This weekly roundup thread is intended for all culture war posts. 'Culture war' is vaguely defined, but it basically means controversial issues that fall along set tribal lines. Arguments over culture war issues generate a lot of heat and little light, and few deeply entrenched people ever change their minds. This thread is for voicing opinions and analyzing the state of the discussion while trying to optimize for light over heat.
Optimistically, we think that engaging with people you disagree with is worth your time, and so is being nice! Pessimistically, there are many dynamics that can lead discussions on Culture War topics to become unproductive. There's a human tendency to divide along tribal lines, praising your ingroup and vilifying your outgroup - and if you think you find it easy to criticize your ingroup, then it may be that your outgroup is not who you think it is. Extremists with opposing positions can feed off each other, highlighting each other's worst points to justify their own angry rhetoric, which becomes in turn a new example of bad behavior for the other side to highlight.
We would like to avoid these negative dynamics. Accordingly, we ask that you do not use this thread for waging the Culture War. Examples of waging the Culture War:
-
Shaming.
-
Attempting to 'build consensus' or enforce ideological conformity.
-
Making sweeping generalizations to vilify a group you dislike.
-
Recruiting for a cause.
-
Posting links that could be summarized as 'Boo outgroup!' Basically, if your content is 'Can you believe what Those People did this week?' then you should either refrain from posting, or do some very patient work to contextualize and/or steel-man the relevant viewpoint.
In general, you should argue to understand, not to win. This thread is not territory to be claimed by one group or another; indeed, the aim is to have many different viewpoints represented here. Thus, we also ask that you follow some guidelines:
-
Speak plainly. Avoid sarcasm and mockery. When disagreeing with someone, state your objections explicitly.
-
Be as precise and charitable as you can. Don't paraphrase unflatteringly.
-
Don't imply that someone said something they did not say, even if you think it follows from what they said.
-
Write like everyone is reading and you want them to be included in the discussion.
On an ad hoc basis, the mods will try to compile a list of the best posts/comments from the previous week, posted in Quality Contribution threads and archived at /r/TheThread. You may nominate a comment for this list by clicking on 'report' at the bottom of the post and typing 'Actually a quality contribution' as the report reason.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
The most recent story I've seen about the war is US doctors talking about how many Palestinian children have been shot in the head by sniper fire, and the parents of those children say they were shot when playing, outside or inside. The story before that was the killing of Mohammad Bhar, where an intellectually disabled man was attacked by an Israeli military dog before they kicked his family out and made sure he died without receiving medical treatment (which the family discovered when they were finally allowed back to their house to see his maggot-ridden corpse).
Most people I know in real life consider those stories and the countless others like them barbaric and disgusting - we think members of our own armed forces who do those things deserve to go to prison for the rest of their life and lose all their honours and awards in the process. If that's what qualifies as meek and timid from your POV, I'd hate to see what it would take for you to actually criticise them.
Anecdotes that I am sure some of which happened (although one must be clear that "US doctor in Palestine" is an entirely self-selected group of pro-Hamas partisans). But that is not data.
I'd hope not if they are isolated incidents caused by fog of war and genuine mistakes, as I suspect is the case.
Given the urban nature of the conflict and known Hamas tactics of hiding their military targets in civilian areas, we'd expect a lot of objective carnage, in the numbers. PLO numbers (almost certainly inflated) have total casualties at 39k. That is 20x less than what we'd expect if Israel was conducting the conflict with a "genocidal level of brutality". 39k is the total casualty number from a particularly bad year for the Army of South Vietnam, a theater where most of the conflict was not conducted in cities.
Even if Israel was acting without genocidal intent, but merely a casual disregard for civilian casualties total death would be far FAR higher. There aren't many places in Gaza that aren't legitimate military targets (on account of Hamas storing all their munitions in hospitals, schools, and apartments), if Israel just dropped dumb bombs on every building that they had good intel had weapons or Hamas agents in, there wouldn't be any buildings over 2 stories tall left in Gaza.
I don't think Israel is guilty of genocide, but casual disregard for human life seems to fit the bill. https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/
That is not what I get from the article at all (despite its author's obvious bias). What we have here is a military equivalent of comstat + incorporation of tracking of specific individuals. The very act of doing this is the opposite of casual disregard for human life, because by making targets, they are necessarily excluding targets, which in this sort of conflict is a demonstration of judiciousness. There is a good case for, instead, simply engaging in creeping artillery fire and leveling every building that is a possible Hamas fortification. And that is simply a military case. Far before you would be engaged in intentional targeting of civilians.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
War is brutal. Israel has done many bad things, perhaps more than necessary, but that's how war goes. America was hardly polite and soft on Japan in WW2.
If Native Americans started randomly suicide bombing American cafes and launched roughly one attack every twenty years that would kill hundreds, how many Native American civilian casualties would you max out at before saying "no, the cost is too high to keep bombing reservations"?
This was in response to claims that the Israelis were being meek and timid - you can absolutely play the "people do bad things during war" card, but you also just wiped out the claim I was arguing against in the process.
That situation and history are so different as to make the comparison moot - and if this was an attempt at emotional appeal, I'm also not American.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link