What is the U.N.? What is it good for? What does it do? What purpose does it serve? Is it beneficial to the world? Why does it exist? These are questions that I have carried around with me for as long as I can remember. Also, for as long as I can remember, all of these questions have been met with resoundingly negative answers.

From what I have gathered over my life is that the U.N. is, and has been for a long time, an obsolete organization. This fact is even more so true for the United States than for other nations.

In general, the U.N.’s purpose is to promote peace and understanding between the nations of the world, and on the surface that is exactly what it does. It is a diplomatic organization in which every nation has a voice on world affairs. The organization maintains many agencies to work towards this goal including the Peacekeepers and UNICEF. But do these efforts really have a meaningful impact on the world at large? Do they really promote peace and cooperation?

Every attempted “peacekeeping” mission that I have learned about has all but failed. The U.N. has never successfully prevented a war after World War II. If the U.N. worked as it should, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Serbian wars of the 1990’s, the Rwandan genocide, the rise of ISIS, and even the ongoing genocide in Burma should all have been squashed instantaneously.

The vast amount of foreign aid given by the U.N. to regions stricken with poverty, famine, and war haven’t seemed to make anything better. Ever increasing amounts of money are poured into the same regions where aid has been sent since the organization’s inception, more than 70 years ago, with no evident improvements. The U.N.’s biggest monetary contributor for these and all their efforts is invariably the U.S (nevermind that most nations that receive foreign aid despise America).

In addition to being the organization’s largest backer, the U.S. was one of its founding members along with the other victors of World War II. For these reasons it has come as a shock that the U.N. would overwhelmingly vote in favor to condemn President Trump’s decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel by moving our embassy there. Well, actually, it's not that shocking. The U.N. has a notorious reputation for floundering on important world decisions. Their policy of centripetal appeasement to rogue nations, terrorist organizations, and the inner workings of its own corrupt bureaucracy is nothing new at all.

128 nations voted to condemn Trump’s move. Many have criticized the president’s as well as U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley’s strong responses to this blatant show of disrespect from the world community. Why should they though? Should not America command a unique respect from the world for all that we have given and contributed to its development? I am not saying that everyone should blindly agree with us all the time, but such a public display as this was uncalled for.

Unsurprisingly, this is not the first time the U.N. has sided against a democratic ally-state in favor of an oppressive autocratic nation. From 1945-1971, Taiwan was recognized as the official representative of the Chinese people to the U.N. and maintained a permanent seat on the security council. In 1971, this privilege was transferred to the brutal communist regime of the People’s Republic of China. While not only did the U.N. abandon a long time ally, the move also added to the long Cold War between capitalism and communism that had plagued the world since WWII and resulted in a general incompetence within the U.N. to pass decisions (members of the security council have the right to veto, these members being; France, the U.K., the Soviet Union, China, and the U.S.).

The Trump administration has since threatened to cut nearly 40% of its current funding to multinational organizations, such as the U.N., that do not support U.S. values. This may very well be the right way to go for now. As a nation, we could use that money more now than nameless faces halfway across the world.

In my opinion, the U.N. needs to either be greatly reformed or removed altogether and replaced with a more effective world organization. An organization that will take action instead of shirking against human rights violations, one that will go out and physically defend the life and liberty of all people everywhere, and most importantly, one that will not merely appease enemies of the free world, but stand against them as a bulwark against oppression.