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GHcool
"Forever a curious character."

Posted - 05/14/2008 : 01:45:52

quote:
Originally posted by Se�n

quote:
Originally posted by GHcool

Sean is wrong on both counts: (1) Israel never "plays the Holocaust guilt card" when it receives mere criticism and (2) nobody ever accused Sean of being anti-Semitic.
Perhaps I'm displaying my ignorance of what exactly 'antisemitism' is. I assumed 'criticism of everyone in Israel' and 'antisemitism' are almost the same thing (although antisemitism would also include discrimination against Jews not living in Israel).
quote:

Point 1 deserves further discussion. A lot of criticism of Israel is completely legitimate. In fact, the Israeli media is full of criticism of Israel every single day of the week. The line between legitimate criticism and overt anti-Semitism is crossed when people distribute deliberate disinformation (such as Hezbollah's false claim that Israel disseminates AIDS to Muslim world), when people make outlandish comparisons between Israel and the worst regimes in world history (Nazi Germany and apartheid South Africa are the most popular comparisons), when people selectively focus on Israel as being among "the worst" countries in the world, wishing for Israel's destruction, and a other forms of intellectual dishonesty and ignorance in the form of racism.
I've never heard any of those, although no garbage spread by the likes of Hezbollah surprises me. Those claims are quite ludicrous and should be regarded with absolute contempt. I'd expect many in the Middle East to believe them though.

You're right, Sean. Many people in the Middle East do believe these lies and false analogies. Unfortunately, many people in Western countries also believe and spread them. Check out the photos here.

BiggerBoat
"Pass me the harpoon"

Posted - 05/15/2008 : 16:30:28

Funny this should come up as I was chatting to Jesus the other day (I know him reasonably well- he drinks in my local) about this sort of thing. I saw him at the end of the bar reading the �International� section of a broadsheet newspaper, so I joshed with him by saying, �Hey, J-Man, I thought you died to save us? Doesn�t look like it did much good did it?!�

Now I�d always thought he was quite good-natured, serene even, but that really riled him.

�Look,� he said, �I never said I was going to save anyone and even if I did you�ve got to understand that it was at the end of a very hard day. I�d walked bloody miles with a ruddy great cross on my back; some joker had put a crown of thorns on my head and if that wasn�t bad enough a retarded Roman was poking me in the chest with a pointed stick before I died, so excuse me if I said something I didn�t mean.�

�Ah, like when Hilary �misspoke�?� I asked.

�Yeah, kind of, except she plain out lied whilst raping the English language.� He said, still clearly miffed.

�So what about all this trouble in the Middle East with your old lot, is that going to be resolved any time soon?� I asked.

�Well, they�re not �my old lot�, I am in fact Jewish.� He said.

�What, still? I thought you were the first Christian?�

�And exactly where in all my teachings did you find me saying, �Oh, and by the way folks, after I�m dead can you make sure that you take my life and then use it as some sort of emotional crutch for your own pitiful life and dress it up it all kinds of dogma that I never recommended and then go around the world stealing everything you can under the pretence that you�re following the one true path�? Bollocks to that BB, Christianity is worse than the friggin� plague as far as I�m concerned. I was trying to bring everyone together and what did they do as soon as I popped off? They �interpreted� my words and then set thousands of new strains of the same thing loose on an unsuspecting public. I�d like to take my name of the credits but it�s a bit late now.�

�And what about Israel? Were they really promised that land� I asked.

�Yeah, originally, when there was no one else there, but it�s a bit different when you�ve moved away and then decide you want it back isn�t it? Have you heard of the Lost Tribes?�

�Is that something to do with Peter Pan?�

�No you dick,� he said taking a slurp of his pint, �The land was given to twelve tribes. Three joined up to form the Kingdom of Judah, the Jews, who have since reclaimed the land but the other nine are still missing and, in effect hold as much claim to the land as the Jews. Now, should all these tribes rock up after someone does some kind of DNA test, do you think the Jews are going to share? I don�t think so somehow.�

�So what will happen?� I asked. This was interesting.

�What do you care? You�re all fucked anyway.� He snarled.

�Fucked? How?� This didn�t sound good.

�Apocalypse baby. That great self-fulfilling prophecy that allows you all to think you can do whatever you want with no consequences. This planet was a present and you shat on it. The planet will survive but you lot have had it. Not one of you will survive.

This was all pretty heavy. �And is there a heaven?� I asked, gulping.

�No.�

He turned back to his paper at this point but the second half of the match was starting on the pub TV so I went and watched that. We won 2-0 you�ll be glad to know.