(no subject)

[taffimai]

Two questions from the Dyke March:

1) Why does being a lesbian have to come with a built-in political agenda? Just because I like girls I need to be an anti-Capitalist vegan? Why?
2) Why has the left so embraced the Palestinian side of the Israel/Palestine conflict? Do they not understand that Israel was created in an attempt to create a place of refuge for a group that had just barely survived attempted genocide? Do they not understand that they are siding with a group that systematically uses acts of terror to advance their cause? Can they not understand that no, Israel isn't perfect but that this isn't a black and white issue?

Comments

[kita0610.livejournal.com]

Oh, man, you are NOT going to play the "my persecution beats yours" game for realz are you?

I declare Bingo.

Taff? (Who btw is far too nice to tell you to go away) I am done.

[hellenebright.livejournal.com]

House rejects your call of Bingo!, declares your card incorrectly stamped.

The whole point is I am *not* trying to play the "my persecution beats yours" game. It's tasteless for one thing, and pointless for another.

My point was that while the position of modern Israel is often regarded as unique, with a unique set of factors that no-one else can understand, there are actually many examples in history where circumstance has given rise to an incoming group which is or becomes more powerful than the indigenous group, thereby creating the grounds for conflict.

I believe in the US the Catholic Irish were seen largely as the victims of oppression by the Unionists and the British. In the UK, they were largely seen as the cause of the problem, and were the group expected to make concessions. The feeling was very much that when Ireland was partitioned in 1922 they should have either moved south or resigned themselves to Unionist rule. The Catholic government of Eire was seen as stubborn and inflammatory in insisting in it's constitution that Eire consisted of all 32 counties.

Does this sound familiar?

I feel a certain way about Ireland, which is nothing to do with it as a political entity, having a self-governing identity etc, and everything to do with it being the ancestral homeland. From listening to many Israelis and non-Israeli Jews speak, it seems to me that they feel the same way.

So I can see that both an incoming population and an indigenous one can both have the same or similar feelings for a location. Which makes it hard for me to 'take sides'.

History is history, and sometimes all you can do is put the history to one side and say 'well, here we all are now, what do we do next'.