(((Queer Becci Cat))) she @kittybecca@mastodon.starrevolution.org

@botkitten !followme

the reality is that genetics, for the purposes of the situation with israel/palestine, are irrelevant. this is a human issue involving the very recent dispossesion of an entire people and their ongoing internment and subjection to an apartheid society. the idea that Jews are entitled to go and make a state where people are already living, to dispossess them, kick them out of their homes and seize them to sell to recent Jewish immigrants -- this is what should be attacked. no one has a "genetic" claim to anything, and that entire argument on the Israeli side is spurious.

antizionism is good and should be encouraged.

sadly, it's possible to buy into antisemitic theories simply because they're useful for antizionist narratives, without giving them proper thought or checking to see if they make any sense or not.

also sadly, this is common on the left. for example, many people on the left repeat uncritically the claims that ashkenazi Jews are either:

(1) europeans

(2) khazars

(3) otherwise "impure canaanites" as opposed to the palestinians who are pure canaanites and thus more similar to the original Jews

i'm going to break down why this is antisemitic.

(1) scientists have done extensive genetic studies on the Jews. they have concluded that both ashkenazi and sephardi Jews contain significant matrilineal European contributions. however, they have also concluded that ashkenazi and sephardic Jews are closely related to all other Jewish populations: yemenite Jews, iraqi Jews, you name it.

(2) the khazar theory is something they have definitively ruled out, although back when it was a valid theory, lots of ashkenazi Jews believed it as well.

(3) there are no pure canaanites or pure semites. these have always been sociolinguistic groupings, and the levant has been ruled by a succession of non-canaanite empires for most of recorded history. no one is genetically pure. any inhabitants left over from the ancient levant would have mingled with greeks, romans, persians, babylonians, arabs, turks, etc., none of whom would have been genetically homogenous on their own accounts either.

(4) so to believe in the idea that ashkenazi Jews are less genetically semitic than other semitic populations, that we are khazars, or that we are genetically purely european requires believing that the scientific record has been edited/modified, that there is, well, a conspiracy to show that ashkenazi Jews are "real Jews."

by all means, oppose israel! but also check your biases and (where applicable) privileges.

i had a really good idea for a long toot and it's gone

broadly speaking, people who self-identify as left-wing share the following things in common:

1. they believe traditional power structures involve the exploitation of the majority of people at the hands of a powerful elite
2. they believe this arrangement is undesirable
3. they believe this arrangement can be changed
4. they believe in taking collective action to bring about this change

this is true of everyone who self-identifies as left-wing. even primitivists. even "center-leftist" liberals.

it isn't true of fascists because fascists believe traditional power structures have been undermined by a conspiracy of "inferiors" in order to weaken the traditionally powerful, who they believe to be the rightful rulers of the world. they will no doubt claim otherwise, though, so use a grain of salt.

but those things are the common thread that unites just about everyone who self-identifies as left-wing. the specific differences involve industrialism vs. primitivism, mixed economy vs. full communism, statism vs. anarchism, etc..

so instead of saying to liberals "lol fuck you you liberal capitalist pig," what we could instead be doing is taking that common ground we have with them (listed above) and explaining why capitalism contradicts and undermines their desire for a more just world, how it's allowing a backdoor for all other forms of injustice to get in via a monopoly on the means of production.

***note***

there are exceptions. i'm not talking about democratic politicians, major democratic donors, or people whose livelihood is in being a liberal, like NGO members. you can't assume with such people that they have any common ground with you.

i'm talking about the vast majority of people who call themselves liberals or otherwise call themselves left-wing and disagree with you on the fine points. it's true, those fine points are extremely significant! which is all the more reason to see the urgency of finding common ground with others.

i keep confusing "followers" with "follows"

this is unlikely to stop any time soon

anyway thanks for being my follows ^_^

maybe i'll post long posts here if nothing else

so, sorry if there's confusion... i was going to move here from queer.town, but i was having trouble importing my followers and so i tried to do it one more time, thought it wasn't working and changed my info from "moving here" to "backup account"... anyway apparently it worked this time, so people are likely to have seen different infos because of caching and all... and i'm not entirely sure whether i'm going to move here but i do really like the 2000-character limit and the existence of a .onion sooo *shrug*