One bite at a time
If you want to save the world, start by saving the United Nations
By Ellen Snortland 10/20/2005
Why or how do you save the United Nations? Who can save the UN?
These are relevant questions on this 60th anniversary of the ratification and signing of the United Nations. In 1945, when President Harry Truman signed the UN Charter as ratified by 98 out of 100 US Senators, I wonder if any them, Democrat or Republican, could have foreseen how “dissed” the UN would become, 60 years later. I doubt it.
Let’s take a brief memory tour of the year the UN was “born.” First, as US citizens, we had just fought a horrifying war that cost millions of lives. There were very few people who didn’t have a loved one serving in the armed forces somehow. Everyone sacrificed someone or something to the war effort. Not only food, but gas and shoes were rationed. Our country, usually aloof because we were not accustomed to being attacked on home turf, like the Europeans or Asians were, had gone through Pearl Harbor. Nightmarish “other worldly” reports came in about concentration camps where GIs had to confront the smell of burning flesh and inferno-style images of bodies stacked like cords of wood that were seared into their brains forever. Hitler proved the “power of one” in a way that people could have never predicted.
This was the intellectual soil and “space” that people received the vision of world peace. It’s a powerful context to say, “Hey, let’s all have a place in the world where we can meet up and work out things before we blow ourselves to smithereens.” Our citizens and leaders had the dubious benefit of having just seen how unwinnable a nuclear war would be, because of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Is it any wonder that 98 Senators in a rare bi-partisan voice ratified the UN Charter? Rather than voting to wage war, they voted to try peace. This was historical! And courageous! With the exception of the short-lived League of Nations, who could have dared to envision a world at peace on such a massive scale?
Fast forward 60 years. Today we have a Congress that could very easily eviscerate or quit the UN. I’m not kidding.
As a people, I say, we are morally obligated to save the UN. How? Here are some starters:
Create the UN potential anew for people who didn’t live through any of the horror of World War II: The World War II folks are not going to be around that much longer. They must share the vision of world peace that motivated joining the UN in the first place. I’m optimistic about the passing of the peace “torch.” Young people are clearer than ever, in large part thanks to the Web, that we are truly a small and destructible planet. We need to get Model United Nations (MUN) programs back up and running in schools where they were slashed in penny-wise, pound-foolish budget cuts. MUNS can change kids’ lives for the better and forever and help create new globally oriented leaders.
The MUNs are like theater/sports/debate programs, and as an extra-curricular activity, there’s no better way to practice real diplomacy, in-depth study of complex issues, geography and politics. It’s an effective and inexpensive way to get under-represented youth into a leadership pipeline in college, government and corporations.
Grow up: The radical right-wing radio propaganda machine has pumped anti-UN dreck and misinformation over the airwaves without being answered sufficiently for years. Listeners have not had callers who get past biased screeners in order to offer differing and educated points of view. Perhaps we all need to grow up and stop expecting that in 60 years the UN is going to be perfect or a panacea.
Thank the UN: If you use international mail, view broadcasts from overseas, own intellectual property protected by international law, have vaccinations readily available, use a passport, use airplanes to go abroad, you’ve been beneficially impacted by the existence of the UN. The list of the invisible, back stage impact of UN departments that we take for granted is endless.
Vote for the UN: Insist that your elected representatives show support for the UN.
Why save the UN? We need it. We have the potential to be destructive or peaceful beings. It’s an idea whose time has come.
A powerful way to “vote” UN is to attend the United Nations Association’s big UN 60th anniversary party/fundraiser at 7 p.m. Saturday. Eat, drink and be intellectually stimulated. Brilliant, incisive and funny “Saturday Night Live” alumna (and PW columnist!) Nora Dunn hosts the event at the Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena! The speakers, UNA-USA executive George Garland and internationally renowned sitar master Nishat Khan are both experts on the UN Millennium Development Goals.
Show up at the Pacific Asia Museum, 46 N. Los Robles, Pasadena, or visit www.unapasadena.org to purchase tickets in advance.
Contact Ellen at www.snortland.com.
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