5 ms·

I wasn't aware of this issue, and as framed by the ACLU it's pretty alarming. That said, experience tells me to always get both sides of a story. Can anyone s

I wasn't aware of this issue, and as framed by the ACLU it's pretty alarming. That said, experience tells me to always get both sides of a story. Can anyone suggest a good representation of the other sides' position?

mattficke 4y ago
The (unconvincing) argument is that boycotting Israel is discriminating on the basis of religion and ethnicity, and is therefore not protected under the 1st Amendment (for the same reason laws banning racial discrimination don’t violate the 1st amendment.) It’s not a very good argument imo.
- HKH2 4y ago
  Yeah it makes no sense. You can't boycott Israel, but the government can sanction Iran etc.
mkoubaa 4y ago
These laws are passed in states who are politically dominated by apocalyptic evangelical christians who believe that the state of Israel is the only thing holding back literal Armageddon
- faxywaxy 4y ago
  I'm not super well versed in evangelical christianity but I think they want Israel to start Armageddon, their goal is bring it about, not to avoid it: https://www.businessinsider.com/battle-armageddon-israel-evangelical-christians-2013-1?op=1 https://www.businessinsider.com/battle-armageddon-israel-eva...
ars 4y ago
It's not really that complicated, people pretend they are boycotting Israel because of issues with Israel, while in reality it's just antisemitism. The proof comes when you ask them who else are they boycotting, and it's no one. You get even more proof when you start asking them detailed questions about what's going on in Israel and they have no clue. Or they say things that aren't actually true. The 1% who are intellectually honest about it are easily dwarfed by the 99% who are doing it out of hate.
- rnk 4y ago
  Those claims would benefit from supporting details. Somehow you know the hearts of humans?
  - ars 4y ago
    I'm Jewish, the amount of antisemitism online has skyrocketed, and virtually all of it pretends to be "legitimate criticism of Israel", because blatant antisemitism gets blocked, but if you pretend it's about Israel then you confuse people, and you don't get blocked. In all of my time online I've encountered actual criticism of Israel only a handful of times. Under 1%. One easy way to tell: Are they criticizing all of Israel, or a specific policy? This has more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Ds_of_antisemitism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Ds_of_antisemitism
    - edanm 4y ago
      I don't know, I think you're being way too dismissive about many people's intentions. I've had plenty of arguments here on HN about Israel, and it doesn't seem like most people are just antisemites. Many people have concrete, legitimate criticisms of Israel (and frankly, there's plenty to criticize.) Sure, some could be motivated by antisemitism, but 99% of people? That doesn't seem right to me. At all. (E.g. in most arguments, anyone even a little knowledgeable will argue specifically against settlements or against certain actions of the IDF, not just blanket "against Israel existing.")
    - fenderbluesjr 4y ago
      While you may(or not) be right about rise in antisemitism, there also seems to be a lot more videos surfacing of stuff that doesn't reflect well on Israel. I consider myself pretty unbiased in this, I have absolutely no opinions about ethnicity etc and have often come to defense of Israel in some discussions but I can honestly say that my own view has soured a little bit. The killing(and denial) of that journalist, and that video of a funeral procession spring to mind. Starting to remind me of Northern Irish loyalists(who happen to revere Israel), which imo is a pretty ugly movement. Nothing about this is inherent to the people or country but (I think) like loyalism, comes from a degree of insecurity that can manifest as truculence
iudqnolq 4y ago
> That said, experience tells me to always get both sides of a story. Can anyone suggest a good representation of the other sides' position? I've never understood why this is seen as a good idea. In the spirit of your statement, can you suggest a good representation of why you think this is worthwhile? There's no natural law that issues should have two sides, and I think forcing everything into that framing is part of why our media discourse is so broken. This also promotes the misconception the truth lies in the middle, which encourages people acting in bad faith to pick extreme positions and skew the average.

mattficke 4y ago

The (unconvincing) argument is that boycotting Israel is discriminating on the basis of religion and ethnicity, and is therefore not protected under the 1st Amendment (for the same reason laws banning racial discrimination don’t violate the 1st amendment.) It’s not a very good argument imo.

HKH2 4y ago
Yeah it makes no sense. You can't boycott Israel, but the government can sanction Iran etc.

mkoubaa 4y ago

These laws are passed in states who are politically dominated by apocalyptic evangelical christians who believe that the state of Israel is the only thing holding back literal Armageddon

faxywaxy 4y ago
I'm not super well versed in evangelical christianity but I think they want Israel to start Armageddon, their goal is bring it about, not to avoid it: https://www.businessinsider.com/battle-armageddon-israel-evangelical-christians-2013-1?op=1 https://www.businessinsider.com/battle-armageddon-israel-eva...

ars 4y ago

It's not really that complicated, people pretend they are boycotting Israel because of issues with Israel, while in reality it's just antisemitism. The proof comes when you ask them who else are they boycotting, and it's no one. You get even more proof when you start asking them detailed questions about what's going on in Israel and they have no clue. Or they say things that aren't actually true. The 1% who are intellectually honest about it are easily dwarfed by the 99% who are doing it out of hate.

rnk 4y ago
Those claims would benefit from supporting details. Somehow you know the hearts of humans?
- ars 4y ago
  I'm Jewish, the amount of antisemitism online has skyrocketed, and virtually all of it pretends to be "legitimate criticism of Israel", because blatant antisemitism gets blocked, but if you pretend it's about Israel then you confuse people, and you don't get blocked. In all of my time online I've encountered actual criticism of Israel only a handful of times. Under 1%. One easy way to tell: Are they criticizing all of Israel, or a specific policy? This has more info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Ds_of_antisemitism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_Ds_of_antisemitism
  - edanm 4y ago
    I don't know, I think you're being way too dismissive about many people's intentions. I've had plenty of arguments here on HN about Israel, and it doesn't seem like most people are just antisemites. Many people have concrete, legitimate criticisms of Israel (and frankly, there's plenty to criticize.) Sure, some could be motivated by antisemitism, but 99% of people? That doesn't seem right to me. At all. (E.g. in most arguments, anyone even a little knowledgeable will argue specifically against settlements or against certain actions of the IDF, not just blanket "against Israel existing.")
  - fenderbluesjr 4y ago
    While you may(or not) be right about rise in antisemitism, there also seems to be a lot more videos surfacing of stuff that doesn't reflect well on Israel. I consider myself pretty unbiased in this, I have absolutely no opinions about ethnicity etc and have often come to defense of Israel in some discussions but I can honestly say that my own view has soured a little bit. The killing(and denial) of that journalist, and that video of a funeral procession spring to mind. Starting to remind me of Northern Irish loyalists(who happen to revere Israel), which imo is a pretty ugly movement. Nothing about this is inherent to the people or country but (I think) like loyalism, comes from a degree of insecurity that can manifest as truculence

iudqnolq 4y ago

> That said, experience tells me to always get both sides of a story. Can anyone suggest a good representation of the other sides' position? I've never understood why this is seen as a good idea. In the spirit of your statement, can you suggest a good representation of why you think this is worthwhile? There's no natural law that issues should have two sides, and I think forcing everything into that framing is part of why our media discourse is so broken. This also promotes the misconception the truth lies in the middle, which encourages people acting in bad faith to pick extreme positions and skew the average.