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geneva_convenience banned me from their comm (inventing_reality) after simply asking if they demand we hold all Jews accountable for Israel. (thelemmy.club)
submitted 3 days ago by to c/chapotraphouse@hexbear.net
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Jews are not systemically oppressed anymore but clearly certain reactionaries sure do want them to be.

Collective punishment is always wrong. You can't just make your whole ideology out of fuckinslammer memes or you turn into this person.

Parenti fucking rolling in his grave rn. You do not get to invoke a foundational modern marxist while doing the opposite of material analysis.

Would you apply the same logic to Christians? Arguably Christians have done far more harm. Or are you defining Jews as an ethnicity? How is that better? Is there something genetic or is it religious?

These may seem like silly semantic differences but they are actually important and the people that make either argument are wrong for the same reason: Collective punishment and collective guilt is always reactionary.

Ironically some of these same people would say I am doing Jewish exceptionalism but are they not doing the same thing claiming this is an exceptionally Jewish form of fascism.

I do not believe such distinctions are productive but rather only serve to excuse one's own participation in similar relations. By invoking some sort of Jewish exceptionalism you are only absolving yourself of guilt and complicity. By definition when you claim there is some sort of Jewish exceptionalism at play you are implying they are a special uniquely bad group apart from the international white supremacist project that enables and requires the existence of Israel.

You claim to be denouncing special treatment of Jewish persecution and overcorrect into actual Nazism. Or to be more accurate I guess Strasserism.

I no longer care if people want to call me a zionist for pointing this out. You are just embarassed white supremacists trying to offload your crimes onto Israel, there is nothing Israel has done that the rest of the west has not done tenfold, all are complicit and blaming it on Jews is just Nazi shit. I will fight to the death for the Palestinian people but I will not tolerate any single person implying collective guilt. This goes for everyone, white, black arab, persian, etc.

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[–] 20 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (2 children)

"B-b-but a lot of Jews are Zionists!" Yeah, so? The problem is still the part where they're Zionist and not the part where they're Jewish.

So? So the problem is you're thinking too individualist. As a Marxist, I don't care about passing moral judgement. Here's a cold, factual material analysis instead. Jewish institutions are overwhelmingly Zionist and support the genocide materially. Temples hold auctions for stolen houses and collect money for the IAF. Real existing Jewish religion in the world today has a systemic, structural problem with Zionism. Or rather, the problem is that it doesn't have a problem with it. It has many material benefits and privilegees interlinking it with the imperialists, colonial genocide machine.

The minority of Jews who aren't Zionists have a hard time finding communities and places of worship, where they feel welcome and aren't excluded based on their principled rejection of the real white Jewish privilege to have the option to be able to move to my families area, kill them, steal their house, steal their land and get lots of state support to build a new live there. They are in the minority, they don't get any funding, they need outside support to affect real structural change inside institutionalized religion. But they are also in the best position to affect this change, to lead the reforms. If they don't take responsibility, there's no hope for institutionalized Jewish religion to move away from it's currently majority fascist, hegemonic class position.

If we were to ignore this real systemic issue, by focusing only on individual beliefs, we'd commit the error of classic idealism.

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  • [–] 15 points 2 days ago* (1 child)

    I don't disagree with any of that. But I am struggling to figure out what part of that should cause anyone to shift their criticism away from Zionism and towards Jews instead.

    Of course anti-Zionist Jews are a minority. They also happen to be a minority that's on our side. Why on earth should I include them in my criticism? And why on earth would I not include non-Jewish Zionists in my criticism? If I simply talk about Zionists, I am accurately labelling my enemies and not including any allies. If I talk about Jews, I am including only some of my enemies, and also including some of my allies. This is complete and total nonsense. There is literally no upside. It's controversy bait and nothing more.

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  • [–] 10 points 2 days ago (1 child)

    I don't disagree with any of that. But I am struggling to figure out what part of that should cause anyone to shift their criticism away from Zionism and towards Jews instead.

    Not against Jews, but against the majority of Jewish institution.

    They also happen to be a minority that's on our side. Why on earth should I include them in my criticism?

    Exactly. We shouldn't. We should do everything to support them.

    And why on earth would I not include non-Jewish Zionists in my criticism?

    Yes, definitely criticize them too, and it is all one flight. But those two fronts still require different strategies. The fight for reform of zionist Jewish institutions needs to be lead by Jews. Zionist evangelical institutions need to be reformed by Christians. They face different obstacles and circumstance. This makes it necessary to offer tailored strategical critique to each of them, to build and support their struggles.

    If I talk about Jews, I am including only some of my enemies, and also including some of my allies.

    Yes, I completely agree. We should avoid generalizing language. But also avoid a critique that is to broad in its targets to be strategically useful. "Zionists" is to broad. "Jews" is anti-semitic. "Zionist Jewish institutions", is better. I always try to critique institutions, not individuals. Even, for example, capital instead of capitalists. It's not about the moral character of individuals, but about systemic forces.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 days ago

    I have no problem with critiquing Zionist Jewish institutions. This is not at all what genocide_convenience is going around saying, nor does it contradict anything I have said here or elsewhere.

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  • [–] 11 points 2 days ago

    They are in the minority, they don't get any funding, they need outside support to affect real structural change inside institutionalized religion. But they are also in the best position to affect this change, to lead the reforms. If they don't take responsibility, there's no hope for institutionalized Jewish religion to move away from it's currently majority fascist, hegemonic class position.

    why should "change it from the inside" work for these organs when we don't think it works (nor that anyone has an obligation to try) when it's police or democrats etc?

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