I find it funny that leftists are suddenly against cancel culture. With that said, I’m against cancel culture even in these circumstances. I find it difficult to sympathize with the people being targeted here, but my principle remains that a private individual should not experience mass harassment or lose his job for expressing views which, however offensive, are not related to that job.
I admit I would have a hard time interacting, even in a professional capacity, with someone I knew held such views. (I’m surprised by that - I thought I was almost unphasable.) I can see why that would play a role in a company’s hiring decisions. I’m not sure how to reconcile that (and the general principle that as a private individual, I don’t have the obligation to interact with someone I don’t like) with my belief that a culture of protecting free speech requires that people’s careers won’t be destroyed for what they might say outside of work.
Leftists have ever been for (so-called) “cancel culture”? Since when?
According to this survey by the Pew Research Center, liberal Democrats are much more likely to consider “cancel culture” to mean “actions taken to hold others accountable” and conservative Republicans are much more likely to consider it to mean “censorship of speech or history”.
So you only associate with your fellow Klan members?
Suddenly I’m much less certain that people getting fired for “racism” were actually being racist. But I’m not lonely - I think you’ll find that your position regarding this issue is actually much less popular among the general public than it is in certain specific spaces (such as Lemmy).
As of January 2019, the site had profiles of 1,853 individuals and 563 professors. Canary Mission targets Arab and Muslim students and faculty in particular. Blacklisted individuals have reported being questioned by employers, graduate schools, and the FBI about their support for Palestinian rights after Canary Mission reached out. They have been put on leave, been denied bank accounts, and received death threats.
The FBI did question some people on that website, but not necessarily because of that website. For example, they questioned one person on that website because of his Facebook post:
Some of the tactics are questionable, namely dragging in students who never signed the letter in question.
But if you did sign an open letter, then I think you basically doxxed yourself. I mean, the purpose of signing an open letter is to publicly endorse whatever it says.
McCarthyism targeted people for possibly (and often not actually) supporting a legal political movement. Supporting terrorist organizations and that being made public isn't the same thing. And an individual or group using a website announcing someone's public actions isn't the same thing. McCarthy abused his authority as a member of the federal government to harass and and punish. Canary mission has no such authority. It just turns out a lot of people don't like people who side with terrorists.
That being said, I am not really a fan of canary mission. I think more work needs to be done on education and understanding of the entire situation instead of a few of the most recent events. If I were still in the US, I would probably try to organize such groups. But it is definitely a much harder goal to accomplish.
Doesn’t matter if it’s a student or otherwise. If you sign a public document, then you should not be afraid to be associated with the document. Otherwise what is the point of signing it?
And again, student or not if they didn’t sign it then they should be left alone (even if they are indirectly related to someone who did sign it).
I don’t think so. To summarize, a bunch of students signed a letter on their own behalf or on behalf of the student organizations they lead. Their names were collected and published on a website. I don’t see any problem in that. If you sign a letter, you should own it.
The website further denounces the letter as well as organizations like al-Jazeera as anti-semitic. That’s fine too. Public debate naturally involves people in the debate accusing each other of all sorts of things: anti-semitic, fascist, racist, sexist, whatever. If you don’t like that kind of negative feedback, don’t make public statements - such as signing letters.
The website further drags individuals who had nothing to do with the letter into the debate. That’s inappropriate.
This started as a response to the letter (as far as I can tell). But Hillel groups at universities (mine included) were regularly harassed by groups supporting a free Palestine. After the response to the letter, they realized "hey maybe we can do something about shit like that, too" (not a direct quote by them).
I mean we were just trying to hang out, pray, and eat food together. And my gut feeling is all of those people should be shamed. But my slower brain reaction is that I hope some of those people that I regularly talked with started to better understand what they were saying.
Ah so I got it backwards. They started with noting abuses, but the letter gained them some notoriety(or infamy depending on who you ask). Good to know.
Again, I have mixed (at best) feelings about it. They do these things in public so don't necessarily have a reason to expect privacy. I have experienced harassment on campus, myself. But I'm unsure that it will have the desired long term impact.
There has been a clear escalation. If you sign a public document, your name is there. Now they add your face and address. Now they misconstrue the meaning of the document to say you are antisemitic.
The did include faces, but so what? If you sign something in public, why would you expect strangers to be unable to associate you with what you signed?
And being misconstrued is also part of public debate. Always has been. You can’t expect to denounce something in public and not get yourself denounced in return. You can’t expect everyone you publicly oppose to be fair or open-minded when they clap back.
Ykw you’re right. Addresses would make it dangerous, but shit the rest is… As you’ve argued, fair game, and to me a scary but fair use of free speech. I would use the same tools on those with power, gladly.
So other minority groups are given authority on deciding what is and isn't racist, bigoted, etc.
to them. Particularly amongst the left. Why are Jews not afforded that same authority? The vast majority of Jews in the US support Israel. We are typically Zionist. And when a terrorist group attacked Israel, rather than blaming the group that literally stated their goal is to kill all Jews, they blame the state of Israel for the entire situation and everything that has happened before, we aren't supposed to see that as antisemitic? When they say Free Palestine. From the river to the sea. We aren't supposed to see that as antisemitic? Why? Do some of us look too white to be a proper minority? Sure didn't stop synagogues from getting bombed. Didn't stop attacks from the Klan. Exclusion from public spaces, and this is just in the US. Should we also look at Europe? One of the reasons Jews support Israel is that now, for the first time in a long time, when people turn on us again, we still have a home.
OK you have some amazing arguments. It is really hard to find a retort to some of these, and I can’t do all of them.
The only reason Israel can be equivalent to Jews is because Israel is an ethno-state. Israel has much greater power and control than Palestine, which is why leftists say Israel can be blamed for the rise - and funding - of Hamas.
Antisemitic speech and hate crimes have been on the rise in the wake of this conflict, yep. I dont want to conflate crimes with political speech against the state of Israel, though.
Protestors who are pro-palestine have also seen a rise in police action against them, and social threats. People are being threatened for their speech. Politicians who seemingly want to condemn Israel feel that they can’t because they will lose power.
70% of Israelis think Netanyahu fucked up and needs to leave office.
NGL I saw overt police violence from cops on orthodox Jews in Israel. Americans, by the way. American cops are training in Israel because it is the most strict police state that Americans can go to. The IDF for all its force actually fucked up so badly that thousands of Israelis were killed and hundreds kidnapped. And why did Hamas do this? Well, they are antisemitic. But the people who voted Hamas in are not, but are simply frustrated with the occupation. Israel killed all of Palestine’s good politicians who may have made a deal happen, and then let Qatar give Hamas billions. So… Israel can cut off food, water, and electricity to Paleatine, but they can allow Qatar to send billions in funding and Iran to send literal drones and missiles? Hello? Israel is to blame in so many ways, and genuinely Israeli Jews deserve better than the government that they have now that is more focused on genocide than solutions to Israeli concerns.
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