm one of them, who see the HRW in a different light. Our point of view (roughly, as with many things there are degrees) is that there is a tendency in countries like the US to say "those people are much worse than us" and use that as an excuse to behave poorly.

I know you are against NPOV, as it makes false balance out of non-equal arguments at times. I even agree; few things irritate me more than those man-on-the-street pieces where one person from each side of an argument is quoted, leaving out any sense of how many people agree with each side. That being said, I believe that you are erring on the other side of the spectrum, taking as settled fact a stance that is, in fact, not so settled.

Before you say it, no, I won't go and find stuff to counter you. I'm not a huge supporter of HRW I think there's another author here that is and will probably be willing to find the evidence for you. My interest, as per usual, is clarity of thought.

And, also per usual, I'm not going to get into the finer points of liberal hypocrisies on a CP talk page. I'm not in the habit of tilting at windmills. Aziraphale 11:19, 29 August 2007 (EDT) <-Does like 'Man of La Mancha,' though....