That Starmer fella...

OK, let me be clear then. All of my comments are within the context of the criticism of Starmer for his swift response to McDonald.

If you're someone of Palestinian origin using the phrase, then I absolutely think there is space to have a nuanced opinion based on phasing and context.

I'm well aware of the whole sentence. It's still dumb af and he deserved suspension.

Fair enough it sounds like we weren't quite debating the same thing. I appreciate the time and thoughtful posts.

wouldn't waste my time with a strawman

I was literally responding to the only important thing you wrote, which was minimising the thoughts and feelings of those who feel attacked by a phrase so you could focus on those who either didn't care about it or wouldn't be subject to it.

and better yet, reply with something relevant to further the discussion that i hadn't talked about at legnth

We both agree you talked at length.

I'd suggest that it going to court does make it contentious, although not illegal.

I don't think anyone is suggesting there aren't a plurality of views but it just seems that given Labour's recent history of anti-semitism it isn't a sensible way to push the envelope. The same sentiment could have been expressed without that antagonistic phrasing.

You didn't seem to be discussing Israel's reach in the media generally, the reply was in context of this statement specifically. Which makes me wonder if it is even possible to boil this down to "Israeli view" or "Palestinian View" when it comes to how this phrase is used?

and a bunch of white power dickheads felt it integral to speaking about their oppression

It's not really a good analogy if the oppressed people in it are actually the oppressors, or maybe it is but things are in the wrong order.

If anyone feels the need to use a phrase which victimises others then they are the oppressors in that sense. They may be the oppressed in other senses of the word - I would certainly rather be Israeli than a Palestinian resident of the Gaza Strip - but I would suggest they're unlikely to be the subject of antisemitism, which is what we're talking about.

antisemitism, which is what we're talking about.

I think we're talking about whether a particular phrase is, or can be wholly written off as antisemitic, and whether someone should be punished for using some of the words in said phrase with a pretty obvious change. You bright in a phrase which isn't to do with antisemitism, compared it with a word changed and asked if it would be acceptable, but the one you mentioned has the next line including an overt racial slur and sending people back, the rivers to the sea one calls for a free country, there's ambiguity in the last one, it could certainly be seen as antisemitic in some circumstances, your analogy isn't great because it compares it to an outright racist chant, where you've changed one word but ignored some very racist other parts and focussed a whole argument on it, I think that's why Maj brought up a strawman. Sending people back is from a position of oppressive power, calling for freedom less so, but you have essentially compared people calling for a free Palestine to racists wanting people out of their country because of a bad analogy.

but you have essentially compared people calling for a free Palestine to racists wanting people out of their country because of a bad analogy

I agree with most of what you've written, but the negative of the phrase is not calling for a free Palestine, it's calling for wiping Israel off the map, and in turn Jews.

The reason the analogy doesn't work is because there is ambiguity.

I mean, white South Africans certainly felt victimised by the anti-apartheid movement, so I guess in that context Nelson Mandela was the oppressor.

Spear of the Nation, indeed. What was he thinking? Disgraceful really.

Good news for Keith as he attempts to triangulate between red (neck) wallies and agitated postal voters in England.. Latest polling in North Britain suggests 30 seats for nu (new) Labour..

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Keith?

FFS

I mean, white South Africans certainly felt victimised by the anti-apartheid movement, so I guess in that context Nelson Mandela was the oppressor.

The difference being that Nelson Mandela wasn't a heavily armed religious fanatic and didn't break into a peace festival and rape and torture to death thousands of civilians, before promising to do it again, several times.

This war is too complex to think one side is 100% oppressed and the other 100% oppressors. Anyone who tries to do that is selling something, and I'm not buying.

you have essentially compared people calling for a free Palestine to racists wanting people out of their country because of a bad analogy

If they have to use a racist phrase to call for a free palestine, I've no problem with that. I want a free palestine myself. But I don't use racist phrases to call for it. If I did, I would expect to be compared to other types of racist. That's why it isn't a straw man.

What IS a straw man is trying to muddy up the argument by pretending that I have a problem with the political position. I don't. I have a problem with when people express a political position in a racist way.

There is as much ambiguity in the phrase 'no black in the union jack' as there is in the phrase 'from the river to the sea'. And 'black' is not a slur.

And 'black' is not a slur.

Of course, but from my memory of that chant it carries on with "so send those p-words/n-words back" which is full on racist. The ambiguity in from the river to the sea is that it goes on to call for Palestine to be free, some awful antisemites mean for the destruction of Israel and Jews with this, but many don't as had been shown, and McDonald used some of the phrase with a pretty big caveat to show he was the latter, although I agree it wasn't sensible to use it at all with the ambiguity surrounding it.

^this was basically my feeling. Although I’m generally quite uncomfortable with the phrase, it seems to me he was trying to find a positive way of using it. It has backfired badly and in retrospect he shouldn’t have gone there.

some awful antisemites

It is a bit more than that isn't it? It is Hamas and PIJ, who conducted a horrendous atrocity against Jewish people on a scale that hasn't been seen since the Holocaust on 7th October.

It surprises me that some people can't find a way to express themselves in a way that doesn't rely on using a simple and reductive slogan. Surely they have the imagination to formulate expressions that aren't used in Hamas' constitution?

many don't

citation needed

as had been shown

citation needed

I'm not trying to be difficult here, you're clearly a decent person trying your best to be fair, but there IS a principle here.

My principle is that if a significant number of people from a particular oppressed group tell me a phrase is racist, I believe them. I don't go around trying to find other people from that oppressed group who think it isn't, I don't try to talk about how in SOME contexts it's OK, I don't talk about there being any ambiguity, I just stop using the phrase, and assume those who haven't either don't know its history, or don't care about being perceived as racist.

I don't apply that principle selectively based on whether the group is black, or Jewish, or female, or working class, or whatever it is. But for some reason with Jewish people, many people think it's OK to not apply that principle.

If a significant number of black people told us a phrase is racist, we wouldn't debate it - and certainly not less than a month after thousands of black people were slaughtered for the crime of being black. But there is a very different approach where Jewish people tell us that they think a phrase is racist. We feel OK to debate it. We shouldn't. I do not accept that there is ambiguity in that phrase, but even if I did, it was still a deeply stupid thing to say - as stupid as saying 'no black in the union jack' at a BLM rally.

Obviously not the same, and much like all in life there is no simple answer, but Mandela was no Saint (his own words). He founded and headed up the military wing of the ANC, was convicted of planning guerilla warfare and bombings (does the fact he was fighting apartheid offset that??? I don't know), was a communist party member and was on terrorist watchlists for the US up to the late 2000's.
He could be considered to have been heavily armed?

Still, he is one of the greatest men ever, a father to a nation and a hope and inspiration to millions to this day.

citation needed

Maj posted with citation on the previous page.
http://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2023/11/2/from-the-river-to-the-sea-what-does-the-palestinian-slogan-really-mean

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/oct/31/from-the-river-to-the-sea-where-does-the-slogan-come-from-and-what-does-it-mean-israel-palestine

The first two results when I Google the phrase also show many don't think it's racist, many do, it's ambiguous. It doesn't contain anything that is racist without context, there are no slurs, no outright calls anything other than freedom and a place. I do listen to the people who say it's antisemitic, I wouldn't be chanting it anywhere, McDonald as a public figure should've been more aware and said something else. You're still wrong too compare it to "no black in the union jack" as the next line chanted includes both a racial slur and a direct call for sending them back, no-one claims that isn't racist, there's no ambiguity, words taken alone without context are racist within it. Using the analogy of changing a word within it (not even the slur, which you completely gloss over) and chanting it at a BLM rally is a strawman arguement, even the situation is different.

I mean, Nelson Mandela was heavily armed and did lead a terrorist campaign that killed innocent people, so by your own (deranged) logic he was doing a bit of oppressing.

Anyway, your original point was that simply chanting “from the river to the sea” constitutes a Palestinian doing an oppression of Israel. My - admittedly mostly fatuous rejoinder - was not about the armed struggle conducted by uMkhonto we Sizwe, but that the simple fact of the name “Spear of the Nation” and the language that they used was considered threatening to white South Africans, and they perceived it as an existential threat.

And of course, a settler nation will always perceive the language of liberation as an existential threat. Palestinians could chant “we’d like a cheese sandwich with our freedom please” and someone would tell you it’s a grave offence. Expecting the subjugated to express their desire for freedom in a manner that doesn’t offend their subjugators strikes me as perverse at best.

And yes, hamas are vile and their actions unconscionable, but to suggest they are oppressing the occupiers, who happen to be one of the world’s most advanced military powers, just suggests a gross misunderstanding of the structural nature of oppression.

And yes, hamas are vile and their actions unconscionable, but to suggest they are oppressing the occupiers, who happen to be one of the world’s most advanced military powers, just suggests a gross misunderstanding of the structural nature of oppression.

The structural nature of oppression means that people who may oppress in one context can be oppressed in another. That's literally the point of intersectionality - not to simply divide up the whole world into two camps, the oppressed and the oppressors, but to look at the specific kinds of discrimination specific groups suffer as a result of things that're beyond their control.

Again, someone who lives in Gaza may be oppressed in other ways but they are unlikely to suffer from antisemitism. And antisemitism is what we're talking about in relation to 'from the river to the sea'.

EDIT Who did Nelson Mandela rape torture and kill btw? Bearing in mind that the acts carried out by the ANC during the 60s did not - as far as I can work out - kill anyone, but targeted governmental infrastructure, and their bombing campaigns in the 1980s were carried out while Mandela had been in prison for several decades.

the rainbow sheep simply exists in this thread to engage in debate pervertry, i wouldn't feed them.

spend your time reading elsewhere, plenty of good and valuable sources linked by people to make your own mind up. also plenty of marches, sit ins and action coming up to get involved in or maybe go speak to a neighbour.

there might be a ride out in your town:

https://twitter.com/bigride4pal/status/1719790723522802021/photo/1

another day of action is coming up:

https://palestinecampaign.org/events/day-of-action-for-palestine-ceasefire-now/

go, speak and stand with people at these events, you'll meet palestinians, allies, jewish people, muslim people, israelis, a whole host of people, might change your mind or make you sympathetic in a way you hadn't realised, certainly has done so for me over the years

you can also give to a fundraiser here, organised by @Browndonneur

https://www.justgiving.com/page/cyclists4palestine

just going to relink some stuff on the phrase by jewish and palestinian voices, as some readers missed these.

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/

i also found these two articles really helpful:

https://forward.com/opinion/564190/hamas­-charter-truth/

https://forward.com/opinion/565515/jewis­h-grief-war-hamas-gaza-israel/

some accounts i've found good compasses for international conflicts:

https://twitter.com/BarnabyRaine

https://twitter.com/AyoCaesar

https://twitter.com/rivkahbrown

https://www.instagram.com/moya_lm/?hl=en

there are a lot more out there, some users have linked some others that touch on different view points, they'll offer far more insight than a thread on the bike forum if anyone reading is unsure on it all but wants to learn more and have a view on it all. ✌️

And antisemitism is what we're talking about in relation to 'from the river to the sea'.

Whilst ignoring the fact that a lot of people use it as a call for freedom from a specific oppression Sure if you focus fully on whether people find it antisemitic, you will find that people find it antisemitic.
I still think your analogy is bad, I don't really think there are useful analogies here but I'd say if yours is in anyway correct, it's equally similar to people claiming that those chanting "black lives matter" on said rally are racist. Many people have claimed it, people in governments included, that analogy resembles this situation too but it's not the same and doesn't prove "from the river to the sea" isn't antisemitic because BLM isn't racist, that would also be a strawman arguement, this situation is more complicated than that, the phrase had been used in antisemitic ways, but isn't inherently so. All lives matter has certainly been used in racist ways, isn't really something that you'd want to be saying if you're a public figure discussing a related tpoic, but the phrase itself isn't inherently racist and even that's not a great analogy.

You would never get people On Here debating whether or not All Lives Matter was a racist dogwhistle. Not in a million years. Only where Jewish people are the victims is it OK to doubt lived experience, and usually by people who think of themselves as being anti-racist, and on the left.

Incidentally, @Maj, Rivkah Brown, who you referred to above as your 'compass' on these kinds of issues, referred to the rape and slaughter of 1500 Jewish people by Hamas just four short weeks ago in the following terms:

"Today should be a day of celebration for supporters of democracy and human rights worldwide, as Gazans break out of their open-air prison and Hamas fighters cross into their colonisers' territory. The struggle for freedom is rarely bloodless and we shouldn't apologise for it."

If she's your compass I see why you've ended up where you've ended up.