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It's not just Texas. Try public voicing anti-Israel anything and you'll quickly learn how our freedoms are a farce.
by bsenftner 5y ago
It's not just Texas. Try public voicing anti-Israel anything and you'll quickly learn how our freedoms are a farce.
- cpach 5y agoI don’t follow. Is it not possible in the US to criticize Israel?
- AzzieElbab 5y agoBDS is going a bit beyond criticism.
- hnbad 5y agoDoes nobody remember the backlash against France for not participating in the wars in the Middle East? Companies publicly boycotted French products and went to the extent of replacing the word "French" with "Freedom" in words like "French fries" or "French toast". Boycotting Jewish companies (for being owned by Jewish people) is antisemitic, but the goal of BDS is boycotting Israeli companies over accusations against the Israeli government the same way e.g. the US sanctions Iranian companies over accusations against the Iranian government.
- AzzieElbab 5y agoThere is nothing wrong with boycotting Israel or any other country for a reason of your choosing. The problem with BDS is its complete dishonesty, it passes ongoing armed conflict for something else.
- Hizonner 5y agoThe "BDS movement" is not an organization and does not have a sharp boundary, but insofar as it has something vaguely like a boundary, the vast majority of the people inside of it are not engaged in armed conflict against Israel, are not supporting armed conflict against Israel, and never have been. Even if the majority of them were, the defining issue for BDS itself is not doing business with Israeli entities. Not doing business is not armed conflict. For you to have a point, they would have to somehow using the boycott itself to aid in shooting up the place. That doesn't even pass the laugh test.
- unethical_ban 5y agoSo? Everyday people want to "BDS" China for their human rights abuses, Russia for their territorial and cyber aggression. There are countries in the world doing shitty things in the eyes of some, and those people and orgs sometimes call for political and economic pressure to be applied. Why should the government be able to punish individuals who voice such opinions, excepting diplomatic or national security roles?
- sndman 5y agoExactly how is BDS going beyond criticism? Do the recent reports on Israeli treatment of Palestinians go beyond criticism? https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/israeli-authorities-and-crimes-apartheid-and-persecution https://www.hrw.org/report/2021/04/27/threshold-crossed/isra... What about B'Tselem's report? Is that beyond criticism? https://www.btselem.org/topic/apartheid https://www.btselem.org/topic/apartheid
- prionassembly 5y agoThis is an unpopular opinion, but taking a firm anti-Israel stance requires (1) a deeply naive view of international relations where the line between good and evil is easily located or where it's easy to quantify how much evil each side is doing... xor (2) closeted anti-semitism. Note that anti-semitism is very unlike racism against people of color in that it holds the enemy to be already ensconced in higher positions of power; sometimes (as you'll see in the Unz/Sailer kind of literature) it even holds Jews to have superior intellects. (Sometimes a firm pro-Israel stance is grounded on a very weird conception of Christianity as closer to Jewishness than it really is. The New Testament is written in Greek, and whatever its ultimate truth is, it is expressed in the language of Greek philosophy.)
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- notsureaboutpg 5y ago[dead]
- realce 5y agoA flawless state that imputes no man, what a miracle!
- prionassembly 5y agoThat's a strange extreme. I mean, there are good odds that you're from the country that perpetrated Abu Ghraib, and for what -- a make-work war on the other end of the planet. The whole Israeli question is really too complicated for a HN comment. All I'm claiming is that the BDS movement claims a kind of moral certitude that's not only not sufficiently grounded, it doesn't try to be sufficiently grounded. And while I'm sure many support "global progressive movements" out of the goodness of their hearts, the fact that there is such a movement betrays something darker. Remember that I said "xor" -- the firm anti-Israel position is naïve xor malicious. Then: you don't have to be "firmly anti-Israel" to see many of their crimes.
- 5y ago
- rhizome 5y agoIt is. The freedom they're referring to is a freedom from consequences resulting from their speech.
- unethical_ban 5y agoFreedom from consequences from the state, which is absolutely a right they should have that the state attempts to deny.
- JohnWhigham 5y agoYou're reflexively labeled anti-Semitic and often castigated for it.
- FridayoLeary 5y agoI'm confused. That in no way reduces your freedom.
- imgabe 5y agoEqual treatment under the law is a key tenet of freedom. If you are bidding on a government contract, your bid should be equally considered along with everyone else’s on its merits, irrespective of whatever your personal beliefs on unrelated matters might be.
- FridayoLeary 5y agoCompany policy and personal beliefs are very different things. The former has many legal restrictions while the latter is immutable. I don't understand why you are conflating the two. This law is entirely relevant to companies not individuals.
- skohan 5y agoSo I understand that this exact clause is in contracts which must be signed by paid speakers at public universities. I.e. you cannot boycott Israel and give a lecture at a university. Would you consider that an infringement on speech?
- imgabe 5y agoCompanies are made up of people. There is nothing that only affects companies and not people. A company is just a legal abstraction that represents a group of people.
- cies 5y agoIf this systematically happens to journalists, it is kind of limiting what can be said in places amplified by media. I think this is exactly what happens.
- unethical_ban 5y agoRepublicans and certain evangelical sects of Christians here, along with the American Jewish lobby, intentionally and constantly associate any criticism of the Israeli government with hatred of the Jewish people. This is clearly not everyone in the US, but it's enough that if you're a business or public figure who makes noise about it, you'll be branded anti-Semetic by a particular "news-as-hatred" cable network and certain members of Congress.
- bsenftner 5y agoIt is not possible to mention Israel in any manner other than positive. All I said was Israel is a protected topic, and look at the controversy of that and the down votes, proving my point.
- ebiester 5y agoThis is not new. Try supporting communism in any time since the 30s. Try being openly gay in any era before the 1980s. Fundamentally, any society has bounds on the "true" freedom of speech, and America, despite its best intentions, is no different.