If you could tell me your favourite essay (please note: if your opinion is that they all sucked, it may be true to you, but it is not constructive). Haha.
I agree the BIBAS babies is one that should be included. Also, the Desecration of Truth. All your essays on Israel are clear, fact based and persuasive although I always agree with your points of view 100%.
I hope it’s ok if I share the paragraphs I saved from your article on the Bibas babies and the nature of evil - one of your best:
“There are moments in history when the world is forced to stare into the abyss to confront, without equivocation, the existence of true and undiluted evil.
The murder of the Bibas babies was such a moment. No longer can we speak in the comfortable abstractions of politics and policy. No longer can we entertain the empty rhetoric of peace processes or the delusions of coexistence. The depravity we witnessed—the strangling of infants in their coffins, the jeering of the mob, the stamping feet of those who have surrendered every shred of humanity—has revealed the soul of the beast.
The murder of the Bibas children was not a tragedy.
It was a choice.
A choice made by a people whose hearts are shrivelled husks, whose souls are tumours of poison, whose very existence is defined by negation and destruction. The blood-drunk mobs that stomped upon the earth, crazed with ecstasy at the murder of infants, were not victims of circumstance. They were willing participants in a society that feeds on darkness, gorges itself on blood and bile, and cannot be satiated, only extinguished.”
I think a nice mix of personal and political. I think your experience with the horrible unjust termination, a bit about your wife and your daughter and the dogs. And obviously a palette of your political beliefs from Canadian politics, Israel, antisemitism, academics, and bureaucracy. But I think whatever you choose will be wonderful because I very much appreciate the clarity of both your writing and your thoughts.
I agree the BIBAS babies is one that should be included. Also, the Desecration of Truth. All your essays on Israel are clear, fact based and persuasive although I always agree with your points of view 100%.
Thank you. Your responses make a big difference. My views amongst almost all my gentile friends are not supported, but I’m not changing.
I hope it’s ok if I share the paragraphs I saved from your article on the Bibas babies and the nature of evil - one of your best:
“There are moments in history when the world is forced to stare into the abyss to confront, without equivocation, the existence of true and undiluted evil.
The murder of the Bibas babies was such a moment. No longer can we speak in the comfortable abstractions of politics and policy. No longer can we entertain the empty rhetoric of peace processes or the delusions of coexistence. The depravity we witnessed—the strangling of infants in their coffins, the jeering of the mob, the stamping feet of those who have surrendered every shred of humanity—has revealed the soul of the beast.
The murder of the Bibas children was not a tragedy.
It was a choice.
A choice made by a people whose hearts are shrivelled husks, whose souls are tumours of poison, whose very existence is defined by negation and destruction. The blood-drunk mobs that stomped upon the earth, crazed with ecstasy at the murder of infants, were not victims of circumstance. They were willing participants in a society that feeds on darkness, gorges itself on blood and bile, and cannot be satiated, only extinguished.”
I hoped someone would say that, but I wrote that one in tears, literally, and I’m not embarrassed. Thx
You shouldn’t be… it’s extremely powerful. Tragically such moral clarity is often absent nowadays.
I think a nice mix of personal and political. I think your experience with the horrible unjust termination, a bit about your wife and your daughter and the dogs. And obviously a palette of your political beliefs from Canadian politics, Israel, antisemitism, academics, and bureaucracy. But I think whatever you choose will be wonderful because I very much appreciate the clarity of both your writing and your thoughts.
I drew on the following authors for my last three essays on anthropological reversibility:
Meerloo, Joost A. M. The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing. Cleveland, World Publishing Company, 1956.
Scott, James C. Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. Yale University Press, 1990.
Shklar, Judith N. After Utopia: The Decline of Political Faith. Princeton University Press, 1957.
Thanks. I meant essays that I had written but I will read these too