Women and International Human Rights - Case Study Example

Reflective Journals Name Institution Course Date Reflective Journals Women and International Human Rights Women play an important role in the society. Unfortunately, it is worrying that women are still being looked at as an inferior gender in most parts of the world. I am particularly disturbed to learn that women in many societies are still being subjected to old and traditional cultural practices of our forefathers even in the modern world, which denies them the right to education, education and nutrition among others, areas. For instance, countries such as Kenya, Somalia, Ethiopia and Indonesia, young girls are still being subjected to female genital mutilation as a rite of passage this is notwithstanding the fact that some of these countries, such as Kenya and Indonesia have banned such cultural practices. Edwards (2010) study found that the majority of FGMs are performed against the wishes of the girls and this amounts to serious human rights violation, which the world should stand against. The most disturbing thing is that, once a girl has undergone the cut, they are viewed as adults and some are married off to old men so that their parents can get bride price and this denies the girls a chance to attend schools and acquire good education as the boys. Personally, it is in my view that such cultural practices continue in various parts of the world because of lack of commitment by the United Nations and the respective governments to act as they appear to tolerate such cultural practices. Besides FGM, it is horrifying to learn that there is still widespread trafficking of girls to different parts of the world where they are being subjected to forced labor and sexual exploitation, such as prostitution. For instance, I was perturbed to learn that more than 2 billion people, the majority of whom are girls are not protected as required by the UN Trafficking in person protocols. However, personally it is in my opinion that this is a failure on the part of the UN to fulfill its mandate of providing adequate protection to people against human trafficking and other forms of human abuse. As such, it would be important for the UN to be more serious about this growing problem to ensure that girls are provided adequate protection against exploitation and that they are empowered through education and employment for the betterment of the society. Torture and Degrading Treatment Torture is one of the worst forms of punishment that are still applied to date in many countries. Although torture amounts to human rights violation, this form of punishment is still widespread. Although it would be expected to find torture still being used as a means of silencing people or to force people to provide critical information in undemocratic and failed states, I am surprised to learn that torture is still widespread in modern democracies. Countries such as North Korea that are ruled by autocratic leaders like President Kim Jong Un would be expected to use torture and I would not be in any way surprised by this. However, the extent to which torture is used as a form of punishment or a means of coercion in the modern democracies, such as the United Kingdom, Israel and the United States is not just surprising, but is something to worry about. For instance, the United States that is considered the most democratic country in the worlds have reportedly tortured people in different countries in its War on Terror as has been reported in countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and Vietnam among others (Grans, 2015). The UK’s use of torture was also highlighted in Ireland vs. UK ECHR 1978 case. This is serious in my view considering that the U.S. and the UK are among the powerful democracies that other countries where human rights violations are prevalence normally look up for help. The involvement of these countries in human rights violations, such as torture makes the war against human rights abuses difficult to win because any time they try to voice their concerns in other countries; they are being accused of double speak and hypocrisy. It is also worrying to learn that the United Nations appears to have given up on the war against human rights violation especially torture. This is notwithstanding the fact that the UN has passed a number of laws that aims to prevent torture and other human rights violations. For instance, the people of North Korea are still being subjected to torture by King Jong Un under the watch of the UN that is supposed to intervene and protect the victims of torture (Grans, 2015). This to me indicates that the UN has failed on its mandate as a human rights protector. The reason for failure of the UN, in my view is because of the politics and conflict of interest in the UN body, which is bad for the world. Children’s Human Rights Children are an important part of the society. As such, children just as adults ought to be accorded the respects they deserve and their rights protected. Unfortunately, I am made to learn that a lot of children are being subjected to human rights abuses and denied their rights. First, education is one of the most important thing that a parent or state can provide a child as it empowers a child to be knowledgeable and prepares them for the future. Therefore, when they are denied the right to education, this is like subjecting the children to poverty and suffering, which is not good for their future wellbeing. It is also disturbing to learn that as high as 250 million children between the ages of 5-14 are involved in child labor while about 250,000 others are child soldiers (Grover, 2009). This amounts to abuse of the rights of these children considering that these are children who should be in schools with their colleagues. As such, it is in my view that the governments, especially those in developing countries are not doing enough to protected children from exploitation and human rights abuses. This is because it in my view that other that the parents and guardians of the children, the state has a responsibility to ensure that a child’s right is protected. At the same time, it is in my view that children’s human rights abuses are widespread because the Human Rights Commissions are not doing enough to ensure that the rights of children are protected. I feel that, not unless the Human Rights Commissions take appropriate action to bring the perpetrators of child abuse and exploitation to books, then children in most countries, especially developing countries will continue to experience human rights abuses and exploitation under the watch of the state. For instance, Grover (2009) indicates that the Islamic State fighters in Syria are using children as soldiers and even using them as human shield. This is very painful considering that world leaders including the UN not taking appropriate action to put this acts to an end and the worry is that the failure by the UN to intervene in such situations only encourages other states and militants to continue recruiting child soldiers. Therefore, the most appropriate response to the issue is to ensure that children are empowered by keeping them in schools and helping their parents come out of poverty as these are the major factors that make children more susceptible to abuses. At the same time, UN in conjunction with the International Criminal Court (ICC) should ensure that people found guilty of child abuse and exploitation are prosecuted to deter the would-be perpetrators. Prisoners’ Rights And The Rights Of Those In Detention All countries have prisons that hold convicts of various offenders. However, there has been a growing controversy as to whether keeping convicts behind bars is an effective deterrence to crime or not. However, personally I feel that the debate should instead focus on why people commit crime and how to prevent crimes so that people do not end up in prisons. This is because there has been no concrete evidence to show that prisons are effective in deterring crime (Brown, & Wilkie, 2002). Therefore, it would be very important for governments to ensure that crime is prevented in the first place. To keep people away from prisons, I suggest that governments all over the world should focus more on social policy that focuses on prevention instead of harsh sentencing which evidence has shown not to work. In particular, the governments ought to focus on providing people with better housing, education and employment opportunities because lack of these important social tools are some of the reasons that drive people to crime. Besides, I feel that subjecting prisoners to hash punishments only serve to make them become hardcore criminals. It has emerged that most prisoners are subjected to harsh punishments, instead of focusing on reforming them to become better people. However, such forms of harsh punishments only amount to a violation of the rights of prisoners, which ought to stop in my opinion. Instead, prisons should ensure that persons incarcerated are treated in a humane, dignified and respectful manner since they also have rights just as other ordinary citizens. References Brown, D., & Wilkie, M. (2002). Prisoners as citizen’s human rights of Australian prisons. Sidney: The Federation Press Edwards, A. (2010). Violence against women under international human rights law. London: Cambridge University Press. Grans, L. (2015). The state obligation to prevent torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment: The case of honour-related violence. Human Rights Law Review (2015). Doi: 10.1093/hrlr/ngv029 Grover, S. C. (2009). Prosecuting international crimes and human rights abuses committed against children: Leading international court cases. New York, NY: Springer Science & Business Media. Read More