Political Memes

The Israel-Palistinian affair reflects the larger dichotomy of principle vs. loyalty.

The enlightenment values behind the US and French revolts and transformations are propped up by the principles that everyone is entitled to equal regard by the society, are endowed with the same rights, are treated equally by the justice system in so on.

(Mind you, both of these nations failed to embrace these principles fully, still don't, and progress towards this ideal is slow and meandering — to say the least.)

Of course the challenge, then, is extending that degree of citizenship to the worst wrongdoers, even after they've ~~profiteered on war and drug addiction, wrecked the economy through financialization and turned entire government institutions against the people they were supposed to protect~~ sexually assaulted kids or killed with intention.

We don't like giving our criminal suspects their day in court. When convicted, we don't like to consider that they were, wrongfully, and in either case, we want them to suffer not just incarceration, but to languish in squalor, abuse and neglect. We want them afraid to reach for the soap. We don't like extending rights to those we regard as outcast.

But if we don't, we dip into the other side of the coin, in which criminal is not defined by what you did, but who you are. Feudal society is structured based on contracts of loyalty. If you are born of the better blood (monied, ethnically pure, faithful to the orthodox) then you deserve all the benefits of the doubt. Whereas if you are alien or other, you deserve to be outlawed.

And this applies when the good guys fuck children, murder with intent, profiteer on war and drugs, wreck the economy though financialization and capture government institutions so they don't protect the people. And yeah, at it's worst, we see things like genocide and torture become controversial because the heroes are doing it and the goblins are on the receiving end of it.

So not just the US and Israel, but the entire world needs to reflect on what kind of society they want to be. Unlike economic structures that can be blended, guiding ideology tend to be a slippery slope. Once it is established that some people can be denied rights and regard by fiat because they're of the wrong faith or the wrong blood, or aren't rich enough, then that refusal of access can extend to anyone else, and eventually everyone else.

And we're seeing this develop in the US, as MAGA circles talk about liberals in blood libels and calls to hunt and execute them. In this case liberals includes anyone who isn't MAGA.