Mermay 2023 - #09 Modern - HTTYD Hiccup And Astrid

I think about the fact there is a mosque on top of our destroyed Second Temple.

The part that makes me sad, is that I bet so many prayers are said wanting to kill Jews, as they pray on our Holy Land.

I am torn. I want vengeance of course, but I also don't want to hateful. I want justice, I don't want "vengeance". Justice for all that our people have gone through. Justice for all of those who are so antisemitic and hateful. Saying they want to listen, but they scream over you, they don't listen.

Israel was brutally attacked out of nowhere in the middle of the night on a Jewish High Holiday, aiming for civilians... not caring if his citizens are collateral damage. That is clear-cut terrorism. If this isn't, then the USA needs to be tried for war crimes, as well as many other countries.

Do you not care about any other suffering but your own?

You broke into a building, breaking the law, damaging it, then when not even 24 hours later you are asking to be fed... but... what about the starving Palestinians? They haven't eaten in days, you just need your breakfast...

Stupidity of this world, the twisted ways of thinking, brainwashed youth...

We have said it so many times. We just want to be independent, we want to have a right to exist, we want Land promised to us by G-D. There is nothing wrong with people living next to Israel, as long as they are not constantly sending teenage suicide bombers, and shooters. Not teaching their children to be terrorists and that martyrdom isn't the way to "get into heaven".

Please. Help us.

P.s. About 1/3 of the population of Israel is Arab, and some are even white. Do they deserve to die?

Hmm...

Astrid redraw:>

I've never tried to exactly redraw an image in digital before, as I did in traditional, although I think this is an oversight))

Hope you like it, I tried very hard on this, her skirt is just a pain🥲

@elenajones23 first of all, who are you, a non Jew to lecture me about what my religion does or doesn’t allow? Who are you to tell me, as someone who doesn't practice the same religion, that I can or cannot do things?

The Torah isn’t a simple set of guidelines and commands, it’s far more complex than that. It has different interpritations, so saying the torah doesn't allow it is blatantly false. The name "Zion" (Promised land) is mentioned 154 times.

“It isn’t your land and it never was your land” bullshit.

en.wikipedia.org

History of Israel - Wikipedia

History of Israel - Wikipedia

We absolutely do have a land, if we don't, then why do we have holy sights in Jerusalem? Why are names like "Jaffa" and "Haifa" Hebrew?

en.wikipedia.org

Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy) - Wikipedia

Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy) - Wikipedia

The land of Israel is where my ancestors came from, it is where they lived, it is where they had a connection to, and it is where they suffered under the romans and were exiled.

We were never welcomed in Europe, we were never welcomed in the rest of the middle east.

These are ancient scrolls called the "Dead sea scrolls" which are a set of ancient Jewish writings dating from the 3rd century BCE.

This is all of what remains of our ancient temple, this is what it once was:

The first temple is Solomon's temple, the second one is Herod's temple, which was destroyed in 70CE by the romans. centuries later, the Muslim caliphates built the Al Aqsa mosque which was built on top of our temple mount. Today, the west wall is all we have left of this historic holy place.

The name "Palestine" was given to the land of Israel by roman colonisers who exiled most of us from the land of Israel, took many of us slaves, and scattered everyone else through western Europe (Some moved further east).

Now about the Nazis = Zionist argument. The Nazis originally made a deal with German Zionist Jews (The Haavara agreement) to bring about a mass migration from Germany to Israel, it should be mentioned that this was because Hitler and the Nazis wanted a Jew-Free Europe, not because the Nazis supported Zionism.

This deal was criticized by both Nazis and Zionists. Zionist criticised it because it made a deal with the devil, and the Nazis criticised it because it went against their philosophy.

The Nazis were extremely antizionist, the belief that they were Zionists is soviet cold war propaganda to demonise the state of Israel and the broader Jewish community. They believed that Jews were biologically incapable of running their own state and were too inferior. Hitler had a "Palestinian" friend (Amin al-Husseini) who campaigned in Berlin, fought for a Palestinian state, and even CONTRIBUTED TO THE HOLOCAUST. They also lead a boycott of Jewish businesses in "Palestine".

So, you're wrong. So very very wrong. You can try to lecture me about the history of my own people and religion all you want, but you're wrong.

Please, kindly fuck off and read a history book. Please attend a Synagogue service and learn more about our religion before you come spewing false bullshit about it.

Hello, you have shared previously that you use mb/fc for how factual/biased media sources are, and charity navigator for rating charities. These are very helpful (thanks!), and I was wondering if you have any other resources for finding out the reliability of organizations (like BDS and Standing Together) or information sites (like the Jewish Virtual Library). I understand that at some point I need to be able to figure out the trustworthiness of organizations/sites on my own (do you have additional advice for that, the “Consuming News and Media, Avoid Misinformation” ALLMEP post was helpful!). For now it is still a struggle though, so I wanted to ask if you knew of any resources that rates organization/sites such as these.

It's gonna be a little bit of a struggle always, unfortunately. But it gets easier with practice. I think most of my thoughts and resources can be found under my #media literacy tag. But I also super encourage my followers to add resources of their own. Personally I'm inclined to trust resources from goyische and Jewish allies for peace from whom I reblog frequently and who have demonstrated excellent media literacy in the past. In particular, @faggotry-enjoyer @arandomshotinthedark @comradevo @wyf-of-bathe and @gehe-lihiyot-androgynos-varda spring to mind first, but I know I'm forgetting at least one vital friend and contributor (please forgive me). If they or anyone else wishes to provide their recommendations on this post, please feel free to do so. If you, @jellymarbles, wish to ask my opinion on a source you're unsure about, I'll do my best to provide an honest and balanced answer. I'll also tell you if I simply don't have the knowledge or ability to determine if that source is trustworthy and will attempt to find someone who is.

I'm so proud of you and all the work you have done to grow as a person for the benefit of so many groups (Muslim, Jewish, Israeli, Palestinian, and Arab) of which you are not a part. It makes so much of a difference. If everyone was more like you, the world would be a much better and more peaceful place. Bless you and thank you.

There’s a Senate inquiry into the worsening rental crisis!

Thanks to the Greens you can now write a submission to a committee inquiry into how the rental crisis is affecting you and your community, provide evidence, and shape the reports that’ll be given to the National Cabinet in September and November to suggest how they can address the rental crisis.

This is super important! The information that YOU give to this inquiry will inform both the state and federal government about just how dire the situation is and help it understand how it needs to do more to fix the rental crisis in Australia.

So share - and don’t forget to click here to submit BY 28 JULY!!!

Ps. Some of the links don't work anymore due to the account being deleted or deactivated

the suffering never ends

my favourite cousins (rtte edition)

I've been thinking about this for a couple of days now. It's a good question, but it has a lot of answers because its actually pretty complex. Mind you, a lot of this will be based on my own observations and experiences-I myself never went to college but instead spent 4 years of my life in the USAF. I will link to things that better explain the science to it, but generally speaking, its observations and personal experience and US/Western history. And I may not touch on it all because there is a LOT! Also, I do criticize aspects of Christianity though, this doesn't mean I hate Christianity or anything like that. Rather, I'm pointing out the flaws of it-there have absolutely been positive aspects to Christianity!

And, as a disclaimer-supporting Palestine isn't the issue. Palestine deserves its own state and with the rights of its citizens respected-or however the people there, Palestinian and Israeli, decide on how those 2 states will be, such as 2 state confederation, etc. They're the ones that ultimately decide, I'm just here to make sure everyone has their human rights respected. Its easier to say 2 state solution to get the idea across that I want both to exist and that I support however they set up their state(s).

No, rather, the issue is the means of which the younger generation (and that of my own, as we're the next age bracket up) claim helps support Palestine. And truthfully, its a mess of how/why we came to this place.

Christianity doesn't exactly allow for questioning nowadays-it wasn't always like this for the religion, but absolutely became so over time. And its gone in cycles as well. You get the severe hand of the Catholic Church for much of the Middle Ages or Protestant Church (like Puritans!) at times, reformations, then First Great Awakening to be followed by the Enlightenment (and for the record, many of the Founders of the US practiced a very different type of Christianity that would make Evangelicals scream). Then came the Second Great Awakening as a response to the Enlightenment, then the Third Great Awakening and Fourth Great Awakening (which may or may not actually count, but still had a lot of changes)...and well, US culture is a mix of Enlightenment, First, Second, Third and Fourth Great Awakenings along with bits from before that, with varying degrees of influence depending on the time period. Right now, we're dealing with the shit from the Fourth Great Awakening-like the rise of the Religious Right and apocalypse BS. You do still see pieces of prior awakenings, such as more social justice oriented churches and churches that look to be more universalist, but they're being drowned out by those of the Fourth Great Awakenings. Enlightenment still hangs on, but the Fourth is absolutely trying to destroy it as it consumes and destroys what's left of prior Awakenings.

So as you can see, Christianity does go through cycles of questioning but ends up defaulting back to being unquestioned. Which is a problem, on top of the antisemitism that's been a part of it for a . Enlightenment, while far from perfect, allowed questioning and tolerance for others as well as separation of Church and State.

But we're losing that as the Right gains ground and the Left gets more extreme to counter it (or not).

And because the 'don't question it' aspect is partly due to Christian thought, where your Priest/Pastor/ Reverend/etc is supposed to be the one who speaks for God's Word. They are supposed to know the ins and out, so what they say *must* be true and as servants of the Lord, they *must* be infallible or far closer to it then the rest of us sinners.

This unquestioning attitude on leaders leads into sin as its also reduced into a binary. You either are or are not. Once a sinner, always a sinner. You can never be cleansed of it. This absolutely has warped the social justice sphere in horrific ways. Purity tests, a hierarchy on who matters most and should get all the attention on, and more. If not a sinner, you are innocent and deserve nothing terrible. But if you are, well...

Ever wonder why there's such a rush to prove someone is a sinner when something terrible happens to that person instead of realizing that 'hey, that doesn't matter, what was done to them was awful?' Its easier to do that and preserve the power structure and people in control of it. My next point is as follows-people don't generally think of 'oh yeah I'm going to be evil'. Rather, they see themselves, their community, etc as good and thus what is done to sinners must be deserved. Its how terrible people that can woo a crowd have such voracious defenders. They confirm and say the right things-to whatever is considered right to that community and seem to do so without caring on the opinions of others-though truthfully when challenged, they do not handle it well. Unfortunately, too many consider that a hallmark of leadership, when leadership itself is complex. It is not the loudest asshole in the room that seems to say the right things.

Am I talking the Right? Or the Left? It applies to both actually, because its all shared overall cultural values. Someone could be the most anti Christian, pro human rights campaigner but still engage in this thinking. They didn't do the work of truly figuring out the more problematic aspects they learned; they just figured if they left Christianity and/or opposed it that they were good, forgetting that it affects damn near everything in the overall culture in many different ways. Or they were on the right, came to oppose it but still engage in mannerisms from there, because they didn't do the work of really deconstructing it.

Some of this, I see in my own age group. They will point out to how the US acted after 9/11 to argue on how badly the US acted and how Israel is acting right now. But they will forget on how social media has been deliberately fucked with-the Great Russian Interference on tumblr back for the 2016 election was an example-but far from the only example. It was chilling seeing how well they researched how to 'speak' to the groups they were looking to sway with propaganda. And that is repeating, right now. On this site and elsewhere, with the desired effects of antisemitism and Islamophobia being on the rise. And too many are not questioning it-not thinking 'why is this a random tweet and/or why is this written to deliberately make me mad?'

Several things have stuck with me from my time in the Air Force. One of which is this-brainwashing, as its is commonly known, doesn't exist. Rather, its because you accept it-most cases aren't from accepting it due to threats/acts of violence, but by simply not questioning your own bias over time.

Honestly, its pretty terrifying to know that you will never be immune to propaganda. Its hard to be aware of so much being thrown at you. Unfortunately, depending on where you lived, you may have received schooling on media literacy. I say unfortunately because it should be universally taught, but isn't. The cracks in the school system continue to worsen-I was made aware of recently that even in NYC, a progressive stronghold, the Holocaust isn't taught much and plenty of states don't mandate teaching about the Holocaust (a little over half don't but also read the survey article, it is interesting on that states that do teach end up with more people that deny it compared to states without mandatory teaching. ). This contrasts my own education from back in the early to mid 2000s, where we read the Diary of Anne Frank and Night, saw Schindler's List and pictures and discussions on what happened in the Holocaust.

I have a theory as to why it is strangely higher in states that teach it. We know that American history is unfortunately lacking at times and propaganda at others. What I suspect is those people who are very young and not exactly in the position to really think further on it, are confronted with 'hey this was also an important historical event and the US gov't fucked up' they immediately start disregarding anything that's true because one lie means all are lies. Add to that teens, due to brain development at the time, have very black and white thinking and its not helped by overall society Part of this is due to Christian thinking, but also due to factors of poor education, poverty and a general need for things to be simple because of the mental energy involved. One of the articles talks about climate change denial, but it can be extrapolated to other areas.

Now, I bring up brain development but its complex. Yes, the brain isn't completely developed until around age 25 (varies from person to person), however, a person doesn't magically become less impulsive, or more empathic and so on. You still need to have those traits nurtured and practiced prior. Unfortunately, this too has fallen into the binary thinking-where you have people truly saying anyone under 25 is 'literally a child' instead of examining the various stages of brain development and comparing/contrasting with age groups and more.

Now, let's talk about something else. The race for a spot in college and the absolute insanity teens must go through, not just to place a spot with testing, but also place in scholarships, loans, etc. Ever think about the origins of why students need extracurriculars? Its due to antisemitism-to keep Jewish students out. Its also why legacy admissions became a thing as it serves to keep the well to do in the student body. While Affirmative Action has helped some minorities and/or poor people into college, the threshold remains high due to well, extracurriculars cost money. and testing has its own problems. And some students may have to work part time to help their families, taking away from even having the option of it. That's also not accounting for racist/sexist/etc exclusion in certain extracurriculars that's slowly being corrected.

Add into that many take AP courses-which can be harder than the actual college course. You have to pay an amount as well to take the course/test, just for a shot at having completed it. While 3 and above is considered good, its up to the colleges on if they are willing to accept it in full or partial...or even at all.

Continuing on with the black and white thinking, I was often told to either go to college or flip burgers, with the burger flipping seen as a terrible thing. Obviously, I can point out how utterly classist that was now, but hearing that growing up that the only way to make something of yourself was to go to college? That can fuck with someone. I had friends that didn't have lunch because they were too busy with multiple AP classes and then would try to sneak a snack during their extracurriculars. I did take some AP classes, some I was great at and some I was very much not but I absolutely refused to do as they did.

Simply put, there is too much pressure on teens to get into college while colleges do the bare minimum to make themselves more accommodating. This means a lot of new young adults haven't spent their teen years finding out who exactly they want to be or having been taught critical thinking skills because that was given up to memorize facts for the many tests taken. Add to that many are just so damned tired trying to keep up and they also don't have the energy to try and work on those skills either. So we're working with at least two generations of grinders trying to get a spot for a better future, but losing out on critical aspects needed to prepare them to be emotionally stable adults while that spot continues to end up further and further from them as the debt piles up.

This makes them easy prey to fall into extremist thinking. I remember being full of a lot of passion at that age, to the point of feeling extremely deeply. I still feel deeply on things, but I've also settled down as I've gotten into being an adult and gaining experience as I age. Part of it is trying to carve out what is 'you' and what you believe in/stand for and trying to understand the new responsibilities gained as a new adult. And freaking out at the sudden lack of structure of college life compared to the highly structured school life.

Now let's add into social media and how there's algorithms in place to push you towards for extreme thoughts. This extreme thoughts can be from within the nation or outside. Combine that with the young adults not having critical thinking skills needed to properly engage with social media, the need to feel like one is doing the right thing and being on the 'right side of history', Christian thought and black and white thinking seeping in, and its a huge set up of deliberate, not deliberate and in between actions taken up to this point by various institutions that have led a good chunk of Gen Z and some Millennials to this point.

There is inexperience involved for sure, many of Gen Z were born after 9/11. However, its absolutely not solely due to that-there are so many factors at play here, along with just the general inexperience young adults have that are being taken advantage of. And, like I've mentioned, some in my own age group have also fallen into the trap. Their inexperience isn't so much due to age, its more due to general history. There's also an aspect of learned helplessness here for both groups due to the sheer number of BS with wars, the economy, pandemic, climate and how everything seems to just get worse.

Nontraditional news isn't completely bad I want to say as well; however there is a lot of it that absolutely is. Nontraditional news isn't held to the same standards as the traditional news is. Anyone can make a podcast, spout off absolute BS and have it take off because there's not much in the way of an integrity check. There's a damn good reason why there's the saying of 'a lie has already traveled around the world while the truth is still tying its shoe laces.' (Old) Conspiracy theories spread, the rise of AI related things has aided those in spreading fake news and divisions only get deeper. The rise of needing to be seen and heard because they're not being seen and heard in real life is also a factor, and explains why a lot of the activism ends up slacktivism and gets twisted into 'look how morally right I am being!' at the expense of the groups supposedly being championed. Social media being ubiquitous and damn near required for social networking doesn't help either as it promotes falling further into a hole by those that lack experience on how to navigate it.

Add into the Cultural Christian ideas of rally around a leader that spouts off the correct words and seems to be doing the right things to the point the leader replaces the ideals and warps them, the need for an apocashitstorm for there to be a 'truly perfect utopia' to come about at great cost to everyone but the people longing for it and the inability to admit wrongs for fear of losing the 'innocence' they had and instead becoming whatever the buzzword for bad person is. Its pretty dangerous. Its how you get people assuming the worst of you but at the same time wanting to do exactly what they think you do-for their noble causes of course.

Add also into the ever present antisemitism that goes unchallenged throughout all levels (and for far far longer than the US was the US) and general regret of US History (and promotion of said historical issues at expense of other areas with their own histories around the world!) on top of all that is how you get the extreme 'Hamas did nothing wrong! Those Israeli women, men and children deserved their rapes because they're settler colonizers!' Empathy is only for the innocent.

Its very easy to be empathic for the innocent, just like its easy to be a saint in paradise. But for those that aren't? Well that's asking too much, too much thinking about what your values actually mean and if you're truly living up to them. Nuance is a rare thing, a despised thing-unless it can be used to keep the 'innocent' innocent as they are deemed to never be allowed fault. Its how you get people praising Hamas and thinking they are liberators as well as claiming that what Hamas did wasn't actually what they did. Even if before they were saying those Israelis deserved it. ANYTHING to keep their group they claim to champion 'innocent/pure' and because they lack the ability to distinguish Hamas from Palestinian citizens and the Likud run Israeli gov't from the Israeli citizens, it reenforces this.

The point isn't justice at all; its people that want to be able to freely hate a group and feel justified in doing so and act out what violence they would like to do to their own enemies. Do they care about Hamas and their oppression of Palestinians? No, they don't and even fight back against factual accounts of Hamas oppressing Palestinians. There's also an extremely racist (and for Muslims, Islamophobic) fantasy at play-oh those people we don't consider white, they're going to butcher people, they can't help it, they're oppressed! Palestinians are a people, not a terror group like Hamas. Do some join with Hamas to commit horrific acts of violence against Israelis? Sure, just like some Israelis use their time in the IDF to cause as much harm to Palestinians. Doesn't mean all Palestinians or all Israelis are of one mind-rather, like any people that exists, there will be a lot of differences in opinion.

They hate Jewish and/or Israeli people far far more than any love they claim to have for Palestinians-if they even had any true positive feelings towards them to begin with. Everything I mentioned above (and I'm sure I missed some stuff!) is why the youngest age group as well as many in my own claim to support Palestine while not actually doing so.

Speaking of-here's charities that are working to end this war and have solutions to hopefully make a better future for Israelis and Palestinians.