Sunday, June 20, 2010

Shooting Unarmed Humanitarian Volunteers In The Head Is A Bad Thing

... and saying that doesn't make you "anti-Semitic."

How debased is our political culture that one even feels the need to say that?

2 comments:

no_blah_blah_blah said...

It seems that disliking a government's policies (falsely) equates to racial hatred, nowadays...

I suspect that part of the reason is due to the psychological need for certain Western nations to atone for past mistakes that resulted in general misery for the Jews until it all culminated in the Holocaust. The turning away of Jewish refugees on the M.S. St. Louis by the U.S. and Canada is a particularly shameful example.

Canada should be forever ashamed that it didn't help the Jews who managed to flee Germany before the Holocaust. The problem lies in what has been learned and what is done in response.

My conclusion is that nothing has been learned. For example, all the Canadian government (in all of its many incarnations since 1945) is doing is being super-friendly to the Israeli government in the hopes that the Israeli government never feels the need to bring up Canada's old shames.

To have truly learned from the past, Canada should be trying to help current victims of injustice and not just trying to make nice with old victims of injustice. Being overly nice to the Israeli government now doesn't change the fact that thousands of Jews who escaped Germany only ended up back in Germany to become part of the millions who died horrible deaths, "thanks" to Canada (amongst other nations).

(sarcasm) But hey, maybe if the Canadian government is really, really nice to the Palestinian government half a century later, that will totally make up for its policies toward Palestine right now. (end sarcasm)

thwap said...

For much of the Canadian public there's been a sustained process of indoctrination of "tiny, little Israel" fighting for its life from the Arab hordes (who have been subjected to a sustained process of demonization.)

Then there are the "conservatives" of the Blogging Tories who are latecomers to the struggle against anti-Semitism. Now that Israel is a powerful bully, it seems like a safe, satisfying endeavour for them.

Last, there's stephen harper's pandering to "end-time" Christian fundamentalists, ... what he perceives as the Jewish vote in Canada, ... a cynical, ugly policy.