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Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

paranoia.dubfire.net

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Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Criticizing the actions of any government is what it is, but many critics of Israel go so far as to say there should be no Jewish state, which in effect means the Jews should be a people without a homeland, forever vulnerable to extermination by the Gentiles they are forced to live amongst as an eternal minority. That alone is suspicious as it carries the shadow of antisemitism, but once you throw in explicit support…

Criticizing the entire idea of a theocracy, and that a religion should (of course) have a homeland to dominate, does not make you an antisemite, nor covered with antisemitism "shadow." More an antisemitism smear. Now, I am suspicious of the people who are irate about Israel as a Jewish state, but are all about the Dalai Lama. I don't see how that makes sense unless you have something against Jewish people.

The child of a Jewish mother is Jewish regardless of their religion, and this applies recursively, so you can have generation after generation of secular Jews as long as there's an unbroken matrilineal line. So Israel is not a homeland for a religion, it is a homeland for a nationality.

Sure, a convert to Judaism is also a Jew. But Judaism is explicitly not a religion for everyone, it is only a religion for the Jews. So if you believe in Judaism but have no desire to be a Jew yourself, you can just follow the Noahide laws. Actually becoming a Jew entails an extra step beyond that, namely the intention to join the Jewish nation. So not even in the case of conversion can the Jewish nation be equivalent to Judaism.

In practice, Israel is also just as secular as any Western country. No theocracy to be found there. This is more than you can say for, say, England, which has a state-established church with the monarch at its head.

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#132
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An the same goes for antisemitism. In America, [publicly] write anything critical of the Israeli government and you are labeled an anti-Semite.

Criticizing the actions of any government is what it is, but many critics of Israel go so far as to say there should be no Jewish state, which in effect means the Jews should be a people without a homeland, forever vulnerable to extermination by the Gentiles they are forced to live amongst as an eternal minority. That alone is suspicious as it carries the shadow of antisemitism, but once you throw in explicit support…

> ... the general attitude of the West has always been antisemitic.

Yes, we so viciously keep the Jews out of the good jobs in finance, law, and science.

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#133
post #6

If the author's going to complain about hype in news coverage, perhaps he shouldn't be a leading contributor to one-sided news coverage like the Wall Street Journal's 'What They Know'. Or is hype in news coverage only a problem when it's hype the author personally disagrees with?

Isn't that a Tu Queue fallacy?

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#134
post #111

> Today, Ryan Singel, the editor at Wired's Threat Level > blog responded to my blog post, but incorrectly frames > my criticism as if it were solely directed at Quinn > Norton and her coverage of Cryptocat. Considering about half of your original article was strictly discussing Norton's coverage, I can see where he got that idea. Then your original piece includes this bit: > It isn't clear why Norton felt it wasn't…

The concept of "privilege" as used in social justice speak is merely a tool used to discredit people who are in the wrong demographic/social/cultural categories without having to address the content of their arguments. And pointing this out is labeled "derailing", to avoid having to address that line of argument either.

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Criticizing the actions of any government is what it is, but many critics of Israel go so far as to say there should be no Jewish state, which in effect means the Jews should be a people without a homeland, forever vulnerable to extermination by the Gentiles they are forced to live amongst as an eternal minority. That alone is suspicious as it carries the shadow of antisemitism, but once you throw in explicit support…

Criticizing the entire idea of a theocracy, and that a religion should (of course) have a homeland to dominate, does not make you an antisemite, nor covered with antisemitism "shadow." More an antisemitism smear. Now, I am suspicious of the people who are irate about Israel as a Jewish state, but are all about the Dalai Lama. I don't see how that makes sense unless you have something against Jewish people.

Israel is not a theocracy.

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And you wonder why almost the entire world bar US politicians hates Israel. Not Jews. Israel. Illegally putting "facts on the ground" through settlements is a big deal to the Palestinians and it's a big deal to everyone else. It needs to stop.

I never justified the settlements, I just think anti-Israeli sentiment wouldn't be improved any by removing the settlements. It almost doesn't matter if Israel does everything right or wrong anyway, because that's not the reason the world hates them.

Why do you think the world hates them, then?

(aside: There's a long distance between "please stop allowing or encouraging your government to treat other human beings in this terrible, terrible manner. Please think about the crimes done to them by your parents and grandparents - and by you. Please consider how you can encourage peace," and "we hate you." Or there should be, anyway; there are some very invested people.)

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Israel is the only country whose mere existence seems to require justification Well, that's because most other countries weren't plopped down in the middle of an inhabited region, resulting in decades of violence and oppression that, and this part is critical, continue to this day . The US also shouldn't have been plopped down on the land inhabited by American Indians, but since the dust from that has mostly settled…

It's counterproductive to bathe ourselves in outrage over mistakes that cannot be rectified when there are problems today that could be solved, or at least improved on, by calm diplomatic negotiation, if either side could distance themselves from their hurt feelings long enough to cool off a little and be realistic. Getting everyone riled up over the injustice of it all pushes this process into the future and benefit…

>It's counterproductive to bathe ourselves in outrage over mistakes that cannot be rectified when there are problems today that could be solved, or at least improved on, by calm diplomatic negotiation, if either side could distance themselves from their hurt feelings long enough to cool off a little and be realistic. Getting everyone riled up over the injustice of it all pushes this process into the future and benefits no one.

If you want to have diplomacy in the middle east, it is absolutely crucial that we first acknowledge that creating Israel there was a mistake. Not doing so is just continuing to say "fuck you" to Palestinians. We need to say "look, putting Israel here was a mistake, but it's here now and we have to deal with this."

>Feelings have a way of being irrational, but ignoring them exacerbates problems rather than solving them.

If, whenever someone disagrees with you, you feel like you're talking to Hitler, you're going to find that your feelings get ignored a lot. There is simply no way to have a productive conversation without ignoring feelings like that.

>The idea that dissolving Israel was ever on the table is absurd.

Are you taking offense to my mention of dissolving Israel after you brought it up?

>I'd like to know how that could possibly be true. It's quite a stretch for me to imagine that when the leadership of Israel's enemies call for "the Zionist entity" to be pushed into the sea they have something else in mind.

Ugh. So now what you're saying is that when someone mentions that putting Israel there was a mistake, you immediately attribute to them the positions of Islamist extremists. How do you ever expect to have a rational discussion when you can't stop thinking in kneejerk feelings?

Re: Responding to Wired's ad hominem hatchet job

#140
post #133
post #6

If the author's going to complain about hype in news coverage, perhaps he shouldn't be a leading contributor to one-sided news coverage like the Wall Street Journal's 'What They Know'. Or is hype in news coverage only a problem when it's hype the author personally disagrees with?

Isn't that a Tu Queue fallacy?

ack. And additionally, this "tu quoque" accusation also insinuates that WSJ reporting focuses on hype - whereas the author explicitely mentions their reporting as a example of high-quality journalism (and other commenters here seem to agree).
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