Gaza Dada, by Mike Gold – Brainiac On Banjo #373 | @MDWorld
August 4, 2014 Mike Gold 4 Comments
It’s nearly impossible to discuss the Gaza War without instantly entering the polarization zone. Damn near everybody’s gone to Defcon 2-level volatility. I totally understand why some folks roll up their sleeves, clap their hands and back away from the discussion, but these are the times when considered, intelligent opinions must be shared and discussed.
Instead, you are stuck with me.
I don’t particularly value the lives of children over that of their elders: dead is dead, and anything other than natural causes is a bad death. I realize that, in the eyes of some, this makes me a cross between Simon Legree and John Wayne Gacy, but to my considerable experience most people who express their opinions in the terms of “we’re doing it for the children” are building a wall that discourages debate lest the challengers be perceived as anti-child. Feh. Children are the hope for the future only where there is a future.
Here’s a whole bunch of realities: Children die in war. Adults die in war. Soldiers die in war. All of them die needlessly – each and every one of them, no matter how “good” the war. War won’t go away; that’s the most obvious proof of Darwinism. In war there is no right and wrong, there is only death and destruction. In the middle of a war, there is only the fight for survival, and that means killing those who are out to kill you. That’s no different than taking shelter from a hurricane.
The two final realities: Number one, war sucks. Number two, there’s nothing we can do about that. Sorry, idealists, but we have to acknowledge our limitations. The human race has not evolved past our monkeybrain lust for war.
War over turf and property is lousy, but war over religion is worse. There is no room for compromise. It’s like the abortion “debate” here in the States: both sides are entrenched in their own beliefs – this includes me – and there is no way to have just a little bit of abortion. In that sense, I acknowledge those who are opposed to abortion under any circumstances to be totally honest to their beliefs, even though I disagree with those beliefs. If you define a fetus as a baby (note: I did not say “living being”), then it doesn’t matter if the fetus is the result of rape or incest. Can you be anti-abortion and pro-war? Not if you define anti-abortion as “pro-life.”
Hiding arms, bombs, missiles and soldiers in buildings or neighborhoods that house
civilians is, quite literally, a war crime. It is an evil, ugly, cynical thing to do. There’s nothing original about Hamas doing this – it’s a cowardly tactic that goes back to the year Gimmel and has been deployed in Iran and Syria whenever somebody tries to liberate those nations from what they call (and might very well be) Sunni or Shiite tyranny.
Taking out places that house arms, bombs, missiles and soldiers is a necessary defensive move. Those arms, bombs, missiles and soldiers are being used to kill you, your family, your friends, and your children. All acts of war should be used only as a last resort, but of all those, this is the final resort.
Sadly, the Gaza War is at that point of final resort. That’s a reality, and only the insane or the zealot would think that a society should commit mass suicide by not defending itself. This is why I don’t understand pacifism… and why pacifism has little to do with war.
First and foremost, the Gaza War is a battle of public relations. Hamas sticks their arms, bombs, missiles and soldiers in areas such as schools and hospitals, the Israelis take them down, Hamas shows the footage all across the world and Jews get ripped a new one for blowing up kids. Yes, I said “Jews” and not “Israelis” and I did so because the reality is that Jews, Israelis, and Zionists long have been conflated. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion remains well distributed and strongly believed by fools and bigots worldwide. Right now the French are criminalizing pro-Israel organizations but not pro-Palestinian groups. Hamas does not recognize the sovereignty of Israel, Israel wants to be both safe and around, and Americans who do not believe Israel has that right to exist are hypocrites.
Personally, and I’ve said this so often that readers can sing along, I believe in freedom of religion and therefore I find theocracies to be horribly wrong. All of them, be they Palestine, Israel, the United States, or anywhere else.
Unless the frogs and locusts return.
Mike Gold performs the weekly two-hour Weird Sounds Inside The Gold Mind ass-kicking rock, blues and blather radio show on The Point, www.getthepointradio.com and on iNetRadio, www.iNetRadio.com as part of “Hit Oldies” every Sunday at 7:00 PM Eastern, rebroadcast three times during the week – check www.getthepointradio.com above for times and on-demand streaming information. Gold also joins MDW’s Marc Alan Fishman, Martha Thomases and Michael Davis as a weekly columnist at www.comicmix.com where he pontificates on matters of four-color.
Rick Oliver
August 5, 2014 - 9:33 am
Not dissimilar to Sam Harris’ analysis of the conflict. His is just much longer:
http://www.samharris.org/blog/item/why-dont-i-criticize-israel
Rene
August 5, 2014 - 5:09 pm
Mike, I do find your view of war at the same time a little cynical and a little naive.
You seem to view war as some biological imperative that is wired into our monkey brains, calling it a Darwinian struggle.
Now I’ll appeal to something said by that great “idealist” called Adolph Hitler. Hitler said that the German people, the ordinary folks, were no different than other ordinary folks in any other country. He said that ordinary people don’t want war. Ordinary people want a calm life with food, sex, and friends.
Ordinary people must then be MADE to want a war. By their glorious leaders. Thus the whole propaganda machine of the Third Reich. The killer ape monkeybrain is either a myth or something latent that must be kickstarted by the propaganda machine.
Most wars are like crimes in detective stories. To understand a war, you gotta always ask yourself the same question the detective asks:
“Who benefits?”
Lets see. First of all, Hamas does.
People in the West may see those terrorists as either religious fanatics brainwashed into madness who have hard-ons when they think of destroying Israel or as misguided oppressed folks striking back because they live in poverty.
Not I. I see in them cold calculation. They want power in their society, just as ambitious, cold men have always wanted. Most Palestinians are ordinary folks that want the same thing ordinary folks always want. The problem is with the non-ordinary folks.
When violence escalates, when the bodies of victims pile on, you and I may see it as a great tragedy (in your case, it seems like you see it as an unavoidable tragedy), but Hamas doesn’t see a tragedy, they see political fruits ripe to be picked.
The more violent, fearful, and militarized Palestinian society becomes, the more power Hamas acquires. The more they can silence the moderate voices.
Likewise, most ordinary Israelis just want to be left alone. But Benjamin Netanyahu and his right-wing folks benefit from having an active enemy in Hamas. Every time Hamas acts, Netanyahu’s Likud gains in strength in Israeli society. Actually it was a spate of suicide bombings that led to Netanyahu’s first premiership. Elsewise, Shimon Peres would have been elected.
So, who benefits, number two?
Netanyahu does.
You do blame monkeybrain aggression. I blame the 3-5% of people in any population who make up the blunt of political parties, corporate boardrooms, and serial killer conventions (thanks, Neil Gaiman). Those people who see other people as tools for their own ambitions.
If I blame the rest of the people is for allowing the psychos to make the big decisions for them.
Rene
August 6, 2014 - 5:45 am
On further reflection, I don’t remember if it was Hitler or Goebbels who wrote that ordinary people must be made to want a war. I think it was Goebbels.
Martha Thomases
August 6, 2014 - 7:24 am
Rene, in a nutshell, you have captured the on-going argument Mike Gold and I have had for lo, these many years. However, since you were not raised in American secular Jewish culture, you don’t quite grasp the nuance and hair-splitting so beloved by our people.
Especially when this ceremony is performed over a nice sandwich.
In fact, this is way more like the peak experience one can have at Katz’ Deli, not that ostentatious piece of theatrics made famous by the shiksa, Meg Ryan.
Mike Gold
August 6, 2014 - 9:58 am
Rick — yeah, Sam Harris’ podcast is very interesting, a bit more extreme than my position but that’s actually sort of comforting. I wonder if he’s related to the great Broadway producer of the same name.
Rene — I respectfully disagree about how humanity must be taught to engage in warfare. Our history as a species tells us otherwise. We fight for what we want, we fight to protect ourselves and our loved ones, but mostly we fight, ever since we crawled out of the sea. Birds do it, dogs do it, people do it. Money, turf, protection, preemptive protection, sex, food, whatever. It’s what we do. Religion just adds an additional item to the list, but history has shown us that religion has been the prime motivator behind the organized violence of warfare at least since the first Crusade, nearly one thousand years ago.
However, we CAN be taught NOT to engage in war. We don’t do that, for all the reasons you mentioned. But at the end of the day we still have the moral and unmitigated right to defend ourselves and the obligation to defend our families, and the bad guys are going to react, and the cycle renews itself.
I respect and admire pacifists. They are working towards a noble and a necessary goal. I don’t know how that goal can be achieved, and nothing I’ve read from pacifists has enlightened me in this regard. We should not stop searching, but the reality is if we don’t defend ourselves we disappear. Genocide remains high on humanity’s top 10 list.
I haven’t researched it, Rene, but I also believe the comment you related is attributable to Goebbels. The origin of warfare was written by Lenny Bruce in his routine “The Law.” The way wars start was visualized by the 4 Marx Brothers and the 4 writers Bert Kalmar, Harry Ruby, Arthur Sheekman and Nat Perrin.
Martha — I don’t think we’ve been arguing, and I’m willing to fight about this. I think we’ve been discussing. The main reason I enjoy these discussions with you, outside of the fact that I usually learn something, is that we can discuss issues without hostility. That’s a rare and beautiful thing.
But each of us is full of contradictions. For example, you mentioned Katz’s Deli. A wonderful place, but its wonderment lies in the red meats that you, a sort-of vegetarian, decline to eat. Go know. But next time we go to a movie, I wanna go to Katz’s with you, either before or after. I realize you will not “send a salami to your boy in the army,” which must come as some relief to Arthur, who remains of draft age.
It appears we disagree about who made that Katz’s scene famous. You say the shiksa Meg Ryan. I say it was the Jewess Estelle Reiner.
Your turn.
Martha Thomases
August 7, 2014 - 5:13 am
I thought Estelle Reiner was Italian? Although Mel Brooks says Jews and Italians are the same thing.
I call it an argument, and I don’t limit it to two people. I will also argue with a position I held last year and a position I might hold next week. Also, I continue to argue with things my mother said to me 45 years ago.
I like the way Katz’s smells, and love love love the pickles.
Mike Gold
August 7, 2014 - 6:54 am
Oh, great. Now we can discuss what constitutes an argument.
Yep, Katz’s pickles are terrific — in a neighborhood known for its pickles!
Mindy Newell
August 9, 2014 - 9:06 am
Hamas’s charter (as an organization or a quasi-government” is the destruction of the state of Israel.
They are the bad guys in this this drama.
Mindy Newell
August 9, 2014 - 9:07 am
At Martha and Mike:
Estelle Reiner is the one who made that scene so totally famous.
Rene
August 9, 2014 - 4:01 pm
Mike and Martha –
Hey, I’m of Italian heritage, but I also do love to split some hairs.
I’m not as naive as to say that humans don’t have a potential for violence and fighting, motivated by certain passions. That is evident. But do ordinary people have a great potential for organized, intentional, anonymous, widescale, lethal violence (i.e. war?)
I’d say most ordinary people don’t.
Soldiers must go through rigorous training to become desensitized to killing people. And lots of soldiers who have been to war have trouble later to reintegrate into society. So, war isn’t some sort of “natural activity” for humans.
So, why does it happen?
Because war is manufactured.
And manufacured by who?
All those 19th century studies and philosophies about war and evolution and animal behaviour didn’t account for 20th and 21th century discoveries on neuroscience and antisocial personality disorder.
Follow my line of thought, Mark. For a long time people have associated war and violence with some sort of undirected emotional explosion. And maybe that is true for the foot soldiers, or for a drunken bar brawl or someone who kills their cheating wife in a pique of jealousy.
But I think war has a lot more to do with lack of feeling than with excessive feeling. The dissociative thinking of regarding people as just numbers? Check. The propagandists and jingoists re-writing reality to be most favorable to their side? Check. The dehumanization of the other side? Check.
Those are all psychopathic behaviours. War is psychopathic behaviour in a large scale.
So, no. I don’t think it’s monkeybrain aggression motivating war. I also don’t think social progress has been all about “taming” the ordinary man’s worst tendencies.
I think it’s all a matter of leadership. When people don’t watch out, who assumes the leadership? The most intelligent, daring, and cold psychos who aren’t hindered by a conscience.
Rene
August 9, 2014 - 4:02 pm
Ooops, I meant Mike, not Mark.