Facebook Follies of Friends and Families

[Eddie Teach]

It's not such a complete correlation. Much of it is anti-western rather than anti-Jewish.

[Sophie Scholl]

Can anyone point to an actual Antisemitic tweet she made?  Not a reported and abridged tweet, but an actual complete tweet?  I've found the reporting of what they actually said to be incredibly messed up with blatant editing of them or seemingly intentional misinterpretation when they were summarized.  Now compare the actual tweets to what the President and many others have tweeted and said.  In full.  With context.  There is no legitimate comparison for the levels of Antisemitism.

[katmai]

The Jews are alright, now those fucking Irish......

[garbon]

Also she can't being able to resist voicing the backward anti-semitic stuff I suspect he brings from her parents' household and upbringing doesn't help.

Anti-Israel /= Anti-Semitic

No, they're not equal, in a way that a correlation coefficient of 0.99 is technically not equal.

Unless you're "anti-Israel" to mean something pretty drastic, that's codswallop.

I think this Vox article points out how poorly constructed anti-Israeli comments due provide cover for anti-semitic garbage. About half way down is a bit on Labour and Corbyn.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/12/18220241/ilhan-omars-twitter-tweet-anti-semitism

[garbon]

The Jews are alright, now those fucking Irish......

I'll say.

[Admiral Yi]

I think this Vox article points out how poorly constructed anti-Israeli comments due provide cover for anti-semitic garbage. About half way down is a bit on Labour and Corbyn.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/12/18220241/ilhan-omars-twitter-tweet-anti-semitism

Your link supports my point, that "there is legitimate criticism of Israel that is not not anti-Semitic.  Which is a no-brainer.

The only question for DGuller was whether "anti-Israel" means "kill them all" or whether it means stop doing that nasty shit.

[Sophie Scholl]

Speaking out against Saudi Arabia doesn't mean one is anti-Islamic, right?  Both Saudi Arabia and Israel are countries dominated by one religion and home to the holy place associated with their respective religions.  Both have some rather reprehensible actions associated with their respective governments.  Both have a lot of influence in the United States politics.  Both have adherents of the religion that dominates their respective nations within the United States and globally.

[garbon]

Speaking out against Saudi Arabia doesn't mean one is anti-Islamic, right?  Both Saudi Arabia and Israel are countries dominated by one religion and home to the holy place associated with their respective religions.  Both have some rather reprehensible actions associated with their respective governments.  Both have a lot of influence in the United States politics.  Both have adherents of the religion that dominates their respective nations within the United States and globally.

I'd suggest reading the vox article I posted.

[Tamas]

There are plenty of valid reasons to criticise the present Israeli government but "Israel controls US/world leaders and opinion" is NOT a commentary on that government. Let's not hide behind that obvious bullshit.

[Malthus]

Speaking out against Saudi Arabia doesn't mean one is anti-Islamic, right?  Both Saudi Arabia and Israel are countries dominated by one religion and home to the holy place associated with their respective religions.  Both have some rather reprehensible actions associated with their respective governments.  Both have a lot of influence in the United States politics.  Both have adherents of the religion that dominates their respective nations within the United States and globally.

I think you misunderstand the nature of the relationship of Judaism to Israel, if you are making a serious comparison of it to Wahhabism and Saudi Arabia. 

Judaism is both a religion and a tribal identity (similar but not identical to an ethnicity). A large percentage of Jews, both in Israel and in the West, are not religious at all. The notion that Israel is "dominated" by religious Judaism in the same way as Saudi Arabia is dominated by Wahhabian Islam is nonsense - which isn't to say that the ultra-religious don't have an irritating amount of clout within Israel. But for all that, Israel is basically a western nation, with (to give but one example) the largest gay community in the middle east - something literally punishable by death in Saudi Arabia.

Moreover, within America, Jews are not uniformly backers of Israel. For historical reasons, Jews tend, as a group, to be *more* liberal than non-Jews, and many Jews are outspoken critics of Israel from the left. That's not unusual--within Israel, many Israelis are critical of their own government, again often from the left. Not something you find much in Saudi Arabia.

This error is similar to assuming (say) that all Irish people are Catholic, and so Ireland is "just like" Saudi Arabia; noting that the Irish are found throughout the United States; and warning that the Irish presence creates a security threat - all those Irish are surely more loyal to the Pope than to America. This position was actually a factor during the election of Kennedy.

Israel has lots of problems, but lumping all Jews together, comparing Israel to Saudi Arabia (or Nazi Germany or Aparthied-era South Africa) isn't a good rhetorical way to highlight those problems.   

[Malthus]

Speaking out against Saudi Arabia doesn't mean one is anti-Islamic, right?  Both Saudi Arabia and Israel are countries dominated by one religion and home to the holy place associated with their respective religions.  Both have some rather reprehensible actions associated with their respective governments.  Both have a lot of influence in the United States politics.  Both have adherents of the religion that dominates their respective nations within the United States and globally.

I'd suggest reading the vox article I posted.

It's a good article.

[crazy canuck]

It is hard to have a conversation when the common ground is so devoid of commonality.  Have a nice day.

Have you considered avoiding starting off with sarcasm? That might go a long way towards establishing commonality.

I started out by listing some of the better known publications that take her ideas seriously.  I am not sure how that was read as sarcasm. 

[Valmy]

She is also getting a lot of support for her ideas from places like the Economist, which grudgingly admits she makes good points about taxation policy and the New York Times which regularly runs editorials pointing out that she has done her homework on this issues and that her ideas are not as radical as people seem to think.  There was a recent piece which argued the radicals are the GOP and that her suggested polices would take America back to more sane taxation policies the US had before it was hijacked by the radical right.

I really don't understand you and others here dismissing her so easily.

I think it's mainly two parts.  The hard right is just totally deranged when it comes to anything involving her.  The moderates without a cause are often susceptible to go down the rabbit hole halfway, and being too busy admiring their rationality to realize that they're still in the rabbit hole.

That is why we have you around DGuller. You can set us straight.

[DGuller]

It's a tough and thankless job, but someone has to do it.

[The Minsky Moment]

I agree with Malthus 95%.  The 5% concern is that there has been a real degeneration in governance and human rights in the past decade. The Likud-led government seems to be sliding inexorably toward the Orban-Erdogan-Putin corrupt authoritarian continuum. Israel is still better governed and far more robust rule of law than other nations in the neighborhood but the trend is very troubling.  The treatment of the Palestinians is inexcusable even given the security situation.  Toleration of dissent has gone way down with official efforts to suppress NGOs and retaliate against journalists.