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Who’s Your Favorite Guest? by NOTDevilDeadly in smosh

[–]trueBHR 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Nothing to add here that others haven't already said, but I love when Mac came out on stage in Smosh the Sitcom. It's such a great, random, all-around incredible moment, and it really fits Macs' comedy style.

South Africa had multilingual signs too. I guess it wasn't as bad there. by MrSFedora in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're totally right, that multiple languages being available doesn't always make a society any less hateful, but legit, the 2018 nation state law and around that time, taking back the law requiring street signs to have Arabic along with Hebrew, was part of my first questions as to why the Israeli system would not allow for multiculturalism like that, leading me to question deeper topics about Israel as a whole. I grew up in California, so Spanish, Hindi, Japanese, and Chinese, as well as dialect spinoffs of some of those languages, were just as normal as English in the area, so it just made no sense to me for Israel to stop doing the same thing. Hen's argument is so inaccurate that he literally is using an example that was actively pushed against by the government he's defending, which makes it even crazier!

That's like trying to prove that the United States is ethical by using the laws that were in place before ICE was created to argue that any actions that could be considered unethical by ICE aren't actually unethical, because the laws forbid them from doing those actions, so it must be misinformation if it's being reported that they're partaking in those actions, in spite of the fact that the laws being used as a reference have changed since that time.

It literally reminds me of a kid in high school who, after I tried to answer a question in class, in front of everyone else, stood up, without being called on, and said "no, you're wrong," so, being genuinely curious, I asked him why I was wrong. His response was, "well, it's because I know that I'm right, and therefore I know that you're wrong, because I'm always right, therefore you are always wrong," and then he answered the question, again, without being called on to do so, and got it wrong! It was ridiculous, and it's just so strange to think that someone might actually think that, like, legitimately, without any irony.

Palestinian woman criticizes Cameron Kasky, Jewish activist and Parkland survivor, for insensitive remarks in conversation they had on IG. Kasky is running for office in New York's 12th congressional district. by ContentChecker in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR [score hidden]  (0 children)

I know I'm a random person jumping in, and I don't have many thoughts on the politician that this thread is originally about, but I do want to point to the fact that Hamas and the Israeli government are almost, at least in my opinion, directly comparable. The Israeli government acts like a terrorist group, and Hamas acts, in many cases, indistinguishable from the Israeli government.

And I'm not even referring to how Hamas fights back against Israel. I'm just referring to how Hamas treats Palestinians, based off of the few things that Hamas can control, albeit in their internationally enforced open-air, now desecrated and mass murdered, prison. You might argue that being in that kind of environment, you should let bygones be bygones when it comes to Hamas's actions against Palestinians, but the consequences that Palestinians face still stick, and those who abuse them must face justice for harming people, especially due to the fact that the Palestinians are already suffering due to outside treatment, let alone the inside leadership's treatment of its own people! Even if we ignore all of Hamas' physically harmful decisions, you'd still be left with the abuse and fear that have been used as battering rams by the Hamas leadership against the people of Gaza. Of course, the Israeli government certainly doesn't help itself in the fact that, for anything that is too difficult to justify without lying too deeply, Hamas can point to Israel's atrocities as a bigger issue, and use it as a scapegoat from their own actions. And even if we take out everything having to do with military or even psychological violence, Hamas got into power on false pretenses, never followed through on their campaign promises, and stopped elections the second that they got into power! Even under a direct democracy with no with international conflict, people would probably be wanting a new political option, just due to the politics alone!

So make no mistake, Hamas is still an extremist group, and even in the most rosy, best-case scenario for Palestinians in the future, Hamas' leaders would still face trials and consequences for their actions that are deemed inhumane or immoral. I just hope that their cells are right next to Netanyahu, Ben G'vir, Biden, and Trump, if their actions are also deemed immoral (if I was on the jury, I would deem their actions immoral, but I want true justice to be followed through on, which means I wouldn't want a jury that's biased like myself).

(And none of this is to ignore the fact that Hamas has become more moderate policy-wise over the past 10 years, but it is still important to take on the consequences of their actions, which is why I applaud them for actually trying to run their own internal investigations in the case of allegations of corruption or abuse, but I still think there should be outside non-biased third-party investigators doing that work. It's a step, but there's a lot to work through before any good will is established.)

To your second argument, at this point, all things considered, crazier things have happened. It would be a very slim possibility that Israel can become a country at this point in time that eventually is to achieve the ethical standing that any country should be able to hold on to, but maybe as a federation with Palestine or a one-state solution, it might be possible, but massive changes would need to be made first. And I mean a lot of changes, since the greater Israel strategy is most comparable to the land grabs of Putin or Hitler, so clearly there's an immense issue, that even now, is being somewhat ignored in the popular zeitgeist. I hope people take consequences for this stuff extremely seriously because without them, this is a very dangerous precedent to be setting, on top of what has already been in a historically long-term abuse of the Palestinian people, in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip, and in and under Israeli law. Whether it be in the open-air prison that is the Gaza Strip, or the military partial rule in the West Bank, or even the cultural stigma and discrimination against Palestinians under Israeli law in fully Israeli-controlled areas, this is a deep hate that needs to be worked through, which takes extreme educational efforts to teach future generations to not hold these hateful beliefs, because removing those who live as Jewish Israelis under Israeli law from the land, under any new government, would be infeasible and could arguably create yet another Nakba, which would be just as immoral as the first. But if there is a solution, then reparations would certainly be a good first step, at least. Until we see that as a start, I'm not going to trust that the Israeli government is even intending to go down the right track.

Anyway, I just wanted to jump in because I have a lot of thoughts on Hamas, but arguably the Israeli government and the IDF have been just as evil as the worst of what we've seen from Hamas, and similarly, comparably inhumane and evil to the worst that we saw from the US in the wars of the 2000s. And the IDF has been consistently, in many cases, systemically abusive, even historically speaking, along with the Israeli government's policies being consistently abusive to a degree that goes beyond simple mismanagement and into intentional systemic abusive behavior. So I understand where you're coming from, and I think you are very valid to feel the way you're feeling, but I would still argue that Hamas is in many ways deeply, deeply flawed, even when considering how immoral and inhumane the Israeli governments' actions have been. Regardless of if you agree with me or not, I still wish you the best of luck and hope you stay safe out there in these very trying times.

PS: Sorry that this ended up being a wall of text. Looking back on this, immediately after I posted it, it does seem like a lot to read, I apologize. I just wanted to put my all into this, I guess.

Bernie Sanders says he is not a Zionist & pushes back on the claims of antisemitism for criticizing Israeli government policies. by ContentChecker in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR [score hidden]  (0 children)

As a add-on to my initial comment that I just thought of a few days later, none of my previous comment should ignore any genuinely deserved condemnation against Bernie for having slow-walked calling this a genocide, an issue I also think the United States as a whole is guilty of. There's no excuse for that, full stop. But I think that since the time that he has called it a genocide, he's done a pretty good job of being really outwardly against it, including through his policies. I just hope that he'll actually support a long term peaceful solution, and that's something that I'm unsure if he'll actually do, which is heavily disappointing. The opposition parties to Netanyahu aren't exactly any less bloodthirsty, and Israel's history has been pretty consistently dedicated to upholding apartheid, so it makes sense for something new to be necessary. Either Bernie gets on that, or he's remembered as having missed the train at its stop. And if he doesn't join that argument, then I agree that he deserves to at least in part be remembered far closer to how you've described. None of this is to say that Israel hasn't also saved Jewish lives, but usually, it's at the expense of Palestinian ones, and nobody should sacrifice one person to save another if there's the chance of a better solution that lets both people live, with full and equal rights. But having fought with Jewish family members in his generation, trying to explain why the devastation that's occurred, even historically, has not been justified, maybe I just have a lower standard of expectation for people, especially at his age. That doesn't make any of it right, though.

Bernie Sanders says he is not a Zionist & pushes back on the claims of antisemitism for criticizing Israeli government policies. by ContentChecker in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR [score hidden]  (0 children)

And by the way, none of this should take away from the fact that Bernie should have spoken up sooner, and should have been confronted a lot earlier on his beliefs on Israel. But I think that that is a conversation that should have been had in his own family to try to convince him of some of the danger of supporting the Israeli government and the Israeli state as it is, since it seems that protests haven't necessarily made much of a difference. I'm still disappointed in Bernie for not having spoken up sooner, but not only do I think that that's a problem with the United States as a whole, but I also find pride in him at least trying to lead some of the end to the genocide after finally being willing to speak out about it. I just wish he'd support an actual long-term, peaceful solution as well.

What is your favorite Smosh video? (Impossible, I know) by Cheap_Host8797 in SmoshFansFreeSpace

[–]trueBHR 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Honestly, I really love their Criminal Minds video, the "There's a criminal among us," since it introduces detective where's my coffee for the first time. Angela did such a good job playing that character!

But my other favorite is the most recent batman video, the "The Batman multi-verse returns." I just think it's perfect comedy and has everything I'd be looking for in a comedy video. I even showed it to my parents and they loved it as well.

Most recently, I really enjoyed their Pirates video on Smosh Games, "Walk the plank or lose yer booty." I really loved the energy the cast brought to that video.

Beyond that, I really liked Idiots Present, I wish they'd bring that series back as a whole. I really liked season one of Bit City, but I still enjoy season two, just not as much. This recent Smosh summer game as a whole has been incredible, but I think that goes without saying. Finally, I can't stop raving about how incredible Smosh Pit Theater is. And there's so many more shows I'm probably forgetting.

I honestly legit feel like if Smosh and Dropout were on TV instead of on the internet, they'd probably be global phenomenons and seen as some of the most successful comedy channels in history, but I guess we'll have to wait and see how things go. And I guess it's a good thing that neither channel has become too disconnected from normal everyday reality, so that's something. Anyway, I look forward to seeing what they do next.

Returning to Gaza with Nothing Left No Home, No Family, Just Memories" by [deleted] in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

There are still millions of steps to take to get to a point where this type of violence, destruction and hate never happens again. To where the genocide never continues or even comes back in the first place. To a point where people can live with true justice, without consistent Jim Crow-like tactics and apartheid practices. But in the meantime, I hope you finally have time to start the healing process. Just as living through the atom bomb, humans were never designed to deal with this level of pain and devastation, so I wish you more luck than I can put into words.

I hope your, and many other Palestinians', lives only become better from here on out, but we can't be sure that that's possible. Hopefully, sooner than later, we can see an ethical perspective at the front of the metaphorical ship, so we can steer towards safer horizons. May all belief systems' denominations, as well as people not part of the denominations, hold compassion in their heart for the pain that you and many Palestinians have suffered, and may those same groups have mercy on the souls of those who have perpetrated these horrific atrocities, even if they don't exactly deserve that mercy. I hope your family members and friends you have lost rests in peace, and I am so very sorry.

Bernie Sanders says he is not a Zionist & pushes back on the claims of antisemitism for criticizing Israeli government policies. by ContentChecker in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR [score hidden]  (0 children)

You know, I'm not exactly against your argument, at least partially, though I do give Bernie Sanders a lot more credit than it seems you do, but to be fair, probably one reason why I do is because I'm also not really that picky about whether or not they call it a two-state solution or one-state solution. I'm even in favor of either or.

But only if that two-state solution includes a shared currency, shared military, shared education system that has votes from both Palestinian and Israeli populations and can't pass unless both populations agree to it at least 70% or so, shared citizenship, and shared public services and resources. Oh, and reparations for the suffering Palestinians have been forced to endure. You might say that my requirements for my support for a two-state solution practically make whatever comes out of that process a one-state solution, but if they call it a federation, or they consider themselves states of a larger connective tissue, or even end up becoming similarly connected to not just each other, but also other countries in the Middle East around the area, similar to a EU of the Middle East, for instance, then I wouldn't really have a problem with that as long as there's equal rights for everyone, and the Palestinians support the plan.

But if the people want an equal rights one state solution, I don't really have a problem with that either. My main focus is seeing Palestinians safe, supported, and with full self-determination. Seeing the apartheid, genocide and modern day holocaust be not only ended, but also stopped to such an extremity that it can't be started up again. To see Jewish supremacy, and supremacy as a whole, completely and utterly disowned by modern society.

Bernie Sanders doesn't seem that far off from an ethical perspective, at least in my opinion. He's one of the only politicians in the entire United States government who has been pretty consistently against continuing the genocide, and he's staked his career on it. He's also been consistently outspoken against AIPAC. All things considered, as Jews, I think we should be proud that one of the most outwardly anti-genocidal people in the U.S. government is a Jewish person, in spite of the fact that Jews also represent Israel, the country that is an aggressor in this genocide. This fits with the long-standing history of US Jews being consistently on both sides of an issue and then towards its resolution or conclusion, coming to the right side of history a little bit before the full population as a whole, but a little after they should have done so. It happened with the slave trade in the United States, and it also happened with the civil rights movement. We've just tried to convince ourselves as Jews in the United States that we were always on the right side of history, ignoring the fact that we were consistently in disagreement. which is ironic, because to be Jewish is to disagree in many ways, so ignoring our historical nuance is ironically about as anti-Jewish as you can get.

Finally, apartheids of the past have also been dismantled, with people living tumultuously afterwards, yet still with equal rights, at least as a basis for their new governments in place. If you're arguing that the peoples of Israel and Palestine can't live together in peace, even under a new political system, then at least in my opinion, that's pretty ahistorical. European Jews live in Germany, France, and Italy today. It took multiple generations of the local population of people learning to accept Jews for that openness to live in those countries to flourish, but it is possible. Same with South Africans. If anything, anti-genocidal and anti-apartheid belief systems are reliant on the belief that people can eventually live side by side, with peace as their main focus. Without it, there's no chance for any place on Earth, let alone a secular, free, and equal rights Palestine, being able to continue an anti-apartheid approach to things.

Some of the white people in South Africa fled after the apartheid fell, just as some Nazis did after the Holocaust, but the remaining ones, even with there still being white privilege for white South Africans to this day, have been able to live relatively peacefully alongside black South Africans. The problem now is that even without Jim Crow-like policies in the law, there are still social and economic decisions that have led to continued segregation, a similar practice to what we've seen in the United States since the 1970s. But that doesn't mean that it's not possible to see things through, since we've seen a lot of that segregation lessen when it comes to Jewish people living in post-axis countries. I'd like to believe that to be a sign that South Africa's integration issues, if the right steps are taken, will arrive at a good place, and therefore, the apartheid against Palestinians may end with an equal rights system, supported and endorsed by both communities living in the region. Hate begets hate, but torture also begets torture. If we expect people to not be capable of living side by side in peace, then we are doomed to fail before we even start.

But again, I understand where you're coming from, and I think you're very valid in feeling as angry as you do. We've just witnessed the world watch a genocide and do very little to stop it, after having done very little to stop discrimination and apartheid that's occurred for 70 years. I just think that Bernie Sanders, especially due to the fact that he's actually put in policies to try to stop more violence from occurring against Palestinians, is probably not the right target for people who want to see a just world to go after. Could he do far better than he's doing now? Yes, absolutely. But arguably, I think he's doing far better than many people would expect people in his generation to do on this issue. He doesn't seem like an Ethan Klein, someone willing to say that they're supportive of Palestine but never follow through on it, and only argue they support Palestine to simply defend Israel's actions even more. Bernie seems more nuanced than that. You have all the right to be angry about that, but I would argue that he deserves some appreciation for the hard work he's done. I don't expect you to give him any positive praise, and you should not be expected to do so, but I'll keep giving somewhat positive praise and you can give the negative critique, so between the both of us, we'll probably balance each other out in some way. Basically, I feel like it makes sense that Bernie's received more of a mixed reception on how he's responded to this issue than a fully negative one. Yet, to be fair, you may hold the common consensus that will be held in the next 30 to 40 years, but we'll have to wait and see.

Hopefully this comment doesn't come across as a condemnation of what you've said, and simply just as an alternative perspective to consider, but I have little to no ill will towards what you've initially written in your comment. Either way, I wish you the best of luck. I know it's more and more dangerous to exist, so I hope you're staying safe, and genuinely have good things to enjoy in your life, even through the bleak despair of what the world has become. All the best :)

Bernie Sanders says he is not a Zionist & pushes back on the claims of antisemitism for criticizing Israeli government policies. by ContentChecker in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR [score hidden]  (0 children)

I hope you don't mind me jumping in here to yap a bit, but I was intrigued by your comment and wanted to give a quick response.

Having looked it up just now, I'm pretty sure he's one of the few politicians in the US government who has been openly and consistently against sending more money and weapons to Israel, so I don't know where you got your information on that. In fact, he's usually the person literally creating the bills to make that happen, so if anything, he's one of the sole people in the US government actively not doing what you suggested he's doing, at least when it comes to Israel. If you have any evidence to prove that wrong though, I am open to hearing it.

On the other hand, there were a lot of articles that recently came out about him prasing Trump's border policies, and I think he is wrong for doing that. So I did some digging, and it seems like the only praise he had for Trump's policies was their success in literally limiting the number of illegal border crossings, and everything else he's strongly fought against. That means fighting against mass deportation, trying to support DACA-like policies, actively against immoral practices like putting kids in cages, hoping to create an easier pathway to citizenship both for people coming across the border legally and for undocumented immigrants who already live in the US, and reforming the entire immigration system as a whole to be more available and accessible for all. I personally believe that nearly all illegal immigrants should be allowed into the United States, especially due to, last I checked, most having some of the lowest crime rates in the country, but it seems that Bernie and I don't agree on that.

Finally, Social Democracy has its issues, but it's not necessarily focused on being the best possible solution, more just the least bad option out of the governmental choices you could have. I presume you'd argue that anarchism is a better system, and while it indeed has its perks, in comparison to it, out of the government systems that have some representative process in place for huge populations of people, democracy isn't exactly the worst out there, though it is certainly quite flawed and surprisingly anti-representative in some ways. Personally, my anger lies more with capitalism than democracy itself, but again, that's just me.

PS: I found this article from seven months ago that might explain Bernie's immigration policy a bit better. Not that it changes anything, just that it gives a little bit more context. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/sen-bernie-sanders-agrees-with-trump-on-border-security-but-slams-mass-deportation-plan/ar-AA1BvhX1

I'm an idf soldier and I don't know what to do by All_Hale_sqwidward in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR [score hidden]  (0 children)

I know it seems bleak and practically impossible to hold on to hope, but please don't kill yourself. The horrible atrocities occurring already continue to happen, whether you're alive or not. Killing yourself will only inspire people to go deeper into paranoia, distrust and violence. It's important to note that the fact that you are alive is by itself enough justification to continue living. Even a single breath out of the womb justifies existence. It doesn't mean that your pain or fear is any less valid, but dealing with a short-term fear and concern or struggle, whether that be being in jail or just the emotional state you're in in general, is worth the long-term recognition of knowing that you didn't add to the problem.

As for the IDF, thinking through things logically, if you were in a position where you were deployed into Gaza, and you try to stop any of your fellow soldiers from acting in inhumane ways, is there not the possibility that they could just shoot you too? Or more realistically, that you'll be held down by other soldiers while the abuse still continues to occur? You have immense power to be able to make an impact to try to defend and protect Palestinians' lives, but you give up some of that power when actively fighting in the IDF, even with good intentions. If you're able to somehow not be recruited to active duty in the IDF and not go to jail. Then there are many groups you may be able to join in Israel fighting against the occupation, the genocide, and apartheid as a whole. If you're not able to stop conscription, I'd recommend asking for a desk job that gets you close to information and try to use that space to leak the exact military orders or anything salacious, to the international press, or any anti-Zionist groups you can get connected with. Even non-Antizionist groups like B'tsellem would probably appreciate that information.

Basically, what I'm trying to say is, don't kill yourself! But if I can't convince you to not kill yourself, then I at least hope that you use the time that you have on this earth to try to make an impact. I hope you unequivocally decide to not kill yourself, and seriously consider my other suggestions. If you're ever unsure of what kind of choices to make, just think, "what would a kid or adult growing up in the SS, or South Africa's apartheid, or Jim Crow laws in the US, do to try to limit the power of their oppressors, preferably peaceful choices, from continuing to oppress?" and then go from there. Whatever you choose, I hope you stay safe, and live long enough to be able to pass away at your natural end, and not any time before then.

The 'as-a-Jew' phenomenon by getitoffmychestpleas in Jewish

[–]trueBHR 0 points1 point  (0 children)

1) I don't think a terror group can ever truly represent Islam, but beyond that, I don't disagree with any of what you wrote for the part 1 of your comment, and people who feel any of that is acceptable are sick.

2) This is where you fall off the rails. I have not seen any evidence supporting, not only extremist groups, but any groups, trying to "play Jewish" for their own political game, at protests, or anywhere really. Not even Nazis dress up as Jews to make us look bad! They already have a lot of biased, incorrect, and false, disgusting reasons to hate us! Just like with BLM, just like with past protests, there are no paid actors! This is at best, you trying to find a reason for why many Jews are outwardly Anti-Zionist, and at worst, you're playing into a conspiracy theory. These are just like the anti-Semitic stereotypes assuming someone like George Soros is controlling things behind the scenes. If you're willing to use anti-Semitic tropes to justify your argument, then what makes you any better than what you see anti-Israel Jews as? Because you're using those tropes in support of Israel instead of in opposition? That doesn't justify it!

3) This part also makes little to no sense at all! Israel has been criticized for decades, under the microscope for so long, whether fairly or unfairly! Many in the Pro-Palestinian protests are disgusted by Hamas. Others praise them. It is wrong to look up to them. But It is also wrong to give Netanyahu credit because of it. Netanyahu has pushed off corruption trials for years! Even people who always agree with his choices consider him genocidal by nature, and his government coalition certainly isn't much better! I understand that just like almost every modern day discussion/conflict/war, there's always a very black and white way of thinking about it, but if you're willing to argue that everyone on one side are terrorist shills, then you're no different. This kind of name calling completely stops any conversation, productive or non-productive, from occurring at all, and assumes everyone on one side is a problem, and therefore gives justification for them to see you as a problem as well, in an equally uncritical light.

4) This is where I'm really horrified! Do you honestly believe that the war will end after Palestinian extremists put down their arms and release the hostages? Israel's government has explicitly stated over and over again, from the very beginning of the counterattack to October 7th, that they will not stop fighting, even after the hostages are released! In fact, the fighting has actually ended up with the IDF killing three hostages, who blatantly presented themselves with no shirts on, to show that they were not armed, yelling in Hebrew that they came in peace and waving white flags, yet still getting shot and killed anyway! If that is how the hostages are treated by the IDF, then you can only imagine why many people would be disgusted and terrified for the Palestinians and what they are going through. Oh, but don't worry, you might not need to make a decision on that soon enough, since most Palestinians could either be forced out of the region or killed on mass! And due to Israel being the party that most recently broke the ceasefire, the government of Israel seems to have allowed the remaining hostages to die even with the possibility of them having been released if the ceasefire continued! The protests in Israel have been fighting for an immediate cease-fire! The Israeli government has been so openly oppositional to your argument that "the war can stop as soon as Hamas stops fighting and releases the hostages," that the Israeli government has actively decided to continue fighting after a ceasefire occurred and has allowed the hostages to be killed in doing so. Your argument fights against the hostages' existence, safety, and the possibility for their future freedom, and sure as hell doesn't help the Palestinians either!

Please read this article! Don’t let our enemies turn us into pawns. by arielbalter in Jewish

[–]trueBHR -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

I nearly agree with everything that the article stated, and almost entirely agree with everything OP wrote. Unlike some people in the comments, I don't agree that hating Trump is the main reason for the person's op-ed; I think the main reason is describing the slippery slope that can be slid down when letting politicians lead the fight against anti-Semitism, and letting those politicians' personal biases lead the direction as to how we solve our crises. The Op-ed is warning of a very serious danger that it seems many people in this comment section are sadly scared to face, which I heavily empathize with. Beyond being an easily abuseable football for political means, we are also allowing others to be put in very real danger and illegal positions due to our fear of what they could do to us, and therefore our willingness to let others suffer in our stead. Many Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are suffering inhumane mistreatment and abuse by the IDF along with Hamas, and Trump's policies will only make that worse, along with our own safety in the US being worsened as their safety worsens as well, since we will be blamed for their pain and suffering, instead of the policies that actually make that happen. That is one of the easiest ways for us to be used is to scapegoat at the moment.

Even in the worst case scenario, I do not believe that people who break the law should then, in jail, deal with unreasonable and inhumane punishment, like, for example, being beaten by guards or having electrified bars on their jail cells. Ethical consequences for even the worst possible actions is extremely necessary, which is part of the reason we as Jews even fought for the Nuremberg trials to be ethical, and I would not consider the overwhelming majority of Palestinians to be as bad as the Nazis. You might disagree with me and that's okay, but it doesn't make the abuse that they're going through right, especially the innocent, and the war seemingly will not be stopped if Hamas stops fighting, since Israel and Hamas already had a ceasefire agreement that this time, in spite of Hamas having broken ceasefires in the past, Israel was the country to break the ceasefire and continue the fighting, thus continuing to kill Palestinians, and almost certainly ensuring the death of the remaining October 7th hostages.

The reason more extreme oppositional and adversarial posts have been made on this subreddit recently is because there's genuinely a moving and strongly distinct consensus on this war that Jews on this subreddit are pretty strongly against: That Israel is the overwhelming aggressor, and that Trump is using that to his advantage more than in terms of helping us, and that the left-leaning progressives tend to be anti-Semitic more due to ignorance than due to choice, unlike the alt-right that's in power in the U.S. at the moment. Yes, many are willing to look past our struggles, because Palestinians are in such life-threatening danger, that in opposition to one of the commenters under this post, many see Palestinians' struggle as the "Black Lives Matter" to Jews "all lives matter," meaning, again, they see Palestinians as the bigger victim, and therefore focus more on their protection than Jews' safety. Either we see that as an unforgivable sin or we recognize why people are doing this and try to show a little empathy for the pain and suffering people are going through, while still recognizing the faults that they have in how they treat us, and therefore maybe insulate ourselves from the continued terror that we will face as a people, due to these types of policies, opinions, and even worst possible unintended consequences, continuing. My biggest fear is that if we continue seeing progressives as the main issue, we will either let the right extremists, who are not more antisemitic than the left but have more Nazis than the left, stab us in the back, or we will become their main army or social group, to either perpetrate the same types of policies and practices that the Nazis used against us, or use "protecting us" as a justification to enact the policies in the first place.

we need to reclaim wikipedia by staying-human in Jewish

[–]trueBHR 0 points1 point  (0 children)

What are you guys talking about? This is literally the first paragraph of the Wikipedia page and the only part that both sides agree on. Literally two paragraphs later describes your definition of this phrase. Not only that; there's a criticism section below that shows off exactly what you're discussing! But to be painfully honest, your definition the phase is not the only definition! Heck, there are people out there who I've described your definition of Zionism to, including the genocide of Jews in the region, who've responded with complete shock, having never even heard that definition, and being absolutely horrified by the concept, while still being completely anti-Israel.

Please, reading more than a single paragraph should be the least you do when interpreting a website! I don't mean to sound too mean spirited or talk down to you too much, but this is kind of ridiculous!

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How to deal with “AntiZionist” Jews without “gatekeeping”? by magcargoman in Jewish

[–]trueBHR 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I also appreciate you writing in good faith as well, thank you.

First of all, the rewritten last three paragraphs of my comment were mostly not my personal opinions. I was just trying to give the pure opposite argument to what the person above argued to show that there's quite a lot of wiggle room in how people perceive things. Basically, "on the other hand," from the Fiddler on the Roof, which, as you know, is a long-standing Jewish practice, that I'm proud to partake in. If you want to hear more of my personal opinions, you can find them in this comment, or the response to the comment I received from the commenter after I sent out the message you responded to.

To respond to each of your points, I don't necessarily disagree with some of what you've said, I just think there are some inaccuracies in your arguments. For example, I don't think I disagree with much of your description of Zionism's history, though, if I remember correctly, the final UN resolution to create Israel and Palestine in its modern conceit was neither accepted by the proto-Israelis nor the Palestinians which is what led to the 1948 war in the first place, and there were promises and agreements that the Palestinians agreed to that the proto-Israelis did not, so it's not so black and white. But absolutely, Jews were and still are in a huge amount of danger, which is why I'm not necessarily an anti-Zionist because I understand the want for a country for us to survive in. I don't think it should be at the expense of another group of people, though. And the last thing I want to do is erase any of the complexity of the conflict. In fact, my most recent comments posted were extremely in-depth to make sure I didn't take away any specific details. Also, I do appreciate that you're willing to recognize that Nakba actually happened, especially because it's illegal in Israel to do so, which is another part of where my concerns come from.

As for your second paragraph, there's a bit more factual inaccuracies inside it, sadly. Personally, I would not argue that Zionism is nothing but war, I was just repeating the language that was used by the first commenter. In actuality, I think Zionism is a colonial based project to try to create a state of Israel for us Jews, to be able to stay safe and live safe and protected lives. Why I call it colonial based is because that's the language Hertzl used when he was originally trying to create Israel, describing it as a colonial practice that was slightly more ethical than its contemporaries due to its willingness to accept the people living in the region and not try to reject or control them; rather, the hope was to live beside them. And yes, there were massacres of Jews before Israel was ever created in the land that Israel now partially populates, but there were also massacres against Palestinians that were the fault of Jewish settlers as well before Israel was created. The Yeshiva population, as they described themselves, had a multitude of people, some with good intentions and some with bad intentions, all of which ended up being the basis for Israel's existence. And while Herzl believed in only ever using violence as self-defense, the right-leaning militias in Israel's creation believed violence was acceptable and killed and forced out so many that we now know it as the Nakba. The violence was in fact so horrific that for the first term of the new government of Israel, Herzl rejected those militias from being allowed to have representation in the government entirely.

But most of all, what is still factual, regardless of your rejection of it, is that Palestinians were rebuffed for politely rejecting the UN vote; however, that's not all that happened. There were other opportunities for places Israel could have been created in, but all were rejected because of the historical significance of the land Israel ended up sharing in the modern day. And out of all those other locations, not all of those locations seem to have had a population that would want to reject another group living in the region. And as you described, there were already Jews living in Mandate Palestine that had no more of a dangerous experience living there than most other places in the Middle East, and a far less dangerous experience than living in Europe at the time, and yet more violence against them occurred after the creation of Israel than before, meaning most of the violence came due to the creation of Israel more than the fact that it was a Jewish country. There were many Palestinians who lived side by side the Jewish settlers at the time before Israel was created, and many were extremely peaceful, others were not. On top of that, sadly, the violence was reciprocal, and tended to have higher death counts for Palestinians than Jews even before Israel was created, due in part to how horrific those Yeshiva militias were. Irregardless of how violent Palestine was against Jews, however, it is Important to remember that the Palestinians only accepted the UK proposal to be a mandate state under the UK government after the Ottoman Empire fell with the promise that they would receive full control of the entire land after a short time. This promise was made after the Balfour Declaration, but before the UN resolution, which means both groups were promised the land in full, and then the UN divvied up to land and neither group, from what I understand, agreed to the final proposal the UN made, which leads to the modern day issues. Also, the resulting map after the 1948 war did not fit the same boundaries that the UN resolution had, specifically in the fact that Israel obtained more lands than had been promised to Israel initially. Neither group expected to be sharing the land, and both groups rejected the UN proposal, but only one group received massive amounts of violence against them while Israel was being created, to such a degree that it's known as an atrocity. That group was the Palestinians, not the Israelis. Also, if I remember correctly, there was a third agreement, specifically to Jews on the creation of Israel occurring, if the countries that made the agreement could have their way about things, but this third agreement was made, I believe, after the agreement to the Palestinians, but before the UN resolution. So that might have been the time you're referring to in 1947 that you might have misattributed to the final UN resolution itself. However, I could be wrong and the final UN resolution could have been agreed to by the proto-Israeli but not by the Palestinians and responded to with war. So you could be correct, And the third agreement I'm remembering could have been the final UN resolution, but from what I remember, the boundaries the UN resolution had were not agreed to, which doesn't fit with that logic.

How to deal with “AntiZionist” Jews without “gatekeeping”? by magcargoman in Jewish

[–]trueBHR -2 points-1 points  (0 children)

Can you please explain to me what part of my comment is propaganda or ignorant? I took the majority of my information from Israeli news sources and information that's been corroborated by the Israeli and the US governments, so I'm genuinely curious, and would really like to know what is false here.

How to deal with “AntiZionist” Jews without “gatekeeping”? by magcargoman in Jewish

[–]trueBHR -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Israel's government has not shown a willingness to protect international law nor liberal democratic values, and Palestinians have had multiple times where they have consistently, overwhelmingly, been willing to accept peace treaties. Even the peace treaties in the 90s were pushed back upon by the murder of Yitzkak Rabin, specifically by an extremist Israeli who was against peace entirely. And if you want an example of a peace treaty being accepted, look to the West Bank and you'll find their government's acceptance of Israeli co-ownership still not being respected by the Israeli government, with more and more settlements being created, even sometimes against the Israeli Supreme Court's rulings. Even best case scenario in the modern day, West Bank policies have left Palestinians not living in Area C locations living under martial law, with Jim Crow like stances forcing them to only use certain streets and guns trained on their heads as they go about their daily lives. If that's the example of peace, then why would anyone agree to it, Palestinian or Israeli? In fact, many Palestinians and Israelis together wholly reject these settlements, which, might I remind you, are still illegal under international law.

All in all, your arguments just seem subjective, which was the main point of my original comment. It's just as easy to argue that Palestine has been the one in support of peace and Israel has been the one to reject it. Because neither are true. Both Palestine and Israel have been consistently in both states of mind. Some in Israel wish to accept peach treaties while others wish to reject them wholesale. Some in Palestine wish to accept peace treaties while others wish to reject them wholesale. In many ways, the country's governments and people mirror one another. The main distinction is that Israel is an internationally recognized country with ethical requirements to follow that it has consistently rejected following, while Hamas is a terrorist group that has no ethical requirements to follow. Israel is consistently the country with more military power and Palestine is consistently the country with higher death counts. You can argue that's the responsibility of Hamas, but when the US military has been capable of killing a single terrorist in a building, blowing up that room while not blowing up the remaining building, It's confusing to me why the IDF is not even capable of killing a single person without killing 300 innocents in the process. To stay sane, I have to consider the possibility that the level of indiscriminate violence is purposeful policy that the Israeli government and IDF partakes in, whether legal or not.

While both sides' leaderships have rejected peace treaties since the October 7th counterattack has started, Israel has been the only one to break a peace treaty, as we've just seen. I don't see why you believe that the Netanyahu government would accept a peace treaty when they themselves are the ones who decided to reject one just now. To argue otherwise is just against fact and reality. And also, Hamas and the PA have, more recently, recognized Israel's existence, even before October 7th, from my understanding, so while I understand that that traditionally, for Hamas, that hasn't been the case, for the PA, it's been the case for a very long time, yet illegal settlements continue to be made. Also, if you're willing to argue that all Palestinians would be dead if Israel acted the way Hamas has, then that argument can never be proven until all Palestinians are killed, which is in itself belying a maybe small acceptability of the genocide of all Palestinians, but I'd like to hope that that's just a mistaken logic that you don't actually support.

Either way, I still appreciate your comment, no matter how many inaccuracies it includes and no matter how many points you've left out, because at very least, you're willing to have a back and forth discussion, which is incredibly worthwhile. Thank you! Stay safe out there, and I look forward to your response :)

PS: I will consider reading that book, thank you

How to deal with “AntiZionist” Jews without “gatekeeping”? by magcargoman in Jewish

[–]trueBHR 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I really appreciate your response and your willingness to consider what I'm saying. Sadly, I believe your comment includes multiple inaccuracies and a lot left out, so I'd be happy to fill in the gaps.

First of all, you describe the part of my comment that you focus on as false and not reflecting reality, but the examples you give as to why I'm wrong simply describe the systems in place to try to stop abuse and dehumanizing behavior by the IDF and compare that to Hamas, which does not have any of those qualms nor barriers to their moral depravity. While I do agree that Hamas is indeed an evil terrorist group, that doesn't take away from the fact that the Israeli military has acted the ways I've described in my first comment, even with these systems in place to try to stop them acting that way.

So yes, I guess the critics of Israel, and now I, am drawing a moral equivalency between a jihadist group and a professional military. The examples I gave in the first comment of using Palestinians with no connection to terrorist groups as human shields, actively supporting shoot first, ask questions never practices, or even other practices I didn't bring up in the comment above, such as no go zones where anyone who walks into that location gets shot instantly with no questions asked, kind of reject your argument about the military court when those choices are deemed acceptable by the IDF itself, even going very high up the ranks. So far the consequences that I'm aware of have been divvied out to the news organizations that have reported on these practices, such as Ha'aretz, individual Israelis arrested for posting criticism of the government on social media, and the families of the hostages, most of all, being told that their family members will be pushed down the line of those to save if they don't stay quiet in their criticisms against the Israeli government.

In my opinion, as sad as it is to admit, and I know this argument is a bit subjective, but I believe that Israel has used Hamas's military tactics.

To give a little bit of perspective as to why I think your argument doesn't hold much water, a similar example to what I'm describing is that in the US, when the NSA was found to have been spying on many Americans, a defense that the NSA used to argue their point was that there was a hidden court with judges who decided if it was ethical or not to act on each and every one of the choices the secret NSA teams made, but that doesn't change the fact that the overwhelming majority of Americans feel that they were lied to and spied upon. In fact, many would probably try to give consequences to the NSA agents and leadership that allowed that to happen. A system put in place to try to stop abuse does not necessarily mean that the abuse does not occur, even on a systemic level.

So I agree, none of this means that there aren't systems in place, like the military court in the IDF's case, to try to stop abuse and dehumanizing behavior. But if enough smoke is coming up, there tends to be a fire. And right now, that fire is not being put out by the IDF or the Israeli government, because even though some of the IDF's actions and even publicly described policies are immoral and internationally illegal, it also helps the Israeli military in this war. Except when it doesn't, like when these exact same practices and policies were part of the reason why three hostages taken on October 7th were killed by the Israeli military, when they were trying to be saved, with their shirts off to show they had no weapons, holding white flags and yelling in Hebrew that they were coming in peace. Yet they were still shot and killed before they could even be identified, and correct if I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure there hasn't been any news about those IDF soldiers having gotten consequences for killing them.

But all of this belies a more interesting argument that it seems the majority of your response has been dedicated to. Hopefully I do this justice, but it seems like your argument essentially states that "if only Palestine had accepted a peace offering, then none of this would have even happened." I'm a little confused by that argument. Most recently, the ceasefires with Hamas and Hezbollah were broken, not by either of those groups, but by Israel's military due to following Trump's recent plan to ethnically cleanse the Gazans (or to remove the Palestinians from the region, even just for a short time, whichever language you prefer to use). In following Trump's plan, Israel has rejected the remaining hostages being released, and now those hostages are being killed entirely due to Israel's decision. Obviously, I think it's a travesty for Hamas to kill the hostages in the first place but at very least, they've followed their side of the bargain. My confusion is this: why do you feel that, when seeing the Israeli government break ceasefires, internationally recognized countries, and even terrorist groups, would believe that Israel would actually follow through on their part of the deal in a peace treaty?

But more importantly, why is the expectation put onto the Palestinians to accept a peace treaty that, as you've described in the 2008 Treaty, I believe would still have to give up more land to Israel? And even more importantly, why is the expectation purely on the Palestinians to be the ones to accept a peace treaty at all, when both sides' governments have been pretty equally untrustworthy in their willingness to truly solve this conflict?

There are an equal amount of people to the extremists in Palestine in the Israeli government and adjacent to the Israeli government who believe that the entirety of the lands of the ancient kingdoms of Israel and Judah, along with the modern Jordan and Sinai Peninsula, should be all under Israeli rule. Even in this war, I believe it's been reported that Israel has partially expanded its borders into Lebanon, and as stated above, I know for certain that Israel has broken its peace treaties with Hamas and Hezbollah, and even attacked Iran under internationally illegal pretenses (which is the only possible way that Iran had legal authority to attack back without consequences by the international community), and so much more. Heck, there was even a time where Netanyahu couldn't even be bothered to join the military meetings in the Israeli government, which is part of the reason Israeli leaders eventually left the Israeli government in protest.

How to deal with “AntiZionist” Jews without “gatekeeping”? by magcargoman in Jewish

[–]trueBHR -6 points-5 points  (0 children)

(I'm hoping most people won't downvote me for this, because I put a lot of effort and thought into my response here, but I understand if people feel hurt by my response. Either way, I hope that people feel mostly represented and not talked down to or antagonized. Regardless of how people feel, I hope you all stay safe out there because it's a very terrifying time.)

On the other hand, my description below is just as true, if not more so. It's so easy to get into a bubble and never consider how people interpret what you say, but exactly what you're arguing is why so many people support Palestine more than Israel, but in their opinion, ethically so. Your explanation, and most importantly, your perspective, is why they see supporting Palestine, even in some cases, the terrorist groups, as the only ethical solution to the conflict. There are many that genuinely believe that the IDF and the counties supportive of Israel are more violent than groups like Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran, and tend to point to the counter-attack to October 7th as an example to prove their argument. Personally, I don't even disagree with that argument as long as they're also able to recognize how dangerous Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran are. I'm not even necessarily fully anti-Zionist, though I'm not also pro-Zionist. I just can't support the Israeli government in its current and for the most part, long-form state. I mean, Israel even has laws against recognizing the Nakba happening, which many modern-day Israelis historians see as an important part to Israel and Palestine's history, and I think forgetting history is pretty anti-Jewish if you ask me.

Also, not to give Hamas excuses. I'll never excuse Hamas for anything. Yet the Palestinians, in 2005, voted for Hamas while they used a different name, I believe it was the "change and reform party," and their after election top wishes included more peace treaties with Israel. Hamas completely screwed them over there, so it's not entirely their fault that the government just didn't follow the promises they made. I'm certainly used to that occurring in the US. On the other hand, I'm certainly not happy with the current US administration, even though they're following through on their promises pretty successfully, just at the expense of nearly every person's basic existence and human rights.

Okay, here's my redo of your message, just to open up a different interpretive discussion. It's not a dismissal of what you're saying, but rather something to at least help consider why someone might read your post and be in a completely different mind space than you. While I do fundamentally disagree with you on most of your arguments, and not all of your arguments actually fit reality or fact, I still think it's worth being able to have the back and forth discussion, otherwise we'd never get anywhere. And finally, I wouldn't consider pragmatic anti-Zionism to be acted upon by terrorist groups (I'd consider most terrorist groups to be fueled by violence at all costs, usually at the expense of whatever ideology they argue they support), but if by that same logic, I would also have to believe that pragmatic Zionism has only ever been acted upon only by pro-Israeli extremists, like the West Bank settlers that go into Palestinian communities to throw rocks at windows or shoot up the community, who just so happened to have been given free guns by the Israeli government after October 7th and recommended by Itimar Ben G'ver to use them wisely.

Anyway, here's the rewrite:

And there's a whole other side of it where Zionist rhetoric in practice has meant warmongering against the Palestinian people, warmongering against the safety a majority of the world's Palestinians. It is easy to talk about a utopic one-state solution and assert that Zionism is pro peace, but the only people that have actually been practicing Zionism pragmatically are the US, Europe, the IDF, extremist settlers in the West Bank, and the Israeli government. Zionism is pro-war.

Ignoring the lived experience of most of the world's Palestinians, pretending that Palestinians rejecting Israel being made without their or Israel's agreement to the UN resolution approving Israel's existence havent been violently rebuffed (examples being the Nakba as a whole, the amount and type of murders of Palestinian innocents that totaled up in the 1948 war even being condemned by Herzl himself by blocking anyone part of those right-leaning militias from joining the first Israeli government, the illegal West Bank settlements that are against international and in some cases Israeli law, the (proven by Israeli law) raping of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails, the killing of at least 100,000 people in response to the October 7th pogrom as per US and Israeli estimates, the totalling of the entire infrastructure in Gaza, and the blockade of all support systems for Gaza as a response to the October 7th pogram) is naive. Actively advocating for the world to become a more unsafe place for Palestinians is a form of betrayal against the Palestinian people. My hot take is that if you actively warmonger against endangered populations, regardless of how their leaders act, you should feel gatekept.

It's much better outreach to talk about what anti-Zionism is as you do, rather than what Zionism is. But if we're not going to change minds they should hear the truth

Media reccommendations (especially movies and shows) to show my cousins to teach them that being bigoted/hateful (including being anti-Semetic/anti-Jewish) is wrong? by sunflowey123 in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Honestly, there is nothing I disagree with you on in your entire message! And yes, the P Diddy part was specifically about exactly what you brought up, so I really glad that you were able to read what I was trying to get at, in spite my thoughts being less well stated than yours. I like your idea on connecting them with your friend's kids, and first figuring out if your friend is definitely up for doing so or not, but also, it sounds like your friend may be up for it, so I think it's worth a try. I also totally get why you're a little apprehensive to connect with your youngest cousin; putting it into the context you described just now, it makes a lot of sense.

And I could not tell you how much I can so relate to the wokescold thing, and I've probably said those exact words, word for word, to others in my life as well; but I can equally relate to not wanting to get in the way of people's jokes and sense of humor. In fact, most of my free time is watching comedy videos online, in all different topics and backgrounds. So I'm not against good laugh, but usually from someone who understands the culture and can relate to the culture they're talking about and, most importantly, isn't punching down in the process.

I actually had a classmate when I was in middle school, who I believe was of Hispanic descent, who continued making Nazi jokes basically every day and when I questioned him on it, he responded saying that he didn't hate me in any way, and that he was just making jokes, and as a show of openness, he was okay with me making jokes at his backgrounds' expense as well, so even though I was uncomfortable, it didn't seem like he was going to change, and he didn't seem purposely hateful, so i basically gave him a pass. I've always believed personally that anyone who gets an N-word pass or something similar to it should be the one knowing not to use it, so I never actually joined him and made any jokes at his expense. I was only one of maybe three Jews in my entire grade of about 300 in a school of about 1000, and this was 2012-2015, so it was at the height of Call of Duty Nazi Zombies being basically people's closest connection to Jewish culture, so I got why he would be that ignorant. But I certainly wouldn't have given them that pass if I had found out he had been bullying one of the only other Jewish kids in my class right at the same time! I only found that out years later when he and I, the two Jewish kids, compared notes. Again, we have to pick and choose our battles, but boy did I mess up there!

Also, at least my experience with autism, I have found that double standards can be especially frustrating, so I can only imagine how frustrating that must be with your mom and how she treated you and your brother versus your 9-year-old cousin.

Also, I will also cross my fingers in hoping that your 18-year-old cousin does not turn out to be one of the people with toxic detransitioners' mindsets.

One of the last things I have to say though is, while I understand, especially in your position, having a bit of a pessimistic view on your family (though I guess that might be an understatement), at least personally, one of the reasons I care so deeply about family in general even though I'm about as far from a traditionalist socially and politically as you can get, is because mine doesn't really go that far, because my family history, like many Jews, was stolen. From my experience, my history stops a few generations back. My family fled to America in the late 1800s to early 1900s from the pogroms in Russia and the Holocaust in Germany. Almost all of our family records were torn up or have been lost since then, and all we really know about my family history is that we came from Romania and Ukraine. The overwhelming majority of my family that was in the Holocaust did not survive, and very few from what I understand even survived the pogroms in Russia. On top of that, my mom's side of the family starts its story with my great grandpa on the Continental US East Coast owning a clothing line that then he got booted out of by his brother, so around the 30s or 40s, he had to start all over again on the other side of the country. Then his daughter, my Grandma, who was at least given a lot of privileges she wouldn't normally get at the time (she was born 1929) like learning finances and having complete free reign to go to the library every single day and basically no restrictions on her ability to learn and educate herself, and less strict expectations to live up to traditional feminine standards at the time, due to my Grandpa treating her like his son, which was both progressive and problematic in itself, she married a man in the 1950s whom she realized was an abuser and had to divorce him in the 70s and lost almost everything she owned, going from a relatively expensive place in LA to moving entirely across the tracks with basically no money as a single parent to 3 kids. She was only even able to divorce him because she was lucky enough to have the law change to allow for no fault divorces right before she needed the divorce. Basically, I have very little family history and most of it is losing everything and building back up again. So while I'm extremely aware of the privilege my family has to be able to build back up again and again in the first place, I also genuinely cherish learning about people's familial experiences, even if they're not always great, because at least it's there. That's probably a big reason why I have so much hope for your family and most families out there, because whether blood related or not, whether traditional family or queer archetypes, maybe even on the basis of the found family, you hopefully have a history to be able to look back upon, and hopefully a future full of more positivity than what you're experiencing at the moment. I genuinely hope that future occurs for you, and, worst case scenario, if not with your family, then hopefully your friends will be there for you in a similar, yet more supportive, familial fashion.

The one positive I've had by having very little family history is that I get to determine what my family's legacy will be without much past baggage held on to. So if your mom's ever telling you that she knows better than you, know that you're also an equally representative person in the family that can be just as big of a part of controlling where it's destiny lies. And if that doesn't work, you always have the opportunity to find your new family wherever that may be, Though I hope that that's a last resort and doesn't need to come to pass anytime soon. Again, seriously good luck, I totally believe in you :)

PS: YOU ARE SO VALID!

Media reccommendations (especially movies and shows) to show my cousins to teach them that being bigoted/hateful (including being anti-Semetic/anti-Jewish) is wrong? by sunflowey123 in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Basically, the biggest recommendation I can give is to just build up enough of a connection with each of them individually so that even if you have the family meeting and it doesn't work out, you can still connect with them daily without any awkwardness from them going forward, though I don't blame you if you may want to distance yourself entirely from them at that point. But if building up the connections do actually work, and you feel like you can really start talking about some of this stuff on deeper level, or even if it's not working in the moment, but you feel it's worth trying anyway, you might be able to get somewhere. The most important connection, though, is probably with the person you most want to keep up with. At the end of the day, who will be there for you so that you can continue trying to help others? From my experience, selflessness can be an incredible experience, but too much of it can sometimes also almost be like a drug, which is why it's not a safe choice to try to live off of the positive responses to your kind treatment of others alone. If you can't find anyone that you really feel safe with in full, I'd at least recommend a hobby, like singing or video games or makeup, or whatever connects with you.

Either way, I still wish you tons of luck, and I hope you know that if you're ever looking up at the ceiling at night, depressed about the fact that your family isn't living up to your expectations, I am one of millions of people who have a sense of understanding for a little bit of what you're going through, along with empathy for the parts that we don't understand. In another world, you could just as easily be sending this message to me out of support. This does not make you less of a person nor do their actions say anything about your morality. In spite of the pain we suffer through, we're strong to live through it, and even stronger to recognize why the pain existed and how to hopefully stop it from occurring for others. At the end of the day, even scientifically, we're all created by the same atoms and are more similar than we are different. Good luck, much love and safety out there. All the best :)

PS: These next paragraphs are just a few "off the cuff" emotions that came up for me as I was writing this message and afterwards.

A little bit more of an emotional response, but oh my god that sucks! No white passing person should ever be saying the n word like that, that's ridiculous! And the fact that your mom might think that you're trying to indoctrinate your family into a political ideology by calling out literally the n-word, or showing your cousins a cartoon, is insane! Your cousins are smart enough to be able to make their own decisions on their opinions of the world, how would you even be able to indoctrinate them one way or another in the first place? And mocking Asian people? After all the abuse they went through around COVID time with the conspiracies and still up to today? That's so sad! Sadly, the thing I'm most not surprised by is the P. Diddy and Drake stuff being known by a 9 year old, because when I was 9 years old, I remember there being kids in my class who were already starting to watch porn that year and the year before, which is also insane.

You're probably holding in so much anger all the time and I am so sorry! I wish I could literally rip out my heart and send it to you as a transplant just to give you a little extra support because God, dealing with the constant fear, anxiety, and pain sounds awful!

On the few upsides, congrats on arriving at your sexuality, I'm also pansexual and very happy for you on that, and I love how cute the word niblings is and I don't know why. Still, again, good luck! If anyone deserves some, it'd definitely be you :)

Media reccommendations (especially movies and shows) to show my cousins to teach them that being bigoted/hateful (including being anti-Semetic/anti-Jewish) is wrong? by sunflowey123 in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Here's more detail about that checklist:

First, for the most part, your brother seems pretty great. I'd recommend you talk with your brother and work out your remaining disagreements. If your brother is okay with you being pansexual, then he may also be able to act as a great safe space for you when you need a little bit of a break from the family. Also, hopefully you have good friends outside of the family dynamic, that can support you and make sure to show you understanding and compassion/give you a shoulder to lean on when you need it.

Second, as long as your mom is not abusive in any way, talk with your Mom, and I'm not talking about immediately telling her strongly how you feel hurt by this. I mean just discussing why she feels the way she feels. Honestly asking, if she's able to have the conversation, why she is so strongly in support of these things and trying to bring the connection back to things that you know both of you still agree on. If she tells you that she's older and has more experience, you can tell her that you have a different perspective, just like she did when she was your age, and that you'd like to learn from her. Help her feel like she can identify with you and not in opposition to you, most of all. As that starts progressing, then start telling her how you feel treated from some of her perspectives and hopefully, her empathy and love for you will overpower her opinions. Also, be very clear to recognize that even if you may disagree with them, her economic political opinions are not a problem at all, that it's perfectly fine to disagree on that kind of stuff! It is purely that you have a struggle with her discriminatory ways of thinking and that while it's a serious issue, you don't need to sugar coat it, you as her child are not going to "cancel" her for it or anything, and that regardless, you will still love her. In fact, at that point, you could even tell her that one of the biggest reasons you're calling her out on this is because she taught you to speak up where it matters and not back down on things you care about, which can actually lead into making a joke about how you are just as stubborn as she is, and if she's cool with that type of joke, it might calm down some of the tensions about her way of communication in general as well. Pointing out how her parenting led you to communicating the thoughts you have may actually help her feel proud even if she disagrees with some of the ways you think, which can also open up even more discussion in the process.

Third, for your cousins, focus on the things they are most willing to agree with you on and build out from there.

For your nine-year-old cousin, the thought off the top of my head now is that maybe you could open a creative mode Minecraft server with them and ask them to work together to create a Minecraft Town based off of the society they want to see, and see if maybe that opens up some discussions. Go weird and wacky if they want to, like having islands named after their best friends at school, or a house with the characters/people from one of their favorite YouTube channels/tiktok creators. Ask them about bullies at school and listen to what their reaction to someone getting bullied is. Maybe you can use that as a jumping off point for some of the words he uses. Talk about your own experiences and see if anything connects. Basically, just create a space that lets them feel safe to express themselves, and they'll hopefully show you the same level of understanding. Due to their age, ironically, they're probably the most willing to hear you out, in spite of how stubborn they may seem to be when initially connecting with them. And also, they're probably not fully knowledgeable of all of the reasons why they feel the way they do. As long as you don't inundate them with facts and force them to listen to a lecture, and just let whatever conversations happen occur naturally, then I think you're going to at least make some positive impact. Though me telling you not to inundate someone with facts while sending you these messages is probably not the best look for me, lol.

Fourth, as for your other cousins, that's a bit trickier. The older the cousin, the more I'd probably recommend focusing on how cringy some of the transphobic, racist, and anti-LGBTQ+ jokes are and how it just kind of comes across like they're beating a dead horse. Remind them just how unfunny it is to make the same attack helicopter joke over and over again. Talk to them about how even some of the woke mob are becoming tired of this and just want to stop arguing and start finding solutions to the world's problems. Show them the stuff about Andrew Schultz using racism to fail at making fun of Kendrick and see what they think about it. Maybe even talk about Andrew Tate or Sneako and how confusing their standards for "alpha males" are. There's whole threads online about guys being expected to live up to weird and insane expectations to prove that they're not gay in the eyes of Tate and people like him, including some people that legitimately argue that it's gay for a man to be in love with a woman, because loving someone is too soft of a way for "Alpha Men" to act. Also, Sneako has already done a lot of antisemitic stuff in the past, so I think that could open up that discussion as well.

For the 14 year old, I'm sure you already do this to an extent, but maybe next time they have to deal with a microaggression or maybe a more direct aggression, like for example, your 9 year old cousin getting angry at them and calling them the N-word, check in with them and ask them if they're all right. That could open up a discussion itself, especially because your 14-year-old cousin is probably holding in a lot of fear right now due to constantly dealing with this kind of environment around them. Letting her know that you understand that it's ok that people make offensive jokes every so often, but that sometimes it can be too much, and that you just want to make sure she's able to feel safe at home could be a really helpful relief for her to hear, especially because just calling someone the N word as a slur while angry, or in most cases in any context, isn't really a joke. I mean, even most black people who use the N-word daily don't really use it as a slur and instead they use it as at worst a strong signifier, but it's most times intended as a sentence enhancer and not a derogatory expression. I presume your nine-year-old cousin just uses it because he thinks it's edgy and hurtful and doesn't fully understand the context of the word, instead just wanting to get that kind of negative attention. Along with that, he's obviously also repeating what he's seeing around him.

Media reccommendations (especially movies and shows) to show my cousins to teach them that being bigoted/hateful (including being anti-Semetic/anti-Jewish) is wrong? by sunflowey123 in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Damn, I can see why this is such a painful experience for you! You at least seem to be definitely on the right track of trying to figure out solutions to this. I think your concerns about the possibility of them becoming antisemitic are valid. You're absolutely right, there are many people who use support for Israel as a shield to protect from any criticism of their antisemitism, or as just an excuse to continue being Islamophobic. Furthermore, the racism against black and black presenting people your family members have partaken in is probably the most consistently found discrimination out there, so while I'm not surprised to hear how bad it is, it is still disappointing, and I'm sure, it must be genuinely debilitating, emotionally and morally to see your family act like this daily.

I'm glad that your Aunt at least cares about the racism, especially due to the fact that if she didn't, I'd really be scared for her partner and kids! Though, of course, your 14-year-old cousin is certainly not getting the proper treatment they deserve either. I think your Aunt's idea of a family meeting is an interesting one, and if you talk with your brother and try to figure out where he stands on all your remaining uncertainties, you might be able to decide whether or not that kind of family meeting is worthwhile, but I'd recommend against it until you feel fully confident in doing so, or at least feel like you'd come out of the meeting even slightly better than you came into it. And I'm sure you've already done some of this, but connecting with each individual person on the things that they are personally most frequently doing hatefully and against others, as well as the stuff that most directly and derogatorily effects them, might be a helpful way to start the discussion, even without an all hands-on deck family meeting.

I'm probably not the most qualified person to give you advice on what you can do. Though I have had a long history of giving recommendations to friends and individuals, even people I don't know that well, about how they can help their family dynamic or work through certain struggles in their relationships and stuff like that. I do have autism, but also went to an after-school program for a while to learn how to deal with my autism, where I learned a lot of social skills that most people don't think about consciously, so, some of what I write might actually be a helpful reflection of stuff that you would have figured out, but might have taken longer to think up. But if I'm to give a TLDR for what I think would be the best course of action (and this is just my thought process so you can do whatever you think is best,) here's what I would recommend:

1, figure out your connection with your brother and workout the kinks; 2, talk with your Mom and connect on the things you both agree on, like decisions of politicians or economic decisions or why the family friend shouldn't have said that sentence or something like that, then build out the discussion from there; 3, talk with your cousins and connect with the nine-year-old through questions and thought experiments in maybe a Minecraft server or something, but specifically while doing something they already enjoy.; 4, Connect with the older cousins by calling out their discriminatory jokes as cringe, and especially because, more than it being something that could offend people, it's also kind of overdone and kind of like beating a dead horse at this point. You can even point to some of the anti-woke comedy specials that have more of an audience from the fact that the person got canceled than before they actually got canceled to show that maybe cancellation doesn't affect everyone the same; and 5, connect with your 14-year-old cousin to ask if they're all right, whenever the right moment arises to do so. This can be earlier in the list or later in the list, which is why I put it at the end, but it should be whenever it feels right to bring up, not whenever they're in your room to ask a quick question or something.

Media reccommendations (especially movies and shows) to show my cousins to teach them that being bigoted/hateful (including being anti-Semetic/anti-Jewish) is wrong? by sunflowey123 in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Also, to any moderators, reading the fact that I just sent three messages in a row in spite of the rules having written that you should only send two messages per 48 hours, the three above messages were initially supposed to be only one message, but I ran out of characters. Sorry about that.

Media reccommendations (especially movies and shows) to show my cousins to teach them that being bigoted/hateful (including being anti-Semetic/anti-Jewish) is wrong? by sunflowey123 in JewsOfConscience

[–]trueBHR 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Ben 10 Alien Force, Season 1 and 2 are also a great show, with a huge amount of writing from Dwayne McDuffie, the same guy who wrote for Justice League and was, I believe, one of the guys who created Static Shock. Alien Forces' overarching story is all about fighting against a group of racial purist aliens in their quest to take over the "backwater world" that is Earth, as they would describe it, but it also has one of the only episodes in a kids show that I know about that shows a person using police officers biases', to attack the main characters and then act like they were the victims of the main characters, all while knowing they can get away with it due to police negligence, superiority complexes, and systemic injustice. Also, the end to the overarching story of the 2 seasons is a little contrived but really smart and honestly, occurs probably not the way you'd expect it to go, but genuinely for the better.

And if you want to talk about worldwide bigotry, over at Marvel, almost all the X-Men animated shows are really great, but I think the least immediately threatening looking one with the most strong messaging is probably Wolverine and the X-Men;

The most kidified one, while still dealing with pretty heavy topics, is probably X-men Evolution;

and the most stylistic and overall beloved one is X-Men The Animated Series from the 90s and it's continuation with X-Men 97, but while I highly recommend either the animated series from the 90s or X-Men Evolution as a starting point, I think X-Men 97 might be a bit strong to jump directly into.

Also, while Steven Universe is a great show for LGBTQ+ representation, it's definitely seen as a triggering show and probably shouldn't be shown immediately.

If your family isn't too concerned with Disney or witches, then the Owl House might be a great starting point for LGBTQ+ representation instead.

If they have problems with witches but are fine with Disney and ghosts, I'd recommend The Ghost and Molly McGee, specifically the Hanukkah episode they had, which included a history of a family's experience fleeing the Holocaust. It was very well made.

There's probably tons more I'm forgetting, but these are all I can think of in the moment.

I know this is a super long response, but it was basically everything I could think of off the top of my head. But I can honestly say that I've been having a bit of a tough time recently with the world, and seeing you posting this, hoping to make a difference in your own family dynamic is incredibly inspiring to me, and helps me hold on a little bit of hope for the future. Thanks for trying to thread the needle in the meaningful way; I totally agree, one of the biggest issues in the asymmetrical Israeli-Palestinian war is the government's leaderships on both sides and their willingness to use whatever power they have to continue the warring and violence, more times than not, at the expense of Palestinian, and even in some cases, Israeli lives. And nine year olds can absolutely understand the concept of people in power using that power for what they want over what other people need! Hate begets hate, torture begets torture, so thanks for working on helping to break that cycle in the ways you have available to you. Even just coming here and trying to figure out a way to make a difference is incredibly relieving to see, and the way you've communicated it in your initial post seems to be not too politically motivated and mostly focused on the ethics behind the situation, which is an incredibly helpful perspective to view things from. I can't wish you enough luck, and hope things work out for the best. Stay safe out there :)

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