If you are expecting to read my usual Left Coast column, I tell you now that you will be disappointed. I write, today, from a place of horror—about the massacre unleashed against civilians in Israel this past week, and about the morally cretinous bloodlust reaction some who fashion themselves as being on the “left” seem to have experienced in its aftermath, but also in despair at the ghastly collective punishments being unleashed from the air on Gaza residents by Netanyahu’s far-right government and the Israeli military.
Israel chose to put those kids in harm’s way by inciting the conflict, but you should still care that they died. They didn’t ask to be born into this mess and had no choice in becoming collateral damage. Take a break from gazing into the abyss.
War is terrible and the loss of any human life is a tragic and untenable waste but, as an American, children getting gunned down is just a Tuesday. I’m more concerned with the actions the deaths of these particular children will precipitate. Any sort of overly performative grief will only play into that
Sorry you’re so hollowed out by the brutality of the world we live in that you’re numb to the deaths of children.
Children die every day. You only care about the ones you’re told to
Hope you find one that’s worth your while to care about.
First, you aren’t wrong and I want to complement you on you seeing the human lives here. It is important!
To give a
reply, the only way I can grieve and denounce the violence is by pointedly withholding that grief precisely because that grief is weaponized by Israel to commit more atrocities. This removes the shield Israel uses and exposes them to their own horror.
To put it another way, I will also withhold support for an abuser because an abuser will use that as a means of defending and continuing their actions. Keeping that support from them, however objectively legitimate that support is, forces them to confront their own actions.
I think this is where we’re all at tbh.
I think my solution is to ensure that the culpability isn’t misattributed, which is why I emphasized that the blame for their deaths lies with Israel.
An honest-to-goodness Truth and Reconciliation would make great strides for proper attribution.
That’s a long way off, but I would like to live to see the day.
He I justed posted a Big Joel twitter video where he says exactly that about the grief thing!
I just watched it. He says it much better than I did!
He’s good with words.