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I Know Nothing's avatar

The connection with abused children is very helpful. I remember one of the cracks for me was seeing an interview with the writer Amos Oz who's a major establishment figure in "Israel" (now dead, methinks). He said, by way of explaining Israeli violence - (i will paraphrase) an abused child might go one of two ways, they might choose to live a life of virtue and self reflection trying to bring something positive into the world because they understand how negative behaviour makes the world a bad place. They might otherwise just succumb to their trauma and pass on their pain in the form of more violence and abuse.

It was presented as an excuse as in, ho hum, a good chunk of Israeli society is of the second type so ho hum, there you go, that's how the world turns.

What seemed a bit too obvious to me was that while it's good to empathise with an abused person's circumstances even when they do wrong, they should still be made to face the consequences. Wheras Oz thought the supposed trauma lets them iff the hook.

Sorry, that's long winded.

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Libertarian's avatar

I am Irish Catholic American and 9th of 10 kids. 4 of my brothers and I served in the US military; 1 in Vietnam. We condemn Zionist Israel’s genocide of Palestinians.

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