naraburns nihil supernum
1yr ago
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #2
This is a refreshed 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.
I was alive then and it's nothing like post 9/11. A lot of people are criticizing Israel and US foreign policy in the ME right now. That definitely wasn't happening after 9/11. Also, there is a lot more sympathy for Muslims now, especially on the Left. A war for Israel would be extremely unpopular.
Me too, and I admit that the initial vibe was pretty well captured by The Onion's "We Must Retaliate With Blind Rage vs. We Must Retaliate With Measured, Focused Rage" debate. Bill Maher got bumped from ABC for saying a suicide attack wasn't "cowardly", because "murder is bad, cowardice is bad, therefore murder is cowardice" wasn't a textbook example of the Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle, it was just something Real Americans should bellyfeel.
That definitely wasn't happening after 9/11.
Depends on how long you define "after" to mean. It started happening faster than the wars did.
There was some "Voter March"/"No Blood For Oil" protest on 9/12 that only attracted a thousand protesters ... but by the time the reaction to 9/11 was clearly in motion it was attracting the largest anti-war rally in history.
What an absolute soycuck tier shit to say and feel as if you've said something profound. I've lost the last bit of respect I didn't even know I still had for Bill Maher.
I just looked it up and at one point afterwards George Bush had a 92% approval rating. I would say that is pretty different from now. Obviously you can find examples of people disagreeing, but objective measures like polling and voting show it was a much different time. That link you posted was a year and a half after 9/11.
Yeah the Afghanistan war was launched less than a month after September 11 and the rhetoric started pointing that way almost immediately. Bush started by demanding the Taliban hand over Bin Laden or else, they didn't, and the "or else" happened.
I was in college and, at least there anyway, the "we deserved it" talk was immediate, I almost want to say same day. It certainly was not the universal or even the majority opinion but it was sizable and loud.
As a high school junior at the time, my experience largely matches yours. I think 9/11/2001 had too much confusion and fog-of-war for much of a narrative to develop, especially among high school students who were in class (first day of class for my high school, actually!), but by 9/12 and certainly by 9/13, the narrative of "What did we do wrong to deserve this?" or "What did we do to drive these people to such desperation that they felt they had no choice but to lash out in this way?" were very popular, both among students and teachers.
George Bush had like a 92% approval rating. I'm sure there were Marxists and libertarians on college campuses at that time who said we deserved it but the vast majority of people were pissed off and wanted blood.
It seems funny in hindsight, but over the full 8 year terms, George W. Bush had a higher average weekly approval rating (49.4) than Barack Obama (47.9), largely based on the year or so after 9/11. In some ways, it seems like an example of how recency bias clouds expectations. But also that average approvals have been trending downward since the end of the Cold War -- perhaps indicative of larger trends of growing partisanship.
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Notes -
I was alive then and it's nothing like post 9/11. A lot of people are criticizing Israel and US foreign policy in the ME right now. That definitely wasn't happening after 9/11. Also, there is a lot more sympathy for Muslims now, especially on the Left. A war for Israel would be extremely unpopular.
Me too, and I admit that the initial vibe was pretty well captured by The Onion's "We Must Retaliate With Blind Rage vs. We Must Retaliate With Measured, Focused Rage" debate. Bill Maher got bumped from ABC for saying a suicide attack wasn't "cowardly", because "murder is bad, cowardice is bad, therefore murder is cowardice" wasn't a textbook example of the Fallacy of the Undistributed Middle, it was just something Real Americans should bellyfeel.
Depends on how long you define "after" to mean. It started happening faster than the wars did.
There was some "Voter March"/"No Blood For Oil" protest on 9/12 that only attracted a thousand protesters ... but by the time the reaction to 9/11 was clearly in motion it was attracting the largest anti-war rally in history.
What an absolute soycuck tier shit to say and feel as if you've said something profound. I've lost the last bit of respect I didn't even know I still had for Bill Maher.
What? His point was it wasn't cowardice.
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I just looked it up and at one point afterwards George Bush had a 92% approval rating. I would say that is pretty different from now. Obviously you can find examples of people disagreeing, but objective measures like polling and voting show it was a much different time. That link you posted was a year and a half after 9/11.
I was too young by then but did Bush already commit to war at the period his popularity was so high?
Yeah the Afghanistan war was launched less than a month after September 11 and the rhetoric started pointing that way almost immediately. Bush started by demanding the Taliban hand over Bin Laden or else, they didn't, and the "or else" happened.
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Fair enough, certainly more criticism and skepticism now.
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I was in college and, at least there anyway, the "we deserved it" talk was immediate, I almost want to say same day. It certainly was not the universal or even the majority opinion but it was sizable and loud.
As a high school junior at the time, my experience largely matches yours. I think 9/11/2001 had too much confusion and fog-of-war for much of a narrative to develop, especially among high school students who were in class (first day of class for my high school, actually!), but by 9/12 and certainly by 9/13, the narrative of "What did we do wrong to deserve this?" or "What did we do to drive these people to such desperation that they felt they had no choice but to lash out in this way?" were very popular, both among students and teachers.
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Context Copy link
George Bush had like a 92% approval rating. I'm sure there were Marxists and libertarians on college campuses at that time who said we deserved it but the vast majority of people were pissed off and wanted blood.
It seems funny in hindsight, but over the full 8 year terms, George W. Bush had a higher average weekly approval rating (49.4) than Barack Obama (47.9), largely based on the year or so after 9/11. In some ways, it seems like an example of how recency bias clouds expectations. But also that average approvals have been trending downward since the end of the Cold War -- perhaps indicative of larger trends of growing partisanship.
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