Our Transnational Superiors Direct Us

In case you "read" the article but actually only skimmed it, it’s worthwhile highlighting one of O’sullivan’s characteristically droll comments:

"Elites are far more unwilling to give up their fantasies than practical-minded ordinary voters, in part because elites can escape the negative aspects of utopia."

"Negative aspects of utopia" is quite a concept to consider (although I suppose there’s potentially the issue of boredom).

Beyond that bon mot, O’sullivan provided several examples, taken from Fonte’s book, of transnational busybodying in action, including this:

"The UN committee monitoring the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination told the United States in 2001 to overturn the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution because it was an obstacle to outlawing what the committee regarded as hate speech. (U.S. diplomats negotiating a treaty routinely insist on laying down “reservations” when they suspect that some of its provisions might be incompatible with the Constitution. This is something that greatly irks the UN [PDF] and other global bodies.)"

That’s not overstatement by O’sullivan. If you go to the document linked (presumably by VDARE’s James Fulford) within that quote and work your way through its first four (of 13) appalling pages, you'll arrive at page five, which includes the following:

"18. While appreciating that some forms of hate speech and other activities designed to intimidate, such as the burning of crosses, are not protected under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, the Committee remains concerned about the wide scope of the reservation entered by the State party [i.e. the United States] at the time of ratification of the Convention with respect to the dissemination of ideas based on racial superiority and hatred. (Article 4)

The Committee draws the attention of the State party to its general recommendations No. 7 (1985) and No. 15 (1993) concerning the implementation of article 4 of the Convention, and request the State party to consider withdrawing or narrowing the scope of its reservations to article 4 of the Convention. In this regard, the Committee wishes to reiterate that the prohibition of all ideas based upon racial superiority or hatred is compatible with the right to freedom of opinion and expression, given that the exercise of this right carries special duties and responsibilities, including the obligation not to disseminate racist ideas."

I added the underlining — the thoughts in that passage presumably were tiresomely routine for the superior beings who penned it.

But note that O’sullivan didn’t clearly state the full scope of this intended restriction on American liberties by those UN worthies: It’s not merely speech that’s forbidden. So are some ideas.

Regarding one of those forbidden ideas, recall the late Samuel Huntington’s observation in his 1996 book The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order: "It is human to hate."