Relating Tangents
Sep. 7th, 2009 11:59 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
eumeliaIt's been over a month since the shooting at the LGBT youth centre.
On Saturday night there was a march commemorating the dead. The same article in Hebrew were the only reports I could find about it.
As you can imagine, the police has not reported any suspect, no leads and after what I call the "Shiva" week, it was no longer part of the News cycle.
There were more and other murders going around this summer.
A lynch on the beach, someone killed a couple, a father killed his daughter... it's all very gruesome and that's what makes the Yellow News on the television.
According to a Newspaper poll Israelis feel more secure.
Seeing a title like that, my immediate assumption that this means the people living outside Israel proper feel less secure than ever. That is, that the average Palestinian doesn't feel personally secure.
I can hear the apoplexy already.
But fuck it, because if my "personal security" (which doesn't feel that great by the way) is enhanced because we're crushing the freedoms of others... that's not real security, that's walking around willingly blindfolded in the middle of the road.
In that poll it says that "Leftists were also revealed as more confident on the national front than rightists. Just 39% of rightists said they felt very secure, while 51% of those describing themselves as leftists said they felt thus".
I do not know who these Leftists are, because I don't think I've ever felt, since becoming politically aware and knowing why I'm secure in my home, less secure. Simply because the situation we're in is just not sustainable. The fact that haven't been any Nationalistically motivated crime in a while (even the Qassam rockets in the South haven't been that active) the violence that saturates my society is spilling over onto the News and thus into our conciousness even more.
But our conciousness is dissonant. Us Israelis are so used to danger coming from "Them" that crimes like the shooting at the LGBT youth centre was a surprise, that murders coming from families of known Mafia families, that rape and murder are on the front of the national News pages... we feel more secure, because Palestinians aren't shooting us or blowing themselves up.
So they can keep demonstrating against the Separation Fence and Wall and the IDF can shoot at both Foreign (same story, different News agency) and Domestic journalists who go to witness how the IDF protects Us from Them.
After all: 85% [of civilians are] saying they believed the army would be capable of protecting Israel if it were attacked.
*Thumbs up*
In my previous entry one of my most excellent and good friends asked, more seriously than not, to remind her why she lived here.
I ask myself that as well, but that line of questioning is really counter productive, because I was born here. I've never lived any where else and very likely no place I ever live will ever feel like home.
There is violence, crime and hate everywhere.
Possibly there is a difference in the societal framing of those human behaviours.
The systematic Othering that I feel is so insidious and invidious is stifling. The way the campaign I spoke about in my previous entry very simply and without much thought, casually disseminates the idea that not only are Jews better than non-Jews (the Goyim, the Gentiles), but that we must keep Jews from choosing a life that may or may not include the Judaism that Israel proclaims to be the true path.
I've been told, more than once by more than one person, that I'm narrow-minded. I find, more often than not, that I'm told this when I challenge the ideas that have been presented to me as default.
An argument usually comes to a stalemate when the person I'm arguing with says "I'm secure in the knowledge that I'm right!".
What a lovely thing to have, righteousness.
To never doubt or question, or to have been doubted or questioned.
The last time I felt that way was when I was serving my time in the IDF and when I came back to reserve duty in the same place... my doubts left me less equipped with the ability to deal with the fact that my actions were contributed, contributing, to the death of people (innocent and not).
I know I'm one of the good guys. I don't know how "nice" I can be about it any more.
On Saturday night there was a march commemorating the dead. The same article in Hebrew were the only reports I could find about it.
As you can imagine, the police has not reported any suspect, no leads and after what I call the "Shiva" week, it was no longer part of the News cycle.
There were more and other murders going around this summer.
A lynch on the beach, someone killed a couple, a father killed his daughter... it's all very gruesome and that's what makes the Yellow News on the television.
According to a Newspaper poll Israelis feel more secure.
Seeing a title like that, my immediate assumption that this means the people living outside Israel proper feel less secure than ever. That is, that the average Palestinian doesn't feel personally secure.
I can hear the apoplexy already.
But fuck it, because if my "personal security" (which doesn't feel that great by the way) is enhanced because we're crushing the freedoms of others... that's not real security, that's walking around willingly blindfolded in the middle of the road.
In that poll it says that "Leftists were also revealed as more confident on the national front than rightists. Just 39% of rightists said they felt very secure, while 51% of those describing themselves as leftists said they felt thus".
I do not know who these Leftists are, because I don't think I've ever felt, since becoming politically aware and knowing why I'm secure in my home, less secure. Simply because the situation we're in is just not sustainable. The fact that haven't been any Nationalistically motivated crime in a while (even the Qassam rockets in the South haven't been that active) the violence that saturates my society is spilling over onto the News and thus into our conciousness even more.
But our conciousness is dissonant. Us Israelis are so used to danger coming from "Them" that crimes like the shooting at the LGBT youth centre was a surprise, that murders coming from families of known Mafia families, that rape and murder are on the front of the national News pages... we feel more secure, because Palestinians aren't shooting us or blowing themselves up.
So they can keep demonstrating against the Separation Fence and Wall and the IDF can shoot at both Foreign (same story, different News agency) and Domestic journalists who go to witness how the IDF protects Us from Them.
After all: 85% [of civilians are] saying they believed the army would be capable of protecting Israel if it were attacked.
*Thumbs up*
In my previous entry one of my most excellent and good friends asked, more seriously than not, to remind her why she lived here.
I ask myself that as well, but that line of questioning is really counter productive, because I was born here. I've never lived any where else and very likely no place I ever live will ever feel like home.
There is violence, crime and hate everywhere.
Possibly there is a difference in the societal framing of those human behaviours.
The systematic Othering that I feel is so insidious and invidious is stifling. The way the campaign I spoke about in my previous entry very simply and without much thought, casually disseminates the idea that not only are Jews better than non-Jews (the Goyim, the Gentiles), but that we must keep Jews from choosing a life that may or may not include the Judaism that Israel proclaims to be the true path.
I've been told, more than once by more than one person, that I'm narrow-minded. I find, more often than not, that I'm told this when I challenge the ideas that have been presented to me as default.
An argument usually comes to a stalemate when the person I'm arguing with says "I'm secure in the knowledge that I'm right!".
What a lovely thing to have, righteousness.
To never doubt or question, or to have been doubted or questioned.
The last time I felt that way was when I was serving my time in the IDF and when I came back to reserve duty in the same place... my doubts left me less equipped with the ability to deal with the fact that my actions were contributed, contributing, to the death of people (innocent and not).
I know I'm one of the good guys. I don't know how "nice" I can be about it any more.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 12:32 pm (UTC)I often wonder what the world would look like if people realized that what is right for them wasn't necessarily right for other people, and their choices or birth don't give them the right to suppress other people.
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 01:06 pm (UTC)That was way more convoluted that I meant it to be.
Buttercup, you're one of the bestest!
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 03:40 pm (UTC)Do unto others in moderation as you would have them do unto you after imagining what you would want if you were them.
As for the poll, it's a bit strange. The title talks about Personal Security - i.e. will I be mugged as I walk along a dark street - while the examples cited are all about Military/National Security.
Also, I assume that there is no lack of consensus that the job of the army is to protect Israel if it were attacked by another army?
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 05:26 pm (UTC)Do not do unto others as you would not want done to yourself.
It removes the squicky thought of assuming that your desires are the same as everyone else's desires. And, for me at least, it makes the emotional impact greater. Would I want someone to bulldoze my home or the homes of my family? No? Then I shouldn't do it. The silver rule is narrower, but it makes fewer assumptions that all people are like me.
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 05:31 pm (UTC)Thanks!
no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 05:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 05:38 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 06:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-09-07 06:45 pm (UTC)Self-hating Jews ahoy!