What It Means to be Liberal

or, "Oops, I guess I painted a target on myself!"

So it's been a long time since I actually wrote here. I have to confess, I never rode high the wave of the Obama victory, and frankly, in an odd way I'm glad I didn't -- the let down would have been much worse. I mean, the whole FISA vote was a big clue not to get one's hopes up, in my opinion. And then he started stacking his cabinet with Washington insiders and conservative Democrats (and even couple of Republicans...) and nary a Progressive in sight among his inner circle. And then of course... Rick freakin' Warren. And now, the clincher for me is Obama's refusal to speak out against the massacre in the Gaza Strip -- hell, what statements that have come out his camp are tacitly supportive of Israel! Forgive my cynicism, but I'm beginning to wonder if the primary difference between McCain and Obama really is that Obama can make his way through an entire statement without stumbling and uttering a malapropism.

So, in my lonely journey out into the blogosphere for answers, I stumbled upon something... well, disturbing. Ghastly and disgraceful, I would venture to say. By the way, buckle up -- this is going to be a long post because I'm making up for lost time. It will also include a humble request from me to you, but we'll get to that.

So anyway, what I stumbled upon was a blog written by a Jewish American who is pretty much literally celebrating what Israel is doing to the Palestinians. I'm not talking about the sort of jibes those of us on the (apparantly civil) end of the blogosphere take at neoconservatives when they earn themselves a heapin' helping of schadenfreude. I mean, this woman is really rejoicing in what Israel is doing -- not just the bombing, but the suberversion of the peace process, the grand spin campaign to clean Israel's image of war crimes, the denial of Palestinian's right to live, let alone live in their ancestral homeland. The works.

I suppose I should have known better when it comes to neoconservative blogs, but... well. I was shocked. So I posted a comment. Not surprisingly, it got bounced in moderation. I probably could have stopped there. Some would argue that I should have. But what is going on in Gaza, right now, right this minute, is a crime against humanity. And I thought about how the crimes of Nazi Germany against the Jews went unpunished for so long, and how people were afraid to speak out, and I decided that enough was enough. Nothing justifies an air strike on an undefended population center -- particularly one of the most densely populated, impoverished ones in the world today -- and so I sent an email to the site's proprietor.

For some background, it was this news story that prompted my specific response, as well as Ms. Yourish's reaction to it at yourish.com, specifically /2008/12/27/5826 (besides the obvious backlash that backlinking might bring down on me, I also refuse to dignify that blog with link rank.)

Ms. Yourish,

I'm fairly confident the comments section on your blog will continue to be thoroughly screened and censored, and while I don't expect you actually care about anything but your own interests, I still feel compelled to say something.

I find it disgusting that you celebrate this atrocity against the Palestinian people. Your own blog shows you not only know about Israel's duplicity -- the fact that the "peace process" has been nothing bit a ruse to discredit the notion that any sort of compromise is possible -- but you embrace this duplicity with open arms. It's clever that Israel fooled Hamas by sending in a few scant humanitarian shipments as a false show of good faith? Maybe that's considered acceptable behavior to Zionists, but the rest of the world would consider that a crime.

Israel has been planning this massacre for months -- your own blog posts constitute evidence of that. They've been planning it as far back as the unilateral withdrawal itself, if Dov Weissglass' own words are to be believed. You and your government have made a mockery of diplomacy and you've turned your back on everything the rest of us fought for when we helped saved the Jewish people from the atrocities of World War II. How dare turn around and commit atrocities of your own and betray the memories of those you lost to the Holocaust -- the memories of those that many of us lost, because Jews were not the exclusive victims of those crimes.

The rest of the world isn't fooled, anymore. For sixty years, Israel has been able to operate in the shadow of US imperialism, shielded by apathy, racist anti-Arab rhetoric, propaganda and misinformation. For sixty years you've answered the crimes committed on your own people by inflicting them on others. Things are changing, and they will be quickly leaving Israel behind (and probably the United States as well, by all accounts, but that is another matter). I'm not telling you this because I expect you to listen to me, or to care about anyone you don't consider fully human. I'm telling you this so that you remember that there really was a choice, some time in the future when we're all suffering the effects of Israel's crimes against humanity, much like we all suffered from the effects of the crimes of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia. You remember that you helped sow these seeds; unfortunately, we will all have to suffer the whirlwind thanks to you.

I doubt it will ever actually touch you directly -- I imagine you're affluent enough to remain afloat even in the economic crisis that is going to leave myself and many of my friends close to destitution, and since you're safely ensconsed here in the US you'll never have to witness the suffering and the horror that is war for yourself. I'd like to say that you'll have to live with your own demons for the rest of your life as a consequence of the crimes you endorse, but I imagine you will sleep farily soundly. I have no illusions that appealing to your sense of humility and compassion will bear fruit. So there is really little more to say.

Sincerely,
Pi3Orionis

Harsh? Yeah, admittedly. Impolite? Well, even Ghandi was a bit rude when he couldn't take it any more ("I like your Christ. I do not like your Christians. They are so unlike your Christ.") Vitrolic, even? Dare I say, but what can I say, it's in the name of my own blog.

Hateful? Certainly not.

Well... I guess I have to be honest. I expected there would be consequences -- you know, accusations of trivializing the Nazis by making a reference to them, accusations of being a Nazi myself... you know, the usual sort of reply one gets when one offers criticism of Israel to the right wing -- but I didn't imagine Ms. Yourish would be so crass as to try to mobilize an attack upon me by publishing my email address in a blog post where she, er, responds, to my letter ( /2008/12/29/5850 on the aforementioned site). You know, for a self-described writer and publisher I expected something a bit more... sophisticated. Mea culpa, or caveat emptor, or whatnot, I guess.

Lucky me, I've only gotten one little piece of hate mail thanks to the stunt, so I suppose I got off easy. But it's occurred to me this is a symptom of something larger -- a symptom of a sort of contagious mindset in which taking joy in the suffering of others, making vicious personal attacks or even outright racism, even actively participating in a campaigns of disinformation and slander have all become tools of the right wing. And with these crudely sharpened knives, they lash out at everything liberalism stands for... justice, honoring of promising, respect for human dignity, freedom of speech, the providence of forums for open discussion.

So here's my request. Fight it. For too long liberals have been ignored, and in part it's because we don't stoop to the depths of our assailants. We've been slandered and forced to defend ourselves in realms of civilization that wouldn't even exist if not for the liberals who have been the innovators, defenders and champions since the very beginning -- art, literature, academics, sciences. We don't have to wield the same crude weapons of the right wing, those of insult and slander and misdirection... we have weapons which are far more powerful in our hands, and they are powerful because we marshal them -- we are at are strongest not when we are attacking someone with them, but when we are defending with them... and stronger still when we wield them in defense of others. Speak out. Join a local group of activists. Keep blogging. When someone else gets knocked down, give them a hand, help them get up and stand with them. Keep asking questions, all the time, of everybody. Be willing to concede to the truth in honest debate; be willing to stand strong against an onslaught against the truth. Find a cause, and be willing to invest yourself in it.

I know it's difficult. We get precious little respect nowadays, in the United States, those of us who can still see the shining beacon on the hill. The political process has been subverted by greed and the national dialog has been polluted by propaganda. But we cannot give up, because doing so doesn't simply mean something as petty as defeat. It means suffering and loss for everyone. Neoconservatives lied to get us into a war with Iraq; but the sons and daughters of neoconservatives bleed no less when they lie broken on the battlefield. The poor working-class Republican suffers just as badly as anyone in the conditions of the raw economic folly that right wing philosophy has brought us, even if he cannot or will not see that. When we cede ground to those who would destroy us -- the haters, the spin doctors, the war profiteers, the swindlers in business suits, the preachers of intolerance -- everybody suffers. Even themselves, in the end. Just read over Ms. Yourish's reply to my letter and see how profoundly alone and cut off she thinks her people (and by extension, herself) are from the rest of humanity.

We aren't fighting against somebody. We're fighting for everybody.