I strongly urge you to read Coleman Hughes’ absolutely outstanding “The Struggle for Black Freedom Has Nothing to Do with Israel (substack.com)”. In case you wonder, Coleman Hughes is a young African-American male.
Here's a rational Palestinian
perspective that does little to counter Mr. Hughes’ article, but provides balance
to your reading. It emphasizes the significant
residential separation between Arabs and Jews in Israel. However, contrary to an apartheid state, these
separations are despite government efforts as opposed to directed by the
government. The Israeli government has
tried to avoid segregated communities, but the Israeli Supreme Court has ruled
that the government cannot constrain where citizens choose to live. Voluntary (and very incomplete) segregation
is not apartheid.
I just subscribed to Coleman Hughes’
blog for $70/year. As a result, you can
subscribe for $50/year by clicking here: https://substack.com/accept-pub-credit?credit_token_referring_user=kfr7e&utm_campaign=invite-friends-credits-share&utm_content=give-credit&pub=1247192.
Mr. Hughes could also have made
these
additional points:
- Discrimination
against Arabs is forbidden in Israel, whereas Hamas oppresses women, gays, apostates, and infidels and treats other Gazans differently than Hamas members.
- Arab
Israeli citizens do not have to serve in the military, whereas Jewish Israelis
must serve at least two years.
- Both Arab
Israelis and Jewish Israelis get their respective religious holidays off work.
- Arab
Israelis desired and received their own public schools, but they can send their children to
mixed schools or Jewish-run schools (Jews can also send their children to Arab-run schools).
- Palestinian Israeli citizens retain their Israeli citizenship forever (as do their children.
Why are so many college administrators, faculty and students spouting fatuous defenses of Hamas and criticisms of Israel? The only explanation I've been able to come up with is that it seems those administrators, faculty and students are victims of a USA education system that has indoctrinated them, teaching them particular ways to look at the world instead of a more objective openness to evidence. What else could explain it? Of course, that is coupled with the tendency of humans, particularly teenagers, to join faddish protests enthusiastically, even if they lack knowledge of the issues.
Why are so many of our teachers left-wing?
In colleges, left-wing faculty have
consistently hired like-minded peers.
The current DEI statements increase that ideological bias, but it has existed
for a long time. When I entered Yale in
the mid-1960s, I was among the most “progressive” students, yet observed that
conservative ideas seemed less well received by faculty than liberal ideas.
It K-12 schools, it seems likely to partly be because business
professions and the teaching profession have natural selection. Capitalist-minded people are more likely to
go into business, reducing the pool of potential conservative teachers. Likewise, people who dislike business are
more likely to go into teaching. Partly,
it is because our K-12 teachers came through our educational system. There may also be a hiring bias.
I'm a huge fan of public education and I think we have a lot of wonderful teachers of all political stripes. I'm not criticizing most teachers, but rather the overall tendency of the educational system. We create difficult working situations for our teachers and our teachers' unions seem more concerned with ideology and protecting their turf, than with educational success. Any time you get a lot of like-minded people together, group-think can encourage subtle biases.
If you’ve read my educational blog,
you know that I would like to establish summer business internships for teachers,
primarily so that they could counsel students more effectively as regards career
choices and preparation. A secondary
advantage is that it would improve their perception of business and capitalism.
After I wrote the above, there was a Congressional hearing on December 5, 2023 in which senators grilled the presidents of Harvard (Claudine Gay), the University of Pennsylvania (Elizabeth Magill) and MIT (Sally Kornbluth).
Many people were appalled that the presidents took the position that, as Ms. Gay said, "When (CT: i.e., "Not until") that speech crosses into conduct that violates our policies, including policies against bullying, harrassment and intimidation, we take action."
Defending free speech is critical and it is better to err on the side of allowing too much free speech than too little. The problem is not so much that they allowed the Hamas-supporting speech, it is the following:
1) Unequal protection of free speech. People using undesired pronouns, those who believe that men and women might have different talents in general, those who have conservative economic beliefs, etc. often do not enjoy the free speech that was accorded to the Hamas supporters.
2) One-sided education. As reported in the Wall Street Journal on Dec. 6, 2023, one Harvard student said he could not understand the negative reaction as four Harvard classes had assigned readings from Franz Fanon that made it clear that Hamas/Israeli conflict can be simply seen as fighting colonialization. This student was not alone.
I have no problem with students reading Franz Fanon. He was a bright guy with challenging thoughts. I’m not expert in Franz Fanon. Although I think people’s perspectives are complicated, hence “experts” may not always interpret a person’s position accurately, I am quite willing to accept that Fanon would have been supportive of Hamas. However, why is he reading Fanon in four classes, apparently without being exposed to contrary thought? Had he been exposed to contrary thought, I don’t think he would have been shocked by the criticism. It seems that Harvard is teaching Fanon as an article of faith. Of course, I might be wrong.
3) As noted above, it is the role of the adults on campus that is of greater concern.
