F**king Mondays: Reader Pushback, Genocide, And A British Comeback

Another controversial week on The Banter.

Welcome to another edition of F**king Mondays! In the roundup this week:

Everyone hates The Banter

Unsurprisingly, my piece yesterday on the left becoming what it hates led to considerable reader blowback. Along with another exodus of subscribers, there has been some furious conversations between readers in the comments section and in my inbox. Here’s a sample of the feedback:

I've subscribed to The Banter in the past and am always open to paying for a quality product.  However, this is the second excerpt I've seen from this author and I'm not supporting anything that supports him.  First, the author appears to be trying to short circuit criticism of Israel by focusing on anti-Semitism (unacceptable from the right and the left), and Hamas (also bad),  with barely any discussion of the Palestinians (who are not synonymous with Hamas and deserve concern and support).  I don't like this, but that alone wouldn't stop me from subscribing.  I would simply avoid this author.  

What's not fine is the tortuous logic by which 'identity politics' is bad and terrible and must lead to anti-Semitism.  What this reads like is a long-winded, pseudo-learned, and dishonest attempt to carve out one identity for protection, while minimizing all others as misguided or even malevolent.

Let me tell you, if I wanted to read disingenuous nonsense like this, there are plenty of other places to get it.  I'm unsubscribing now.

Other readers have been more supportive of my position:

Ben, it’s not that you’re not a liberal anymore, it’s that they’re not, and perhaps never were. In an amusing, but perhaps sad way, they are making Bill Maher‘s case. I always thought that the people Maher complained about were a tiny minority of the progressive movement, and that his perspective was off. But that tiny minority has gotten really loud — and again, disproportionately so — lately. It’s not good for any of us

And:

Excellent and beautifully presented

Dont you think the real problem isnt “race”, it’s more about class, and social positions that can sometimes be purchased with enough cash .

During apartheid in South Africa, when only white europeans were full citizens, the country suddenly declared the Japanese to be white, so they could do business with the white South Africans. Not other Asians. Just the Japanese.

So much for race. In the US Im considered white, but not in France or Australia.

Its absurd!

The problem is really fractionalism.

Not too long ago in this country we were all Americans. Now we’re all hyphenates. Even white people have their little tribes. Its frustrating and counter-productive.

Also, I think what we see is that it isnt so much “left” or “right”. Its circular. Go too far in either direction and youre on the other side.

More like theres an extremist side and a centrist side of the circle.

Let’s keep fighting for the center. And I’ll still snuggle off toward the left of the circle. Girl can’t help it. Im still proud to be a progressive.

The reason I haven’t said much about the plight of Palestinian people is not because I don’t care about Palestinians. I do, and find the escalating death toll in Gaza to be heartbreaking beyond belief. The reason I’m spending most of my time talking about rabid antisemitism on the left is because it is directly related to my own safety.

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder and the rise of the Black Lives Matter movement, the right started their own counter movements (Blue Lives Matter, All Lives Matter etc) and insisted black people didn’t care about dead cops or dead white people. It didn’t seem to occur to conservatives that black people had more immediate concerns after watching a police officer slowly, and very brazenly murdering a black man in broad daylight and in front of dozens of witnesses.

We’ve just seen a terrorist organization slaughter 1,300 innocent Jews on social media, then in response to the genocide, protests erupt around the world in defense of it. How would people like Jews to respond? Every Jew I know is terrified by the insane rise in antisemitism and most are in a state of shock that their supposed political allies have not just abandoned them, but are actively cheering for Hamas.

It’s depressing so many subscribers have left because I’m trying to articulate what this feels like, but I’m not going to filter my opinion going forward. As always, I welcome pushback and debate and want to extend thanks to everyone sticking around even when they disagree.

Definitions of genocide

Speaking of the plight of Palestinians, there is considerable debate over the definition of genocide, and whether the Israeli government is committing it. This is an extremely difficult subject that does not benefit from being being rammed through the “oppressor vs oppressed” narrative. Omer Bartov, a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University has an extremely thoughtful piece in the Times about this that is well worth reading. Key quote:

It is clear that the daily violence being unleashed on Gaza is both unbearable and untenable. Since the Oct. 7 massacre by Hamas — itself a war crime and a crime against humanity — Israel’s military air and ground assault on Gaza has killed more than 10,500 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, a number that includes thousands of children. That’s well over five times as many people as the more than 1,400 people in Israel murdered by Hamas. In justifying the assault, Israeli leaders and generals have made terrifying pronouncements that indicate a genocidal intent.

Still, the collective horror of what we are watching does not mean that a genocide, according to the international legal definition of the term, is already underway. Because genocide, sometimes called “the crime of all crimes,” is perceived by many to be the most extreme of all crimes, there is often an impulse to describe any instance of mass murder and massacre as genocide. But this urge to label all atrocious events as genocide tends to obfuscate reality rather than explain it.

“Intent” is the operative word here. Hamas committed the exact definition of a genocide given their aim was to ethnically cleanse Jews from the land. This is something the radical left will not acknowledge, despite there being hours of footage from Hamas fighters’ bodycams howing undeniable acts of genocide. I don’t believe the Israeli government as a whole aims to do this in Gaza, but some in the Knesset clearly do, and the death toll is climbing at a horrifying rate. This is not good and I hope that those on Israel’s side have the courage to acknowledge it.

Irrespective of the technical definitions, the death of so many people on both sides is horrifying and we can only hope there is a breakthrough in negotiations in the very near future.

David Cameron is back!

Some news from across the pond:

David Cameron has returned to government as UK foreign secretary, in a stunning comeback for the former prime minister which highlights Rishi Sunak’s willingness to take risks as he looks to revive his political fortunes.

Downing Street announced on Monday that Cameron would join the government, accepting a peerage in order to do so, as part of a wider reshuffle in which Suella Braverman was sacked as home secretary and replaced by the foreign secretary, James Cleverly.

I’m not sure bringing back the man who brought Great Britain six years of austerity and a Brexit referendum that destroyed the British economy is the move Rishi Sunak thinks it is, but it is certainly a bold one. Labour looks set to form the next government as Tory support has collapsed across the nation, so Cameron’s stint will likely be a short one. Cameron does have real experience on the international stage of course, but given the UK’s diminished role in global politics after Brexit, it’s hard to see him bringing any real benefit.

The firing of the controversial Suella Bravermen is genuinely good news though, and a signal Sunak recognizes enflaming the culture wars and stirring xenophobia isn’t a great electoral strategy.

See you next week!

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