naraburns nihil supernum
1yr ago
(text post)
29851 thread views
Israel-Gaza Megathread #1
This is a megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
This is a key question for determining the moral severity of the terrorist attacks we saw this weekend. A common criticism of Hamas is that they engage in terrorism against civilians whereas their morally enlightened (ostensibly) Israeli cousins only attack military targets. But I think this ignores the fact that Israel has the luxury of successfully hitting military targets. Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism. Yet at the end of the day, the same if not more civilians are killed, and the same terror is instilled in the enemy’s civilian population. Regarding an Israeli missile attack in May which killed ten civilians, Amnesty writes:
They were launched into densely populated urban areas at 2am when families were sleeping at home, which suggests that those who planned and authorized the attacks anticipated – and likely disregarded – the disproportionate harm to civilians. Intentionally launching disproportionate attacks, a pattern Amnesty International has documented in previous Israeli operations, is a war crime.
The idea that it is morally acceptable to kill civilians when you also kill military targets at the same time is often brought up when American bombings in Japan during WWII are discussed. However, I’m not convinced that there is a clear moral difference between Hamas actions and, say, the firebombing of Tokyo, where as many as 100k were killed, the vast majority being civilians.
Back to the question at hand, we know that Zionists had no issue bombing embassies and killing non-combatants in order to colonize the land of what is now called Israel. In the 40s, they notably bombed a British embassy, and in the 50s the Israeli government pressured Britain and Italy not to investigate the bombing. Recently, an Israeli historian has claimed that Zionists were responsible for the bombings targeting the Jews of Baghdad in order to pressure Jews to migrate and settle Israel. So, back when Israel’s position was more similar to Palestine, they did in fact engage in terrorist activity. If Israeli militants would behave as Hamas militants were they in that position, then the immorality of Hamas conduct is greatly diminished in severity.
Not all people, not all civilizations, not all tribes, are equal. This is a core conservative conceit, it’s also inherent to ideas like HBD that you yourself agree with. Human progress has always involved the conquest of some peoples by others.
“I do not admit that the dog in the manger has the final right to the manger, even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit, for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America, or the black people of Australia. I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place. I do not admit it. I do not think the Red Indians had any right to say, 'The American Continent belongs to us and we are not going to have any of these European settlers coming in here.' They had not the right, nor had they the power.”
Winston Churchill on Palestine (1937)
‘Punching down’, in other words, may be more moral than ‘punching up’. The many settlers of the Americas did what they did and so, perhaps, will the Israelis.
Not all people, not all civilizations, not all tribes, are equal. This is a core conservative conceit...
No, it certainly is not, in the sense of moral worth that you are explicitly appealing to.
it’s also inherent to ideas like HBD that you yourself agree with.
I thought HBD was just about population averages in performance, not moral worth? Have I not been told that over and over again for years now? ...In any case, I do thank you for the citation.
I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place.
We learn nothing. The foolishness of Enlightenment Progressivism is without bound. You and everyone else making similar arguments here know for a fact that you have no rigorous, objective, scientific materialist standard for "better" or "higher-grade" or "worldly-wise" other than raw strength. Your appeal is pure Might Makes Right, and you make it because you have lost the ability to even imagine that the roles could be reversed.
It is possible that some violence is more moral than others, because it is directed by ‘higher grade’ civilizations against lower grade ones.
No, that is not possible, nor has it ever been possible. When you design a better microprocessor, that does not give you or your culture additional moral value. Technological advancement does not, cannot, and never will imply moral value. It doesn't matter if I'm knapping flints and you're building star destroyers: our moral responsibilities to each other remain entirely unaltered. To think otherwise is to fatally misunderstand both morality and technology on an extremely basic level.
Describe for me the moral gradations between murder with a stone versus a flint knife, a bronze sword, an arrow, a bullet, or a laser-guided fragmentation submunition. Show me the moral difference between strangling a person with my bare hands and disassembling them with sci-fi nanotechnology. Show me the objective moral difference between oral storytelling around a campfire and Avengers: Endgame, or between a horse and an airplane. What is the moral value of refined aluminum, and what is the exchange rate in charred corpses of your friends and family? What is the atomic mass of love or mercy, or the molecular weight of justice?
Of course, you and most other rational materialists don't actually believe in moral value or morality in any meaningful sense, as these threads have amply demonstrated. They are just words to you, made-up labels to be applied where convinient, because ultimately there is no meaning or value to anything at all, no final accounting, no judge and therefore no justice, beyond that enforced by your own strong arm. And of course, when the nuke goes off in Tel Aviv some day, or the tech shifts the wrong way and its Israelis getting slaughtered down to the old men and the infants, that will not be "a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place", will it? Because chip fabs and language models, right?
And of course, when the nuke goes off in Tel Aviv some day, or the tech shifts the wrong way and its Israelis getting slaughtered down to the old men and the infants, that will not be "a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place", will it? Because chip fabs and language models, right?
There's a reason I'm not an Israeli, namely that I think the chances of Israel losing (everything) are much higher than most people, and especially most Jews, recognize. My existence in the diaspora is comfortable enough, and as such (a sign of loyalty, perhaps) I also don't favor additional (or any) American/Western aid for Israel. Nevertheless, both as a Jew and a supporter of civilization in the endless struggle against savagery, barbarism, and low IQ nonsense, I won't shed any tears if the Israelis decide (and successfully ensure) that enough is enough. The Holocaust was a tragedy of history and, though I don't particularly consider German civilization superior to Jewish civilization, we got fucked and many of us paid the price. That is life, and though I have thoughts on the general principles of the matter, I personally harbor no illusions that I am morally superior to a German or Palestinian, nor do I care to be.
I think Jews are mostly quite aware of, and discuss incessantly, Israel lacking strategic depth and being in a precarious situation and having no choice but to preemptively strike etc etc; if anything, they overestimate the threat from its utterly inept or degraded, and frankly well-taught in previous wars, neighbors.
What they do get wrong is the relative danger of being in the Diaspora, because they take deluded Whites lending vocal support to Hamas and other savages too seriously, and extrapolate this incoherent virtue-signaling gibberish to willingness for participating in or enabling Antisemitic violence locally. I appreciate that progressive Jews at, say, Harvard may experience very… interesting emotions right now; but realistically, they're unlikely to ever get hit with more than a variant of anti-white anti-colonial invective from their peers. Hence «there is only one country where it's safe to live while being a Jew» refrain. (Though judging by Twitter and in light of recent events, India might quality).
Then again, I may be overestimating human rationality and pacification again.
This website is a place for people who want to move past shady thinking and test their ideas in a
court of people who don't all share the same biases. Our goal is to
optimize for light, not heat; this is a group effort, and all commentators are asked to do their part.
The weekly Culture War threads host the most
controversial topics and are the most visible aspect of The Motte. However, many other topics are
appropriate here. We encourage people to post anything related to science, politics, or philosophy;
if in doubt, post!
Check out The Vault for an archive of old quality posts.
You are encouraged to crosspost these elsewhere.
Why are you called The Motte?
A motte is a stone keep on a raised earthwork common in early medieval fortifications. More pertinently,
it's an element in a rhetorical move called a "Motte-and-Bailey",
originally identified by
philosopher Nicholas Shackel. It describes the tendency in discourse for people to move from a controversial
but high value claim to a defensible but less exciting one upon any resistance to the former. He likens
this to the medieval fortification, where a desirable land (the bailey) is abandoned when in danger for
the more easily defended motte. In Shackel's words, "The Motte represents the defensible but undesired
propositions to which one retreats when hard pressed."
On The Motte, always attempt to remain inside your defensible territory, even if you are not being pressed.
New post guidelines
If you're posting something that isn't related to the culture war, we encourage you to post a thread for it.
A submission statement is highly appreciated, but isn't necessary for text posts or links to largely-text posts
such as blogs or news articles; if we're unsure of the value of your post, we might remove it until you add a
submission statement. A submission statement is required for non-text sources (videos, podcasts, images).
Culture war posts go in the culture war thread; all links must either include a submission statement or
significant commentary. Bare links without those will be removed.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
How would Zionists behave if they were in the Palestinian position?
This is a key question for determining the moral severity of the terrorist attacks we saw this weekend. A common criticism of Hamas is that they engage in terrorism against civilians whereas their morally enlightened (ostensibly) Israeli cousins only attack military targets. But I think this ignores the fact that Israel has the luxury of successfully hitting military targets. Israel can kill just as many civilians as Hamas by targeting military sites, while also killing relevant military leaders and defending against unwanted criticism. Yet at the end of the day, the same if not more civilians are killed, and the same terror is instilled in the enemy’s civilian population. Regarding an Israeli missile attack in May which killed ten civilians, Amnesty writes:
The idea that it is morally acceptable to kill civilians when you also kill military targets at the same time is often brought up when American bombings in Japan during WWII are discussed. However, I’m not convinced that there is a clear moral difference between Hamas actions and, say, the firebombing of Tokyo, where as many as 100k were killed, the vast majority being civilians.
Back to the question at hand, we know that Zionists had no issue bombing embassies and killing non-combatants in order to colonize the land of what is now called Israel. In the 40s, they notably bombed a British embassy, and in the 50s the Israeli government pressured Britain and Italy not to investigate the bombing. Recently, an Israeli historian has claimed that Zionists were responsible for the bombings targeting the Jews of Baghdad in order to pressure Jews to migrate and settle Israel. So, back when Israel’s position was more similar to Palestine, they did in fact engage in terrorist activity. If Israeli militants would behave as Hamas militants were they in that position, then the immorality of Hamas conduct is greatly diminished in severity.
Not all people, not all civilizations, not all tribes, are equal. This is a core conservative conceit, it’s also inherent to ideas like HBD that you yourself agree with. Human progress has always involved the conquest of some peoples by others.
‘Punching down’, in other words, may be more moral than ‘punching up’. The many settlers of the Americas did what they did and so, perhaps, will the Israelis.
No, it certainly is not, in the sense of moral worth that you are explicitly appealing to.
I thought HBD was just about population averages in performance, not moral worth? Have I not been told that over and over again for years now? ...In any case, I do thank you for the citation.
We learn nothing. The foolishness of Enlightenment Progressivism is without bound. You and everyone else making similar arguments here know for a fact that you have no rigorous, objective, scientific materialist standard for "better" or "higher-grade" or "worldly-wise" other than raw strength. Your appeal is pure Might Makes Right, and you make it because you have lost the ability to even imagine that the roles could be reversed.
No, that is not possible, nor has it ever been possible. When you design a better microprocessor, that does not give you or your culture additional moral value. Technological advancement does not, cannot, and never will imply moral value. It doesn't matter if I'm knapping flints and you're building star destroyers: our moral responsibilities to each other remain entirely unaltered. To think otherwise is to fatally misunderstand both morality and technology on an extremely basic level.
Describe for me the moral gradations between murder with a stone versus a flint knife, a bronze sword, an arrow, a bullet, or a laser-guided fragmentation submunition. Show me the moral difference between strangling a person with my bare hands and disassembling them with sci-fi nanotechnology. Show me the objective moral difference between oral storytelling around a campfire and Avengers: Endgame, or between a horse and an airplane. What is the moral value of refined aluminum, and what is the exchange rate in charred corpses of your friends and family? What is the atomic mass of love or mercy, or the molecular weight of justice?
Of course, you and most other rational materialists don't actually believe in moral value or morality in any meaningful sense, as these threads have amply demonstrated. They are just words to you, made-up labels to be applied where convinient, because ultimately there is no meaning or value to anything at all, no final accounting, no judge and therefore no justice, beyond that enforced by your own strong arm. And of course, when the nuke goes off in Tel Aviv some day, or the tech shifts the wrong way and its Israelis getting slaughtered down to the old men and the infants, that will not be "a stronger race, a higher grade race, or, at any rate, a more worldly-wise race, to put it that way, has come in and taken their place", will it? Because chip fabs and language models, right?
There's a reason I'm not an Israeli, namely that I think the chances of Israel losing (everything) are much higher than most people, and especially most Jews, recognize. My existence in the diaspora is comfortable enough, and as such (a sign of loyalty, perhaps) I also don't favor additional (or any) American/Western aid for Israel. Nevertheless, both as a Jew and a supporter of civilization in the endless struggle against savagery, barbarism, and low IQ nonsense, I won't shed any tears if the Israelis decide (and successfully ensure) that enough is enough. The Holocaust was a tragedy of history and, though I don't particularly consider German civilization superior to Jewish civilization, we got fucked and many of us paid the price. That is life, and though I have thoughts on the general principles of the matter, I personally harbor no illusions that I am morally superior to a German or Palestinian, nor do I care to be.
I think Jews are mostly quite aware of, and discuss incessantly, Israel lacking strategic depth and being in a precarious situation and having no choice but to preemptively strike etc etc; if anything, they overestimate the threat from its utterly inept or degraded, and frankly well-taught in previous wars, neighbors.
What they do get wrong is the relative danger of being in the Diaspora, because they take deluded Whites lending vocal support to Hamas and other savages too seriously, and extrapolate this incoherent virtue-signaling gibberish to willingness for participating in or enabling Antisemitic violence locally. I appreciate that progressive Jews at, say, Harvard may experience very… interesting emotions right now; but realistically, they're unlikely to ever get hit with more than a variant of anti-white anti-colonial invective from their peers. Hence «there is only one country where it's safe to live while being a Jew» refrain. (Though judging by Twitter and in light of recent events, India might quality).
Then again, I may be overestimating human rationality and pacification again.
More options
Context Copy link
Fair enough, then, and I apologize for interpreting your comments otherwise.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link