Tag Archives: news

Identity Politics and the Twilight of the Idols

Posted on by under Election 2024

Though I’ve never voted for Trump and never will, the Trump campaign can be “credited,” if that’s the right word, with a pair of useful things, both related to the same underlying thing. The underlying thing is ethnic identity politics, and the two things are the taboos regarding what you can say about it.

Taboo #1 is that you’re not allowed to attribute dual loyalties to members of an ethnic identity. Every ethnicity is axiomatically assumed to be loyal to Uncle Sam and the Stars and Stripes.

Taboo #2 is that you’re not allowed to wonder whether there there are any non-accidental connections between certain ethnic identities and, say, reactionary politics. The axiom here is that whatever the other differences between them, every ethnicity–or, every ethnicity in America–fundamentally pledges allegiance to freedom, equality, and the happy, smiling ideal of being a good neighbor. We may eat different foods, or attend different houses of worship, or wear different clothes, or make sure to marry within different demographics, but at the end of the day, we’re all the same.

The upside of watching Muslims line up to endorse and vote for Trump is that we can say good-bye and good riddance to both of these delusions. Continue reading →

Fajr Scientific Banned from Gaza

Posted on by under EVS Journal, Health Care Series, Palestine

Two weeks ago, I posted here on Fajr Scientific’s Gaza Medical Evacuation Initiative. I’ve just learned that the initiative has been canceled, as the Israeli government has now banned Fajr from operating in Gaza. This decision comes a few weeks after the release, by 99 physicians associated with Fajr and similar medical organizations, of an Open Letter to President Biden and Vice President Harris, providing medical testimony and forensic evidence that the Israeli military had, among other things, been executing Gazan children by shooting them directly in the head and chest.

From the letter (bold type in original): 

Children are universally considered innocents in armed conflict. However, every single signatory to this letter saw children in Gaza who suffered violence that must have been deliberately directed at them. Specifically, every one of us who worked in an emergency, intensive care, or surgical setting treated pre-teen children who were shot in the head or chest on a regular or even a daily basis. It is impossible that such widespread shooting of young children throughout Gaza, sustained over the course of an entire year is accidental or unknown to the highest Israeli civilian and military authorities.

Here is the appendix to the letter. This article contains images of X-rays showing bullets lodged in children’s heads and throat (the trajectory in the latter case being through the forehead). Here’s a link to The New York Times essay discussing the evidence (may be paywalled). Continue reading →

No One is to Advocate Anything Until I Blow This Whistle

Posted on by under cancel culture, Fatwas, moralism, Palestine

The New York Times has a click-baitish headline about Hamas on the front page, except that unlike most click-bait headlines, this one happens both to be click-bait and true.

“Pro-Palestinian Group at Columbia Now Backs ‘Armed Resistance’ by Hamas”

It’s true. They do. Of course, at this point, a headline like that is a bit like one ca. 1943 that said:

“Pro-Jewish Group at Columbia Now Backs ‘Armed Resistance’ by Stalin’s Red Army”

Or, how about, ca. 1944: Continue reading →

Vote Like It Matters

Posted on by under Election 2024

It’s become a cliché of philosophical commentary on the ethics of voting that voting is prima facie irrational. If you vote as an individual, your vote represents a mere 1/n of the totality of the election, where n represents the total number of voters in the election. If we consider, say, national elections in the United States, then n will be a very large number. Since it is, 1/n represents a tiny number. The tiny number represents a given individual’s contribution to the overall electoral result, the implication being that each individual’s contribution is, qua individual, de minimis. It’s so small that it seems irrational to bother with it. The effort you put in is not worth the result that comes out. Continue reading →

Arrested Princeton Students’ Statement on Court Appearance

Posted on by under cancel culture, General announcements, Palestine

Princeton, New Jersey 
5 months ago, 15 of us were arrested for protesting the University’s complicity in the ongoing genocide against the people of Gaza. 2 of us—both graduate students—were arrested on the 25th of April minutes after the launch of the Gaza Solidarity Encampment. 13 of us—Princeton students, researchers, and affiliates—were arrested on the 29th of April for participating in a peaceful protest in a University administrative building. At the time of our arrests, the university barred us from campus and evicted us from university housing, all without formal disciplinary charges. Weeks later, the university conducted a “disciplinary investigation” and sanctioned us with four years of disciplinary probation. One of us, postdoctoral researcher Sam Nastaste, remains barred from campus. These measures are far harsher than Princeton’s response to previous campus protests. 
Continue reading →

REPUBLICAN FREEDOM WITHOUT NON-DOMINATION?

Posted on by under Uncategorized

How much of republicanism can we get without making any essential reference to domination? Maybe quite a lot. 

First, whatever job the government has, if carrying out this job requires substantial power that is liable to abuse, then part of your political ideal should be republican democracy (and you should be very leery of even putatively ideally benevolent dictators). In particular, you might want a high level of assurance, born in part through moral recognition, that the government or government officials will not behave like the criminals that they are supposed to protect us against (supposing that this, at least, is part of the job that governments have). Just say no to a charter city run by Elon Musk or whatever.

Continue reading →