Interesting Links for 06-08-2014

[andrewducker]

• Artist in "Saying controversial thing in order to get publicity" shock. (This time, about children)
  (tags: art children )
• Discrimination at work goes unpunished as women can’t afford to sue
  (tags: law discrimination UK )
• Guardians Of The Galaxy Had Highest Percentage Of Female Viewers Of Any Marvel Studios Movie
  (tags: marvel movies women )
• EU

Comments

[bart_calendar]

I don't get why Israel seems to be intentionally making themselves look bad.

[andrewducker]

I think that Israel has, historically, gotten a very easy ride, because the media didn't tend to cover them Doing Bad Things - and instead focussed on Palestinians Doing Bad Things.

I mean, they got out of things like the Second Intifada without much in the way of negative publicity. They presumably assumed this would go the same way.

Unluckily, for them, we're now getting reporting via a number of different channels now, so it's much easier for news to reach us, even if the general media isn't initially covering it.

I've seen discussions of whether destroying Gaza's power generation ability was actually a strike to cut off the bloggers in the area...

[bart_calendar]

That blogger idea could easily be true.

I wonder if no longer getting an easy ride will change their tactics or cause them to double down.

[andrewducker]

The thing about Israel is that the situation between them and Palestine has been in a holding position for decades. There's not been any kind of end-game in sight for either side, and the basic goals of (the extreme of) both sides was entirely incompatible.

Sorting out The Troubles took both sides in Northern Ireland going "You know what, I'm fed up with this, and it's not getting me anywhere." We'll need something similar to happen in Israel/Palestine for that to get sorted.

(And that's not terribly likely while Israel is surrounded by other countries that are still not recognising its existence.)

[octopoid_horror]

I'd say that also America is getting less popular globally, and the right wing and its influence in America (the bit that seems to be the most vocal about Israel) is to a large degree to blame for that decline in popularity. Imagine I made some clever analogy between the Iron Dome system and the United States here.

[fanf]

American influence perpetuates/ed both conflicts by providing money and arms. America switching from supporting war to supporting peace was important for Northern Ireland and it will be for Palestine.

[livredor]

Because Israel seriously doesn't care what random American or European leftwingers think about their actions. Netanyahu has this particularly badly, but a lot of people have the mindset that they'll hate us whatever we do. If it doesn't actually affect their funding or their arms deals, the people who make the decisions are totally indifferent to articles in the liberal press or on blogs full of handwringing about racism or killing children or whatever. Partly because there's just as much handwringing when Israel is being relatively humanitarian as when they're being aggressive, I suspect. But it's pretty much like, everybody hates us, especially on the left, and that's how it's been for 70 years, why bother trying to look good to these people who hate us anyway just for existing?

[usmu]

Unfortunately I can only find a version of it with Spanish subtitles blocking out the English ones on youtube, but Defamation by Yoav Shamir is an interesting documentary from 2009 on anti-Semitism and particularly the new definition that is seems to have taken on: criticizing Israel. There's some part of it that really show this entranced view of the world.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1377278/