I find it particularly challenging to know what is the most ‘effective’ or ‘rational’ in this situation. To me, it seems that a relatively good thing to do personally for myself is to raise awareness in my circle about the amount of suffering and death facing Palestinians right now.
I was thinking that it would be easier to talk to relatively more rational or empathetic people, or to people in countries where free speech is generally considered a given right—such as the UK and the US. But so far, I feel quite weirded out by bringing up the Palestinian side of the argument in both of these countries and Western Europe in general because I find people on this issue to be incredibly biased, consciously or subconsciously.
I am recognizing that there is bias on the Palestinian side as well and that some people in the movement (by no means all) do not condemn Hamas and the October 7th attack. But I do think that the pro-Israeli bias is much more prominent. There are particular groups of people who I found especially pro-Israeli without considering enough opposing evidence to their opinion, and it becomes confusing and hard to talk to people from these specific groups.
By no means do I want to generalize this to all members of the group, but I think certain cultural views predispose people to bias to one side of the argument to the point that there is less room for rational review of evidence available. An obvious group I couldn’t communicate with are some of the Evangelical Christians in the US, who use spiritual rather than empirical justifications. A less obvious group is many Germans, who tend to be sensitive towards antisemitism and Israel due to their country’s despicable past but do not extend the same level of empathy towards Palestinians. This is a particularly challenging bias that applies sensitivity to a certain group rather than sensitivity towards the extent of ‘bad things’ that can happen to another group. Another particularly challenging hypocrisy I encountered is people who would be ‘pro-peace’ and oppose sending arms to Ukraine or hesitate from publically denouncing Russia (the Israeli government famously didn’t send any weapons to Ukrainians) but would deem it problematic to stop sending arms to Israel.
That being said, I understand that someone’s background is not a unique contributor to their views or biases. I know many Israelis who have quite moderate stances on the current situation, but also many now-Israelis from my country and elsewhere from the former USSR who have one of the most extremist views I have ever encountered.
The point is, it seems to me that with some people no amount of evidence would change their opinion about Palestine even if they are relatively rational otherwise. It makes me wonder how much can be done.
I want Israel to exist and keep being an innovative and forward-thinking country, but without recognizing and fixing crimes against humanity there is no room for advancement. I also think all hostages should be released unconditionally, but I also attend pro-Palestine marches because I don’t think anything can ever justify 14,000 + innocent victims being murdered. I condemn any justification of the October 7th attacks, precisely because people who suffered from these attacks have nothing to do with Israeli colonialism at large. Any attempt to justify this to me is as troubling as justifying any other horrible event and is not very compatible with EA values.
I find it particularly challenging to know what is the most ‘effective’ or ‘rational’ in this situation. To me, it seems that a relatively good thing to do personally for myself is to raise awareness in my circle about the amount of suffering and death facing Palestinians right now.
I was thinking that it would be easier to talk to relatively more rational or empathetic people, or to people in countries where free speech is generally considered a given right—such as the UK and the US. But so far, I feel quite weirded out by bringing up the Palestinian side of the argument in both of these countries and Western Europe in general because I find people on this issue to be incredibly biased, consciously or subconsciously.
I am recognizing that there is bias on the Palestinian side as well and that some people in the movement (by no means all) do not condemn Hamas and the October 7th attack. But I do think that the pro-Israeli bias is much more prominent. There are particular groups of people who I found especially pro-Israeli without considering enough opposing evidence to their opinion, and it becomes confusing and hard to talk to people from these specific groups.
By no means do I want to generalize this to all members of the group, but I think certain cultural views predispose people to bias to one side of the argument to the point that there is less room for rational review of evidence available. An obvious group I couldn’t communicate with are some of the Evangelical Christians in the US, who use spiritual rather than empirical justifications. A less obvious group is many Germans, who tend to be sensitive towards antisemitism and Israel due to their country’s despicable past but do not extend the same level of empathy towards Palestinians. This is a particularly challenging bias that applies sensitivity to a certain group rather than sensitivity towards the extent of ‘bad things’ that can happen to another group. Another particularly challenging hypocrisy I encountered is people who would be ‘pro-peace’ and oppose sending arms to Ukraine or hesitate from publically denouncing Russia (the Israeli government famously didn’t send any weapons to Ukrainians) but would deem it problematic to stop sending arms to Israel.
That being said, I understand that someone’s background is not a unique contributor to their views or biases. I know many Israelis who have quite moderate stances on the current situation, but also many now-Israelis from my country and elsewhere from the former USSR who have one of the most extremist views I have ever encountered.
The point is, it seems to me that with some people no amount of evidence would change their opinion about Palestine even if they are relatively rational otherwise. It makes me wonder how much can be done.
I want Israel to exist and keep being an innovative and forward-thinking country, but without recognizing and fixing crimes against humanity there is no room for advancement. I also think all hostages should be released unconditionally, but I also attend pro-Palestine marches because I don’t think anything can ever justify 14,000 + innocent victims being murdered. I condemn any justification of the October 7th attacks, precisely because people who suffered from these attacks have nothing to do with Israeli colonialism at large. Any attempt to justify this to me is as troubling as justifying any other horrible event and is not very compatible with EA values.