Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract • Hacker News Board

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#251

Post by pydry » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 10:47 AM UTC

hackerlight wrote: post #182

pydry wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Yes, those specific anti-Zionists aren't anti-semites. These are the types of anti-Zionists that you'll find in tech circles who are educated, egalitarian minded people that are cognitively capable of separating the crimes of a state and the ethnic group inside it. Israel hates these people the most. It's not hard to see why. Random people who attack Jews arent a threat - they get condemned and sent to prison quickl…

> staunchly avoided condemning the publicly stated highly racist views of the President of Israel after I raised them. This is irrelevant to the question being discussed which is whether anti-Zionism is correlated with anti-semitism. However, I did look up his statements now and yes it appears he is indeed some kind of racist. That's still besides the point. > very clear anti-zionism correlation to committed anti-rac…

>This is irrelevant to the question being discussed

It's completely relevant. The point being that being anti zionist is a necessary precondition of being consistently antiracist.

I will condemn clear and open anti semitism. I have no problem with that.

I cant in good faith condemn anti semitism and not condemn Isaac Herzog's comments. Anti semitism is racism. Isaac made some very clear and very obvious racist remarks as the head of the zionist state too. To be consistently antiracist I have to condemn those too, as well as the sheer overwhelming levels of racism inherent in the state he leads.

It is also a natural consequence of holding these views that you will, inevitably be accused of antisemitism. The correlation on that is nearly 100% as far as I can see - it happened to me, it happened to all of my friends, it happened to everyone involved in BDS.

Consistent antiracism guarantees that you will falsely be accused of antisemitism...by racists.

>As I described above, anti-Zionism is a wide tent with some racist genocidal crackpot conspiracy theorist

And pro zionism is a wide tent with a self declared racist at the very top whose racism is endorsed, whether implicitly or explicitly by damn near everybody in the tent.

I keep asking pro zionists and zionist apologists to prove themselves exceptions to this rule and they consistently refuse - thereby implicitly placing themselves in the "pro racism" group, i suppose.

>Dishonestly euphemistic and you know it.

No, not really. I tend to view the president of a cause to be a bit more representative of it than I do a few crackpots who hold up a flag. I similarly dont view Baruch Goldstein as representative of all zionists.

Unlike most other people who conflate antisemitism and antizionism, I dont just have a preferred flavor of racism.

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#252

Post by pydry » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 11:08 AM UTC

Adverblessly wrote: post #184

pydry wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Another reason people say that is because anti-Zionism is demonstrably correlated with anti-semitism This isnt true at all. The far right, for example, are pretty openly antisemitic. If somebody takes pains to distinguish the two on the other hand they're rarely bullshitting. The converse is true though. Attempts to conflate antizionism and antisemitism by are almost always ultimately driven by a staunch belief in J…

> This is reflected by the views of the President of Israel, who is openly against miscegenation. Sorry if this is nitpicking, but who are you talking about here? The President of Israel is Isaac Herzog, formerly the leader of the opposition and on the left side of the political map. I'd be highly surprised if he held such opinions. If you are talking about the Prime Minister (Israel is one of those countries where t…

Yeah, that guy. If you google for isaac herzog miscegenation and you'll find it.

If you visit the occupied territories around, say, Hebron it will be far less surprising that even somebody on the left would hold such views.

His was a useful example not because it's the most heinous but because he is at the top and clearly representative rather than a crazed rando, because he was very unambiguous about what he meant and because he doubled down on it when challenged.

It's hard, if not impossible, to find examples in the west that meet all of those 3 conditions.

Racism permeates their society to its very core. There are plenty of examples that are way, way worse.

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#253

Post by RickJWagner » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 11:54 AM UTC

When will people finally realize?

- The goal is a diverse workplace.

- A diverse workplace means many religions, skin colors, sexualities, etc.

- The more diversity, the better the chances some corporate political statement is going to offend co-workers.

- The best policy is to not discuss politics or religion in the workplace. This provides the best environment for diversity.

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#254

Post by mberg0 » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 1:19 PM UTC

EdwardDiego wrote: post #14

hourago wrote: post #8

> “Due to retaliation, a hostile environment, and illegal actions by the company, I cannot continue to work at Google and have no choice but to leave the company at the end of this week,” Ariel Koren said in a statement posted Tuesday to Medium. Many people is missing the point. "Retaliation" is illegal. > Google denied retaliation and the National Labor Relations Board found no wrongdoing after an investigation In m…

Boycotting Israel gets your company in trouble with various state governments in the US, like no supplying services to the government, and in Arkansas, it gets even more viral in that people you supply services to are forbidden from supplying services to the government. My RH contract specifically forbade boycotting Israel, I'm sure for those reasons. And of course, I imagine that Israel has laws about doing business…

No post body was provided.

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#255

Post by jollofricepeas » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 1:26 PM UTC

edanm wrote: post #175

numeromancer wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

I don't mean to be rude, but this sounds fairly anti-semitic. "It doesn't matter about what all the Christian groups think, what matters is that the Zionists [implied to be Jews?] are buying the legislation". This might definitely not be your intent - but that is for sure how I am currently parsing your comment.

Agreed.

1. Obviously anti-semitic

2. Not even true. The Christian Right lobby is HUGE and includes evangelical Protestants, Catholics, and LDS.

3. The Christian far right is significant and spent over 10% of the total lobbying spend in the last election cycle.

Sources:

[1] https://www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/7/2011/...

[2] https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/5050/trump-us-christian-spe...

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#256

Post by myth_drannon » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 2:00 PM UTC

panick21_ wrote: post #230

Adverblessly wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> settler-colonialist state based on religion Are you referring to Jewish colonialists coming to British ruled Palestine in the early 20th century, Muslim colonialists conquering Byzantine ruled Palestina in the early 7th century, Roman colonialists that exiled Jews and renamed the area Palestina in the early 2nd century after previous conquest, Greeks, Persians, Babylonians, Assyrians or Egyptians? Or maybe how acco…

Well we can't do much about what the Romans did. Muslim empires conquered Palestine in the 7th century yes, but they didn't widely displace the population. And even in the case of the roman, there was a large diaspora within the roman empire at the time, but not really a whole lot of systematic population replacment. The colonists movement called Zionism (that is historically closely interlinked with other colonialis…

Zionism started way before WWI

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#257

Post by ovi256 » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 2:05 PM UTC

staticman2 wrote: post #164

qsort wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are at least three different claims here that I'd like to unpack: 1) "If you really have to pick a belief system to put your faith in, you can do much worse than traditional religion." Now, I'm a lifelong atheist, and atheism is one of the few things I never changed my mind on, but I came to the conclusion that this is probably true: at the very least, traditional religion is a stable belief system that won't d…

The idea that religious people don't have bullshit creeds outside their religion is a false one. Religious people in America act religious on Sunday and like ruthless, immoral "greed is good" capitalists on Monday, flexibly switching ideologies for their convenience.

You're describing someone with a ruthless flexible ideology. A truly religious person would apply the principles of their religion during the week too.

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#258

Post by foogazi » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 2:44 PM UTC

EdwardDiego wrote: post #14

hourago wrote: post #8

> “Due to retaliation, a hostile environment, and illegal actions by the company, I cannot continue to work at Google and have no choice but to leave the company at the end of this week,” Ariel Koren said in a statement posted Tuesday to Medium. Many people is missing the point. "Retaliation" is illegal. > Google denied retaliation and the National Labor Relations Board found no wrongdoing after an investigation In m…

Boycotting Israel gets your company in trouble with various state governments in the US, like no supplying services to the government, and in Arkansas, it gets even more viral in that people you supply services to are forbidden from supplying services to the government. My RH contract specifically forbade boycotting Israel, I'm sure for those reasons. And of course, I imagine that Israel has laws about doing business…

> that for Jesus to come back, the State of Israel has to exist.

Imagine thinking that humanity has the power to influence the actions of G_d

Oooh, then you’d see the actions of the opposition as influenced by the devil

A cycle of hate, mind-blown

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#259

Post by foogazi » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 2:49 PM UTC

ThunderSizzle wrote: post #65

bayindirh wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe it's because that the religion is one of the most important factors which formed these alliances and adversaries throughout the history. Without these cultural and religious layers, what remains is same for everyone. A human body.

Sure, you are correct. But that also means Jews/Christians have a very rocky road together. Technically, "Christians" performed the Holocaust, for starters. It begs a question - when you add in Islam, why do Christians and Jews suddenly become political allies?

> when you add in Islam, why do Christians and Jews suddenly become political allies?

Goes back to the Crusades, the Islamic invasion of Europe and the fall of Constantinople

It’s not like Christianity embraced Jews either, but they did not present an existential threat

Re: Google employee resigns after ‘retaliation’ for protesting Israeli contract

#260

Post by hackerlight » Fri, Sep 02, 2022, 2:51 PM UTC

pydry wrote: post #251

hackerlight wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> staunchly avoided condemning the publicly stated highly racist views of the President of Israel after I raised them. This is irrelevant to the question being discussed which is whether anti-Zionism is correlated with anti-semitism. However, I did look up his statements now and yes it appears he is indeed some kind of racist. That's still besides the point. > very clear anti-zionism correlation to committed anti-rac…

>This is irrelevant to the question being discussed It's completely relevant. The point being that being anti zionist is a necessary precondition of being consistently antiracist. I will condemn clear and open anti semitism. I have no problem with that. I cant in good faith condemn anti semitism and not condemn Isaac Herzog's comments. Anti semitism is racism. Isaac made some very clear and very obvious racist remark…

> It's completely relevant. The point being that being anti zionist is a necessary precondition of being consistently antiracist.

Anti-Zionism being a precondition to antiracism doesn't imply that all anti-Zionists are antiracists. That's fallacious. As I've said, and provided examples for, anti-Zionists contain both principled antiracists and nationalist racist genocidal antisemitic crackpots. It's a union of two distinct sets of people. Anti-Zionism ~= {principled and commendable anti-racists}U{antisemitic neo-nazis and Arab-Muslim ethoreligious nationalists}. The first set of people arrive at their anti-Zionism because of egalitarian principles, the latter are just a broken clock that happens to align with antiracists on this one issue but otherwise they get their views from hatred and ethnonationalism. It's not hard to understand.