Hamas doesn't equal the entirety of the Palestinian population in the same way that the Israeli government/military doesn't equal the entire Israeli population. Why is that so hard for you .ml tankies to separate? There's a reason why I specifically make sure to phrase the discussion as "Hamas's actions" not "the Palestinians' actions"
IrateAnteater
joined 2 years ago
Man, I feel like a lot of the science headline writers forget that dark matter and dark energy were only ever placeholders. This doesn't "rattle our view of the universe"; we already knew that our view was incomplete, hence the need for placeholders in the first place.
Nobody is vilifying someone because they have different opinions on the importance of reading Shakespeare in high-school, or if they think, big centralised public libraries are a better option to lots of smaller public libraries.
No, but they are dumping people into that category in their mind, and then making all kinds of assumptions and conclusions about that person based off the one false assumption. And then because it's the internet, the name calling starts and all constructive conversation ends.
Just look at this thread. I started it with "the current American political discourse sucks" and no-one commenting was able to take that statement at face value. Everyone replied with assumptions on what my stance was on issues I didn't mention. It's that exact reflex that I have a problem with. Essentially, I agree with the message, but I disagree with the delivery method.
Being called an extremist is not really the thing I'm taking issue with. The right wing has been doing that for decades, screeching "communist!" at the most ridiculous things. And depending on which particular ideals you subscribe to, being such an "extremist" is probably a good thing.
The issue I have is that instead of calling out that shitty behavior, the left has started emulating and expanding on it. In addition to calling everyone "fascist", they've started attacking the entire concept of being a centrist (and I mean actual centrist here, not just right wingers arguing in bad faith). People aren't born believing in one socioeconomic system or another, it's learned. Generally, everyone is going to start off somewhere in the center, as they become politically aware. If the only voices they ever hear is two sides screeching names at eachother, you wind up with a disengaged and disinterested voting population, which will only help the fascists.
Oh no! Whatever shall they do?
Orcas are the biggest of the dolphins, and they are nightmare fuel for anything they decide is food.
Are you a great white shark that just smelled an orca? Better nope out to the other side of the planet before the orca eats your liver.
Are you a seal just swimming along? Oops, an orca just yeeted you 30 ft into the air with a tail slap, and is going to eat your stunned ass when you land.
Are you a smart seal who thinks they're safe on the ice? Nope. Orcas will break up the ice and knock you off using waves.
Are you a grown ass moose casually going for a swim without a worry in the world? Forgot about one of your only natural predators. Now you've been eaten by an orca.
I'm old enough to remember the first Iraq. I'm also aware enough of history to understand that when you hold a group up as the innocent victims, when they were anything but, you create an environment where other groups emulate them down the road.
The Israeli government holds the lions share of the blame for the Gaza genocide, after all, they are the one's doing it. But if we want to learn from this, and learn from what led up to it to hopefully short circuit things before they get this far in the future, we must acknowledge Hamas role.
Hamas may be fighting for the Palestinian people, but how you fight can have a major effect on how your enemies react, and also can have a major effect on soft support from third parties. Things like fighting out of civilian areas, and fighting without uniforms, etc, were made war crimes in the past specifically because of situations like this; it ends up getting civilians caught in the crossfire at best, and targeted at worst.
This isn't a left/right position, this is just observations on what has happened globally every time an assymetrical war has been fought over the last 30 years.
Realistically, everyone holds some blame here. If the UN had some balls (and if the US and USSR could have pulled their heads out of their collective asses back in the seventies) there would have been peacekeepers and a two state solution after the first war. Probably should have made Jerusalem a city state like the Vatican, just to stop everyone fighting for control of that too.