That Starmer fella...

The main thing is to look like we care

Ouch. Probably clumsy drafting, but a proper Freudian slip there.

And yet...

https://yougov.co.uk/politics/articles/47735-more-trust-starmer-than-corbyn-on-israel-palestine

I think the call for politicians to look at half a picture on the screen without the full information and form an instant judgement as to whether it’s this side of the line or the other side of the line is extremely unwise. I’m not going to get involved with that kind of exercise.

A cynic might suggest that he's being somewhat disingenuous, and has made up his mind, long before this latest situation, where it concerns Israel's dealings with Palestine.

people who make "from the river to the sea palestine will be free is racist" arguments in the way people have above. clumsy analogies of "it's like making this racist antiblack statement", reminds me a lot of terfs trans exclusionary radical feminists when they're like "transgender is like pretending your black". both rely on an radical, typically white, liberal position based in reactionary thinking and no material understanding of racism or colonialism (let alone gender studies).

it relies on taking an issue and flattening it to being viewed through a western colonialist lense, a lense where america and its allies are furiously working for our safety, a lense where everyone speaking out against those goals is a terrorist/ commie/ homosexual. a lense where racism is "racism or not racism" and the idea of intersectionality or inter community dialogue doesn't exist in the mind of those making the analogies. the only thing that exists is the interests of the coloniser.

it is a divisive term, plenty of israeli, jewish and secular people on the right and centre find it inflamatory; describe it as racist. however the position widely documented in anti racist/ progressive circles, academics, theological teachers, organising groups (jewish, israeli, palestinian, muslim, secular) is "it's fine... we actually have a lot of thoughts on it and are willing to defend it but also understand and explain why people might draw issue". to come back to the trans analogy it's actually a lot more like "cis" or "cis-woman" - plenty of people you probably find v reasonable and agreeable, prehaps progressive, would describe cis as a slur, and you might be swayed by their argument, you might even tell a trans person to change their language, you might call for an mp to accept their suspension for fanning the flames, but you'd be wrong. it's just a term, can mean a whole lot of things depending how it's used. it's a term a whole bunch of trans people, non trans people, professionals and accedmemics find important

there are freaks on all sides ofc, willing to do and say genocidal things, willing to use words of any people to justify their own interests, plenty of people who defend the term will be first to admit this. you do not have to look far to see jewish and palestinian voices who disagree with "it's a racist term" and offer nuanced perspectives of it instead.

https://forward.com/opinion/415250/from-the-river-to-the-sea-doesnt-mean-what-you-think-it-means/

https://www.jewishvoiceforlabour.org.uk/article/from-the-river-to-the-sea/

https://jewishcurrents.org/what-does-from-the-river-to-the-sea-really-mean

https://novaramedia.com/2023/10/18/dutch-court-rules-from-the-river-to-the-sea-protected-speech-and-not-antisemitic/

this binary position strips not only palestinians of the right to be able to define themselves and their history. it strips the right of jewish people to define themselves, their experience, their fears, their criticism of israel less they be told they're "not jewish, antisemitic, or don't undertand". it strips muslims of their right to protest, campaign, and voice heart wrenching pain as they see brothers and sisters bombed, only to be seen as "terrorist sympathisers" or scared to google certain things less they end up on a list. it treats israelis as this singular block of people who have a sigular understanding of themselves, their faith and their interpretation of what peace looks like.

but this is the intention of the binary, liberal view of racism, it's so we do not discuss postcolonial thought or critical race theory. it absorbs the discussion of racism into the support of colonialist thought. it then can be used to help justify the ongoing bombing in gaza and the westbank among other colonial projects by western states. all these things do is ensure they can run forever war over any target they can dehuminise effectively. a forever war which makes us all, but especially jewish and muslim people, far less safe and prone to violence.

Is that right? I'm basing my view that it's potentially a difficult phrase from the view among Jewish people, not making my own view. I'm not trying to deny them agency, I'm saying that if at least a reasonable proportion of Jewish people consider it to have antisemitic connotations (not without any reason - there is history of it being used by antisemitic groups who do want to eradicate Jews from the area), then surely it's better to avoid it?

I don't see how that's denying the right of Jewish people to define themselves - ignoring the views of those who find the phrase offensive and using it anyway might be though.

It's amazing how people who immediately saw the problem with the Labour right invoking tropes about Diane Abbott being an 'angry black woman' in private conversations have such difficulty identifying the problem with a similarly problematic trope used openly by one of their ideological allies at a rally in public during wartime and following a judgement by the EHRC that Labour was institutionally racist.

Almost like this is a factional issue rather than one of principle.

A cynic might suggest that he's being somewhat disingenuous, and has made up his mind, long before this latest situation, where it concerns Israel's dealings with Palestine.

I don't think that's cynical. Given the gutter Labour were in with regard to Jewish people in general and Israel in particular a few years ago, there has to be a period of correction. Is it likely that Starmer has overcorrected? Maybe. Did he handle the question about the sieges badly? Absolutely. Would it have been better for him to have openly admitted all this and made a slight change to his position to remove any doubt? 100%.

But those who have spent the last four years calling him a flip flopper, and accusing him of going back on his promises, and being someone you can't trust - well, that's also a factor here. If you don't want to accept that a leader might change their mind when the facts change, then you have to adhere to that principle consistently. His stick-up-the-arsedness about this is at least in part done to avoid such accusations. Well,those people have what they said they wanted - consistency, even if the principle is wrong.

i don't believe you are making your own view andy,

but i do think you're individualising it when we're speaking about the structure systemically. this is a classic struggle people have when they're introduced to postcolonial theory/crt/feminism/gender studies. a struggle that's often capitalised on to discredit the perspective.

think "not all men" and "white lives matter" - common response for other examples of this way of thinking. where people individualise their daily concious interactions (which are often considered and healthy) and often not their structural position or unconcious actions (which we may have less control over)

when we talk about this we're not talking about concious individual actions of those with no material power or influence, but millions of actions which all add up or single actions of those with material power.

it's why i'm careful not to direct reply to people, as we're all capable of unconcious bias / thought and changing ones opinion with new information should be encouraged and applauded.

i also agree with you, a reasonable proportion of jewish people do consider the phrasing harmful, but also a reasonable proportion of jewish people do not, an overwhelming number of palestinian people see it as integrel to speaking about their oppression who couldn't give 2 fucks about hamas and didn't vote for them, so when in these situations we look explaining why this might be we should give a voice to all these perspectives then use a suitible framework to analyse them. which is the intention of stuff like postcolonial theory and CRT.

The FA guidance on this (admittedly not the most progressive of organisations but indicates a direction of thought) is that "River to the Sea" is considered offensive.

https://twitter.com/RobHarris/status/1719683713456386298

It just seems like one of those easy to avoid things that if you're not sure it is probably wise to steer clear.

It just seems like one of those easy to avoid things that if you're not sure it is probably wise to steer clear.

Cut and keep operational guide to the culture wars.

a reasonable proportion of jewish people do consider the phrasing harmful, but also a reasonable proportion of jewish people do not, an overwhelming number of palestinian people see it as integrel to speaking about their oppression who couldn't give 2 fucks about hamas and didn't vote for them

You're entitled to your opinion, of course, but I think you're making a lot of assumptions here.

If I were to say about a phrase such as 'aint no black in the union jack' that a reasonable amount of black people found it offensive, another reasonable amount didn't, and a bunch of white power dickheads felt it integral to speaking about their oppression - well, you'd give me short shift, right? And you'd be right to. Because when looking at a phrase that people find offensive, only one thing matters: do the people at whom it is directed generally find it offensive?

If so, probably better not to use it.

Feel like this analogy might function better if it weren’t comparing the Palestinian people to white power dickheads.

Seems kinda racist imo.

Let's take every one of your points as agreed.

Given the issues with antisemitism under Corbyn, is it reasonable to suspend and investigate a white English guy of Christian-Scottish origin when they use a phase many Jewish people view as antisemitic?

Feel like this analogy might function better if it weren’t comparing an old white guy the Palestinian people to white power dickheads.

And the Dutch courts recently ruled it to be not antisemitic and count as protected free speech: https://elsc.support/news/victory-from-the-river-to-the-sea-is-protected-speech-dutch-court-rules

Almost like there’s a plurality of views around this, but the Israeli position is better represented than the Palestinian one.

Except the convo here is about the general use of the phrase so nah

Also, can we remind ourselves of the exact phrase that MacDonald used please? Talking of river to sea is not uncommon in this context - you can find the same phrasing in the original party platform of the Likud party FFS.

the Israeli position is better represented than the Palestinian one

If that's right (and I'm not sure it is) then wouldn't that be reasonable anyway - if the question is whether a statement is antisemitic, then I'd suggest the views of Jews should be given most precedence?

To put it another way, given you know it is viewed by many Jews as offensive, why not just find another phrase to support Palestinians (which noone is saying you can't or shouldn't do)?

Eh? "We're talking about the phrase generally"

"Let's get back to exactly what the individual said"

That

1) Maj was having a general conversation about the use of the phrase “from the river to the sea”

does not preclude

2) pointing out that MacDonald’s suspension is an act of laughable cowardice

i would apreciate it if you were going to reply to me directly you wouldn't waste my time with a strawman and better yet, reply with something relevant to further the discussion that i hadn't talked about at legnth. that might be too much to ask from someone who's spent many years seemingly existing soley in this thread and worrying about home renovation.

seems i missed the reply button, @ReekBlefs

Thanks for the reply. I do get the difference between societal structure and individual interactions, I'm just not sure why my view on this falls within that framework. Completely understand there are a plurality of views on this, but I guess that's my point - given that is the case, I don't understand why we don't take the more cautious approach (like I'm sure most of us would in almost any other case where something could be viewed as racist)

If that’s right…

Israel’s representation in western media has always been more positive and always will be more positive than the Palestinian representation.

Unrelated to this particular issue, where I happen to agree with your last point.
However, history tells me to expect that any phrase used in support of Palestinians could and would and has been interpreted as anti-Semitic.
Support for Palestine and Palestinians always draw this response, and always will.
As discussed elsewhere, at length, it serves no-one.

sorry, i want to be clear, my issue isn't with the internal machinations of the labour party, ultimately they do what they want and they're accountable for it,

my issue is the flattening of antiracist rhetoric between farcical examples which ignore the context that islamphobia and antisemitism have both plagued britain, and continue to do so, for years, often at times deliberately made to be in competition with each other for their own interests

i'm also not suggesting people should or shouldn't use the phrase in question - but merely rejecting that the ol "this is just like x" has had a poor outcome for marginalised groups historically and especially is not helpful to solving either anti black racism or other forms of racism. for reasons briefly mentioned above.

(exscuse me if my language or brief, or can be clippled in certain ways, i'm on a bike forum not in uni)

If that's right

Like, if you don’t think that Israel has greater reach in the propaganda war (especially in the west) then I’m not sure what can be said.

i agree with you, personally i'm a bit overly cautious myself in wording i use, which is probably why i seek to link to other people saying it who are affected by this stuff and not just my own word.

as i mentioned to hugo, i just sort of reject this flattening of critical theory which has not only hurt racial minorities and ethnicities, but also queer people like myself when we resort to binary articulations. im also painfully aware how limiting the pursuit of optics or tone correcting can be when an marginalised group is trying to find words for what is happening to it. if we're going to talk about these things, educate ourselves on them, often the outcomes of atrocities our own history has caused, i feel we have a duty to give them the care they deserve and sometimes make unpopular observations.