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Comment of the Week: We’re Not All Wrong, YOU’RE Wrong |
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 by Tamar Fox, November 14, 2007 |
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TAGS:
In response to my post about picking olives with Palestinians, Ismail wrote: 
Can't We All Just Get Along?: Not really, no.
Judging from the context of her remark, Tamar was proactively insulating herself from the imagined ire of partisans of Israeli policy who may have thought she was going too easy on the Palestinians. Nothing ironic at all in pointing out the political myopia behind such a fear.
And please, don't confuse principled objection to a political delusion with hostility, and lay off the namby-pamby "everyone's a little right, everyone's a little wrong" banalities, would you? Please advise if there is any other significant political disagreement in which this spineless trope occurs with such frequency.
It may be true that all perspectives have some particle of reason supporting them, but so what? Should that require that we put the brakes on our deeply held beliefs? I'm sure there are lovely Israelis who desire peace, just as I'm sure there are reprehensible Palestinians. So what? Taken as a whole, the historical evidence suggests to me that Israel has, since its inception and under many different regimes, made the dispossession of the Palestinians a conscious element of its statecraft. You may disagree (or, like Benny Morris, you may agree but cheer these disgusting actions anyway), but please come up with (what you imagine are) substantive reasons for your misapprehensions, rather than this silly incantation about there being enough blame to go around.
Ismail
Ismail’s right that “particles of reason” shouldn’t put the brakes on deeply held beliefs, but that doesn’t mean someone else’s deeply held beliefs are wrong, babe. I haven't found the historical evidence quite as convincing as you have, apparently.
Also, yes, you should register.
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Tamar Fox has an MFA from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, but she still doesn't like sweet tea. Born and raised in Chicago, she's also lived in Iowa City, Dublin, Oxford, and Jerusalem. When she's not rocking out at honky tonks she teaches More... |
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Anonymous
Tamar-
You say, "Ismail’s right that “particles of reason” shouldn’t put the brakes on deeply held beliefs, but that doesn’t mean someone else’s deeply held beliefs are wrong, babe. I haven't found the historical evidence quite as convincing as you have, apparently."I'm not entirely sure what you mean to say in your first sentence (although I'll admit I love the phrase, "Ismail's right"), but it sounds like we agree that seeing the reasons for our rival's beliefs shouldn't mitigate our fealty to our own. But if we're convinced that what we believe is true, mustn't that mean the other person is wrong? I understand that you disagree with me about how to understand the historical record, but are you not therefore required to say I'm wrong? If not, why not? (I'm assuming you're not coming from some radically skeptical epistemological neighborhood and believe that things are knowable).
Anyway, I'm tickled to be involved in a Comment of the Week, and I want to thank all my peeps, my amazing manager-"Whassup, Sy?"-and all the fans, and big ups to God, who made this all happen for me.
Oh, and to Tamar, for calling me "Babe".
Anonymous
Sorry, again I forgot to sign the above.
And how about capitalizing the word "Palestinians" in the "Tags" section of your post? Your transparent attempt to expand Zionist orthographic hegemony is fooling no one. IsmailSoccer
whats the point?
Tamar Fox
Soccer--One day it will happen for you, I promise (bli neder, obviously). Doesn't exactly help your cause that you like to imply I'm a whore though...
Ismail--You can be convinced that you're right but just not be aware of the facts on the other side, which is different from being convinced you're right and thinking the facts on the other side are either made up or insignificant. Also, I don't think that the conflict is an issue where the fault lies entirely on either side (and I'm not at all saying that in a namby pamby 'we've all made mistakes' kind of way--I really think there have been massive fuck ups on both sides, though not necessarily in equal proportions). I believe Israel has a right to exist. Does that make it okay for Israeli soldiers to mistreat any Palestinian civilian, ever? Absolutely not. But it might mean that I'm against the creation of a Palestinian state [this is not an actual example of my beliefs, it's merely a hypothetical]. In other words, the sources you use as historical record may hold no water for me (or little water), or they may be completely valid in my eyes, but it may be more important to me that Jews have a state of their own. Which is to say, you can acknowledge the accuracy and/or validity of someone else's point, and still say, "But X is my priority, so I choose to ignore/disregard/reframe that claim."
Anonymous
Tamar-
It sounds like you're saying that there is no conceivable evidence that could sway your opinion. If that's so, what's the use of talking? If you find yourself in a factual dead end or are otherwise trumped by your interlocutor, you can simply pull out your "get out of jail free" card; "doesn't matter-the necessity of a Jewish state is so primary that countervailing argument, no matter how airtight, is beside the point". Are you really saying this? If so, you might as well recuse yourself from the grownup table, where notions of logic, rationality and rules of argument are supposed to enjoy primacy. I find it kind of insulting that you would implicitly invite me to take the time and energy to present an argument, when in the back of your mind , you're prepared to fall back on a simple assertion, supported or not. IsmailTamar Fox
Ismail, that's exactly the opposite of what I'm saying.
I think we may each come to the table with some ideological cores that we won't abandon. And that's fine. The question is how much we're willing to negotiate and investiage and sacrifice around them.
Also, all of the opinions I mentioned were hypothetical, not representative of how I think.
Anonymous
"I think we may each come to the table with some ideological cores that we won't abandon. And that's fine."
Well, it's fine as long as your "ideological core" doesn't include the very issue that's under investigation. After all, you know that, both historically and contemporally, the utility for the Jews (not to mention the Palestinians) of a Jewish state is an idea which finds both supporters and detractors among Jews. Apparently, you're saying that you don't wish to be included in this conversation, since you're transcendentally committed to one side of the question-regardless of the validity of the other side's points. Once you say that you're ready to "ignore/disregard" your opponent's claims, regardless of their validity, you've opted out of that conversation. As I hope you'd see, this does terrible violence to the idea of community, in the sense that you're announcing that you're ready to renounce the consensual rules of engagement in favor of issuing an ukase, without concerning yourself with such petty notions as evidence, etc.
Lest you think I'm not getting your point, let me say that I understand the idea of coming to the table with some some unshakeable beliefs. For example, I can't imagine any set of arguments that would persuade me to own a slave. I'm prepared to say that I have an ideological core which forbids even considering owning a slave. Of course, this would also prevent me from coming to the aforesaid table in the first place-why bother? Also, I run across increasingly fewer people these days who promote slavery-go figure.
My point is this; if you want to include among your ideological core beliefs an issue that many thoughtful people find problematic, well, that's your business, but you need to accept that this puts you outside a lot of interesting conversation. I'd love to hear the reasons for your belief, but I don't care to fall for a bait-and-switch, where it looks like you're having a discussion, in the sense that most of us understand it, but you're really just going to ignore facts, validity, etc, in deference to a quasi-religious (i.e., extra-rational) commitment to a foregone conclusion.
I happen to be the only non-Jew in my Israel/Palestine discussion group. My companions represent the gamut of opinion from agnostic to liberal to feral re Zionism (I'm the only non-Zionist). Nevertheless, we are able to discuss engagingly and interestingly. I actually have mixed feelings about the utility of these sorts of groups, but we've been meeting so long, and we (well, most of us) like one another so well that the social rewards overshadow whatever political misgiving I may have. How long could such a thing last if one of us said, "Say what you will, I'm ignoring your evidence because it doesn't comport with what I already believe" ?
Ismail
JewcyCraig
Tamar Fox
For the most part, I think we completely agree and you're just reading into things I'm not really saying. I'm not going to defend myself against something I didn't write, though I am irritated by your constant assertion that I'm closed minded when I think I've demonstrated that that's simply not true in regards to Israel, or most issues, both religious and political.
My point is this: We all have our priorities, and we're entitled to them. Person A could say, "I abhor the senseless violence that took place at Sabra and Shatilla, and I think there's no excuse for inhumane treatment of refugees. However, the state of Israel is something that's of utmost importance to me, and despite my objections to the way that affair was handled from start to finish I will continue my support of the state." That isn't closed minded or small, and I think it's the people who are dedicated but honest that end up accomplishing the most because they don't spend much time trying to make things look good, they instead actively try to fix things.
To an extent, this is why your comments never fail to make me nod and then roll my eyes. I see your point. Absolutely. But other than the dissolution of the State of Israel, which isn't something I can get next to, I don't see what your suggestion would be, so I end up tuning you out half the time. God knows I'm the last person to say, "Can't we all just get along," and I agree that that's an immature way of dealing with this, but when you're playing a song with only one note you can't be surprised when my accompaniment is similarly simple.
I disagree that if I "include among [my] ideological core beliefs an issue that many
thoughtful people find problematic... [I]
need to accept that this puts [me] outside a lot of interesting
conversation." Pretty much any ideological belief is something that many thoughtful people find problematic, and for the most part thoughtful people choose issues which are of greatest importance or relevance for them, and then try to understand and engage with them. The idea that Israel as a state has a right to exist may be problematic to a lot of people, but if it didn't exist that would certainly be problematic for lots of other people. Your idea ends up with everyone holding hands and swaying, because they're afraid of ever taking a stance on a problematic issues.
Ismail
"Why don't you put the name "Ismail" into the "Name" section of the comment, instead of just putting it at the end?"
Because sometimes I'm a dumbass who can't see what's right in front of his face. Thanks for the suggestion, which I will now follow.
By the way, why is it that, when I boldface or italicize something in one of my comments using the mini-toolbar above the comments field, the typographical changes occur in the comments field but disappear when my comment appears on the site? Macintosh, Comcast, Safari. Thanks.