Talk:Proposals for the United States to withdraw from the United Nations

Title
I'd welcome any and all help in improving this article, in both length and substance. Travis Cleveland (talk) 11:47, 24 December 2007 (UTC)


 * "Secession" really doesn't seem to be the right word here - it's not used in any of the sources that I can see, and it implies UN sovereignty which doesn't really exist; in fact, in many ways it's sufficiently loaded to skew the tone of the article! A sovereign state can't really "secede" from an organisation or a treaty...
 * You'd really want something about "ending involvement" or "ending membership", but they don't make fior a very clear title - I've changed it to "withdrawal", United States withdrawal from the United Nations. Shimgray | talk | 00:32, 27 December 2007 (UTC)
 * Article rephrased accordingly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Shimgray (talk • contribs) 00:36, 27 December 2007 (UTC)


 * According the the Dictionary, Seceding means "to withdraw formally from an alliance, federation, or association, as from a political union, a religious organization, etc." which would seem to fit the situation. The United Nations is in fact an association of countries. That being said, I do a think that some might think that "Secession" may seem a bit POV to some people; changing it to "Withdrawl" seems to be dumbing the name down, but I suppose it is nessesary to keep the article neutral. Travis Cleveland (talk) 12:08, 27 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Come to think of it, "Withdraw" is the term used in HR1146; I suppose that reinforces it as the correct word to use. Travis Cleveland (talk) 12:17, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

ReWrite?
I think that the article misses the point that since the fall of the USSR the US has been the only super power and so it wants to get on with doing what it considers right while the rest of the world has other ideas. Previously it would have been the US and the USSR arguing while other nations took sides but now the sides are the US and most other nations (at least it is the EU [without Britain], China, and Russia vs. the US, Britain and a few others). The point is that often criticisms about the US being in the UN are not about cost effectiveness or constitutionality or other principles but expressions of frustration from those who want to see the US acting more unilaterally. Many would say that the Bush Admin. has undermined the US view of the UN for this purpose (for instance the lack of a resolution for the use of force in Iraq is stated as a failure of the UN when actually it is a failure of the UN to do what America (and Britain and a few others) want).

I hope that was not to much of a rant. What I really want to get across is that a lot of people feel that US complaints about the UN are actually US complaints about the rest of the world not falling into line. The article is quite good on the US internal view of the UN but does not give any wider view of what the world may think about US withdrawal motives.

Opinions?

CaptinJohn (talk) 11:58, 3 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Perhaps it is a fact that the United States wants to act unilaterally (which it does), and wants to do it without any supranational entity telling it that it needs a "permission slip." However, the constitutionality of the UN's actions has certainly been a key point for all legistlation regarding leaving the UN. The US rejects the International Court, many reject the law of the sea treaty, and several other UN programs. I don't think that it is any one perticular thing, I just believe that Americans see the UN as usurping them. If you recall, John Kerry's "Global Test" statement was viewed negativley by the majority of Americans, because Americans felt that requiring permission from other nations infringed on American soverignty. In every sense, the internal US view is more important than the external view with regards to withdrawl. That being said, I hope that you will assist in this article, and I will try to include some of your views. A full rewrite is unwarranted, but restructuring it to be more of a global view may be, and to that end I am adding a few tags. Travis Cleveland (talk) 15:51, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

No I think it's mainly isolationism and/or anti-globalism. Do you really think the average American--who couldn't find the middle east on a map--is scheming up some kind of agenda about what should be done there? Foreign policy is usually not even on people's priorities in polls. Even now, look at the presidential polls, the economy is number one by a wide margin. Presidents tend to focus on foreign policy because that's where most of their power lies, that's all. Other countries get the idea that Americans are obsessed with foreign matters when the opposite is the case; most Americans consider foreign countries irrelevant. 71.128.205.128 (talk) 09:48, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

It is only natural that the UN infringes on US sovereignty - it infringes everybody's. Rights only go as far as long they don't violate the rights of others. If America wants to explicitly rule the world, using its unparalleled military force without the UNSC having a say in the matter, well, good luck fighting Asia for final global dominance - China and Japan will eat you for breakfast! No, hopefully there will be no war, but the existence of such opinions in the US only shows to prove that somebody better go over there and say "Good morning America, guess what - the world doesn't end at your borders!"--Mátyás (talk) 17:21, 7 September 2010 (UTC)

Conspiracy Theories?
I'm not sure who, but sombody added a little bit of information to the history section of this article about conspiracy theories. Now, it reads a little "odd," I think it either needs to be expanded to make more sense, or completly cut from the article. Any suggestions? Travis T. Cleveland (talk) 21:45, 19 January 2008 (UTC)

1990s? (chronology)
Withdrawal only made it into formal Congressional proposed legislation in the 1990's, but I think the article is missing a big part of the story by not mentioning the growing tensions between the U.S. and U.N. beginning in the 1970's, notably with the notorious resolution 3379, the extremely controversial proposed UNESCO "New Media Order", the U.S. withdrawal from UNESCO, the U.S. refusing Arafat a visa to appear at UNHQ in New York, and a lot of general resentment that the U.N. was becoming a playground for 3rd-world dictators and Communist tyrants to promulgate anti-American propaganda, while the U.S. shouldered a disproportionate share of the bill. One of the U.S. representatives to the UN during the Reagan administration famously said that if the UN withdrew its headquarters to Europe, then the U.S. would happily go down to the docks to wave it goodbye. Anti-UN sentiment would have never amounted to much in terms of practical U.S. politics of the 1990's and 2000's, if a very solid foundation for somewhat widespread popular aversion to the U.N. hadn't been previously laid down during the 1970's and 1980's... AnonMoos (talk) 16:31, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

NPOV and Citations
This article does not present a neutral point of view. To begin, the majority of the citations are from Right Wing organizations and politicians who remain openly hostile to the UN. The poll cited, for instance, was conducted by a commercial agency using an automated polling system. In contrast, a poll conducted by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, a non-profit research organization, found that the majority of the US public supports the UN (http://www.thechicagocouncil.org/UserFiles/File/POS_Topline%20Reports/POS%202008/2008%20Public%20Opinion_Foreign%20Policy.pdf). Resources such as the John Birch Society, the Heritage Foundation, and World Net need to be counter-balanced by resources on the other end of the spectrum. Also, the unquestioned acceptance of the United States' role as a global hegemon indicates, more than anything, an ultra nationalist POV. Significant revision is required to bring this article to a NPOV.
 * -Napzilla (talk) 01:47, 24 March 2009 (UTC)

I added your source to the puplic opinion section because i also feel that only quoting polls from one conservative firm (rasmussen) is clearly biased. 188.23.168.229 (talk) 20:53, 4 June 2010 (UTC)

I agree that this article needs revision. I plan to add more information later from other sources, since one can clearly see that the majority of its References and Links are from right-wing organisations. --Ebacci EN (talk) 03:37, 21 July 2010 (UTC)

UNGA Resolution 3379 of 1975
It's really slightly bizarre that this article still makes no mention of UNGA Resolution 3379 of 1975 -- which was probably the single UN action which created the most negative publicity in the United States ever, and which played a large role in catapulting systematic hostility towards the UN from being advocated by a small number fringe extremists only, to being embraced by significant and influential factions within the GOP... AnonMoos (talk) 16:51, 15 August 2011 (UTC)

Constant addition of unreferenced statement
As per Proper Sourcing guidelines, I'm deleting the following statement:


 * "The popularity of the United Nations in the United States continues to decline to this day."

I believe 3 years is time enough to find a source for such a controversial statement. I realise this has been deleted before but added again several times. This article might require protection. Ebacci EN (talk) 00:37, 28 August 2011 (UTC)

Merge Proposal into United States and the United Nations
I would like to propose a merger of this article into this.

Please see the Discussion page for the destination article for more information. Ebacci EN (talk) 05:46, 1 September 2011 (UTC)

removing POV tag with no active discussion per Template:POV
I've removed an old neutrality tag from this page that appears to have no active discussion per the instructions at Template:POV:
 * This template is not meant to be a permanent resident on any article. Remove this template whenever:
 * There is consensus on the talkpage or the NPOV Noticeboard that the issue has been resolved
 * It is not clear what the neutrality issue is, and no satisfactory explanation has been given
 * In the absence of any discussion, or if the discussion has become dormant.

Since there's no evidence of ongoing discussion, I'm removing the tag for now. If discussion is continuing and I've failed to see it, however, please feel free to restore the template and continue to address the issues. Thanks to everybody working on this one! -- Khazar2 (talk) 21:18, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Added citation needed in the Unilateralism end
A rather broad and bold claim was made and no citation provided. I am also of the opinion that the article requires a great deal of attention from those knowledgeable on the subject, too many primary sources still in the article and some bit of POV is present in portions. That said, I have my own POV that would color my edits. An example is, unilateralism in the case of destroying Al Qaeda in Afghanistan, but most certainly not in the use of thermonuclear or nuclear arms when not being actively bombarded by the same. So, who wants to toss their hat into the ring and work with me to turn this into a "Decent Article", if not a Good Article?Wzrd1 (talk) 20:37, 14 February 2015 (UTC)

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No such thing as misnomer or not, cepu, say any is ok. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Lyhendc (talk • contribs) 02:41, 4 October 2018 (UTC)

H.R. 193: American Sovereignty Restoration Act of 2017
This one has just been posted as of January 3rd, and under the current presidency, who knows if it will be dropped by the wayside this time around?

https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/115/hr193/text — Preceding unsigned comment added by Kode54 (talk • contribs) 03:45, 23 January 2017 (UTC)

Delete article
This is the worst article I have ever read on Wikipedia. It's a hodgepodge of speculation and posturing, with no coherent structure. Even the first section is not an intro (For exaple, a broad background of the topic) but rather a gramatically incorrect hodgpodge of cherry-picked "facts" thrown together. Why do we refer to cherry-picked claims and legal manuevers there, but later have an entirely separate section called "legislation"? And the "unilateralism" section is just editorializing. The best this article would possibly be would be a list of legislation, but I think it should be deleted entirely. -- Preceding unsigned comment added by 172.56.50.77 (talk) 13:41, 3 December 2022 (UTC)


 * This is a very legitimate topic, since John Birchers ran an active political persuasion campaign with the goal of withdrawing from the U.N. in the 1960s, and many in the U.S. who were by no means all right-wingers were disgusted by hypocritical Soviet-sympathizing third-worldism in the 1970s and 1980s (the alliance of dictatorships against democracies, with the low-point being General Assembly resolution 3379 of 1975), and periodical flare-ups since then, such as the racist Durban conference in 2001, UNESCO historical revisionism denying any relationship between Jews and Jerusalem, etc etc ad nauseam. If a Wikipedia article is about a legitimate topic for which reliable sources are available, then the usual response if it has problems is to try to fix the problems, not delete the article. AnonMoos (talk) 15:04, 3 December 2022 (UTC)