I live in a university town, which has many lovely qualities, except the roiling background stupidity of a loud minority of students and faculty. Thank you for your articles - they help balance out the annoyance.
A beautiful and finely crafted essay. I live in danger of taking your brilliance and scholarship for granted.
Here is a question. Though a person of pronounced political views, I try always to sympathize with positive and admirable values held by those with whom I disagree. I can grasp that the protestors for an immediate cease-fire are concerned about preserving the lives of civilians who are living in horrific conditions. But where is their outrage over rape and murder and mutilation? Over hostages and young women being held hostage underground for over 100 days? How is it that people who mobilized (as Bari Weiss charges) for saving the girls kidnapped by Boko Harem, or were so vocal in the MeToo Movement or were outraged by the nomination of Brett Kavenough to the Supreme Court…how can they be silent now?
But they are.
My question is this: you attribute this not to bad values but rather the misapplication of values. Do you not see this as an expression of Jew-hatred; that they’ve got it coming, those filthy yids? The antisemitism of Hamas is right there on display, they proclaim it and without shame. Do you see them as drawing from the same well, or simply as ignorant and irresponsible fellow travelers?
I see them as being a mixture. Whenever people do bad things, it is always for only one of three potential reasons. Either they are ignorant, stupid, or evil. If they are ignorant, they are simply useful idiots but with working moral compasses and so hopefully, you need only expose them to the correct information and give it time, but re-education is possible. If they are stupid, exposure to the correct information will not make a dent. It may not be that they have a low IQ per se, but that on this particular issue, they are driven by raw emotion or something other than reason and cannot be appealed to using reason, so they are functionally stupid. As Hitchens used to say, you cannot reason someone out of a position that they did not reason themselves into. Finally, there are those who know the facts, and are smart enough to understand, and simply do not care about -- or actively support -- such wicked cruelty. These people are evil. The protesters include a mixture of all of the above, but I would say, as is often the case with any such group, it's mostly the ignorant and the stupid, as we recently saw in Konstantin Kisin's video in which he went around asking people if they knew what their protest signs meant. Most didn't.
Volodzko Brothers, et al.!! Weaving of all these stories together, current and historical, helps illuminate the actual facts while explaining the vileness and trickery of those trying to destroy us.
Thank you also for giving us some real numbers, with sources, to defend some of the attacks we are faced with.
A problem is those who believe in perfectionism here on earth.
When that inevitably fails they look for scapegoats, never thinking that their own ideology might be at fault.
"[T]hese are not faceless monsters but romantics striving for equality." A timely reminder; thank you.
I live in a university town, which has many lovely qualities, except the roiling background stupidity of a loud minority of students and faculty. Thank you for your articles - they help balance out the annoyance.
A beautiful and finely crafted essay. I live in danger of taking your brilliance and scholarship for granted.
Here is a question. Though a person of pronounced political views, I try always to sympathize with positive and admirable values held by those with whom I disagree. I can grasp that the protestors for an immediate cease-fire are concerned about preserving the lives of civilians who are living in horrific conditions. But where is their outrage over rape and murder and mutilation? Over hostages and young women being held hostage underground for over 100 days? How is it that people who mobilized (as Bari Weiss charges) for saving the girls kidnapped by Boko Harem, or were so vocal in the MeToo Movement or were outraged by the nomination of Brett Kavenough to the Supreme Court…how can they be silent now?
But they are.
My question is this: you attribute this not to bad values but rather the misapplication of values. Do you not see this as an expression of Jew-hatred; that they’ve got it coming, those filthy yids? The antisemitism of Hamas is right there on display, they proclaim it and without shame. Do you see them as drawing from the same well, or simply as ignorant and irresponsible fellow travelers?
I see them as being a mixture. Whenever people do bad things, it is always for only one of three potential reasons. Either they are ignorant, stupid, or evil. If they are ignorant, they are simply useful idiots but with working moral compasses and so hopefully, you need only expose them to the correct information and give it time, but re-education is possible. If they are stupid, exposure to the correct information will not make a dent. It may not be that they have a low IQ per se, but that on this particular issue, they are driven by raw emotion or something other than reason and cannot be appealed to using reason, so they are functionally stupid. As Hitchens used to say, you cannot reason someone out of a position that they did not reason themselves into. Finally, there are those who know the facts, and are smart enough to understand, and simply do not care about -- or actively support -- such wicked cruelty. These people are evil. The protesters include a mixture of all of the above, but I would say, as is often the case with any such group, it's mostly the ignorant and the stupid, as we recently saw in Konstantin Kisin's video in which he went around asking people if they knew what their protest signs meant. Most didn't.
It’s worth the follow to hear you speak your own words. Bravo.
Volodzko Brothers, et al.!! Weaving of all these stories together, current and historical, helps illuminate the actual facts while explaining the vileness and trickery of those trying to destroy us.
Thank you also for giving us some real numbers, with sources, to defend some of the attacks we are faced with.