Pat - always a pleasure to read your posts. I am reading from the shelter to distract myself from the rockets that are being aimed at my children. I keep thinking of what you stated - these silly kids who have no knowledge of history or context. But I think it is more than that- when you peel back a little bit you can see a concentrated and deliberate and global effort to manipulate reality.
This results in dooming the Palestinians to suffer, dooming the ME to more war, dehumanizing Jews and ultimately eroding liberal democracies.
I did a deep dive and just posted - would love your thoughts on it:
I don’t think the average US or Eu resident understands what it is like when millions of people want you dead. All the time. Each ballistic missile is the size of a bus with 300kg of explosives. And then 10000 rockets from Hezb and 10000 from Hamas. Each one with the intent of killing civilians. So thank you. It means a lot.
It’s nothing really. I just want people over there to know that some of us over here 🇬🇧 DO support Israel and do understand how important it is that you prevail. Important for all of us that want to live in civilised, modern, liberal democracies rather than barbaric, medieval, authoritarian theocracies. I really do believe you are on the front line of a fight for all of us, whether we know it or not. Please tell as many people over there 🇮🇱 as you can that they are supported by a lot of people over here 🇬🇧. I hope you are OK. I wish I could do more. Good luck to you all. X
Antisemitism has always been in the air we breathe, in the water we drink.
I just threw out a long comment I had written, listing a litany of examples of antisemitic acts and comments I remember from 40 years ago, during those supposed glory days when people were more righteous. I threw it out because this long list of grievances I witnessed or experienced bored even me.
Look, I was there.
The difference between now and then is not that there didn't used to be antisemitism and now there is. The difference is that back then there was a short blip of about a generation after WWII that felt that overt antisemitism was a tad tasteless. It had to be covert. People had to pretend not to be antisemitic. Universities had to let Jews in, publishers had to publish their tomes, all that, there were unofficial quotas if not official quotas of how many Jews you would countenance in order to prove that you were enlightened and tasteful. Now it's cool to be honest about your feelings, so people are honest about their antisemitism.
Frankly I'm glad to know who hates me, although I do wish that people who were on the fence weren't pushed over into the hating group for the sake of peer pressure.
I just finished Eric Hoffer's "The True Believe: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements". He identifies many of the same forces as you do. The susceptibility of those frustrated people, neither successful nor failed, "in the middle" of society looking for something to believe in....looking for meaning, as most ripe to latch on to the Mass Movements. I suspect if these "Palestinianistas" had the opportunity to experience, first-hand, life on the ground in pre-war Gaza and Israel they would be searching for something else to cast their lot with. Or perhaps they would avert their eyes and carry on regardless of the truth since, for most of them, I suspect they have never before felt so alive, so powerful and so heard...truth be damned.
It's very difficult simply to replace a set of values that have worked as the core of Western civilization with something else that would work equally well.
There is an old Jewish saying, based on observing antisemitism among Christians, that we'd better off if the Jews were religious and the non-Jews weren't. The past several decades have shown that to be wrong. It seems that Christianity didn't cause anti-Jewish hatred; people predisposed to hate Jews found an excuse in Christianity - and didn't have ethical messages that would turn them away from hatred.
Critical Race Theory seems to be the new ideology - and it is probably popular in part because it allows one to engage in bigotry while telling themselves that they aren't bigots. It doesn't actually demand that you avoid _any_ behavior you want to engage in; it doesn't say that you will ultimately be help accountable for bad behavior - but you can preen before your friends who will tell you how moral you are.
I don't know how we could revive those traditional Western religious values - but I don't see a clear viable alternative if we're not heading for civilizational collapse.
Dear America: You are waking up, as Germany once did, to the awareness that 1/3 of your people would kill another 1/3, while 1/3 watches.
Pat - always a pleasure to read your posts. I am reading from the shelter to distract myself from the rockets that are being aimed at my children. I keep thinking of what you stated - these silly kids who have no knowledge of history or context. But I think it is more than that- when you peel back a little bit you can see a concentrated and deliberate and global effort to manipulate reality.
This results in dooming the Palestinians to suffer, dooming the ME to more war, dehumanizing Jews and ultimately eroding liberal democracies.
I did a deep dive and just posted - would love your thoughts on it:
https://open.substack.com/pub/narrativebias/p/why-people-think-jews-and-israel?utm_source=app-post-stats-page&r=fgc1l&utm_medium=ios
Thank you for your message. Sending strength to you and all Israelis. Thank you for forwarding your post, which I will read shortly.
Love and prayers to everyone in Israel 🇮🇱. From England 🏴. Am yisrael chai. 🙏❤️
I don’t think the average US or Eu resident understands what it is like when millions of people want you dead. All the time. Each ballistic missile is the size of a bus with 300kg of explosives. And then 10000 rockets from Hezb and 10000 from Hamas. Each one with the intent of killing civilians. So thank you. It means a lot.
It’s nothing really. I just want people over there to know that some of us over here 🇬🇧 DO support Israel and do understand how important it is that you prevail. Important for all of us that want to live in civilised, modern, liberal democracies rather than barbaric, medieval, authoritarian theocracies. I really do believe you are on the front line of a fight for all of us, whether we know it or not. Please tell as many people over there 🇮🇱 as you can that they are supported by a lot of people over here 🇬🇧. I hope you are OK. I wish I could do more. Good luck to you all. X
Thank you. 200 ballistic missiles is very scary. The boom shakes your whole body.
Antisemitism has always been in the air we breathe, in the water we drink.
I just threw out a long comment I had written, listing a litany of examples of antisemitic acts and comments I remember from 40 years ago, during those supposed glory days when people were more righteous. I threw it out because this long list of grievances I witnessed or experienced bored even me.
Look, I was there.
The difference between now and then is not that there didn't used to be antisemitism and now there is. The difference is that back then there was a short blip of about a generation after WWII that felt that overt antisemitism was a tad tasteless. It had to be covert. People had to pretend not to be antisemitic. Universities had to let Jews in, publishers had to publish their tomes, all that, there were unofficial quotas if not official quotas of how many Jews you would countenance in order to prove that you were enlightened and tasteful. Now it's cool to be honest about your feelings, so people are honest about their antisemitism.
Frankly I'm glad to know who hates me, although I do wish that people who were on the fence weren't pushed over into the hating group for the sake of peer pressure.
But that's how fashion works.
Nailed it. Again. Thank you‼️
Well said.
I just finished Eric Hoffer's "The True Believe: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements". He identifies many of the same forces as you do. The susceptibility of those frustrated people, neither successful nor failed, "in the middle" of society looking for something to believe in....looking for meaning, as most ripe to latch on to the Mass Movements. I suspect if these "Palestinianistas" had the opportunity to experience, first-hand, life on the ground in pre-war Gaza and Israel they would be searching for something else to cast their lot with. Or perhaps they would avert their eyes and carry on regardless of the truth since, for most of them, I suspect they have never before felt so alive, so powerful and so heard...truth be damned.
Thanks Robert. Yes, that book has had a profound impact on me. You are spot on.
It's very difficult simply to replace a set of values that have worked as the core of Western civilization with something else that would work equally well.
There is an old Jewish saying, based on observing antisemitism among Christians, that we'd better off if the Jews were religious and the non-Jews weren't. The past several decades have shown that to be wrong. It seems that Christianity didn't cause anti-Jewish hatred; people predisposed to hate Jews found an excuse in Christianity - and didn't have ethical messages that would turn them away from hatred.
Critical Race Theory seems to be the new ideology - and it is probably popular in part because it allows one to engage in bigotry while telling themselves that they aren't bigots. It doesn't actually demand that you avoid _any_ behavior you want to engage in; it doesn't say that you will ultimately be help accountable for bad behavior - but you can preen before your friends who will tell you how moral you are.
I don't know how we could revive those traditional Western religious values - but I don't see a clear viable alternative if we're not heading for civilizational collapse.
Beautifully written, as ever. Thank you 🙏.
Stepson and family currently in their shelter in Tel Aviv.
Yes, nothing new under the sun. And no more parades.
Even the bottles are too soiled to be new.
It is also “exactly no coincidence” that this is happening as the few remaining Shoah survivors near the end of their lives.
The West seems to have only been able to keep antisemitism (mostly) at bay for one human lifetime. We have such short memories.
Idiots abound.
"unmoored from any transcendent moral underpinnings". Very well put.