It seems to me that most pro Palestine folks aren’t pro Palestine *because it’s an Islamic state* or some such, it’s because they principally reject the aggression of Israel towards the Palestinian people. I mean, just speaking from personal experience, but when religion is brought up in relation to Israel Palestine by my more leftist friends, it tends to be in a historical context (an analysis of who aggressed first and why and so forth) with the purpose of determining that Israel was the aggressor and thus, at fault for the death of the Palestinian people. Now, none of that is to say those are the correct interpretations of the facts, just that the motivation behind the Israel-Palestine protest seems more humanitarian to me, then some attack against Islamophobia.
None of the above undermines the fact that the phenomena you’re talking about does occur (leftists defending Islam) I just think Israel-Palestine is a strange choice because that doesn’t seem to be the primary motivator (at least to me).
Regarding your last question: why do extreme leftists hate America? Could it be the trauma of subverted expectations?
I cannot prove it, but I get the sense that most of the far leftists come from US middle class families. These families have been upwardly mobile - their standard of living has reliably increased since the 1940s. The kids were taught that they should do well in school, and for the most part they’ve done fairly well, enough to get into colleges. If my own experience in the US educational system is typical, they were regularly praised by their teachers and parents for even relatively middling successes.
But unless they studied STEM subjects, upon graduation from college they find that the reliably improving middle class existence of their parents is not guaranteed. It requires, not to put too fine a point on it, dedication and hard work, those old gods of the copybook headings (as indeed it did for their parents and grandparents). Meanwhile, they see many in their cohort succeed. They grow envious, perhaps even embittered. Most people who experience a relative decline in their social status would not accept that it is entirely (or even partially) their fault. Those who enviously see hard-working immigrants succeed might gravitate towards the nativist far right; those who grew up in an environment where such thinking was frowned upon end up instead blaming the “corrupt system”, eg America as a structural concept. (I wince at putting it this way, but I think this might be in line with their thoughts.)
This is all pop psychology on my part and I might be well off base here. Feel free to contradict me.
It seems to me that most pro Palestine folks aren’t pro Palestine *because it’s an Islamic state* or some such, it’s because they principally reject the aggression of Israel towards the Palestinian people. I mean, just speaking from personal experience, but when religion is brought up in relation to Israel Palestine by my more leftist friends, it tends to be in a historical context (an analysis of who aggressed first and why and so forth) with the purpose of determining that Israel was the aggressor and thus, at fault for the death of the Palestinian people. Now, none of that is to say those are the correct interpretations of the facts, just that the motivation behind the Israel-Palestine protest seems more humanitarian to me, then some attack against Islamophobia.
None of the above undermines the fact that the phenomena you’re talking about does occur (leftists defending Islam) I just think Israel-Palestine is a strange choice because that doesn’t seem to be the primary motivator (at least to me).
Thank you Michael, this is an interesting post.
Regarding your last question: why do extreme leftists hate America? Could it be the trauma of subverted expectations?
I cannot prove it, but I get the sense that most of the far leftists come from US middle class families. These families have been upwardly mobile - their standard of living has reliably increased since the 1940s. The kids were taught that they should do well in school, and for the most part they’ve done fairly well, enough to get into colleges. If my own experience in the US educational system is typical, they were regularly praised by their teachers and parents for even relatively middling successes.
But unless they studied STEM subjects, upon graduation from college they find that the reliably improving middle class existence of their parents is not guaranteed. It requires, not to put too fine a point on it, dedication and hard work, those old gods of the copybook headings (as indeed it did for their parents and grandparents). Meanwhile, they see many in their cohort succeed. They grow envious, perhaps even embittered. Most people who experience a relative decline in their social status would not accept that it is entirely (or even partially) their fault. Those who enviously see hard-working immigrants succeed might gravitate towards the nativist far right; those who grew up in an environment where such thinking was frowned upon end up instead blaming the “corrupt system”, eg America as a structural concept. (I wince at putting it this way, but I think this might be in line with their thoughts.)
This is all pop psychology on my part and I might be well off base here. Feel free to contradict me.
Q4P and Hamas have one thing in common, and for the former (who are not blind and not idiots) it’s the most important thing: their enemies. Us.