I wrote: >>> ... this [what raghu was saying] is not the issue I was discussing with David. He asserted that because (a) I criticize Israel, and as he added later, (b) I'm a lefty, it must be true that (c) I equate Israel with Nazi Germany.
>>>Here's the background: in an earlier missive of mine: David B. Shemano referred to >Jim Devine contemporaneously calling Israel "one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth," which I think a reasonable reader [i.e., David Shemano] would interpret as a Nazi analogy.< <<< Counselor Shemano now writes: > This discussion with you has been one of the more surreal email discussions I have ever had. I have learned that just because somebody self-identifies as a socialist, or libertarian, a reader of that person should not make any assumptions about that person or about the very words that person uses, because that person may have a subjective quirk that negates the objective meaning of a writing. Fascinating. Is this some radical twist on post-modern literary criticism that I missed?< It has nothing to do with lit-crit-shit (of which I know little). If David wants to generalize about lefties and then talk about average lefties, that's fine with me. However, it's best if his generalization is accurate. Lefties are not anti-Semites, for example. We are snappy dressers, though. On the other hand, as I said before, if you want to have a conversation with someone, it's best to treat them as _individuals_ not as representatives of a large group. Supposedly libertarians believe in this point, but I guess my stereotype does not apply to David -- or he's not a libertarian. (I'm sorry if I thought David to be a libertarian if my assumption was wrong. I've always thought that libertarians were better than GOPsters, for example.) In general, it's best to avoid stereotyped thinking, confusing a member of a group with the group itself (especially an amorphous one like lefties). David continues: > Just in case I am nominated by the Bush administration to be attorney general or other position [the horror! the horror!] and the opposition does their research, I did want to clarify that Jim Devine's logical argument cited above is such a complete mischaracterization of what I said that I have to believe it is intentional, especially from a guy who believes that you can never make an objective assumption about a writing and instead must carefully deduce the writer's subjective intent.< Did I say that we "must carefully deduce the writer's subjective intent"? I doubt it. I think what's more important is what people _do_. Subject intent plays a role, but it's not as important as actual action. (What people say is important too, but not as important as action. In an e-mail conversation, the only action is what people say.) >To refresh, Doug Henwood made the point that isn't it awful that you can't criticize Israel without being called a Nazi. He was making a point about the use of rhetoric. I pointed out that it took Jim Devine about 30 seconds [sic] to then send a post in which he called Israel "one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth," which in my subjective world is heated rhetoric, and it is kind of silly to ask that the other side stop calling you a Nazi if you call the other side supporters of "one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth."< Heated rhetoric, maybe, but not too heated. (Shaken but not stirred.) Not as heated the rhetoric that David accused me of using in an earlier missive. (Before, he said that I was likening Israel to Nazi Germany. He now seems to have retreated from this overheated stance.) I have already defended my use of the phrase "one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth" before and will not defend it again (except to quote what I said before). I should point out, however, that criticizing Israel is in a completely different category from criticizing someone who criticizes Israel. Israel is a nuke-armed state with military supremacy in the air, sea, and (with its post-1967 boundaries) land. It is in no way suffering an "existential" crisis, despite the overheated rhetoric of some Likudniks. All critics of Israel -- including tenured profs -- are much more vulnerable. Anti-Israel sentiments can be interpreted as anti-Semitic and thus as a form of "moral turpitude," which could mean the revoking of tenure. (Or the end to promotions and raises plus a wall of social snubbing, as Paul Baran suffered -- for different reasons -- at Stanford.) More likely than firing someone for alleged anti-Semitism is that any anti-Israel remarks will set off a process of looking under all rocks to find any _real_ moral turpitude, which is then used to fire the individual. (Look what happened to Ward Churchill: he made some extremely stupid remarks about 911 and found himself to be the subject of a massive investigation. The GOPsters did this to Bill Clinton, too: they kept looking and looking and looking -- long after Ken Starr wanted to retire to Pepperdine -- until they finally dredged something up.) BTW, I'm glad that anti-Semitism is considered to be bad. It's too bad that anti-Black racism (etc.) often isn't seen in the same light. BTW2, just because someone supports Nazis (real ones, not some imaginary Nazi state that exists now) does not mean that they are Nazis. A lot of the British upper classes supported Hitler not because they were Nazis but because they saw Hitler as a force against Stalin. Of course, this does suggest that these people (the Brit. upper crust) were horrible people. > So my point was about the use of rhetoric, not about whether Lefty + > criticism of Israel = Nazi. < Let's go back and look at the dialog: David B. Shemano had written: >>>> It is a comedy watching Jimmy Carter, or Mearsheimer, cry like little babies every time they are criticized. Get over it.<<<< Instead of responding to what Doug was saying, I directly responded to what David said: >>> Though this description seems quite off-base, "get over it" is good advice. Instead of "crying" or retreating, we should _fight back_. It should be made clear that Israel represents one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth -- and that US taxpayers help pay for it. >>>Part of fighting back is making our principles clear: ethnic nationalist occupations of others' lands and the imposition of an updated version of apartheid on them is bad.<< Note that I was not responding to the bit about rhetoric (that Doug was talking about, I presume). Instead, I responding specifically to David's comment about Carter and Mearsheimer "crying." My comment started with "get over it." This refers to what the Left (or what's left of it) _should_ do. It was "good advice." In response, David wrote: >> Jim Devine contemporaneously calling Israel "one of the worst kinds of ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth," which I think a reasonable reader would interpret as a Nazi analogy.<< This is what the argument was about -- what a "reasonable reader" would see. Shane and Bill, for example, agreed that David's interpretation of what a "reasonable reader" would see was silly. I agreed with them, though I did not feel that it was necessary to do so explicitly. Following the "contemporaneously" comment, David also wrote: >>So apparently it is unfair rhetoric for somebody to call your side Nazis, but okay rhetoric to call the other side Nazis, and if anybody calls you a Nazi for calling them a Nazi, that proves they are a Nazi.<< This is crap. As I said, over and over again, it's not just a matter of rhetoric. The Likudniks have much more power than a Walt or a Mearsheimer. They have a big infrastructure, so that their knees can jerk very effectively, putting any critic of Israel on the defensive -- or off the campus. David now writes: > In fact, how dare you assume that I don't believe Israel is a Nazi-like regime. Have I ever said that I don't believe it? I hate it when people make assumptions about me.< Well, David sure _seemed_ negative when he accused me of making an analogy between Israel and Nazi Germany (which, BTW, I view as a false analogy). Unless he shoves responsibility on the shoulders of your imaginary "reasonable reader" (who could not be anything but an avatar of David himself)? I'm glad that David "hate[s] it when people make assumptions about" his views. I hate it when anyone makes assumptions about my views, i.e., that I equate Israel with Nazi Germany. In fact, I don't know anything about David's opinions of Israel. Instead of making assumptions about his feelings on that score, I simply responded to what he _said_. > Furthermore, in an example of unintentional comedy, Jim defended against my > assertion that a reasonable reader would interpret "one of the worst kinds of > ethnic nationalist regimes currently on earth" as a Nazi analogy by saying > "Ethnic nationalism involves much more than the Nazis. Have you heard about > the Hutus versus the Tutsis?" How is the reasonable reader supposed to > interpret this statement? Well, I interpret it to mean that Israel may not > be comparable to the Nazis, but its treatment of its Arabs is comparable to > the Hutus treatment of the Tutsis, which was the genocidal execution of > 800,000 people. Wow -- that really lowered the level of rhetoric.< In context -- and it's always good to read things in context, isn't it? -- that was just the beginning of an explanation of what I meant by ethnic nationalism. But David left out that context. Let's see if I can find, cut, and paste it: >>> In any event, "ethnic nationalism" is a more general phenomenon. It's not always violent. It's one way of creating a base for unifying capitalism or any other class system or of unifying minority groups across class lines. The architects of the Versailles Treaty's division of W. Europe after WW1 followed ethnic-nationalist principles. The French, the Italians, and the English used or tried to use ethnic-nationalist principles to create what we now think of as "modern nation-states." The late Yugoslavia was divided following ethnic-nationalist principles. Etc.<<< Note also that later on in the missive, I praised the US for not being (totally) committed to ethnic nationalism. But somehow David missed those patriotic sentiments. David: > I await Jim's complaint how I am again misinterpreting him and failing to > deduce his supersecret subjective intent.< I never made my opinions or intents secret. In fact, I go on and on and on and on. Laconic is not my strong suit. This is tiresome, depressing. -- Jim Devine / "Segui il tuo corso, e lascia dir le genti." (Go your own way and let people talk.) -- Karl, paraphrasing Dante.
