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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   29460 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 2, 2026

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I remember on October 8th the feeling of going online and seeing people celebrating the rape and murder of Israelis. It was a complete shock, I was totally unprepared for the sheer glee in the online progressive spaces, the instantaneous "pray for Palestine" posts combined with "this is what decolonization looks like" posted approvingly under dead bodies.

Two years later I am able to be a good deal more amused than traumatized by the repulsive shenanigans of the bot army. Partly it's because I am now more aware that much of it is a bot army, a carefully coordinated effort not organic sentiment. Partly it's because compared to when our hostages were still in Gaza I can breathe more freely now.

Partly it's because it's funny. /r/worldnews had multiple users posting their analyses about how Iran has these massive stockpiles of 50,000 missiles and 5,000 launchers that they're keeping hidden in reserve, they're just gonna wait until the defense stockpiles disappear and then theyre totally gonna unleash the hell they haven't managed to until now. (It's easy to imagine them gnashing their teeth as they write this.)

Meanwhile metafilter, which is a site that after its leftist death spiral is so tiny and inactive I'm not sure it's worth deploying a bot army to, had an (Australian) user immediately saying Death to America and discourse ensuing between the people who thought that was totally fine and the people who thought that wasn't "helpful" which yielded the following gem

for what it’s worth, “death to X” is an idiomatic phrase in the Arab/Persian world that just means “down with X” or even just casually “frickin’ X,” not a literal call for everyone in a given country to be executed, in much the same way that English-language “sucks” is no longer regarded as having homophobic implications as an idiomatic usage

I know this kind of stuff would have infuriated me two years ago. It would have made me so angry and depressed. And now I can't help it, I laughed out loud reading that comment. Wow, it truly is possible to be this level of distilled stupid.

That doesn't mean I wish well on these people — I don't, I think they're disgusting. I've had a post brewing in me for two years about how I find it so much easier to sympathize with some terrorist in Gaza who is attached to home and his family and hates me, then with some keyboard warrior in the west with a moral compass directed straight up his ass. The terrorist may also be wishing death upon me (and attempting to enact it) but there's something more morally clean about him.

We've had a much quieter week than expected (thanks to all those thousands of launchers the iranians are stockpiling for the right moment). There's at least 1-3 sirens a day but often not more than that, where I live (other areas of the country have much more because they're more in the flight path of debris). The very beginning of the war had the most, up and down and up and down and up and down like I described, by it's tapered off pretty dramatically.

The houthis don't appear to have joined in with their Iranian friends at all this time around. Hezbollah did join in, which has pissed off the non Hezbollah Lebanese enough we might, maybe, perhaps, if I'm being crazily optimistic, actually see some significant meaningful backlash against them there.

I've been working from home. We are hosting my siblings-in-law who don't have access to a bomb shelter near them and have a newborn, which comes with the expected tensions but has been ok overall.

My poor team lead is Muslim so he gets to have the rocket induced sleep deprivation and also fasting for Ramadan. At the beginning of the week he told me between those two things his brain was barely functioning, but as the rocket fire has decreased we've had more peaceful nights and he's been doing better, as have we all.

It's still uncomfortable and hard, my kids still struggle with waking up to sirens, I know people who lost their homes, I've read about the people who died although I don't know any personally. But I go online and read about all the dead my government has been allegedly covering up and it comforts me, I like not living in the alternate reality these people are living in.

Unlike many many people online who seem to know a tremendous amount about all sorts of things (so many bombs have hit us and been covered up so effectively that no one who actually lives here knows about them — but these people magically do) I know almost nothing. Just the daily experience here, and hoping things turn out okay.

Hope everyone here is ok as well.

Two years later I am able to be a good deal more amused than traumatized by the repulsive shenanigans of the bot army. Partly it's because I am now more aware that much of it is a bot army, a carefully coordinated effort not organic sentiment.

Sorry to burst your bubble, but I think the idea that it is a bot army is a cope (or, more precisely, you taking something that is meant primarily as a propaganda message for a different audience as accurate information). I'm just about old enough to have consciously experienced 9/11 as a European, and the reactions were very similar. Of course back then there was no mass social media, and traditional media was understood to be under the watchful gaze of people who are respectable and have political obligations; but on the ground, already, in my perfectly respectable, mainstream, upper middle class environment, the reaction was almost universally a certain giddiness and excitement, because the underdog managed to land a most spectacular punch straight to the face of the smug snake who had been grating everyone with their smug strutting around. It's not that, individually, people even liked Islam or Islamists, or, imagining an individual American, were happy for them to die a violent death; rather, this did not figure at all, because the American deaths were as much of an abstract statistic to us as the deaths in random US bombings of targets in Sudan. All that mattered is that the Americans had been doing all the hitting, seemed very secure and self-assured in doing so, but finally got hit. People like stories where the plucky underdog embarrasses the Empire.

I don't see the balance or nature of sentiment regarding Oct 7 as significantly different from that at all. The only thing that changed is that now there is an internet where you can share your edgy thoughts with the like-minded, rather than there only being mass media where your edgy thoughts will be judged by schoolmarms with well-paid political consulting gigs. You do also have to understand that, just like 9/11, it is in a way nothing personal; Israelis are simply (1) abstract distant foreigners and (2) the smug overdogs who had been running circles around everyone else with impunity. ((2) might grate when in your internal narrative you see yourself as the underdog.)

but on the ground, already, in my perfectly respectable, mainstream, upper middle class environment, the reaction was almost universally a certain giddiness and excitement

I was pretty young for 9/11, so my impression was that Europeans had a lot of sympathy and support and only soured on the reaction later. This is a big update for me, so thanks for letting me know. You just converted my contempt for Europeans at your general economic dysfunction, cultural arrogance, churlish ingratitude, and eagerness to commit civilizational suicide into genuine hatred.

Edit: I’m seeing other Europeans in this thread disagreeing with you, so I’m updating back to “leftists are evil everywhere.”

Yeah the bot army is always the most insane garbled cope. Especially the whole 'Putin has the world's best digital marketing force that can swing a democratic election by 40% from the CORRECT views that I hold personally' kinda vibe.

That being said I largely find the Israelis better aligned with my interest in functional Middle East civilization and I prefer them to the alternative. It is somewhat funny how badly some people are reacting to Jews going from an essentially unassailable position in polite conversation to being an acceptable target of Left Wingers. These things are cyclical it swings around and maybe don't botch your cultivated position in the first place.

I guess I will believe you when you say that Europeans cheering for 9/11 meant nothing personal to Americans, but it certainly felt personal to us. (In fairness, I don't remember a lot of Europeans openly celebrating, but there certainly were a lot of Europeans saying, in so many words, that we had it coming, and the real tragedy would be if we retaliated against poor innocent Muslims in any way.)

If a major terrorist attack happened in your country, and Americans were all "Haha that's what you get for importing infinity Muslims, face meet leopards!" (and I have no doubt you'd see Americans saying that), I suspect you would take it very personally and would not be convinced by arguments that it was an abstraction, that Americans didn't really wish death to Europeans.

There is of course a more sophisticated discussion about empire and "chickens coming home to roost" (another popular phrase of the time), and just as with Hamas and October 7, reasonable people can talk about what led to this without it being black and white and "They just hate us because they are made of pure concentrated evil." But it is kind of unreasonable to say "You had it coming" (and that "Death to you!" doesn't literally mean "Death to you!") and expect people to believe that it's not personal and they should understand it as an abstract political statement because a few deaths are just a statistic, and you're just celebrating the fat kid standing up to the bully.

If a major terrorist attack happened in your country, and Americans were all "Haha that's what you get for importing infinity Muslims, face meet leopards!" (and I have no doubt you'd see Americans saying that), I suspect you would take it very personally and would not be convinced by arguments that it was an abstraction, that Americans didn't really wish death to Europeans.

I see that all the time, but I don't take it personally because it's default-sub Reddit equivalent posters saying it. What I don't see is international student activism chanting "Anglicise the intifada" and wearing Irish tricolour balaclavas as fashion statements, or at least not outside of Kneecap gigs.

The question is how much of it is organic, if it's organic how much is sincere, and if it's sincere how much is truly earnest.

The fact that you can find people supporting Palestine offline and without any effort looking for them indicates that it's at least meaningfully organic and somewhat sincere, even if they wouldn't do more than make cost-less gestures of support. On the other hand it's rare to hear (non-British) people shitting on Britain outside of social media, so what I see online can be chalked up to low effort trolling and banter.

Well, my point isn't about it being good or bad, just about the sentiment existing organically (contra the idea that only bots would hold such views in force). Regarding the reverse situation, I really can't comment on it for myself because I am too rootless to take insult or injury against any country personally (every country I'm somehow associated with has had its share of terrorism and outside gloating, and all of those left me cold), but certainly going by newspaper comment sections people did seem upset about Americans projecting their narratives e.g. on the Breivik event.

In fairness, I don't remember a lot of Europeans openly celebrating, but there certainly were a lot of Europeans saying, in so many words, that we had it coming, and the real tragedy would be if we retaliated against poor innocent Muslims in any way.

Were there? Because I don’t recall any of that and I’m European and old enough to have watched the second plane hit WTC live on BBC at work.

What reason would Europeans even have had to dislike US en masse outside the pseudo-communist far left circles back then? Clinton era US was generally liked and GWB was a somewhat bumbling but seemingly largelt irrelevant president until after 9/11.

Maybe you underestimate how many pseudo-comminist leftists there were and are. (Again, to be fair, I heard "chickens coming home to roost" from Anericans.)

(Again, to be fair, I heard "chickens coming home to roost" from Anericans.)

Noem Chomsky would be the type specimen there. There's a substantial group of people, mostly intellectuals or those who would think of themselves as intellectual, who dislike America and consider it always in the wrong.

at work

Sounds like you were a respectable person, the intended audience of the respectable shock in the mainstream media?

I remember the edgy young adult / teenage leftist people I knew not cheering, but being incredibly smug. Vibes of some analyses in leftist newspapers were "akshually, the US foreign policy is at fault here". But I think many people may have their memories confounded by the opposition to Iraq war few years later. Condemnation and anti-American sentiment were much more widespread then. Freedom fries and all that.

GWB was a somewhat bumbling but seemingly largelt irrelevant president until after 9/11

GWB was supposed to be the herald of evil white evangelical regime, controlled by Dick Cheney and/or Skull & Bones, who was opposed to the Science, such as teaching evolution in schools and opposition to stem cell therapies. The Handmaid's tale the tv series was not yet made, so nobody made references to it, but it illustrates the mental space.

And all the above is certainly different than the situation with Israel today. Same leftist not-longer-young adult crowd seriously believes (or act like they believe) that Israel is really equivalent to apartheid era South Africa and moral people should oppose it and support Palestinians with the same enthusiasm and moral force as they supported Nelson Mandela. I don't personally know anyone who cheered on their public real name social media, but their relief was palpable when the war in Gaza began and they could again earnestly concentrate on complaining about the evil crimes of Israel.

I mean Israel in the West Bank is inching pretty close to full apartheid. Keeping people in permanent stateless limbo in a swiss cheese of disconnected towns. And the Gaza treatment is fucked up too in that they and Egypt essentially don't allow freedom of movement out of Gaza.

Yeah, my social democrat lower middle class parents were devastated. Even by european leftist standards, /u/4bpp is extreme in his anti-americanism and anti-israelism.

European anti-Americanism works in layers, as in scott's counter-signaling model. The politicians at the top/international elite are atlanticist, the leftist upper middle class is anti, the broad middle class is pro again, the high working class "conspirationist podcast" tranche is against, and real proles/idle poor love American soaps/action movies again.

I was in, essentially, middle school (analogous age bracket) back then. I'm just relaying the general vibes that I perceived around me (from other kids, and by extension presumably their parents because I'm not sure how they would develop those views independently). It might be relevant that this was in East Germany, which by then already had started entering its ongoing phase of Smug Westerner Fatigue.

Plus you're Russian, which have their "Ostalgie" in the 90s. Plus you hold roughly Chomskyite views on the evil of the West, america, israel, and the contrasting fundamental innocence of the Wretched of the world, like the khmer rouge, milosevic putin and hamas.

I don't understand how you leap from "4bpp saw these things around him" to "4bpp personally championed this view". There was, to my best knowledge, only one other kid of Eastern Bloc origin in my entire school at the time, and he was Ukrainian, and I didn't interact with him. Besides, I don't think the attitude had much to do with nostalgia for the East, any more than American "deplorable" Trump voting is due to nostalgia for Jim Crow or whatever its detractors claim, but rather a very similar impulse of defiance against constant moralising by richer, more successful self-proclaimed betters.

Even if you were right and I was just merely secretly reporting on the ostalgic ideations of my pre-teen self rather than a snapshot of what my corner of East Germany believed, the set of beliefs you impute to me is wild (and not very accurate). Innocence of the Wretched? Please! My attitude has long been that the Wretched of the World all deserve each other and utility would increase if they went extinct. I just find those who could not leave their grubby fingers off of them before their self-inflicted demise to be detestable in a different way.

I don't want to sound like a prosecutor, but do you deny your left-wing, anti-nato, pro-Palestine views, and are you now, or have you ever, been a member...?

I'm establishing a bubble here. If those are your opinions, then you will tend to see them in others with greater frequency than you would in the general population.

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Not really an argument that he was in a lizardman-sized bubble. Chomsky was not an insignificant minority figure among the left in Europe, but one of the prominently heard voices, a mainstay of the countercultural bookshops and reading clubs among the left-wing academic class who'd read Le Diplo's praises of ATTAC and sympathize with the Black Bloc.

Were there? Because I don’t recall any of that and I’m European and old enough to have watched the second plane hit WTC live on BBC at work.

So am I, and I kinda remember some of my friend group going "fuck them". Though we were all retarded teenagers at the time, and I don't remember much of what the adults were saying. 4bpp is European too.

Though we were all retarded teenagers at the time

Which is rather different than ”a lot of Europeans”. It’s like trying to seriously claim that ”a lot of people are lizardmen” because a bunch of edgelords put a mark there on a survey.

Well, hold on, teenagers shouldn't be taken seriously, but it's hardly because they express lizardmen opinions.

This is the same as my experience. The guy who was the most insistent about going "fuck them" was basically just a teenage edgelord, a channer before the chans. He became conspicuously right-wing a few years after the events (conspicuous enough to stand out in the generally apolitical atmosphere). The next day there was a minute of silence for the victims of 9/11 and the one guy known for left-wing activism in the class made a point of saying that he was only doing it to honor the civilian victims.

I do really suspect it depends on where you are; Scandinavia was already much more Philoamerican than the parts of Europe (DE, FR) I was familiar with back then.

Yes, this idea of Europeans (in any significant number) cheering on 9/11 seems completely made-up. There was a wave of pro-American goodwill like I can never remember before after 9/11. Lots of European countries participated in invading and occupying Afghanistan.

Iraq, on the other hand, thoroughly reset the counter. But that was after.

As one of those Europeans that cheered up about it - it is not completely made up. Seeing the hegemon humiliated and hurt felt nice after the Serbian bombings.

Eh, what?

The main perceived problem with the Serbian bombings for a layman on the street was that NATO took forever to actually start doing them. Certainly not that NATO bombed Serbia in the first place (outside niche edgelord or old communist far left circles).

In the balkans it was 50/50 aporoval at best.

Is that because it seemed like an arbitrary decision, considering all the shit the Serbs were put through over the last centuries, including genocide in WW2? I don't know much about it, but I've gathered that the genocide of the 8000 Muslims didn't just appear out of nothing?

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It's hardly surprising that countries with significant Serbian minority would have anti-NATO sentiment after NATO struck Serbia. That doesn't reflect the rest of the Europe at all at the time.

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I can't speak to sentiments in Europe post 9/11, but I think this:

You do also have to understand that, just like 9/11, it is in a way nothing personal; Israelis are simply (1) abstract distant foreigners and (2) the smug overdogs who had been running circles around everyone else with impunity.

is wrong. The people celebrating had a problem with very specifically with Israel, and it was absolutely personal. Israel had been bleeding reputation for a while, and 10/7 was a momentary shot in the arm, precisely because you had a very visible group of people openly celebrating it in a way that seemed to validate Zionist critiques of anti-Zionism. They proceeded to burn all that good will and more with their conduct afterwards (not helped by Netanyahu being an extraordinarily repellent figure to all but the far right), which is when their reputation really started to tank.

They proceeded to burn all that good will and more with their conduct afterwards (not helped by Netanyahu being an extraordinarily repellent figure to all but the far right)

This really cant be true IMO. Unless something like 99.9% of people who have allegedly "soured" on Israel post 10/7 are just too stupid to understand what the response was always going to be. You can't have a neighbor that launches hundred + man raiding bands into your territory where 1000+ of your people are killed, 200+ are taken hostage, and thousands of others injured, maimed, raped, not to mention the property damage. The only reasonable response to that is the maximum response.

If a Mexican cartel did that with the support (even tacit) support of the Mexican government and a hostile foriegn nation there would be no more Mexico. Everyone involved would obviously be killed, the government deposed, a gigantic DMZ imposed on their norther border, the country would be divided up into a bunch of territories administered by our local generals at first, later we'd let some local puppet have some semblance of authority. And the country would simply be broken up as well. Baja would be one protectorate, for maximum humiliation we'd call 3 of the new territories we create, "South New Mexico", "South Arizona", and "South Texas". No amount of civilian casualties would set us off of carrying out our goals, and no amount of dissent to our administration would be tolerated, up to and possibly including forcing them all to switch to English as an official language.

And if you asked any American President or Speaker of the House 1865-2000, "well isn't this proposal by some anon anti_dan a little extreme?" They'd first laugh at you, then tell you the US has a rich history of pseudonymous political writers, then tell you I'm a moderate, and a few would say something like, "thats a good idea, do we have to wait for the Mexicans to attack?"

The only reasonable response to that is the maximum response.

This is demonstrably not true. We know because it has happened. The punitive expedition in Mexico did not involve any such tactics, and the US invasion of Afghanistan was not a brutal scorched earth campaign in the slightest.

And if you asked any American President or Speaker of the House 1865-2000

I'm sure some would agree with you, but most of them would call you an absolute barbarian.

The problem in the US, and Israel, and indeed basically every country, is that there is a significant subset of the population with incorrigibly brutal instincts. It is incumbent on the rest of us not to indulge them, however much they try to promise that their methods are the key to success. Their instincts are terrible, and will constantly lead you to doing appalling things that will make your situation worse in most cases.

The problem is not incorrigibly brutal instincts, but the opposite: Tolerating crybullies who utilize their own citizens as human shields.

They proceeded to burn all that good will and more with their conduct afterwards

I think this sentiment gives the lie to the idea that there was much goodwill among people on the left and center to begin with (which is the group that dominates traditional media). The messaging from these people basically seems to have been "Yes 10/7 was a terrible thing, but Israel shouldn't actually have done anything about it". The whole MSM/NGO machine was primed from the outset to hyper-focus on every negative outcome the war had on Gazans and portray them as a particular consequence of Israel's uniquely evil conduct, conveniently forgetting that war always negatively affects civilians, particularly those whose leaders try to maximise their own suffering for PR purposes (using human shields, firing from hospitals, stealing aid etc.)

The messaging from these people basically seems to have been "Yes 10/7 was a terrible thing, but Israel shouldn't actually have done anything about it".

chadyes.jpg

Or, to elaborate and contradict myself: Israel should have done something about it, but not what they did. Israeli leadership wants this conflict to have the moral logic of a war for survival rather than a policing action; they simultaneously want to deny the sovereignty of Palestine and deny any responsibility for Palestinian welfare. The problem is that these positions are incoherent and unjustifiable. Israel occupies a position of near-total superiority over Hamas and other Palestinian militants. Even in the worst case, it does not face anything even remotely approach an existential threat from these groups.

It's been two and a half years of high intensity conflict in an extremely confined geographical space; the victims of 10/7 have been avenged seventyfold, and yet Israel's position is, basically, that they are going to keep bombing Gaza so long as there is evil in the hearts of men (or the President pardons Netanyahu). If they are conducting this war in a good faith effort to end Palestinian militancy (which I question), they should contemplate whether there is some flaw in their strategy.

The whole MSM/NGO machine was primed from the outset to hyper-focus on every negative outcome the war had on Gazans

Was it, though?

There's a lot wrong with this post, but to keep things focussed:

Israeli leadership wants this conflict to have the moral logic of a war for survival rather than a policing action; they simultaneously want to deny the sovereignty of Palestine and deny any responsibility for Palestinian welfare.

Gaza has had complete sovereignty since the mid 2000s. So I don't see any contradiction in Israel treating the conflict as a war.

They proceeded to burn all that good will and more with their conduct afterwards (not helped by Netanyahu being an extraordinarily repellent figure to all but the far right), which is when their reputation really started to tank.

I think this is just a straight up lie. I honestly can't recall anyone expressing even the slightest amount of sympathy for Israel in the immediate wake of October 7th. The idea that everyone in the West was on their side until they retaliated just seems flatly untrue to me. Even to this day I still encounter pro-Palestine types claiming that October 7th was a false flag, or that Hamas only attacked military targets (and the hundreds of hours of footage of their squaddies murdering civilians at a music festival were created with AI). Even pointing out that Hamas raped women and abducted people is widely seen as tantamount to endorsing Israel's "genocide" (massive enormous scare quotes).

From this comment I feel like you most be an incredible bubble. The MSM media from Fox to MSNBC was incredibly supportive of Israel after the October 7th attacks. The boomercons and boomerlibs started out 100% in lockstep support of Israel along with the entire US political establishment. Except maybe the squad which is 4 out of 435 representatives. Young leftists and groypers were very loud, especially online. And the young leftist were loud in deep blue urban cores and on elite university campuses but were pretty clearly a minority.

Now as the war dragged and increasingly turned into a slaughter with no real military objectives a lot of people turned on Israel. Which is why now the pro-Palestine position is the highest it's ever been. Israel had plenty of goodwill in America but they burned it up by gradually showing their opponents right. And I include myself in this I was very supportive of Israel in their initial fight against Hamas but gradually turned against them over the course of the war. And I know several people in the same boat. I could be in a bubble as well but polling seems to show that there was a real shift in opinion during the war in Gaza.

From this comment I feel like you most be an incredible bubble.

It's called "Europe", and specifically Ireland.

Ireland being aggressively in the tank for Palestine is not exactly new, but it is also an outlier. It certainly does not reflect American sentiment.

Back when the PLO was uncomplicatedly a terrorist organisation, the IRA, ETA and PLO saw each other as ideological allies and almost certainly cooperated operationally.

The dominant strain of Irish nationalism is anti-British first and foremost, and therefore anti-Western Civ by implication, which is why it is so hard to organise a right-populist party in Ireland, despite the obvious unmet demand for anti-immigration politics.

That's quite the bubble, yes.

For what it's worth, post October 7th, I recall a massive amount of support for Isreal from a large number of right-wing coded spaces, though perhaps that's my bubble in action.

...conversely, I'm also seeing a number of that same space react negatively to getting dragged into a war with Iran, while the other half has simply devolved into Holden Bloodfeast.

In Australia it felt like the whole Gaza plight/anti-Israeli thing didn't really spin up till after a couple months of the October 7 attacks

I meant it was not personal in the sense that it was not about the individuals who died. Of course it was indeed about Israel, just like the reaction about 9/11 was about the USA.

You might be overestimating how much of that stuff is bots.

I'm someone who was sympathetic to Israel after the 10/7 attacks and defended it against the accusations that it was committing genocide. As I still will, since I believe that those accusations are false.

At this point, though, I'm tired of your country. Tired of its shady connections to many of our highest politicians here in the US. Tired of constantly hearing about it despite its small size. Tired of the sense of self-importance that members of the strongly Zionist subset of Jews tend to have, their belief that they are the main characters of history. Not only tired, but disgusted by having my tax money go to support your country's geopolitical schemes.

Polls show that support for Israel among Americans has actually been dropping. See this for example.

And as the size of the subset of the population in the West that dislikes Israel grows, naturally so also grows the size of that smaller subset of the population which dislikes Israel enough to cheer for Israeli civilian deaths.

Fwiw I don't think comments like yours are signs of bots. To me an obvious sign of bots would be multiple separate accounts repeating a claim that Iran has thousands of launchers waiting to be used. Or one account that's constantly posting comments on this topic and no other topic round the clock and spreading misinfo. It's mostly on reddit or Instagram that I've seen that kind of thing. But I do also believe there's coordinated attempts at pushing narratives on social media that aren't just fog of war misinfo.

I do hope there were very solid strategic reasons for America to join and that they pan out but it's not like the Trump administration is clearly communicating them, hence "hope", that the 4d chess board or whatever becomes obvious in a few weeks. It's really early in the war, but it definitely from my perspective with so little information feels like a big big gamble so I'm really hoping that for the people who have access to way more secret intelligence than I do it's much more of a sure thing.

Israel doesn't have bunker busters, also the US has better Navy and Air capabilities. That's about it. It's also blatantly obvious to outside observers it's Israel calling the shots and Trump/The US playing along. The harder they deny it the more hilarious it becomes. This whole thing is one of the main pillars Trump ran on, promising no more wars in the sandbox. If it were up to Trump himself this wouldn't be happening.

Are we supposed to feel sorry for the people who more than anyone else brought this on themselves - or am I misunderstanding your post? Because polls consistently show that Israelis are the only ones who support this war, and also that they dont give a shit about Iranian civilians. The former makes sense, because this war is for Israels benefit only. For 2 years now we have seen videos of Israelis gleefully committing warcrimes, and then, posting them online. We have seen people take their kids to block food from entering into Gaza and arrange conferences about buying and settling in Gaza land. We have seen soldiers mass rape a prisoner, and then seen those same soldiers be paraded around as heroes. The foremost jewish zionist congressman in America wants to nuke Gaza.

There is no group in modern America who has had an easier ride when it comes to PR than Israel. We are talking iron-clad bipartisan support to the point where both parties forced through the sale of TikTok. Nearly every major media was stacked full of zionist who would bend stories to present Israel in the best possible light, and that was before Ellison started buying everything up. And after all this we are still supposed to feel sorry for you? Have anyone in the Israeli side considered asking their countrymen to not behave as out of control violent barbarians in order to get more compassion?

Israel intelligence agencies literally used a sitting US senator as an asset to manipulate the president.

WSJ: To help make the case on Iran, Graham traveled several times to Israel in recent weeks, meeting with members of the country’s intelligence agency. “They’ll tell me things our own government won’t tell me,” he said. He spoke with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, coaching him on how to lobby the president for action.

https://x.com/katiadoyl/status/2030126333636809191

This is in the wall street journal, they don't even try to hide it. And why would they? They make it clear they're the king, Israel speaks and the west listens. Many of our politicians are actively training with foreign spies to control American politics and they're flaunting it.

Every once in a while they go oops and say the quiet part out a little too loud (like Rubio and Johnson admitting that Israel pushed us into the war before now trying to claim the opposite) but it's barely disguised. And if this is what they're public about, just imagine all the things happening in the shadows.

This is in the wall street journal, they don't even try to hide it. And why would they? They make it clear they're the king, Israel speaks and the west listens. Many of our politicians are actively training with foreign spies to control American politics and they're flaunting it.

What exactly is your objection? That Israel attempts to influence the US government? That it lobbies friendly members of the American legislature to lobby the US president? That it spies on people? That it uses that information to improve its influence efforts?

I really would like to know exactly what you believe Israel is doing wrong here and why.

Certainly one could make the case that countries shouldn't try to lobby or influence the governments of other countries. Do you share that view?

I really would like to know exactly what you believe Israel is doing wrong here and why.

Having any influence at all.

Having any influence at all.

And do you apply this objection just to Israel or to any country which successfully influences the US government?

I would if there were any other countries with that level of control over the US government and media.

I would if there were any other countries with that level of control over the US government and media.

Ok, so for Israel the standard is "any influence at all," but for other countries it's okay to have a little influence. Do I understand you correctly?

Not only should other countries not have the level of control Israel have, but Israel specifically should be punished for previous wrong doings in having less influence than the rest.

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Do you believe it's normal for sitting politicians to collude with foreign spy agencies, including access to classified information that their own domestic intelligence won't share (or maybe can't share, we're just assuming that Israeli intelligence isn't giving any fake information to Lindsey Graham to manipulate him towards Israeli interests after all) in order to manipulate the feds?

I'm not sure I would call that normal lobbying.

Do you believe it's normal for sitting politicians to collude with foreign spy agencies

Not in the US. Here is the definition of "collude"

cooperate in a secret or unlawful way in order to deceive or gain an advantage over others.

Now kindly answer my questions:

  1. What exactly is your objection? That Israel attempts to influence the US government? That it lobbies friendly members of the American legislature to lobby the US president? That it spies on people? That it uses that information to improve its influence efforts?

  2. Certainly one could make the case that countries shouldn't try to lobby or influence the governments of other countries. Do you share that view?

  3. Are you claiming that Israel has done something unlawful? If so, exactly what law was broken? (I won't ask if you believe Israel did something secret, since you said "they don't even try to hide it"

I'm trying to understand your position here, because I strongly suspect that you don't actually have a principled objection to Israel's conduct.

Yes, especially in ways that are obviously detrimental to the citizens of the United States, and beneficial to the citizens of Israel.

Ok, so here's the question. It was reported that Saudia Arabia's senior royalty repeatedly lobbied Donald Trump to attack Iran. How many posts have you made complaining about this?

American politicians should be acting for the American people. Not getting (((influenced))) to help the Israeli people.

So I take you object to Jewish Americans and Christian Zionists lobbying the US government to take pro-Israel action?

No laws have been broken, but that doesn't mean it's okay.

Perhaps not, but the accusation on the table was that Israel engaged in lobbying which was either secret or illegal. It seems that accusation was false.

Do you find drag queen-story hour at the library upsetting? Or 12 year olds being put on puberty blockers against the wishes of one of their parents? Those things aren't specifically illegal, so by this logic you can't have a problem with it lol.

Please show me where I stated or implied that if it's not illegal, then it's okay. Please QUOTE me.

TIA.

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How do you think countries normally interact? A US Senator goes on a diplomatic trip and meets with members of the foreign government, who discuss how to talk to the US executive - and this is shocking to you? A foreign intelligence agency shares military intelligence with an allied government to convince them to act, and this is somehow beyond the pale? How dare Israel advocate for a course of action! Absolute monsters!

Sorry, but I find this to be a really thoughtless take. Like, you haven't put an ounce of critical thought into this WSJ article. I feel like you're motivated here either by your armchair objection to the military action itself, and are working backwards to justify why it was a bad idea, or by simple dislike of Israel - or perhaps both!

? A US Senator goes on a diplomatic trip and meets with members of the foreign government, who discuss how to talk to the US executive -

Is it normal to meet with foreign intelligence agencies and work with them in that?

A foreign intelligence agency shares military intelligence with an allied government to convince them to act, and this is somehow beyond the pale?

They didn't share it with the government in general, it is specifically Lindsey Graham being shown information that the US intelligence won't share with him. Or perhaps can't share with him, we're just assuming that Israeli intelligence isn't giving any fake information to Lindsey Graham to manipulate him towards Israeli interests after all. They're not loyal to the US, they're loyal to Israel and the idea that the spies are going to be honest to random gullible senators is a pretty bold one. Even "ally" spy agencies are still constantly at odds and trying to manipulate each other.

Is it normal to meet with foreign intelligence agencies and work with them in that?

Yes. That was my point. The only reason you think it's not normal is because you read a tweet to that effect.

Seems like an even greater issue then if politicians are regularly holding private conversations with foreign spies.

If politicians want to receive intelligence from a foreign intelligence agency, it would be rather unreasonable to expect that intelligence to be broadcasted. "Spy" is not a job description. Intelligence agents spy, diplomats spy, attaches spy. You sound like you'd expect politicians to essentially never talk to any foreign officials in private.

Everyone spies on each other. USA certainly does spy on many countries and attempts to influence their politicians. If your politicians are uniquely susceptible to "NLP", it's a skill issue. Vote for smarter ones.

How do you think countries normally interact? A US Senator goes on a diplomatic trip and meets with members of the foreign government, who discuss how to talk to the US executive - and this is shocking to you? A foreign intelligence agency shares military intelligence with an allied government to convince them to act, and this is somehow beyond the pale? How dare Israel advocate for a course of action! Absolute monsters!

Yeah, I'm getting a similar sense. Other countries lobby the United States all the time in various ways. In fact, it was widely reported that the de facto monarch of Saudi Arabia repeatedly called Trump to push for this Iran attack.

If people have a general objection to foreign countries lobbying the US for military intervention, fine, but it seems like that's not the real objection here.

Me, I do

See my response to your other post.

I think the objection here is to the implications of the phrase "coaching him on how to lobby the president for action", insofar as lobbying implies at best trying to browbeat your target into action by being louder and more persistent than the other lobbyists, and at worst, disingenuous persuasion techniques bordering on deceit. In the strongest sense of the word, "lobbying" the POTUS is not only different from seeking "convince" him, but, arguably, the exact opposite.

Of course, this is making a lot out of a word choice that's not actually a direct quote as far as I can tell.

It is truly insane. And it still not enough to satisfy the Israelis. After the campaign against Ms Rachel, a bunch of zionist lawyers in UK are now suing Piers Morgan. As long as every single antizionist voice in the worlds is not silences they cant rest it seems.

As long as every single antizionist voice in the worlds is not silences they cant rest it seems.

Certainly one could similarly argue that as long as Israel exists, there is a subset of the population that will not rest, but instead work to undermine, defame, and ultimately destroy Israel if they can. So for example, those of us who are pro-Israel see a guy like David Duke, a white supremacist who couldn't care less about non-whites, suddenly seeming to care a great deal about Palestinian Arabs. Or we see a group called "queers for Palestine" which seems pretty much okay with the fact that in Hamas-ruled Gaza, homosexual activity was a serious offense.

Moreover, the demands made by these people, generally speaking, point to the destruction of Israel. For example, the Israel-haters want a "State of Palestine," but that State of Palestine would not absorb Palestinian Arab "refugees" from places like Lebanon, Syria, and Jordan. (Even though Israel has absorbed all bona fide Jewish refugees from anywhere in the world.) Rather, they want Israel to absorb and offer citizenship to all of these persons, even though it would turn Israel into a majority-Arab state, inevitably resulting in a civil war, mass death and destruction, with a real chance of the Jews being slaughtered or chased out.

One thing that gives the game away was the moment, a few years back, when Israel reached a peace agreement with the UAE. Were progressive "peace activists" overjoyed? Of course not, because it was a step forward for Israel.

The upshot of all this is that anyone who is pro-Israel can see what's going on. There is a war being fought to destroy Israel. Not just on the traditional battlefield, but in courtrooms; in the court of public opinion; within school boards; and so on.

Under such circumstances, it's hardly unreasonable to fight back. Of course, any countermeasures, no matter how legitimate, will be spun as unjustified aggression by Zionists and used to further justify the war to destroy Israel. But at the end of the day, it's better to be feared than to be loved.

But at the end of the day, it's better to be feared than to be loved.

So long as you can avoid being hated, if I recall my Machiavelli. Of course, if you expect to be hated regardless, your options do then devolve to "be not feared, dead, and hopefully eulogised pleasantly and to no longer have your corpse be hated" or "be hated, feared, and have a chance at continuing to live", well, the calculus seems clear.

So long as you can avoid being hated, if I recall my Machiavelli.

I was curious, so I looked it up:

These reflections prompt the question: is it better to be loved rather than feared, or vice versa? The answer is that one would prefer to be both but, since they don’t go together easily, if you have to choose, it’s much safer to be feared than loved.

()()(*)

All the same, while a ruler can’t expect to inspire love when making himself feared, he must avoid arousing hatred.

Of course, if you expect to be hated regardless, your options do then devolve to "be not feared, dead, and hopefully eulogised pleasantly and to no longer have your corpse be hated" or "be hated, feared, and have a chance at continuing to live", well, the calculus seems clear.

Agreed.

Which translation of The Prince is this? I want to know so I can [fedpost] the translator.

Which translation of The Prince is this? I want to know so I can [fedpost] the translator.

I am pretty sure that the translator is Tim Parks. More out of curiosity than anything else, what is your objection to the translation?

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for what it’s worth, “death to X” is an idiomatic phrase in the Arab/Persian world that just means “down with X” or even just casually “frickin’ X,” not a literal call for everyone in a given country to be executed, in much the same way that English-language “sucks” is no longer regarded as having homophobic implications as an idiomatic usage

The thing is, I could believe that (I personally enjoy talking about people being first against the wall when the revolution comes, Sirius Cybernetics Marketing Division style), except that I assume the people excusing your excerpt would also take significant offense at similar (or lesser!) directed from the wrong people at the wrong people.

The thing is, I could believe that (I personally enjoy talking about people being first against the wall when the revolution comes, Sirius Cybernetics Marketing Division style), except that I assume the people excusing your excerpt would also take significant offense at similar (or lesser!) directed from the wrong people at the wrong people.

Yeah, I was thinking something similar. If members of the Beitar Jerusalem football club were to start chanting "death to Arabs," I wonder how this person would react.

Besides, when Arabs or Persians chant "Death to America" and such, they know how it will be interpreted. I'm not big into political correctness, but if you KNOW that something will actually, in good faith, be interpreted in a certain way, and the listener is not performatively getting offended, well, then people don't really owe it to you to search for a charitable interpretation of what you have said.

The phrase is often taken out of context by neocon Americans to show that Iran is hellbent on America's destruction, and thus to justify their highly violent efforts to destroy Iran in turn. Given the context of not just the phrase but these politics surrounding it, I think it actually is meaningful to point out the translation issue, since 'death to America' isn't necessarily proof of what they claim or justification for their own destructive desires/rationale.

Basically it comes across as disingenuous to use the phrase as a basis for wanting to destroy Iran, when idiomatically it's supposedly weaker than it's presented as being. But then again this whole affair is hopelessly mired in bad faith.

The phrase is often taken out of context by neocon Americans to show that Iran is hellbent on America's destruction, and thus to justify their highly violent efforts to destroy Iran in turn.

I'm sure hardly anyone in Iran actually believes they are going to be able to literally destroy America (except in the sense that God will eventually do that for them, which no doubt a few true believers do sincerely believe). That they don't literally mean "We will kill 300 million Americans bwahahaha!" does not mean their sentiment is not very real, and sincerely intended against whatever Americans or American proxies they can get their hands on.

Likewise, we are not going to "destroy Iran." We might destroy their government. We are not going to nuke their cities and raze their crops and exterminate civilians wholesale (which their government would certainly do to us if they had the capability).

I think it actually is meaningful to point out the translation issue

Reality check: Iranians say مرگ بر آمریک. The literal translation is "Death to America." The Arabic الموت لأمريكا likewise translates literally as "Death to America." There is no "translation issue" and while yes, it might have some more general "You suck!" meaning in the minds of some of the chanters who arguably don't literally want every last American dead, it's still pretty unambiguous in its meaning. There is no idomatic usage in either Persian or Arabic where you say "Death to you" and aren't literally (if not sincerely) wishing death upon you.

There have been cases of the chant being used about potatoes and traffic. After 9/11, when Khamenei condemned the terror attacks, large crowds of Iranians held vigils, and some chanted “death to terrorism”. This is not the behavior of a nation that actually wants death inflicted upon a country.

We are not going to nuke their cities and raze their crops and exterminate civilians wholesale (which their government would certainly do to us if they had the capability).

Well, by the same token, Netanyahu calls Iran “Amalek”, which in the traditional telling, must be fully destroyed along with “all that they have […] both man and woman, child and infant, ox and sheep, camel and donkey”. Do Israelis take this commandment literally? No; every Israeli cleric will explain that Amalek is a symbolic representation of evil. But if you’re Iran, you know what they’ve done to Gaza, and Iraq, and Syria, and Libya… so even a symbolic transliteration is not reassuring.

I'm sure Iranians (and everyone else) have said "Death to Pikachu" or "Death to my mother-in-law" at some point.

This argument is disingenuous and seems a lot like the whole "River to the Sea" debate, where whether it's actually an expression of violent intent depends on whether you hate Jews or not. As I already pointed out, not every single person who chants "Death to " literally wants to see an entire country exterminated, but you are well aware that Iranians chanting "Death to " in the streets mean what they say, even if they think it's figurative because they aren't actually in a position to inflict death.

Netanyahu's "Amalek" reference is in fact pretty loaded and I'm sure he knew what he was saying (and that he could waffle on whether he really has genocidal intent). That said, a politician using loaded rhetoric isn't the same as thousands of people chanting something in unison. If thousands of Israelis start chanting "Iran is Amalek," yes, I would assume that the general sentiment is that they would like to see Iran literally wiped off the map and that a not-insignificant fraction of them really and truly want and expect to do that. There are no doubt a non-zero number of Israelis who really mean it literally, and if I were Iranian, I probably would not be very charitable about interpreting an Israeli's use of that word.

Libya

I was unaware that Israel was a big player in the NATO intervention there.

Without taking a stance on what the Iranians actually mean when they say Death to America, I was just thinking a few days back how there exists an American relative equivalent in phrases that demonstrate ambiguity of rhetoric and the need to take cultural context into account in translation: the constant calls for "revolution" and uses of the word "revolution" as a description in politics (Ron Paul Revolution! The Reagan Revolution! Bernie's "Our Revolution!") with "revolution" basically just meaning electing a candidate within the existing system instead of its general historical meaning of a complete societal upheaval from the bottom to the top, often/usually through the force of arms (or at least an implication of the same).

You don't see the word "revolution" used the same way in Finland, for example, a country with negative experience of actual attempts at revolution (the left used the word when it was communist but basically doesn't any more, the right has approximately never used it in any sort of a positive sense).

Without taking a stance on what the Iranians actually mean when they say Death to America, I was just thinking a few days back how there exists an American relative equivalent in phrases that demonstrate ambiguity of rhetoric and the need to take cultural context into account in translation: the constant calls for "revolution" and uses of the word "revolution" as a description in politics (Ron Paul Revolution! The Reagan Revolution! Bernie's "Our Revolution!") with "revolution" basically just meaning electing a candidate within the existing system instead of its general historical meaning of a complete societal upheaval from the bottom to the top, often/usually through the force of arms (or at least an implication of the same).

You don't see the word "revolution" used the same way in Finland, for example, a country with negative experience of actual attempts at revolution (the left used the word when it was communist but basically doesn't any more, the right has approximately never used it in any sort of a positive sense).

Out of curiosity, I asked Google to translate "Industrial Revolution" from English to Finnish and got this: "teollinen vallankumous" Then I asked for just the word "revolution" and got this: "vallankumous" So I think that if there were Americans calling for a "MAGA-style revolution in Finland," I think it would be correctly understood.

Perhaps a better example is the word "kill" which, in English, has both a literal and a figurative meaning. (e.g. "last week the Yankees got KILLED by the Red Sox") Ok, so let's suppose that Benjamin Netanyahu announced - in English -- that Israel is going to KILL the Iranians. Under such circumstances, it would be reasonable to take this as evidence of genocidal intent. Even if Israel's defenders argued that the word "kill" doesn't necessarily mean to literally "kill." That what Netanyahu actually meant was that they would defeat Iran.

In fact, if Netanyahu actually were to say something like this, he surely would have known in advance how it would be interpreted. So if he did say it, it's pretty likely that he would have wanted -- to some extent -- for people to interpret it this way.

So too with "Death to America"

Yeah, should probably specify that I was talking about strictly the use of the word "revolution" in politics, it is used in social trends like "industrial revolution", "sexual revolution" and so on. But yeah, "kill" in this sense is probably a better example, and there's a lot of other violent-style rhetoric like that - "crush X", "kick X's ass" and so on.

Reality check: Iranians say مرگ بر آمریک. The literal translation is "Death to America." The Arabic الموت لأمريكا likewise translates literally as "Death to America." There is no "translation issue"

Reality check: That's not how translation works.

Counter-reality check: I speak Arabic (poorly) and listen to what they actually say and mean.

The Russian translator from the linked example could speak English and listen to what English speakers say and mean.

For what it's worth, I recall reading an article once that described a taxicab driver on a congested road somewhere in Iran shouting "Death to this traffic!".

Also, the argument is weakened significantly because the phrase has a subject. If I say that sucks, sure it's fine. If I say "you suck", that's a little worse but not bad. But if I said "Dave sucks Bob off" then... yeah, it's the original meaning. If I say "damn", that's whatever. If I say "damn you" that's worse and more vitriolic. If I say "damn you to hell" then, yeah, that's like the original meaning again. As far as I can tell, this is a pretty universal rule.

I'm willing to buy that it's softer than US media presents it as, but it's total bullshit that it's lost all connotation. It's still quite hostile. Just like "fuck all republicans" is like, never going to be clean and always going to be something full of animus even if people drop a "fuck" all over the place in regular conversations.

Just like "fuck all republicans" is like, never going to be clean and always going to be something full of animus even if people drop a "fuck" all over the place in regular conversations.

"Peg the Patriarchy" may not be calling for the specific sex act, but the sentiment is correctly understood to be very negative all the same.

The phrase is often taken out of context by neocon Americans to show that Iran is hellbent on America's destruction, and thus to justify their highly violent efforts to destroy Iran in turn. Given the context of not just the phrase but these politics surrounding it, I think it actually is meaningful to point out the translation issue, since 'death to America' isn't necessarily proof of what they claim or justification for their own destructive desires/rationale.

I dunno man, if it came out that a common phrase translated really catastrophically aggressively into the language of a generational rival such that it means "we want to eradicate you" then I think it probably shouldn't be like, your country's slogan. If you decide to keep saying it anyways I think you are actually communicating very clearly. Like I had heard the phrase "nigger rigged" growing up a bit as a basic equivalent to "jerry rigged" but I'd have to be hopelessly naive to start a nigger rigging club and expect that not to be interpreted poorly by many people, if I did it anyways it'd only be possible with extreme contempt for the offended people, possibly rising to the level of just meaning what it sounds like it means.

"we want to eradicate you"

Khrushchev's "we will bury you" line to the West might be a relevant example here: there are alternate readings from the literal -- "we buried my grandmother" doesn't suggest a murder -- but the English default is pretty aggressive. Perhaps some of our Russian speakers can vouch for the idiom.

The usual excuse for "we will bury you" is that Khruschev mean the Communist system was so great that the Soviet Union would move ahead by leaps and bounds. That's a plausible interpretation of the English also, especially preceded with "Whether you like it or not, history is on our side."

It's still bombastic and hostile, but not a threat of nuclear attack.

Language Log's take

The CIA's

The phrase is often taken out of context by neocon Americans to show that Iran is hellbent on America's destruction, and thus to justify their highly violent efforts to destroy Iran in turn

Well do you agree that over the last 20 years, Iran has had a lot of official events which included treading on and burning American and Israeli flags?

highly violent efforts to destroy Iran in turn

Can we agree that the most effective way to destroy Iran would be to take out their food and water infrastructure so that the population dies of hunger and thirst?

  1. Regardless of whether some people saying Death to America only mean it idiomatically, we know not all of them only mean it idiomatically since they have proven, through action, their non-idiomatic desire for Americans to die.
  2. Even if the original Persian has a more idiomatic meaning, the entire discussion was about Western English speakers saying the phrase in English. They (probably) don't mean it literally, of course, they're just using it to signal how they're the good kind of kafir you definitely shouldn't stab or bomb or shoot while you're idiomatically deathing to X.
  3. Of course the same people saying this is fine would have a total meltdown over something similar or lesser reversed. I think it's even funnier if you have more context about the metafilter purity death spiral as they've progressively purged their ranks of anyone guilty of wrongthink.

Regardless of whether some people saying Death to America only mean it idiomatically, we know not all of them only mean it idiomatically since they have proven, through action, their non-idiomatic desire for Americans to die.

Agreed, and I would also ask the following: Of the people who say "death to America," but really only mean "down with America," what percentage would inconvenience themselves to prevent a terrorist attack on Americans? What percentage would genuinely feel bad if such an attack took place and succeeded?

Agreed, and I would also ask the following: Of the people who say "death to America," but really only mean "down with America," what percentage would inconvenience themselves to prevent a terrorist attack on Americans?

That actually seems like a surprisingly high standard. What percentage of Americans do you think would inconvenience themselves to prevent a terrorist attack on Canadians? We mostly don't even hate Canada, and I don't think you'd get more than, say, 30% of Americans actually willing to materially inconvenience themselves to prevent a terrorist attack on Canadians.

I guess it matters how much of an inconvenience we're talking about here, though. If it was something like, "would you be willing to spend $1 more in taxes to prevent terrorist attacks on Canadians", I suppose I could believe that possibly a majority of Americans would be willing to make that sacrifice. But if you turn it around and ask about a rival nation like Russia and China, I'm not sure how many Americans you could get to voluntarily pay $1 more in taxes to prevent a terrorist attack against Russian or Chinese citizens, and I don't think the prevailing sentiment is exactly "Death to Russia" or "Death to China."

That actually seems like a surprisingly high standard. What percentage of Americans do you think would inconvenience themselves to prevent a terrorist attack on Canadians?

Well it depends what the inconvenience is, which admittedly I did not spell out in my post. But let's do this:

All you have to do is pick up the phone and make an anonymous phone call. That's it, nothing more.

Ok, with that in mind, and assuming that there were a brutal 10/7 style terrorist attack planned for Canada, what percentage of Americans would lift a finger to stop it? I'm pretty confident that the majority would. Ok, now suppose there were a similar attack planned for the United States. Among Iranians (or people in general) who say "Death to America" but really mean "Down with America" what percentage would make the phone call? I'm pretty confident that few, if any, would do so.

Ok, with that in mind, and assuming that there were a brutal 10/7 style terrorist attack planned for Canada, what percentage of Americans would lift a finger to stop it?

Elsewhere in this thread, I already conceded I may be wrong on the Americans-saving-Canadians question, depending on the level of inconvenience involved.

But we shouldn't just judge ourselves or others purely on on how we treat our friends or allies.

I'm willing to grant for the sake of argument that Iranians wouldn't make a phone call to prevent American deaths in a terrorist attack. But I would again ask how many Americans would make such a call for terrorist attacks against Russian or Chinese citizens? I don't believe that the general sentiment here in the US is "Death to China" or "Death to Russia", and yet I think even our more tempered animosity towards these geopolitical rivals is enough that I have serious doubts about how many Americans would make a phone call to try and save Russian and Chinese lives.

Don't get me wrong. I actually think the bigger the consequences, the more do-gooder Americans would try to stick their necks out for Russian and Chinese civilian lives. That is, if it were 30 lives at stake, I think there's a reasonable chance a majority of Americans wouldn't make the call. But if it were 3000 lives or 30,000 lives of innocent Russian or Chinese civilians, I think Americans would be more likely to make the call despite our animosity.

But I actually would guess that that is also the case for Iranians to some degree. Don't get me wrong, I am far from believing I have a good read on their general mindset, but I suspect that as the potential death toll in a terrorist attack rises, so too would the odds of an Iranian citizen making the call to try and save American civilian lives rise. Though I have no idea if it would be anywhere close to the rate of American do-gooders in similar circumstances. We could be talking moving from a lizardman's constant of 7% of Iranians for 30 American civilian deaths, to 8% of Iranians for 3000 American deaths.

But I actually would guess that that is also the case for Iranians to some degree.

To be clear, I am talking only about Iranians who say "Death to America" but who actually mean "Down with America." I'm not talking about Iranians in general.

But I would again ask how many Americans would make such a call for terrorist attacks against Russian or Chinese citizens?

Let's put it this way: If there were some American who said "Death to Russia!" but actually meant "Down with Russia!!," I would be pretty surprised if that person did anything whatsoever to prevent a brutal terrorist attack against Russia, even if it were a matter of just picking up a telephone.

That is, if it were 30 lives at stake, I think there's a reasonable chance a majority of Americans wouldn't make the call. But if it were 3000 lives or 30,000 lives of innocent Russian or Chinese civilians, I think Americans would be more likely to make the call despite our animosity.

That's an interesting question, but I think it's beside the point. The point is this:

  1. Over the years, Iran's leadership has repeatedly said things along the lines of "Death to America!," "Death to Israel!," and "Israel will be wiped off the map!"

  2. Many people reasonably interpret this as evidence that Iran's leadership has major animosity towards the United States and Israel; that when these statements are combined with Iran's violent and hostile conduct towards Israel and/or the US, it is reasonable to engage in our own countermeasures, such as sanctions, bombing nuclear sites, etc.

  3. Iran's defenders have tried to dispute this evidence. Among other things, they claim that "Death to America" actually means "Down with America," and that "Israel will be wiped off the map" actually means there should be a change in government in Israel.

  4. It appears these arguments do not stand up to scrutiny.

For the sake of argument, let's say a one-hour talk with 911 and police, after observing some strongly-suspected imminent terrorist preparations. That's about as small as you can go and still have it be a genuine inconvenience.

I think plain civic duty would get you to 75% (EDIT: among Western allies), with most of the remainder being indecision and passivity, not active hostility.

I think by changing it to a 911 call you warp the question being asked.

I doubt that most Iranians are ever in a position that a 1 hour phone call could guarantee the safety of Americans from a would-be terrorist attack. My personal guess is that if an Iranian became aware of a terrorist attack against Americans, and wanted to prevent it, it would take a lot more personal effort and research than a mere hour-long phone call, and they might not even succeed at preventing it.

Just turning the question around. If the information about a terrorist attack in Russia next week fell into your lap, how much time would you estimate it would take you to ensure that the right people got that that information, and how sure are you that your effort would actually prevent the terrorist attack? Do you think the vast majority of Americans would be willing to expend that effort for the citizenry of our geopolitical rivals?

I doubt that most Iranians are ever in a position that a 1 hour phone call could guarantee the safety of Americans from a would-be terrorist attack.

I think it's a more accurate measurement of sentiment, even if it isn't practically useful.

Just turning the question around. If the information about a terrorist attack in Russia next week fell into your lap, how much time would you estimate it would take you to ensure that the right people got that that information, and how sure are you that your effort would actually prevent the terrorist attack?

Informing the Canadian authorities would probably take a couple hours up front, then a day or two in followups. I don't think they would be very invested in stopping it nowadays, so it probably wouldn't be prevented. Regardless, I did my duty.

Similarly, I'd hope that an American (even one who chants bad slogans) would inform the American authorities, and an Iranian would inform the Iranian authorities (assuming they suspect rogue actions instead of government ones). Those reports would have very different results, of course.

Most Americans would highly inconvenience themselves to prevent a serious terrorist attack on themselves. I’d be willing to spend 10% of my savings to prevent a 30+ person terrorist attack in Canada. I still think most American would agree

I guess some of the question is: is 10% of your savings enough to materially impact your standard of living much? If you scaled your income to "average American" levels, is that a candy bar or a car for you?

Do you think the 30% of Americans who have their health care costs paid for by Medicaid would be willing to give 10% of their savings to prevent a 30+ person terrorist attack in Canada?

If I'm wrong on the Americans-saving-Canadian point specifically, then fair enough. But I still maintain that regardless of the Canada angle, the vast majority of Americans wouldn't even slightly inconvenience themselves to save Russians or Chinese people from terrorist attacks. Am I supposed to think worse of Iranians when they have the same hang up about saving Americans?

10% would be enough to hurt but I could plan around.

Canadians use to be our mothers. I guess I’ve become tribal but even my willingness to give would depend on whether it’s Euro-Canadians or all the imported citizens they have today.

I would give very little money to save Russians or Chinese.

Thanks! Personally, I'd reciprocate but sadly I doubt Canadians as a whole would, at least not these days.

I don't have much to comment, except that I hope you and your loved ones stay okay.

Thank you

Hope everyone here is ok as well.

I think most people here are lucky enough to live outside of active war zones. Stay safe!

Doing my best to!

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