MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
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User ID: 1678
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
I've been unable to understand how there can be a stable equilibrium without something pretty close to ethnic cleansing
You're correct and many Israelis of the hard-right and even some on the center-left have publicly lamented that Ben-Gurion didn't "finish the job of 1948" where Israel ethnically cleansed hundreds of thousands in what the Palestinians refer to as "The Nakba". There was another round of ethnic cleansing during the aftermath of 1967.
Since then, the political pressure on Israel has ratched up significantly and even if international opinion is with them now, I highly doubt the West would allow forcible removal of millions of Palestinians today. More importantly, I also suspect the Palestinians would put up a lot more resistance today than their grandparents as they're far better armed and co-ordinated at a local level than they were in the 1940s or 1960s.
In addition, such a large-scale ethnic cleansing would invariably drag in Arab neighbours and kill any attempt at normalisation with Saudi Arabia and dial back the Abraham Accords. Hezbollah is also armed to the teeth and could well join the fray. So I highly doubt something like this would happen. Israel is just boxed in with no good options.
What can Israel do to a very densely populated Gaza strip that won't be branded as a war crime or ethnic cleansing?
Nothing, especially as Hamas was smart enough to take dozens of hostages. Bibi was dumb enough to say "we're at war" when in reality it was a limited cross-border raid that affected the immediate vicinity border communities. A war would entail something like the 1967 or 1973 wars which were existential. This clearly is nothing even remotely similar. This miscategorisation has now boxed him in rhetorically and he can't be seen as backing down. It would have been better if he called it what it is: a major terrorist attack/raid.
In terms of propaganda, it seems clear that international opinion is (and should be) with Israel. But what I'm seeing from Israeli military experts is that this is being described as Israel's 9/11. It was a massive intelligence and military failure on their part and once the initial shock dies down, people will be starting to ask hard questions of the govt. So there will be a political angle to ramp up a massive response which may not be effective in the long run but needed to save the govt from its downfall.
Israel is now a very wealthy society and appetite for large-scale casualties which a major ground operation would necessarily require is very low. While you could do a lot of bombings which would level entire neighborhoods, you'd also risk killing your own hostages. It's really a gigantic failure on the part of Israel. I don't really see any good option for them. Gaza is this problem that they can't seem to solve and govt advisors have talked about "mowing the lawn" in the past, as you'd need to continually launch mini operations to degrade the militants' capabilities without actually solving anything at a root level.
I think this ties into Israel's larger failure of solving the issue with the West Bank situation. The left's "land for peace" formula is dead but the right-wing's continued settlement expansion invariably leads to ethnic tension. Bibi used to be good at "managing the crisis" which allowed the mainstream of Israeli society to sort of forget that there ever was an unresolved issue. This year has seen as a huge uptick in terrorist attacks and now this latest Gaza crisis just compounds the issue.
In a very weird way, Israel is safer externally than it has ever been from invasions from other Arab countries with Saudi normalisation on the tangible horizon adding to the Abraham Accords. On the other hand, the internal situation keeps deteriorating and not just between Moslems and Jews but even between religious and secular Jews. Seems like the place is just a perpetual cauldron of unrest.
Not really. Lots of well-to-do people do projects-based work with fluid locations and enjoy it. You probably just have bad work experiences.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Elon has 10 kids.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Working for money is fucking stupid.
I think it depends how ambitious you are. Some people work for fun, as strange as it may sound to you. Money does give them the luxury of picking a profession which align with their passions rather than their talents (not always aligned, sadly).
Also, people are social animals and there is often greater status in doing something than passively sitting around doing nothing. Perhaps this is less true in European countries like Italy which has relatively little entrepreneurial energy and a lot of inherited old money families, but my impression is that wealthy Americans work a lot. They certainly do in the area of Europe where I am based.
Most people chase the approval of others and if your social circle allows for doing nothing except living on passive income without judgement, then great. But I don't think this is true for many successful people.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
You ironically need the Roman model, where the peoples subsumed by Rome came to view themselves as Roman.
This has been the standard policy for the past 50 years and I don't think it has worked well. It may be different in the US since most immigrants either come from a Westernised background (Latinx America) or are from the upper elites of Third World countries, which tend also to be fairly Westernised. Europe gets neither.
I agree that a two-tiered system is probably untenable in the long run, but this goes to my point about some problems not being able to be solved but merely managed. Besides, it also depends on the willingness of natives to enforce it. Gulf Arabs do it just fine, but I suspect Europeans are too soft. OTOH, the current status quo is a massive failure too. No easy answer here.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
what alternatives do you recommend?
Some problems cannot be solved but only managed. I don't have any good (realistic) solutions - if we define solution as actually solving the issue once and for all. But that isn't an excuse for passivity and resigned fatalism. There are certainly things that can and should be done to manage the issue, e.g. making citizenship harder and akin to the Gulf model, rewriting asylum laws and possibly removing asylum courts. Making controversial practices such as pushbacks legal. Ban certain NGOs who engage in smuggling. And so on.
These things would make matters better but they would not fundamentally solve the underlying issue, which you alluded to (demographic disparities, who are only getting wider). People want easy solutions but I don't see any here, but at the same time it seems to me that the old very generous asylum model has to end.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
I guess this is an argument against consequentialism. Namely, we didn't mean to kill tons of people, we just sort of did. But those baddies over there who did intend to do it nevertheless failed to do so as much as we did, hence we're better people.
Whereas the critics of such a position would simply say, what matters is what you do not what you say or claim to want.
And while I agree that genocide strictly defined is incompatible with Marxism (unless you think of capitalists and kulaks as an ethnicity), ultimately what I look at is how many people the ideology killed and on that count it was simply worst of all ideologies of the 20th century. No contest.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Most elites are left-liberal and thus have an emotional affinity to Marxism in a way they never will to far-right politics. It's about ideological proximity, not rationality. The fact that Marxism was genocidal when it was fully practiced is almost irrelevant.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Thanks. I did not know that US statistics make a difference between new positions and replacements. In my country, they are all grouped together.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
I suspect sub-Saharan Africans and Arabs aren't as capable as Italians in maintaining an advanced industrial economy.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Suella Bravermans Tory conference speech caught my attention as it seems to more bluntly come out anti-immigration
Suella is the home minister and under her watch the amount of student visas has gone up significantly. So has net migration. I personally never understood why right-wingers posing as populists talk as if they were in the opposition when they actually have the control of the government. Meloni is another character who speaks about what's happening in a worried passive tone even as she opens up the floodgates wider (legally!) while doing the bare minimum to stop the boats.
The end result of this would be a South Africanization of Europe
Probably, though the question is if AI will supercede all these demographic concerns. In an era of superhuman intelligence, even what we consider to be significant differences between humans may fade into a mere rounding error.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2023-black-lives-matter-equal-opportunity-corporate-diversity/
The year after Black Lives Matter protests, the S&P 100 added more than 300,000 jobs — 94% went to people of color.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
As I understand it, the recently concluded €50 billion aid package for Ukraine that was voted through the EU parliament needs unanimous consent from all governments and the election of someone like Fico obviously raises the specter of that aid package either not being approved or at least watered down significantly. It is no secret that many larger EU countries (e.g. Germany) want to change this rule of unanimous consent into a qualified majority, which would allow them to steamroll smaller countries like Slovakia.
Until that changes, however, the voice of the smallest countries still matter greatly which is why whoever controls the governments of those countries in turn also matters. Hence the censorship law, which would help put the thumbs on the scale.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Why do you think the book isn't doing gangbusters
Because the thesis of the book is wrong. News recently came out that 94% of new jobs went to PoC in the US, thanks to corporate pledges in the wake of the BLM riots. A straight reading of the civil rights law would have prevented that, so clearly the rulebook isn't as important as Hanania claims. The people who claim that the system is run on anti-White animus are correct and Hanania is wrong.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Glenn Greenwald has written up a good Twitter thread on the EU's proposed new draconian censorship laws. The pretext is that Slovakia's recent election resulted in a guy who has promised to end all Ukraine aid to end up winning it. This is all apparently due to "misinformation". Clearly when the voters have the wrong viewpoints, they must be treated with extra doses of correct thinking and anyone who deviates from it should summarily be punished. The law itself moves the onus onto the social media companies.
So if you think the era of censorship is over, think again. It's not just the EU. The Canadian parliament is also preparing something similar.
The most banal observation is that a system that is confident in its own survival does not need repression. The obvious implication is that the people running the system are not confident in their grip on power and in Europe in particular the big structural trend will be ever-increasing illegal migration once the Ukraine war passes. I suspect this censorship law will be used vigorously to deplatform anyone critical of the loose border policies the EU is promoting.
It's funny because we've long read about people in repressive societies like Iran, Turkey or China using VPN services to get around censorship by the regime. Might we get something similar in Europe in the not-too-distant future? I should add that I am not too pessimistic. People have tasted (relative) freedom and will not go back to the old regime. The rise of alternatives like Rumble is directly linked to increasing political repression on YouTube. Even outright totalitarian systems like the Soviet Union did not succeed in brainwashing their population. I've always felt that Aldous Huxley's dystopian vision of cheap entertainment to distract the masses was a better analogy to the Western elite's preferred methods of control over the more stereotypical 1984 vision that Orwell laid out. But clearly there are limits to how much you can distract people and now the gloves are coming off.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
6% of California's population is black. There are far more Asians and there is simply very little political representation for them. Asians are also a much wealthier bloc. It's actually quite impressive how overrepresented blacks are in California politics (LA Mayor and SF Mayor are both black women) given their lower demographic weight and generally speaking lower socio-economic success, which clearly doesn't impede their political influence.
One wonders if this is solely due to their own talents or if white liberals like Newsom is simply more comfortable with parachuted-in black women than he would be with a high-achieving Asian with roots in the state. So to me this is less about blacks than about relative Asian disempowerment in what is arguably their strongest state outside of Hawaii, coupled with a question if black overrepresentation is perhaps at least partly driven by white liberal preferences for that demographic over Asians.
I suspect many white liberals also support affirmative action because they don't want their kids to be outcompeted by Asian grinds at school and thus prefer lower-scoring blacks and Hispanics to create a more "balanced" milieu. Perhaps this is driven by a similar cultural impulse. This is of course all speculation, but I don't think we can disentangle white liberal preferences when things like this keep happening.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Ah, but England has the legacy of Empire, theirs was arguably the greatest and most influential in the history of the world. Despite all the contemporary controversy, it's certainly impressive and most opinion polls show that the English are largely proud of it.
As for the invasion by the Danes and later the Normasns...they were a closely related people, unlike the Central Asians and later the Europeans for India. On top of that, there was never much of an independent Indian empire, except perhaps the Mughals but of course they were of the 'wrong' religion. So it is understandable that isn't something Hindutva types would like to advertise.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Remember the moslem vs LGBT controversy earlier this year in Michigan? Now it's Canada's turn:
Rallies and marches were held across Canada on Wednesday with the goal of eliminating Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) curriculum and gender inclusive policies from schools.
In Calgary, where local media reports that the anti-trans protesters outnumbered the counter-protesters, a disturbing scene unfolded. The protest’s organizer, Mahmoud Mourra, stood on a low concrete wall, cycling through people, including children, who he encouraged to speak to the crowd.
As one young boy waits to come up to the microphone, Mourra says, “Those guys, they want to tell my son or my daughter for she can be he and now they come with the new term she can be it, a cat or a dog.” Mourra, who was charged by Calgary Police with anti-2SLGBTQ+ hate motivated criminal harassment from online incidents in June, then characterizes the 2SLGBTQ+ community and their allies as "unacceptable, confusing, mentally ill."
Most of these protests were carried out by moslems and after relentless attacks from the Canadian establishment, one of the largest moslem organisations of Canada put out a statement on Twitter - clearly not backing off. This tussle reopens the wounds from earlier this year. Many white liberals were often the first to defend moslem immigrants/refugees and now many are feeling betrayed ("we stood for you, but you won't stand for us"). The right here in Europe has long been using liberal talking points to try to coax white centrists to oppose moslem immigration, but a key feature of both the Michigan brouhaha and this current controversy is that there is no longer such a strong streak of opportunism. Indeed, one gets the sense that many Christian conservatives are elated to have found allies in the fight against LGBT+ ideology.
I think this raises a key dilemma for liberals. If culture is much "stickier" than they assumed, would having a liberal immigration regime necessarily be a good idea? Conversely, might we see a more relaxed stance from the right which has traditionally been very hostile against 3rd world migration, particularly from the Islamic world? We've been told for decades that Hispanic immigrants are very "conservative and family-oriented" but this has mostly been exposed as a hoax. The 2nd gen typically assimilate quite rapidly into liberal culture. The same may not be true to the same extent for moslems.
Finally, for many moslems, voting for the left-liberal parties was often a "necessary evil". In Germany, the Turks are notorious for overwhelmingly backing the social democrats while they vote for Erdogan in supermajorities. On economic policy, they are rational but on social issues they are voting against their own views. What these small tussles may signal is that moslems perhaps feel secure enough not to blindly follow the left out of fear of a nativist backlash from the right. They swallowed the social programming as a necessary evil but this is clearly starting to wane. Clearly, the white left and the brown moslems had a very effective electoral alliance for many decades and I am not one to declare it dead this soon. However, I doubt we will ever get back to business as usual. Something is rupturing here.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
Why did support for Ukraine split along the left/right the way it did
I am not someone who likes excessive racialisation of politics, but I think some on the left may be correct in speculating that Russia being a conservative, white Christian country has a lot to do with it. Ukraine is very similar, but there is simply more respect to Russia since it resembles the USA in many ways (frontier culture, etc).
I also think a lot of right-wingers have this obsession against China for the same reason. It's an alien race, on top of actually being a real threat in a way that Russia is not. And to counter China, it'd be remarkably foolish if you were to push Russia and China together instead (which is what the US has done). I think Beinart wrote about these dynamics well a few weeks ago.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
What is a "Hindu Nationalist" for someone on the Motte?
I can't speak for others, but for me it is someone who cares deeply about Hindus and (often, but not always) views India primarily as a Hindu civilisation. Other dharmic faiths are welcomed but the Abrahmic ones are generally seen as a spiritual threat at the least. I think this is the baseline criteria for someone who I'd consider a Hindu nationalist. I've talked to many of them, most of whom who tell me they are Hindu nationalists, and generally speaking a significant proportion go much further than this, e.g. some incorporate jati identity and often view things like the SC/ST act as no different than moslem appeasement etc.
While there is some truth to this for some Indian communities, this is often pushed by influential land owning groups who want to claim oppression.
Yeah, I'm aware that reservation policy has degenerated into a racket a long time ago, e.g. many OBCs are now knee-deep into those waters. I'm generally speaking against affirmative action, but I don't think a good argument is to say "well, because AIT is pushed by rent-seekers, that means we have invent a new history". I can understand this from a pragmatic political perspective, but the facts remain the facts. The evidence for AIT is overwhelming and crushing. Moreover, it is only getting stronger by the year. The debate in India has completely severed itself from the academic discussion and becomes increasingly unmoored by the day.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
the official version is not really believed by anyone educated above 5th grade civics
Unfortunately, this is not my experience. Some of the most conformist people I've met have had higher education degrees. I think Chomsky wrote something about this some years ago, how the primary function of universities is to increase compliance with the system. Interesting thought.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
If I were to hazard a guess: India's history is (mostly) just being invaded by foreigners. There were a few exceptions (e.g. the Chola Empire), but by and large this was the general pattern. The AIT is the "ürinvasion" so to speak, and if it gets accepted as fact then it sort of acts as a template for the rest of India's history. If you actually spend some amount of time in Hindu nationalist spaces online, they are all pushing the "out of India" theory. It's pure cope, of course.
MelodicBerries
virtus junxit mors non separabit
1yr ago
I'm surprised that people are surprised. The West will back anyone from a radical jihadist or in this case praising a former (?) Nazi if it suits its geopolitical interest. Ultimately, the rhetoric of "human rights" is reserved for the large domestic audience of midwits even as the de facto foreign policy is far more ruthless.
I recall reading that Israel also tried to push its African asylum seekers into the West and then there was HIAS' role in the Syrian refugee crisis.
I am generally speaking more sympathetic to Israel than to the Palestinians but I think many Westerners are wildly overstating how much in common we have with the Israelis, at least the part of Israel that is ascendant.
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