Our World: Reclaiming Language from the Left by Caroline Glick

Middle East • May 2010 • Views: 487

Over the past generation, the Left has inverted the terminology of human rights, freedom, morality, heroism, democracy and victimization.

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7 comments

freetoken May 25, 2010 1:17:03am

“the leftist-dominated Israeli media…” reeks of right-wing paranoia.

HelloDare May 25, 2010 1:49:10am

re: #1 freetoken

“the leftist-dominated Israeli media…” reeks of right-wing paranoia.

Is that where you stopped reading. You missed this:

ON THURSDAY Hamas’s maritime enablers from Europe, Turkey and beyond will arrive at our doorstep. The navy will block their entry to Gaza. Israel will be demonized by terror-abettors disguised as human rights activists and journalists worldwide. And the story will pave the way for the next assault on Israel’s right to exist.

Bob Levin May 25, 2010 2:04:09am

re: #1 freetoken

Ah, the ultra-scientific, historically aware, smell test. Or is this the ‘pick out a short phrase from a 1000 word article to completely dismiss all of the points and information’ tactic?

What’s interesting is that Glick was accurately quoting another writer, David Hornik. So is it paranoia to accurately quote another writer? What do you call it when you quote someone out of context?

And I’m not sure you actually understand the quote you are picking on. Did David Hornik mean that all of the media in Israel is dominated by leftists, or did Hornik mean, the left wing of the Israeli media? Do you know? To me, there isn’t enough data to know. I’d have to ask David Hornik what he meant. I suspect, and that’s as far as I can go, just a hypothesis, that Hornik meant the left wing of the Israeli media. I only suspect this because he used to be the editor of the Jerusalem Post—not a small paper by any means.

Nimed May 25, 2010 2:59:34am

re: #3 Bob Levin

Ah, the ultra-scientific, historically aware, smell test. Or is this the ‘pick out a short phrase from a 1000 word article to completely dismiss all of the points and information’ tactic?

What’s interesting is that Glick was accurately quoting another writer, David Hornik. So is it paranoia to accurately quote another writer? What do you call it when you quote someone out of context?

Is there some sort of sanctuary rule for quotes? Approvingly quoting a paranoid writer is paranoid, yes. By your logic, if one endorses NWO conspiracy theories by quoting Alex Jones, one is automatically exempt from accusations of paranoia.

And I’m not sure you actually understand the quote you are picking on. Did David Hornik mean that all of the media in Israel is dominated by leftists, or did Hornik mean, the left wing of the Israeli media? Do you know? To me, there isn’t enough data to know. I’d have to ask David Hornik what he meant. I suspect, and that’s as far as I can go, just a hypothesis, that Hornik meant the left wing of the Israeli media. I only suspect this because he used to be the editor of the Jerusalem Post—not a small paper by any means.

Context doesn’t make Caroline Glick’s article any better. She shamelessly uses the flotilla headed to Gaza and Chomsky’s trip to smear the whole Left. Are these the designated ambassadors of the left? She claims the flotilla mission is to provide aid specifically to Hamas - every man, woman and child who lives in Gaza is affiliated with Hamas, apparently; she accuses the governments of 4 countries of “colluding with Hamas”; and so on.

Reasonable arguments can be produced in favor of (and against) Israel’s blockade of the Gaza strip, on whether foreign countries have the right to provide humanitarian aid to Gaza, and whether they should. Aid will undoubtedly benefit Hamas, but will also bring much needed relief to the civilian population in Gaza. It’s a pretty complex issue.

Glick sidestepped all this and decided instead to use the incident as a cudgel against Teh Evil Left. Downding for propagating an hysterical screed.

freetoken May 25, 2010 3:38:29am

re: #3 Bob Levin

The author (Glick) has a long history of right-wing writing, and is part of the Obama-hates-America crowd.

Bob Levin May 25, 2010 4:06:06am

re: #4 Nimed

Is there some sort of sanctuary rule for quotes? Approvingly quoting a paranoid writer is paranoid, yes. By your logic, if one endorses NWO conspiracy theories by quoting Alex Jones, one is automatically exempt from accusations of paranoia.

How about instead of playing with logical generalities you actually address the points in her article? Those points are easy to find because they are in larger type at the top of the page. She is saying that words such as human rights, freedom, morality, heroism, democracy and victimization have been inverted by—I think Chomsky would say he is politically on the left, wouldn’t he? Can you not see that the concepts of human rights have been inverted simply by reading the members of the UN Human Rights Council? Wasn’t East Germany called the German Democratic Republic? Is Iran really a democracy? Was Iraq under Saddam Hussein, who won 95% of the popular vote, also a democracy? Does the concept of religious freedom mean that anyone criticizing your religion is a criminal?

You haven’t noticed a change in the way that words are defined? You didn’t notice that something was strange when the world was calling Yasser Arafat a man of peace? Really?

And how closely do you follow Israeli media? They do have a left wing, and a right wing, and a centrist group. Is it possible that the left wing of the Israeli media is misusing those words, changing the definition? Personally, I don’t follow it closely enough. What, in your mind, disqualifies David Hornik as a reasonable observer of Israeli culture?

I read Glick’s article—I really don’t get the sense that she is talking about the Canadian Left wing or the Italian Left wing. I understand the piece as being pretty specific, addressing the flotilla—and she claims the organizers of the flotilla are supporters of Hamas. That statement is either true or false. Can you name the organizers, and do you have their quotes? If you do, then it’s a battle of footnotes between you and Glick. To do this precisely you will need about two pages, not a slight sentence that might fit into a fortune cookie.

Now, I don’t always agree with Caroline Glick. But if I’m going to disagree, I’m not going to tar her with a broad brush while claiming she is tarring others with a broad brush. That seems a bit hypocritical to me. It is also unfair to compare her to Alex Jones. You can take issue with this, but to do so you’d have to go through both bodies of work carefully, meaning time and pages.

The fact is, she might know more details about this particular group, and their funding, and bits about international law regarding shipping regulations. If she doesn’t you’re going to have to prove it, and she is going to have to prove that she does know the situation well. Again, doing this properly will take time and pages.

You are correct, the issue is complex—which is why I criticized Freetoken’s quick and dirty condemnation of the entire article.

And since we are talking about definitions of words, how about defining the political terms ‘left’ and ‘right’. Caroline could probably do the same. After all, the entire point of the article is that dialogue is now ingenuous and cannot be productive because the definition of words is relative. To be honest, I don’t know what the words mean nowadays outside of descriptions of people who need a psychiatric diagnosis but instead choose a political affiliation.

To me, the meaning of the article calls for a reasoned discussion attempting to define the words of our political and philosophical landscape.

And yes, no pun intended, but something is indeed fishy with this flotilla, which is the other main point of the article.

Bob Levin May 25, 2010 4:16:48am

re: #5 freetoken

Like I said, I don’t always agree with her. But I have to be careful as I disagree with her. I don’t find her to be right wing, since, as I said above, I don’t even know what that means nowadays. The folks Charles chronicles are just plain nuts. However, she is quick on the alarm bells—but I can’t blame anyone for being quick on the alarm bells when other countries are very open about trying to annihilate her country with nuclear weapons, as well as planning conventional attacks coming from the north.

She has a clear sense of right and wrong, but she isn’t as clear when it comes to the workings of international diplomacy. And that’s because she is a ‘what you see is what it is’ kind of analyst. Okay. I’ll use a grain of salt. Not a big deal.

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