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On December 05 2019 22:13 Biff The Understudy wrote: The New York Times made an article about the torture programs of the CIA after 11/9. It made me want to both puke and cry.
It's really hard to understand how the american public is ok with that. I don't see how one that is not affected by a higher level of psychopathy can see those drawings and not feel sick.
I hope that this has demonstrated for you how this works despite (posters not being USian and) the lack of a more overtly pro-Israel position without the Republicans around anymore.
It's not so much that they are "okay" with it but as Poulsen was getting at, it's buried under blind hope, obfuscation, pettifogging, middle ground fallacy, misplaced whataboutism, etc....
Edit: To tie it to my point about the role neoliberal media outlets and a failure to hold anyone accountable for a long time play, here's Bush propagandist Nicole Wallace on MSNBC defending torture. She now has her own show on MSNBC.
On December 05 2019 22:13 Biff The Understudy wrote: The New York Times made an article about the torture programs of the CIA after 11/9. It made me want to both puke and cry.
It's really hard to understand how the american public is ok with that. I don't see how one that is not affected by a higher level of psychopathy can see those drawings and not feel sick.
I hope that this has demonstrated for you how this works despite (posters not being USian and) the lack of a more overtly pro-Israel position without the Republicans around anymore.
It's not so much that they are "okay" with it but as Poulsen was getting at, it's buried under blind hope, obfuscation, pettifogging, middle ground fallacy, misplaced whataboutism, etc....
Do you think if Bernie gets in and proposes something leftist when it comes to this conflict, he'll get pushback from the liberal voters?
On December 05 2019 22:13 Biff The Understudy wrote: The New York Times made an article about the torture programs of the CIA after 11/9. It made me want to both puke and cry.
It's really hard to understand how the american public is ok with that. I don't see how one that is not affected by a higher level of psychopathy can see those drawings and not feel sick.
I hope that this has demonstrated for you how this works despite (posters not being USian and) the lack of a more overtly pro-Israel position without the Republicans around anymore.
It's not so much that they are "okay" with it but as Poulsen was getting at, it's buried under blind hope, obfuscation, pettifogging, middle ground fallacy, misplaced whataboutism, etc....
Do you think if Bernie gets in and proposes something leftist when it comes to this conflict, he'll get pushback from the liberal voters?
Hard to say for sure about the voters, but Schumer (Dem Senate leader) has been pretty supportive of Trump's actions regarding Israel.
Recognizing Palestinians had human rights that need to be respected was hailed by the "far left wing" (Bernie supporters) though, so I imagine something like BDS would get a fair bit of neoliberal pushback.
On December 05 2019 22:13 Biff The Understudy wrote: The New York Times made an article about the torture programs of the CIA after 11/9. It made me want to both puke and cry.
It's really hard to understand how the american public is ok with that. I don't see how one that is not affected by a higher level of psychopathy can see those drawings and not feel sick.
I hope that this has demonstrated for you how this works despite (posters not being USian and) the lack of a more overtly pro-Israel position without the Republicans around anymore.
It's not so much that they are "okay" with it but as Poulsen was getting at, it's buried under blind hope, obfuscation, pettifogging, middle ground fallacy, misplaced whataboutism, etc....
Do you think if Bernie gets in and proposes something leftist when it comes to this conflict, he'll get pushback from the liberal voters?
Hard to say for sure about the voters, but Schumer (Dem Senate leader) has been pretty supportive of Trump's actions regarding Israel.
Recognizing Palestinians had human rights that need to be respected was hailed by the "far left wing" (Bernie supporters) though, so I imagine something like BDS would get a fair bit of neoliberal pushback.
From Schumer and the politicians definitely yeah. I'm just not sure where the liberal voters stand on this, and it might matter when the pushback starts. I wish I could look up polls on this but if I look up polls on the opinions of US liberals I'm going to get the whole left obviously ^_^
@JimmiC: Typically it would be siding for the oppressed against the oppressors, but we're going to go with baby steps here and say "not siding with the oppressors against the oppressed".
On December 06 2019 00:05 Wombat_NI wrote: There are layers to ethnic cleansing, even the Nazis didn’t go straight to exterminating Jews, they eventually came to the ‘Final Solution’ after years of escalating.
Which is why it early to proclaim it as happening, he could happen, but treating a presumption like a fact is very dangerous. There is a ton of people against what the right in Israel is doing in the west bank as well. Also, there is a real threat to all the jews in Israel. What would happen if all the countries pulled their support tomorrow?
In current news on the impeachment NPR had a great break down on the phone record's. They show the dates and times of the call's between Giuliani and the white house. Nunes calls and the mystery "-1" number that everyone thinks is Trump but has yet to be confirmed. If it is confirmed it will be another nail in the coffin for non partisan people and sadly probably meaningless to everyone who still support trump.
No specifically the point of my post was that it’s still ethnic cleansing way before the ‘exterminating everyone’ point, not that it’s not ethnic cleansing because Israel aren’t ritually exterminating everyone.
What would happen? Really? There’s no justification for it, whatsoever and Israel isn’t a global power like China that we have to pay lip service to.
That neighbours aren’t exactly fans of Israel is irrelevant, the state only exists because world powers felt the Holocaust was a bit shit, that people descended from those people treat another people as they do is a disgrace anyway but especially informed by that.
First I think it is a huge issue if we are only willing to crack down on people doing horrible things that are not big enough economic powers that it does not hurt us. China is rounding up people of a specific ethnicity, to put them in camps for "reeducation" and not all of them make it out. It is state sponsored organized and actively concealed. It is done to their own citizens and those people provide no threat to them, other than that they worship a different god than the communist party of China.
As I started off I don't know enough about the situation in Israel to make a determination about whether or not what they are doing is ethnic cleansing so I don't want to be put in a position of defending them when I'm not sure that I would if I knew more. What I do know is it is far more complex because there are actually large groups of people who want them wiped from the planet, and they still don't even have a peace agreement with Palestine. There is no simple solution to Israel or Palestine as both groups feel that they have rights to the land for holy reasons and both seem willing to kill the other. Right now Israel and the Jews have more might there so they are abusing it, 70 years ago that wasn't the case, 200 years before that no, 1000 years ago no, and so on. It is a deep seeded religious war that scholars who have studied it there whole lives don't agree and don't have any good solutions for solving it.
The China one is simple, they should just stop their ethnic cleansing and stop trying to eradicate a entire culture of people.
Israeli security forces killed 290 Palestinians in 2018. 5287 people were killed during Venezuelan security operations in 2018, and those are the "registered" number of extrajudicial killings linked to "resistance to authority", They include such crimes as a starving indigenous tribe trying to get food aid and being shot. Can you imagine how many go unreported by the government supported colectivo's? It is disturbing to say the least.
There is a reason why so many Jews through out the world think this type of talk is just people hiding their antisemitism because Hamas has declared Jihad and does want to wipe Israel from the map, so does Iran. Many of them remember actually being rounded up and sent to gas chambers, or have direct relatives who did.
Does that justify some of their governments heinous acts, no it doesn't. And the center and the left with-in Israel itself is trying to fight that right now. People should be supporting the people within the country (that make up a huge %) that want to do the right thing instead of denouncing the whole country and acting as if they are evil. I have yet to hear anyone say "Venezuela is ethnic cleansing", in fact there is way way to many people on the left who support Maduro and justify his heinous acts.
If you want to be about human rights great, we all should be, but it shouldn't be about human rights of the people on the left or right. It should be about human rights of everyone. And sadly the far right does not have exclusive rights to being horrible horrible people who do horrible things, the far left has a pretty ugly history and sadly current record as well.
Well not Israel has a terrible human rights record and anyone be they far left or to the opposite doesn’t really have to do much to point this out.
Its bollocks and everyone who takes 5 seconds to consider it knows it’s bollocks, there’s no complexity to it.
There is literately 1000's of years of complexity to Israel, and the same for antisemitism. And they get to be target of hate from Left right and everywhere in between.
Does that make what their far right leader, who they are trying to bring up on corruption charges for, not a horrible person who has done horrible things. No it does not.
Does it mean that we should not have compassion for the Israeli's, and Jewish people in general for their plight, of course not.
And if you are really mad at this, you should be really really really mad at China and Venezuela's behavior. Because while you are not to my knowledge guilty of it there are some members of the far left who constantly apologize for those countries behaviors because they claim to be socialists. And the people who do that are no different than the right wing people who support violence of their perceived enemies. Those people are just the other side of the same coin.
Israel's issues go well beyond Netanyahu. They have been hiding from any form of criticism against the state, not the people, by shouting antisemitism for a long time.
And yes as always there are other countries that also do bad things, they are also still bad. More then 1 country can be bad and we can be mad at all of them at once.
I totally agree with your second point, in fact it was my point. So lets not keep banging the Israel drum and go after them all. Because when you single out Israel and not the other bad actors it does become to look and feel a lot like antisemitism.
Israel is a particularly bad actor in the region. Worse than Iran and probably equal to Saudi Arabia in terms of "ruining the world".
I agree that they are bad actor, I'm not sure particularly. Saudi Arabia, Iran Syria, Egypt and Iraq all have done some pretty terrible things over time and recently.
And what is your purposed solution to the problem?
2 sides each have a book that says a certain piece of land is not only 100% theirs, but that it is important the other one SPECIFICALLY DOES NOT HAVE IT. That's the funniest part. It's not just "this is your home". It's "and for fucking SURE not THEIR home and make 110 fucking percent sure they never get it"
The only solution is to force the specific land in question to be entirely shared. I think the only realistic and "fair" solution is to treat them both like the idiots they are and say "I'm sorry, but I'm not gonna let your books be the reason millions of people die over the course of this eternal conflict. We're done. Neither of you win and you are forced to share, controlled by some outside entity. No Israeli government, no Palestinian government."
It is easy to argue that both sides of this conflict are awful for allowing a disagreement of this nature cause so much human suffering and death. No piece of land should feel worth that and they should both be ashamed. It is important to reflect on what it means for a human consciousness to be extinguished. Really think about what it means for people to die, then realize how many do because of a disagreement over books. It can't be allowed.
From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
Pro Publica found video evidence of how a 16 year old immigrant died from flu in an border detention center. He was diagnosed with a heavy fever and required to be checked on every two hours and sent to the hospital if worsened. But he died in some awful looking isolation cell without even a proper bed and nobody checking on him for many hours, even though the border patrol log said they checked 4 times on him (this was clearly not true). He faints on the floor for like 15 mins, crawls to the toilet, withers some more and then stops moving. Then he doesn't move for more than 4 hours until his also sick cellmate wakes up and finds him laying there in the toilet and has to alert the guards.
I think this might change a lot of people to go from passive dissatisfaction to active opposition against these detention centers. It's a real gut punch to watch for anyone with empathy.
On December 06 2019 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:... From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
In what proportion of other parts of the world did that heavy-handed approach work?
(Putting aside the question of exactly *who* is going to just take over Israel and Palestine, and whether any possible choice can get buy-in from the world at large.)
On December 06 2019 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:... From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
In what proportion of other parts of the world did that heavy-handed approach work?
(Putting aside the question of exactly *who* is going to just take over Israel and Palestine, and whether any possible choice can get buy-in from the world at large.)
When kids are being shot and hospitals demolished, I am less worried about making sure my proposed solution is an easy slam dunk. The world sits on its hands because no solution is perfect, but people are dying. It's not like it's all on pause until we figure out an ideal solution.
Edit: also, I realize I am taking this a bit off topic, so I feel like perhaps I should drop it since I'm essentially discussing "what should we do about Israel?" Which could be it's own topic
On December 06 2019 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:... From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
In what proportion of other parts of the world did that heavy-handed approach work?
(Putting aside the question of exactly *who* is going to just take over Israel and Palestine, and whether any possible choice can get buy-in from the world at large.)
When kids are being shot and hospitals demolished, I am less worried about making sure my proposed solution is an easy slam dunk. The world sits on its hands because no solution is perfect, but people are dying. It's not like it's all on pause until we figure out an ideal solution.
I don't think it's a question of an "ideal" solution so much as an actually executable solution that will help rather than hurt. Some questions for you to think about:
What are Russia, China, et al. going to do about the West marching in and setting up a new Middle Eastern country they directly control? Or even just the world at large?
What are the Israelis likely to do in response to such an action? The Palestinians? The surrounding Arab states? The worldwide Jewish/Islamic diaspora? (Hint: It probaly involves a wave of terrorism that makes the last twenty years look like a joke. It might actually succeed in having the Israelis, Palestinians, etc. not shoot one another much... but only because they're all too busy shooting at us.)
What makes Palestine more special than the wide swathes of Africa and other parts of the world where similar atrocities occur/have occured?
On December 06 2019 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:... From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
In what proportion of other parts of the world did that heavy-handed approach work?
(Putting aside the question of exactly *who* is going to just take over Israel and Palestine, and whether any possible choice can get buy-in from the world at large.)
When kids are being shot and hospitals demolished, I am less worried about making sure my proposed solution is an easy slam dunk. The world sits on its hands because no solution is perfect, but people are dying. It's not like it's all on pause until we figure out an ideal solution.
I don't think it's a question of an "ideal" solution so much as an actually executable solution that will help rather than hurt. Some questions for you to think about:
What are Russia, China, et al. going to do about the West marching in and setting up a new Middle Eastern country they directly control? Or even just the world at large?
What are the Israelis likely to do in response to such an action? The Palestinians? The surrounding Arab states? The worldwide Jewish/Islamic diaspora? (Hint: It probaly involves a wave of terrorism that makes the last twenty years look like a joke. It might actually succeed in having the Israelis, Palestinians, etc. not shoot one another much... but only because they're all too busy shooting at us.)
What makes Palestine more special than the wide swathes of Africa and other parts of the world where similar atrocities occur/have occured?
I told you that the global consensus of what not to do sets it apart for one. Israel's dependence on the US is another. Even Nazi's had more international support than Israel and they openly taught that their allies were subhuman.
On December 06 2019 16:39 GreenHorizons wrote:... I told you that the global consensus of what not to do sets it apart for one. Israel's dependence on the US is another. Even Nazi's had more international support than Israel and they openly taught that their allies were subhuman.
All of this has precisely zero bearing on Mohdoo's reasons for proposing this action:
On December 06 2019 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:... From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
You and I might have answers to that question but I advised him to ask himself that question, in the context of the position he has said he occupies.
On December 06 2019 16:39 GreenHorizons wrote:... I told you that the global consensus of what not to do sets it apart for one. Israel's dependence on the US is another. Even Nazi's had more international support than Israel and they openly taught that their allies were subhuman.
All of this has precisely zero bearing on Mohdoo's reasons for proposing this action:
On December 06 2019 13:42 Mohdoo wrote:... From a purely humanitarian perspective, the EU and North America have taken a very heavy handed approach to widespread suffering in other parts of the world, but allow what is essentially a repeating story of death and suffering. We shouldn't be allowing a conflict of this nature to exist. We need to end it immediately.
You and I might have answers to that question but I advised him to ask himself that question, in the context of the position he has said he occupies.
I feel like the US doing it is obviously bad which iirc he said the US shouldn't do it but an outside group (which has it's own obvious problems)
We can't end the conflict, but we can end our support for ethnic cleansing. As Neb said, baby steps. A year ago he accepted the inevitability of either the relocation or extermination of the Palestinian people, now he 's at least entertaining outcomes that aren't that.
This probably sounds harsh, but that's where we're at.
On December 06 2019 17:34 GreenHorizons wrote:... We can't end the conflict, but we can end our support for ethnic cleansing..
I don't think anything I said to Mohdoo contradicts this statement.
I'm saying cut the guy some slack. Plenty of bad arguments for you to zlefin in on but you picked the guy who's got a notably improved position since last time. Just my $0.02 that your argument looks more like his old worse one.
'What to do to solve the Israel-Palestine problem' is really complex. I don't have an answer. But 'don't support the continued settlement process' isn't complex, that's easy.
'Why do something about Israel's treatment of Palestine but not Chinese treatment of Uighurs' similarly touches upon a complicated issue (to what degree/ when / due to what factors can the international community respond to the domestic actions of a sovereign country) and it might have some relevance for individual consumers arguing for a personal boycott of Israeli products without being willing to boycott Chinese products (one might well argue that 'convenience' ends up looking like a factor, which is bad for anyone who genuinely presses for worldly betterment). But it's irrelevant from the perspective of 'the US should stop supporting the deeply unethical settlement policies of Israel and their military aid should be contingent upon improved conditions for the Palestinians'.
You can acknowledge that the conflict is difficult, that it's hard to find a good long term solution, while also stating that the current policy is unacceptable. I don't have a solution to climate change either, but I am confident that the solution does not involve increased deforestation, increased cattle production and increased dependency on coal.
On December 06 2019 21:57 Liquid`Drone wrote: 'What to do to solve the Israel-Palestine problem' is really complex. I don't have an answer. But 'don't support the continued settlement process' isn't complex, that's easy.
'Why do something about Israel's treatment of Palestine but not Chinese treatment of Uighurs' similarly touches upon a complicated issue (to what degree/ when / due to what factors can the international community respond to the domestic actions of a sovereign country) and it might have some relevance for individual consumers arguing for a personal boycott of Israeli products without being willing to boycott Chinese products (one might well argue that 'convenience' ends up looking like a factor, which is bad for anyone who genuinely presses for worldly betterment). But it's irrelevant from the perspective of 'the US should stop supporting the deeply unethical settlement policies of Israel and their military aid should be contingent upon improved conditions for the Palestinians'.
You can acknowledge that the conflict is difficult, that it's hard to find a good long term solution, while also stating that the current policy is unacceptable. I don't have a solution to climate change either, but I am confident that the solution does not involve increased deforestation, increased cattle production and increased dependency on coal.
Pretty much.
The actual solution is a difficult and intractable one, but it doesn’t mean certain things should cease in the absence of one existing.
The US isn’t going to shift tack any time soon, at the very least there should be more pressure exerted on Israel to abide by what they themselves agreed to in the past.
Biden's 'No Malarkey' tour kicked off in Iowa with him telling an 84 year old farmer "let’s do pushups together here, man. Let’s run. Let’s do whatever you want to do. Let’s take an IQ test. OK?".
Biden is comedy gold, if that ain't malarkey then what is? He's still the frontrunner, somehow.Warren collapsing on RCP poll averages.
On December 06 2019 21:57 Liquid`Drone wrote: 'What to do to solve the Israel-Palestine problem' is really complex. I don't have an answer. But 'don't support the continued settlement process' isn't complex, that's easy.
'Why do something about Israel's treatment of Palestine but not Chinese treatment of Uighurs' similarly touches upon a complicated issue (to what degree/ when / due to what factors can the international community respond to the domestic actions of a sovereign country) and it might have some relevance for individual consumers arguing for a personal boycott of Israeli products without being willing to boycott Chinese products (one might well argue that 'convenience' ends up looking like a factor, which is bad for anyone who genuinely presses for worldly betterment). But it's irrelevant from the perspective of 'the US should stop supporting the deeply unethical settlement policies of Israel and their military aid should be contingent upon improved conditions for the Palestinians'.
You can acknowledge that the conflict is difficult, that it's hard to find a good long term solution, while also stating that the current policy is unacceptable. I don't have a solution to climate change either, but I am confident that the solution does not involve increased deforestation, increased cattle production and increased dependency on coal.
Pretty much.
The actual solution is a difficult and intractable one, but it doesn’t mean certain things should cease in the absence of one existing.
The US isn’t going to shift tack any time soon, at the very least there should be more pressure exerted on Israel to abide by what they themselves agreed to in the past.
I agree with both those points. You would even get decent support within Israel and the Jewish community in the US. A far more effective approach then the incendiary approach of yelling about genocide and making it seem like all Israeli's are evil.
Hopefully the next US president uses their influence to better the situation. The current one wants people as mad as possible, he wants people yelling about genocide and letting Israel burn because it allows him to say "if you dont elect me the otherside wants your family to all burn" to the Jewish voters in America. Many who would not vote with him because of other issues. And he does not care about the ones yelling about letting Israel burn because they were never going to vote for him anyway.
Would you though?
America is much more pro-Israel than Europe and (I assume) Canada are. Even the milquetoast resolutions and condemnations that are ultimately ineffective that come from Europe and elsewhere the US doesn’t ever echo.
It’s a completely ineffective approach when you run up against a brick wall continually.
The political calculus about telling it like it is vs giving fuel for opposition to frame you in a certain way is a tough one to navigate.