Reactions Continue to Viral Video that Led to Calls for College Presidents to Resign 414
After billionaire Bill Ackman demanded three college presidents "resign in disgrace," that post on X — excerpting their testimony before a U.S. Congressional committee — has now been viewed more than 104 million times, provoking a variety of reactions.
Saturday afternoon, one of the three college presidents resigned — University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill.
Politico reports that the Republican-led Committee now "will be investigating Harvard University, MIT and the University of Pennsylvania after their institutions' leaders failed to sufficiently condemn student protests calling for 'Jewish genocide.'" The BBC reports a wealthy UPenn donor reportedly withdrew a stock grant worth $100 million.
But after watching the entire Congressional hearing, New York Times opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg wrote that she'd seen a "more understandable" context: In the questioning before the now-infamous exchange, you can see the trap [Congresswoman Elise] Stefanik laid. "You understand that the use of the term 'intifada' in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict is indeed a call for violent armed resistance against the state of Israel, including violence against civilians and the genocide of Jews. Are you aware of that?" she asked Claudine Gay of Harvard. Gay responded that such language was "abhorrent."
Stefanik then badgered her to admit that students chanting about intifada were calling for genocide, and asked angrily whether that was against Harvard's code of conduct. "Will admissions offers be rescinded or any disciplinary action be taken against students or applicants who say, 'From the river to the sea' or 'intifada,' advocating for the murder of Jews?" Gay repeated that such "hateful, reckless, offensive speech is personally abhorrent to me," but said action would be taken only "when speech crosses into conduct." So later in the hearing, when Stefanik again started questioning Gay, Kornbluth and Magill about whether it was permissible for students to call for the genocide of the Jews, she was referring, it seemed clear, to common pro-Palestinian rhetoric and trying to get the university presidents to commit to disciplining those who use it. Doing so would be an egregious violation of free speech. After all, even if you're disgusted by slogans like "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free," their meaning is contested...
Liberal blogger Josh Marshall argues that "While groups like Hamas certainly use the word [intifada] with a strong eliminationist meaning it is simply not the case that the term consistently or usually or mostly refers to genocide. It's just not. Stefanik's basic equation was and is simply false and the university presidents were maladroit enough to fall into her trap."
The Wall Street Journal published an investigation the day after the hearing. A political science professor at the University of California, Berkeley hired a survey firm to poll 250 students across the U.S. from "a variety of backgrounds" — and the results were surprising: A Latino engineering student from a southern university reported "definitely" supporting "from the river to the sea" because "Palestinians and Israelis should live in two separate countries, side by side." Shown on a map of the region that a Palestinian state would stretch from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, leaving no room for Israel, he downgraded his enthusiasm for the mantra to "probably not." Of the 80 students who saw the map, 75% similarly changed their view... In all, after learning a handful of basic facts about the Middle East, 67.8% of students went from supporting "from the river to the sea" to rejecting the mantra. These students had never seen a map of the Mideast and knew little about the region's geography, history, or demography.
More about the phrase from the Associated Press: Many Palestinian activists say it's a call for peace and equality after 75 years of Israeli statehood and decades-long, open-ended Israeli military rule over millions of Palestinians. Jews hear a clear demand for Israel's destruction... By 2012, it was clear that Hamas had claimed the slogan in its drive to claim land spanning Israel, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank... The phrase also has roots in the Hamas charter... [Since 1997 the U.S. government has considered Hamas a terrorist organization.]
"A Palestine between the river to the sea leaves not a single inch for Israel," read an open letter signed by 30 Jewish news outlets around the world and released on Wednesday... Last month, Vienna police banned a pro-Palestinian demonstration, citing the fact that the phrase "from the river to the sea" was mentioned in invitations and characterizing it as a call to violence. And in Britain, the Labour party issued a temporary punishment to a member of Parliament, Andy McDonald, for using the phrase during a rally at which he called for a stop to bombardment.
As the controversy rages on, Ackman's X timeline now includes an official response reposted from a college that wasn't called to testify — Stanford University: In the context of the national discourse, Stanford unequivocally condemns calls for the genocide of Jews or any peoples. That statement would clearly violate Stanford's Fundamental Standard, the code of conduct for all students at the university.
Ackman also retweeted this response from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman: for a long time i said that antisemitism, particularly on the american left, was not as bad as people claimed. i'd like to just state that i was totally wrong. i still don't understand it, really. or know what to do about it. but it is so fucked.
Wednesday UPenn's president announced they'd immediately consider a new change in policy," in an X post viewed 38.7 million times: For decades under multiple Penn presidents and consistent with most universities, Penn's policies have been guided by the [U.S.] Constitution and the law. In today's world, where we are seeing signs of hate proliferating across our campus and our world in a way not seen in years, these policies need to be clarified and evaluated. Penn must initiate a serious and careful look at our policies, and provost Jackson and I will immediately convene a process to do so. As president, I'm committed to a safe, secure, and supportive environment so all members of our community can thrive. We can and we will get this right. Thank you.
The next day the university's business school called on Magill to resign. And Saturday afternoon, Magill resigned.
Saturday afternoon, one of the three college presidents resigned — University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill.
Politico reports that the Republican-led Committee now "will be investigating Harvard University, MIT and the University of Pennsylvania after their institutions' leaders failed to sufficiently condemn student protests calling for 'Jewish genocide.'" The BBC reports a wealthy UPenn donor reportedly withdrew a stock grant worth $100 million.
But after watching the entire Congressional hearing, New York Times opinion columnist Michelle Goldberg wrote that she'd seen a "more understandable" context: In the questioning before the now-infamous exchange, you can see the trap [Congresswoman Elise] Stefanik laid. "You understand that the use of the term 'intifada' in the context of the Israeli-Arab conflict is indeed a call for violent armed resistance against the state of Israel, including violence against civilians and the genocide of Jews. Are you aware of that?" she asked Claudine Gay of Harvard. Gay responded that such language was "abhorrent."
Stefanik then badgered her to admit that students chanting about intifada were calling for genocide, and asked angrily whether that was against Harvard's code of conduct. "Will admissions offers be rescinded or any disciplinary action be taken against students or applicants who say, 'From the river to the sea' or 'intifada,' advocating for the murder of Jews?" Gay repeated that such "hateful, reckless, offensive speech is personally abhorrent to me," but said action would be taken only "when speech crosses into conduct." So later in the hearing, when Stefanik again started questioning Gay, Kornbluth and Magill about whether it was permissible for students to call for the genocide of the Jews, she was referring, it seemed clear, to common pro-Palestinian rhetoric and trying to get the university presidents to commit to disciplining those who use it. Doing so would be an egregious violation of free speech. After all, even if you're disgusted by slogans like "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free," their meaning is contested...
Liberal blogger Josh Marshall argues that "While groups like Hamas certainly use the word [intifada] with a strong eliminationist meaning it is simply not the case that the term consistently or usually or mostly refers to genocide. It's just not. Stefanik's basic equation was and is simply false and the university presidents were maladroit enough to fall into her trap."
The Wall Street Journal published an investigation the day after the hearing. A political science professor at the University of California, Berkeley hired a survey firm to poll 250 students across the U.S. from "a variety of backgrounds" — and the results were surprising: A Latino engineering student from a southern university reported "definitely" supporting "from the river to the sea" because "Palestinians and Israelis should live in two separate countries, side by side." Shown on a map of the region that a Palestinian state would stretch from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, leaving no room for Israel, he downgraded his enthusiasm for the mantra to "probably not." Of the 80 students who saw the map, 75% similarly changed their view... In all, after learning a handful of basic facts about the Middle East, 67.8% of students went from supporting "from the river to the sea" to rejecting the mantra. These students had never seen a map of the Mideast and knew little about the region's geography, history, or demography.
More about the phrase from the Associated Press: Many Palestinian activists say it's a call for peace and equality after 75 years of Israeli statehood and decades-long, open-ended Israeli military rule over millions of Palestinians. Jews hear a clear demand for Israel's destruction... By 2012, it was clear that Hamas had claimed the slogan in its drive to claim land spanning Israel, the Gaza Strip and the West Bank... The phrase also has roots in the Hamas charter... [Since 1997 the U.S. government has considered Hamas a terrorist organization.]
"A Palestine between the river to the sea leaves not a single inch for Israel," read an open letter signed by 30 Jewish news outlets around the world and released on Wednesday... Last month, Vienna police banned a pro-Palestinian demonstration, citing the fact that the phrase "from the river to the sea" was mentioned in invitations and characterizing it as a call to violence. And in Britain, the Labour party issued a temporary punishment to a member of Parliament, Andy McDonald, for using the phrase during a rally at which he called for a stop to bombardment.
As the controversy rages on, Ackman's X timeline now includes an official response reposted from a college that wasn't called to testify — Stanford University: In the context of the national discourse, Stanford unequivocally condemns calls for the genocide of Jews or any peoples. That statement would clearly violate Stanford's Fundamental Standard, the code of conduct for all students at the university.
Ackman also retweeted this response from OpenAI CEO Sam Altman: for a long time i said that antisemitism, particularly on the american left, was not as bad as people claimed. i'd like to just state that i was totally wrong. i still don't understand it, really. or know what to do about it. but it is so fucked.
Wednesday UPenn's president announced they'd immediately consider a new change in policy," in an X post viewed 38.7 million times: For decades under multiple Penn presidents and consistent with most universities, Penn's policies have been guided by the [U.S.] Constitution and the law. In today's world, where we are seeing signs of hate proliferating across our campus and our world in a way not seen in years, these policies need to be clarified and evaluated. Penn must initiate a serious and careful look at our policies, and provost Jackson and I will immediately convene a process to do so. As president, I'm committed to a safe, secure, and supportive environment so all members of our community can thrive. We can and we will get this right. Thank you.
The next day the university's business school called on Magill to resign. And Saturday afternoon, Magill resigned.
There was no trap or context (Score:3, Insightful)
They are OK with people calling for genocide against Jews. There's no waiting for action on such things, the speech IS the first action in a chain that is intended to lead to genocide.
It's a tribal battle call to organize against 'the other', and if you allow it, it will spread as it appears to be the mob groupthink and finally becomes it.
It's better to stop a fire at the ignition point than after it's blazing.
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Exactly. They're like "it has to rise to the level of action"
So, nobody's doing anything wrong by threatening these people.
And the victims have to WAIT to be mob-actioned TO DEATH first before the university will even THINK about stepping in.
And even there it's "How can we spin this?"
It's disgusting.
Re:There was no trap or context (Score:5, Insightful)
Um, no. Calling for genocide, which is exactly what the phrase from the river to the sea is, violates all of the colleges harrassment policies in question, which all the students must agree to in order to attend. None of the students chanting such have been punished in any way.
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Right, which is why it's unacceptable for those authorities to claim they aren't taking action "because it has to rise to the level of action". You're agreeing with the person you replied to.
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You're getting very angry over misunderstanding the posts you are replying to, and I honestly can't figure out how you're managing to misunderstand them so badly.
Re:There was no trap or context (Score:5, Insightful)
They are OK with people calling for genocide against Jews. There's no waiting for action on such things, the speech IS the first action in a chain that is intended to lead to genocide.
You need to finish reading the summary to understand the context.
The thing you're missing is that people weren't actually calling for genocide against Jews.
Hamas likely uses the word "intifada" to mean genocide and "from the river to the sea" as a call to eliminate the state of Israel in its entirety that's not how the student groups were using it.
Intifada is a rebellion or uprising, Hamas wants to use that uprising to kick out all the Jews but others just want a free Palestinian state beside Israel.
"From the river to the sea" is another phrase that's usage can change depending on its usage. It's certainly possible to have a free Palestinian state from the river to the sea along side an Israeli state [wikipedia.org] but it's more often used by people deeply familiar with the situation to mean all that region should be Palestine.
And when students were given that context they generally turned against the phrase.
There's definitely an issue that's it's hard to find a pro-Palestinian movement that doesn't involve a segment that wants to wipe Israel off the map. At the same time it's hard to find a pro-Israel movement that doesn't involve a segment that wants to take all of the Palestinian's land as well.
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These universities have behavior codes that can have students expelled for mis-gendering a fellow student, but for some reason harassing jewish students on campus and mobs chanting slogans widely-believed to be calling for the elimination of Israel and the Jewish people is a special case that needs "context"?
Its really very simple, they were asked repeatedly and their answers were consistent.
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Hamas likely uses the word "intifada" to mean genocide and "from the river to the sea" as a call to eliminate the state of Israel in its entirety that's not how the student groups were using it.
Intifada is a rebellion or uprising, Hamas wants to use that uprising to kick out all the Jews but others just want a free Palestinian state beside Israel.
"From the river to the sea" is another phrase that's usage can change depending on its usage.
An ideological and philosophical side that's spent the last 12-15 years seeing windmills everywhere and interpreting any potential "micro-aggression" according to how the offendee felt and not how the offender intended has no claim to switch its position now for this. People have been fired for using the "OK" sign because the left thought it was a racist dog whistle or something.
"From the river to the sea" isn't a dog whistle, it's a dog Air Raid Siren calling for the elimination of any Jews in the area kno
Re:There was no trap or context (Score:5, Informative)
So the Likud Party's reference to 'from the river to the sea" is not a reference to ethnic cleansing, a war crime? [wikipedia.org]
Seems to me you can attach whatever value you want to the phrase. All sides have used it. Buying into your interpretation is the usual stuff about everyone having an opinion, just like they have an asshole. Making this all electioneering propaganda.
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Oh it most definitely is a call to ethnic cleansing. Both sides claim the land, both sides proclaim God gave it to them, both sides claim that God ordered them to exterminate the other side.
There is no way out of this. This is Thunderdome on a larger scale.
Oh there are a couple ways out of it. One would be to make the entire area into irradiated glass and give all parties about 500 years or so to figure their shit out. Another would be to embargo the entire area for a couple decades and let winner take all. This bullshit feud has gone on for thousands of years and has cost countless lives, and neither side is obviously in any hurry to end the bloodshed.
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The 2017 Hamas character is very clear that the goal is "every inch", with the area defined as "Palestine, which extends from the River Jordan in the east to the
Mediterranean in the west and from Ras Al-Naqurah in the north to Umm Al-Rashrash in the south, is an integral territorial unit."
20. "Hamas believes that no part of the land of Palestine shall be compromised or conceded, irrespective of the causes, the circumstances and the pressures and no matter how long the occupation lasts. Hamas rejects any alt
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You use those phrases, you know the association and you're choosing to accept it or you'd choose other words.
The kids chanting it are mostly just ignorant.
When shown a map most changed their minds
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Yep.
But I don't support that either, their hypocrisy is a separate matter.
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A honeypot to vacuum up malcontents versus the incubator for future industry and political leaders. She's always been quite cozy with the ADL, who almost certainly have more to do with her direction here than Republican politics.
This is just part of the coordinated full court press to put the muzzle of politically correct AIPAC/ADL alignment back on most Ivy league kids, by convincing them they will be shut out politics and finance if they don't toe the line or stand aside.
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PS. the true alignment of a politician with ADL can be seen by how rabid their stance on BDS is. Calling out some dog whistles at the whites who hate mass immigration and the ADL tut tutting is just for show.
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Can you explain why it is legal then
Let me stop you there. It is legal right now in America to call on the death of all jews and the destruction of Israel as well. Stop conflating legalities and privately tolerated speech.
Re: There was no trap or context (Score:2)
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Re:You really wanna compare yourselves to Nazis? (Score:5, Informative)
I really think you are using the term "nazi" for "anyone who isn't voting Democrat".
Never mind that Democrats are the most racist, anti-semitic fuckers you'll ever meet.
You're an older conservative Jew, aren't you. I'm guessing based on the fact that you love to label everything you don't agree with as antisemitic, that you believe that Israel can essentially do no wrong, and that anyone criticizing Israel or Zionism is antisemitic - but I think that falls under category 1.
And I guarantee you that the people with the Nazi tattoos and flags aren't voting Democrat. FYI, just because someone isn't kissing your ass and rolling out the red carpet for you doesn't mean they are prejudiced against you.
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Wow, how to unpack that in a way that isn't definitively anti-semitic.
Re:You really wanna compare yourselves to Nazis? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wow, how to unpack that in a way that isn't definitively anti-semitic.
Yup, see there you go. Avoiding the question and claiming that everything is antisemitic. And no denying that the most racist nazi assholes vote Republican.
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The real answer is that the districts they live in are solidly Democrat and have been for the last 80 years or so. If they want a career, that's the party they need to represent. While there are Jewish enclaves in places that are red (Lakewood, NJ comes to mind, embedded in a 65%+ R county), they are rare.
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There are 9 (of 100) Jewish senators and 26 (out of 435) members of the House.
And BOY, are YOU great at mutilating an argument to suit your own distorted view of the world.
Re: You really wanna compare yourselves to Nazis? (Score:2)
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Conservative politics appeals to dumb people, as you just demonstrated with your overtly antisemitic comment.
I love the pivot from Ukraine to Hamas (Score:4, Insightful)
Ukraine was all the rage for months, with Ukraine flags and "I stand with Ukraine" and so on
Now that's old news, we've moved on to "I Stand with Hamas" and "From the river to the sea" so on
It's all just virtue-signaling by morons who know nothing about these conflicts and couldn't find them on a map if they tried
Re:I love the pivot from Ukraine to Hamas (Score:5, Insightful)
I still see Ukraine flags daily. I have yet to see an Hamas flag anywhere besides live protests.
Check all American higher ed institutions (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't reduce this to mere slogans (Score:5, Insightful)
Can we stipulate up front that there are multiple aspects to be addressed here? Reductionism isn't doing us any favors. This is complex territory, and the details matter.
- It is true that the students have a civil right to say that in their opinion, Israel shouldn't exist.
- It is true that this civil right is protected by law from being eroded by the US federal government. It cannot be legally forbidden.
- It is true that this is an inflammatory statement, borderline "fighting words". Additional context is needed to determine if it is on one side or the other.
- It is true that voluntary associations such as universities may legally enforce standards for speech that are more restrictive than federal law allows.
Sorting all that out in a single statement is not impossible, but it is fraught. Personally, I would have answered, "Yes, calling for genocide is against our school's code of conduct. However, students have a right to free speech as well."
Re:Don't reduce this to mere slogans (Score:4, Interesting)
The "Israel shouldn't exist" people are trying to make you conflate two separate things, the support of Israel as an apartheid ethnostate, which would cease to be an ethnostate if Israel granted Palestinians full civil rights, to be substituted / conflated with the idea that Jewish people should not be allowed to exist at all. The easiest response is to quote the talmud, and then ask if a country should be governed racist genocidal religion, which is incompatible with international law, should be allowed to exist. Then ask the respondent about Thomas Payne "rights of man" and American revolution, and ask the respondent if individuals have the natural "right of revolution", when the government literally refuses to obey international human rights law.
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A lot more than that.
Arab nations lost the wars, but by forcing Israel to manage what clearly are prison camps inside their borders they have the last laugh (across the backs of Palestinians). Israel wanted to have it both ways too long. No matter how many generous offer history they throw around, it's clearly not up to prisoners to grovel to be set free. Israel should have just unilaterally given them nationhood with control of their own borders long ago. They thought the grudges couldn't get deeper and d
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Palestine has self-rule, and has for nearly 20 years - remember how they voted Hamas in to govern in their first (and last) election? Hamas officials oversee every aspect of life inside Gaza, Israel just tries to keep military weapons (like mortars, missiles, and AK-47s) from going into Gaza...
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Inmates being allowed to run everything inside the prison, still a prison. Israel man's the walls (albeit very poorly in recent history).
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It's a mistake because it's virtually impossible for Israel to close down the Settlements
They closed down the settlements in Gaza and things got much worse.
No one believes that giving the West Bank self-rule will make things better. It will just turn into another Gaza.
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there are numerous reports from several international institutions that clearly define israel as an apartheid state (which is otoh pretty obvious). since you seem interested in the topic i'll leave you with this one:
https://www.btselem.org/topic/... [btselem.org]
that's b'tselem, an israeli human rights organization (but according to you they must be idiots, and probably are antisemitic jews too). have good read.
Re: Don't reduce this to mere slogans (Score:5, Insightful)
We can add another:
-Having demonstrated in the past a willingness to restrict speech beyond what federal law allows, a university's unwillingness to do the same in this case will be seen as tacit support.
They were trapped not only by Stefanik, but also by precedents set by the universities themselves.
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"Yes, calling for genocide is against our school's code of conduct. However, students have a right to free speech as well."
You've failed your own reductionism. Students don't have rights protected by the university as you pointed out. In the end no one here was worried about going to jail.
The issue with being a free speech abolitionist is the same as God-King Musk is finding out now on X. You may be legally protected, so but so are the rights of people to not want to have anything to do with you.
Congrats, you view just supported genocide - that's the soundbite, that's the marketing material, that's what your sponsors will see,
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It is nowhere near borderline "fighting words". The Brandenburg test, which requires that to be suppressed, the speech is directed towards inciting "imminent lawless action" and likely to produce such action, clearly marks it as protected speech.
But Harvard does not apply that standard to its students (and as a private university they don't have to); they punish students for racism, sexism and various other offenses against favored groups. This leaves them in a tough spot when they then don't punish stude
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Can we stipulate up front that there are multiple aspects to be addressed here? Reductionism isn't doing us any favors. This is complex territory, and the details matter.
Agree.
- It is true that the students have a civil right to say that in their opinion, Israel shouldn't exist.
As the summary pointed out that's a gross mischaracterization of the students' positions. They generally wanted a 2-state solution.
- It is true that this civil right is protected by law from being eroded by the US federal government. It cannot be legally forbidden.
Kinda, I think you can still ban certain kinds of speech, but you need to do it in a viewpoint neutral manner. For instance, you could ban pro-Palestine rallies, but you'd have to ban pro-Anything rallies.
- It is true that this is an inflammatory statement, borderline "fighting words". Additional context is needed to determine if it is on one side or the other.
Some students chanting for Palestinian rights unintentionally using slogans that can mean "genocide".
I put genocide in quotes because I doubt even Hamas wants to murder a
Teaching geography would be a good start. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Teaching geography would be a good start. (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, I was going to say there's a surprising complication I hadn't considered at all... and that's the fact that many college students are apparently mind-numbingly clueless regarding geography, and don't even bother to go educate themselves before making a decision.
'A Latino engineering student from a southern university reported "definitely" supporting "from the river to the sea" because "Palestinians and Israelis should live in two separate countries, side by side." Shown on a map of the region that a Palestinian state would stretch from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, leaving no room for Israel, he downgraded his enthusiasm for the mantra to "probably not." Of the 80 students who saw the map, 75% similarly changed their view... In all, after learning a handful of basic facts about the Middle East, 67.8% of students went from supporting "from the river to the sea" to rejecting the mantra.'
There's no excuse for that! (Score:5, Insightful)
1. Those calling for violence or supporting terrorism / terrorist groups, should be expelled.
and 2. The school should come out in direct opposition to those statements.
No one has to pick a side, they should just prevent threats and violence against any side. The schools and people at the schools, refusing to callout against the terrorist support and violence support, are just showing direct support of it.
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Agree with #2. #1 is an overreaction. University is a place to learn and to make mistakes. As the summary says, "75% similarly changed their view" after looking at a map.
Nor is calling for the abolition of Israel inherently anti-semitic. It probably should never have been created, was anti-semitic in itself by the British (don't come here, go to Mandated Palestine) and they've seriously abused their statehood. But Hamas are worse, much worse, and even if Arab princes clubbed together to buy the real est
The proper response. (Score:2)
The only proper response to "Is calling for a genocide against Jews against the anti-harassment policy?" is "Yes".
As to whether protestors were actually calling for that, that's a separate question. But it was cringey to see the university representatives unable to answer "yes" to such a simple question. Replace "Jews" with "Muslims" or "Blacks" or any other group and I don't think we'd have seen such equivocation.
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I mean... that was the question that was asked. A simple "yes" and moving on would have avoided this entire controversy.
Re: The proper response. (Score:2)
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It's not a trap. You answer "Yes" to the first question and "Because the students didn't call for genocide against Jews" to the second, assuming that it's indeed the case that the student's didn't call for genocide against Jews.
The "fighting words" exception to 1st amendment. (Score:3)
The 1st amendment to the US Constitution protects speech generally, and especially political speech, but not what would be considered "fighting words". Someone could stand in the public square and call some person or group all kinds of detestable things, and that would be protected speech. What is not protected is a call to cause another person or group harm. There's a fine line there sometimes, but I'm not seeing that line here. The phrase "from the river to the sea" is a call to violence, it may be a veiled call since not everyone understands the context but it is a call to violence regardless.
Another fine line is sedition, that is a call to rebel against government authority. The bill of rights protects the right to speak out against the government, and it is in a way doubly protected. First protection is the right to say what you will, and that includes writing it down and handing it out with handbills. The second protection is to address the government directly that you don't like the way things are going. This is political speech, speaking of government policy, that is protected. When the speech is a call to violence against America and/or her allies then that gets into sedition. There were some pretty strict laws against sedition before that have since been repealed and/or watered down but I'm still quite certain that not every case is protected.
Maybe I should dig into more who said what and when but I'm not sure that matters much. It looks like there will be an investigation, and if universities are using government funds to allow students to commit sedition and make calls for violence then at least the government could withdraw this funding. If it is as bad as it sounds then maybe a few people need a few months of "time out" in a federal facility to think about what they did and allowed others to do.
Re: The "fighting words" exception to 1st amendmen (Score:2)
When the speech is a call to violence against America and/or her allies then that gets into sedition. There were some pretty strict laws against sedition before that have since been repealed and/or watered down but I'm still quite certain that not every case is protected.
What do you mean "and her allies"? What definition of sedition are you using that is that broad?
https://www.law.cornell.edu/us... [cornell.edu]
https://www.law.cornell.edu/us... [cornell.edu]
Um... not repealed...
How would supporting an overthrow of Saudi Arabia's monarchy or government ever be _sedition_, for example? That's not from watering down, you've got a completely wrong idea about what sedition is, and what laws involving it are.
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The 1st amendment to the US Constitution protects speech generally, and especially political speech, but not what would be considered "fighting words".
The constitution says no such thing. This particular doctrine was invented by the Supreme court in the 40s. It has never since been affirmed consistently eroded by growing body of case law ever since. The guy who was convicted where this whole doctrine started said the following:
"You are a god damned racketeer
a damned fascist
the whole government of Rochester are fascists or agents of fascists"
In the Gooding case from the 70's...
"White son of a bitch, Iâ(TM)ll kill you.
You son of a bitch, Iâ(TM)
I’m calling out all sides (Score:5, Insightful)
This whole situation stinks to high heaven. Everyone has chosen a side, everyone is claiming to want peace while they angle to make sure their side wins the war that they really want. I’m drowning in the hypocrisy all around.
That whole thing with uni presidents in front of congress was a pure political hit job. The issue is extremely complex and nuanced, but both sides of congress have a motivation to make the universities look bad at the moment, so they verbally trapped those guys/gals knowing full well that the internet would harvest and shuffle their individual words to make them look like monsters. University presidents are supposed to have one foot in politics. Have they seen LITERALLY ANY congressional hearing lately? You don’t answer the questions. You use your alloted time to grandstand and spew 1-liners suitable for tiktok. And you’re being paid 750k per year to make basic errors like that? Rookies.
And all these billionaires eating up the hype and going ballistic about it? I thought they were supposed to be smarter than that. Especially the jewish donors. Some university president doesn’t use exactly the right word about your cause while they’re sweating bullets being literally deep-fried by a congressional panel, and you pull 100 million dollars in contributions? Tantrum much?
On the other hand, their complaints about universities are somewhat legit. Hundreds of left-wing liberal arts scholars have signed letters blaming the jews solely for the crisis. Hordes of liberal academics that are literally blaming the jews for getting themselves slaughtered by hamas, and then the same people demand that the jews back off, lay down on the ground and die rather then fight the war that follows. These people are being used as useful idiots by hamas. Liberal academics seem to have a collective raging hate boner for a tiny minority of people that barely tops 15 million. I thought they were better than that.
Meanwhile, after 3000 years of betting beaten up and bullied, jews get a country of their own, and it takes them less than 50 years to find the ONE group on the planet that’s smaller and weaker than them to lord it over. We forget history frighteningly fast. Israel needs to take a long look in the mirror after the current war shuts down and ask “what am I becoming?”
There are literally no good actors here. Just tons of people who want war, and lots of innocent people who are gonna get caught up in it.
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Bullshit, there are a million and a half Arabs living in Israel, the ones populating Gaza could as well be part of Israel and live as Israelis, that's not their intent, their ideology is destruction of Israel and murdering of Jews, that's their government policy.
Nope. Don't play that game (Score:2)
You're not morally superior by avoiding the core issue and muddying things up with "well, they're both bad". There is a real evil, walking among us, and it's one of the oldest and worst. It's not about just words either. Let's remember: the jackasses protesting with those so-called Palestinian flags and chanting "from the river to the sea" started doing it in the immediate aftermath of the worst mass-killing of Jewish civilians since the Holocaust. These same people screaming that Israel is killing civilian
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Here, let me fix that for you:
"Let's remember: the jackasses protesting with those so-called Palestinian flags and chanting "from the river to the sea" started doing it after Israel started killing 17 Palestinians for each Israeli killed, and wounding 9 Palestinians for each Israe
@hdyoung: Very fine people on both sides ;) (Score:2)
“This whole situation stinks to high heaven. Everyone has chosen a side, everyone is claiming to want peace while they angle to make sure their side wins the war that they really want. I’m drowning in the hypocrisy all around.”
Lets try a different tactic (Score:2)
For reference, before Oct 7th, Isreal
I do not condone (Score:5, Insightful)
Nor do I condone the squeezing and pressurizing of palestinian people by right-wing Israeli governments since at least 1995 when the peacemaker prime minister of Israel was assassinated by an extreme right-wing Israeli citizen.
The results are predictable.
This is ... (Score:2)
We should be arguing about whether H.264 or Ogg Vorbis would have been the better format for that video. Leave the politics for the talking heads and various shills for either side. Just sit back and watch.
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I would like to support free software but there are several modern video formats that tax a 15 year old laptop. In an ideal world I would be a Stallmanite but a little pragmatism is required to ensure any algorithms encoded in software don't cause my computer's fan to sound like a jet engine.
I've been thinking of buying a $50 single board computer as a replacement. Is DietPi a better choice than Armbian? The former seems to be more accommodating. Armbian seems to be selective on which boards they can be bo
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From the Movies to TV
Video codecs MUST BE FREE!!
The conflict is serious (Score:2)
There are good and bad on both sides.
The good are the diplomats, peacemakers and ordinary citizens on both sides who simply want to live their lives in peace.
The bad are the warmakers, on both sides, and the foreign powers that view the conflict as a game of global chess.
We need effective solutions to stop the death and destruction.
Israelis and Arabs both have long and deep historic ties to the land.
There must be a way for them all to live together in peace.
Criticizing college presidents for allowing angry
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I think the only conspiracy nuttery missing from that list is flat earth, otherwise I think you got them all.
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Frankly, I don't give a fuck. Realize that emotions don't mean jack shit in international politics, but they're quite useful to rile people.
Re:The correct response (Score:5, Insightful)
Unfortunately the university presidents responded to far-right Elise Stefanik too politely and actually attempted to answer the question. They should have said: "Is it free speech to riot on the US capitol that we're currently in to disrupt a democratic election and the peaceful transfer of power?" and "Does free speech including lying to the Congress, the voters and using campaign donations to get botox as George Santos, who you repeatedly defended, did?"
Whataboutism that’s used to distract from one’s own wrong is nothing but self-serving. Should Jan 6 or everything with George Santos have happened? Unequivocally no. Should calls for genocide go uncondemned? Unequivocally no. You don’t get to use someone else’s wrong to distract from your own, and anyone suggesting otherwise is suggesting that others’ sins should excuse theirs. Two wrongs do not equal a right.
Re:The correct response (Score:5, Interesting)
Therefore, she's just not a credible person to be asking these questions, and she did not ask them in good faith. My suggested responses don't say antisemitism is OK, but they point out her hypocrisy and lack of any real values.
Re: The correct response (Score:2)
Hmm.... (Score:2)
I see your Jewish Representative Santos and raise you American Indian Senator Elizabeth Warren...
https://www.snopes.com/fact-ch... [snopes.com]
Re: Hmm.... (Score:2)
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You're right in general, but...
No. The moment you say that someone doesn’t have enough “credibility” to call out the wrongdoing of your favored side is the moment you make yourself unaccountable to others.That’s not acceptable. You’re wrong sometimes. I’m wrong sometimes. You shouldn’t need to be right all the time to tell me that I’m wrong.
The fact is: we’re all hypocrites. And while I’ll agree that some are more than others, that doesn’t mean that they lack the standing
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Tu quoque fallacy.
Frankly, I find the OP here too amenable to the presidents. The question they were asked was clearly about genocide, not some other term that might be ambiguous, and when they said it would only be illegal if it turned into conduct (which was clarified to mean exactly that - committing genocide) they reiterated that it would only be illegal once they tried murdering people.
There's just no defense for these presidents. They have to go.
Re: The correct response (Score:5, Insightful)
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To moral people, unlike you, it's a crystal clear yes or no situation. If a white student picketed, shouting to send the n*****s back to Africa, they would be disciplined and likely expelled in a heartbeat. If they said, to send the blackies back, or even the African Americans back, to Africa, again discipline. If they kept cornering Black students and saying that their people are a bunch of lazy criminals and that's why so many Blacks are in prison, discipline.
It's all obviously racist.
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Ah, your great mastery of morality.....
Way to strawman here.
AND ot accuse me of racism as well...
Re: The correct response (Score:2)
Then she outsmarted them.
I've been around universities my whole adult life. The set of skills needed to bubble up to the top in these places is not the same as the set of skills needed to look good in a public debate in front of a representative sample of American citizens.
Ivory tower and all. It's quite real.
Re: The correct response (Score:5, Insightful)
It does seem a bit odd though. From universities where using the wrong pronouns constitutes actionable "abuse" [freebeacon.com], now comes a bunch of hair-splitting over whether chants about intifada are calls for the violence against Jews or not.
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I see you're a lawyer for the Nazis.
Re: The correct response (Score:5, Insightful)
I see you're a lawyer for the Nazis.
Even Nazis have a right to speak.
But the people chanting "from the river to the sea" aren't Nazis. They are mainly on the political left. Unless you think Greta Thunberg [gbnews.com] is a Nazi.
Like "genocide", the word "Nazi" is also being diluted into meaninglessness.
the kids are just ignorant, unsurprisingly (Score:5, Insightful)
But the people chanting "from the river to the sea" aren't Nazis.
The kids chanting it are mostly just ignorant.
When shown a map most changed their minds
The Wall Street Journal published an investigation the day after the hearing. A political science professor at the University of California, Berkeley hired a survey firm to poll 250 students across the U.S. from "a variety of backgrounds" — and the results were surprising:
A Latino engineering student from a southern university reported "definitely" supporting "from the river to the sea" because "Palestinians and Israelis should live in two separate countries, side by side." Shown on a map of the region that a Palestinian state would stretch from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea, leaving no room for Israel, he downgraded his enthusiasm for the mantra to "probably not." Of the 80 students who saw the map, 75% similarly changed their view... In all, after learning a handful of basic facts about the Middle East, 67.8% of students went from supporting "from the river to the sea" to rejecting the mantra. These students had never seen a map of the Mideast and knew little about the region's geography, history, or demography.
Kids these days...
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The kids chanting it are mostly just ignorant.
When shown a map most changed their minds
You see it as an excuse, and I see it as even a bigger problem - people with voting rights in a country with the biggest military on Earth, with unlimited, unrestricted and constant access to any information there is did not even bother to look at the map and as a result they practically called to exterminate the whole country. If they didn't even bother to take out a phone and check, how much do you think they educated themselves about the conflict history or about any issue whatsoever?
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The
FUCK
It
Isn't..
Re: The correct response (Score:5, Insightful)
The best response, which they appeared to be trying to say through the interruptions, is that universities should be bastions of free speech. If what is said is illegal, it is a matter for the police, not the administration. If the speech is not illegal, then it should be tolerated. Universities should not be in the business of suppressing legal speech.
If that's what they're trying to say, then they'd be lying through their fuckin teeth. Penn and Harvard scored second to last and dead last, respectively, in FIRE's rankings:
https://rankings.thefire.org/r... [thefire.org]
MIT is somewhere in the middle. All three have somewhat restrictive speech codes. As the heads of these schools, the buck stops at them. Given their schools already have a propensity towards controlling or otherwise limiting student speech, it's pretty damning that they're basically doing nothing about this.
Re: The correct response (Score:5, Insightful)
Way to ignore the rest of the argument.
"We don't need a 2 state solution.....Intifada Revolution""
So, in effect, what is being asked for is the death of Israel.
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This is what's known as "Accusing Others Of That Which You Are Guilty".
Feel free to deny it. You always will.
Because you don't actually CARE.
You just don't like the blowback of your appearance.
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Stefanik framing her questions the way she did and demanding a yes or no answer to them is exactly the same as asking someone if they have stopped beating their spouse yet.
Anyone demanding absolute and definitive answers in a yes/no format for questions that actually require answers with context is either stupid or doing it for a very specific reason and uses the format to get what they want.
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Yeah. It says that I'm against racism in any shape or form.
And it shouldn't NEED to be said.
But, apparently , these days, people are so fucking stupid and ideologically slanted that it apparently MUST.
Re: The correct response (Score:2)
There are still shops in Portland? I figured they'd have all been picked clean by how.
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Re: Republican view of 1st Amendment (Score:2)
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Disrupting classes, calling for the death of Jews, is not a right.
In the US, there few people calling directly for the death of Jews. There are some, but they few and they are all shouted down consistently. The argument is about calls that question the existence of the country of Israel. There are other ethnicities that we (as people, institutions, and governments) have absolutely no problem stating outright and repeatedly that they have no right to a country of their own: Kurds, Taiwanese, Basque, Sikhs. And these are just the ones that have openly called for their
Re: Israel Bad.. .enough said. (Score:2)
What's wrong with zionists?
Re: Israel Bad.. .enough said. (Score:3)
All of them? Including non-Jewish Zionists like John Adams and Martin Luther King? I'm an atheist and consider myself to be a Zionist.
On the contrary, staunch anti-Zionists tend to be assholes who think they're better than everybody else, including Arab Nationalists, White Nationalists, and Nation of Islam.
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Then again, anyone that can be played by Elise Stefanik is an idiot.
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Ah, yes, that old trope (Score:3)
Stolen lands? You mean the Jews stole ancient Israel (which existed thousands of years before Islam even arose) from the Muslims? And they "stole" it while fighting wars defending themselves from yet more attempts to wipe out the Jews?
Oh, and it you're going to say that Israel is not legitimate because it was only put on the maps recently by Europeans (which is false, Israel is on maps going back thousands of years, even the ancient Romans had such maps) then you're going to have to declare that places lik