Yes, studies usually include such options, but they are also usually included in the summation of results of such studies. I find the absence of any data on the breakdown of % of respondents who answered in such a way or even the mention of it as being included in the response options to be very odd.
Again, this is a fault in the methodology of the study. I simply don’t believe that the reported % of people who are reported as saying “probably true” is an accurate representation of respondent’s actual opinions. By allowing only two possible responses, both extremes and allowing no nuance of “possibility true/false” and no nuance on whether respondents think this is possibly or probably of some, all or none of Jews, any positive opinion, even “maybe some of them are” is turned into a response of the respondent thinking that it’s “probably true of all Jews” that they are more loyal to Israel than France, regardless of whether this is actually how the respondent feels. It is simply a poor methodology for gathering any meaningful data, and this poor methodology combined with any lack of any mention of ‘don’t know,’ ‘no opinion,’ or ‘other(specify)’ leads me to believe that they may not have been allowed as response options, or any such responses were discarded when tabulating the data.
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I just don’t think that all of the responses of “probably yes” reflects a reality of respondents views. When only given a binary yes/no with no shades of opinion between the extremes, the tendency is to take any slightly affirmative response as yes, even “well I know this one guy who is.” Particularly with phone surveys, where the interviewer, who frequently is not making much above minimum wage wants to get a completed survey and the respondent just wants to get off of the phone.
Yesterday’s bombing-and-shooting had nothing to do with antisemitism.
The likely perpetrator behind both crimes – a certain Anders Behring Breivik – left behind plenty of forum posts, all readily available, stretching back to 2009, wherein he explains his views.
Plenty of rants about how “cultural Marxists” have infiltrated Norway’s intellectual milieu (journalist schools is referred to as “Marxist boot camps”), fervent hope for a “cultural euro-version of the Tea Party movement,” etc., etc.
But antisemitism? No.
As it happens, the only ethnic and/or religious group singled out in the killer’s writings happens to be the Muslims.
For a second, I’ll play along and ignore the fact that a book written by a man invokes God for a specific reason, and I’ll ask, don’t you see how others would ask… why not other people, why not me? Why you?
In general religious terms but also in plain philosophical terms, there is no workaround for such a grandiose statement someone makes about themselves and claims it was said by God. How do you think others should treat someone who just comes along and starts making a disingenuous claim like that - oh, it’s nothing, I just have this burden, nothing special, don’t worry about it…
Really? You really expect others to ignore obvious impact this kind of claim has on a life on Earth?
(Oh, and please, don’t make your argument one of those “back to study” again.)
I agree in general that it’s a failure in methodology (if they didn’t include the option, I still want to see the actual questions) but I do not agree with your gloss. At least in English, folks who answer in the affirmative to “Blacks are more likely to engage in watermelon thievery if give the opportunity: probably true or probably not true?” are racists, even if we can quibble over the degree to which they’re racists.
Don’t let the facts get in the way of willful ignorance. It may even be possible to work up to some real righteous indignation if you keep a full head of steam.
Ibn Warraq, I’m not going to join this debate, but if you’re interested in learning about Alan Dershowitz’s intellectual dishonesty with respect to Palestinian issues, you really should read Finkelstein’s Beyond Chutzpah. The documentation is exhaustive. Nobody who has systematically misrepresented Israel’s human rights record as Dershowitz has can be construed as an “advocate for the rights of Palestinians.”
Finkelstein is hardly a reliable source. He’s an avowed partisan who isn’t concerned about the truth. There’s a reason he was denied tenure at Depaul.
This is the guy who claimed that Elie Wiesel and many if not most Holocaust survivors have lied about what happened to them in his book The Holocaust Industry. To prove this he claimed that Wiesel mentioning reading Kant as a teenager had to be a lie because Kant wasn’t translated into Yiddish.
Now leaving aside the fact that massive amounts of works translated into Yiddish were lost during the Holocaust and it’s virtually impossible to tell what has and hasn’t been able to be translated into Yiddish, Alan Dershowitz produced Yiddish translations of Kant from Harvard which was incredibly humiliating for Finklestein since it made him a laughing-stock.
As for Dershowitz, wouldn’t you agree that someone who’s been advocating the creation of a Palestinian state and argued since the 60s that Israel should never have occupied the West Bank should be considered an advocate for Palestinian rights?
It is certainly possible to be both pro-Palestinian and pro-Israel.
Finkelstein is asked here about the Wiesel/Kant kerfuffle. As it happens I don’t entirely buy his interpretations in that earlier book, but either way that’s not relevant to assertions of fact about Dershowitz.
Palestinian rights means more than a collective right to political self-determination in a Palestinian state–which IMO is in Israel’s interest anyway.
With respect to the human rights of individual Palestinians, no, I do not think Dershowitz can be considered an advocate.
I’ve said precisely this myself. I’m not aware that Finkelstein would have any problem with it either.
But again, nobody’s political views are really material to the issue of whether Dershowitz is intellectually dishonest. In Beyond Chutzpah, in particular, Finkelstein provides abundant evidence. All I really want to do here is recommend that you, or anyone who might be interested in the question of whether avowed partisan Dershowitz is himself a reliable source and concerned with the truth, read it for yourself. Make your own interpretations, but look at the documentation offered.
Did you know that Dershowitz tried to stop its publication? The characterization that he felt “any criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic” in fact was offered by Lynne Withey, director of the University of California Press, in that context.
I look forward to your advancing the argument the mass-murdering Norwegian terrorist is in fact as Oriental with dyed blond hair and blue contact lens as you have in the Pit. That would be of more interest than the hijack regarding France.
Dershowitz is vastly more reliable than Finkelstein.
There’s a reason that Finklestein was denied tenure and is largely viewed as a crank.
Sorry, but having seen how intellectually dishonest The Holocaust Industry was, I have no intention to trust some other book.
If you actually think that Finklestein is reliable then I recommend that you read Peter Novick, but having seen how he manipulated and misrepresented the work of others which led to him being denied tenure, I have no reason to trust anything else he writes.
Find a better source.
Moreover if Lynn Whitney really did say that Dershowitz defined any criticism of Israel as anti-Semitic then Lynn wasn’t familiar with the multiple occasions when Dershowitz has repeatedly criticized Israel in his books, articles, and speeches.
Now if you want to persist in insisting that Alan Dershowitz defines himself as an anti-Semite then go ahead.
Forming an opinion of Dershowitz based on the writings of an unreliable, discredited partisan Hezbollah supporter doesn’t strike me as being the most sensible thing in the world.
Huh? Are you claiming that hatred towards someone who makes this claim is the correct response? :dubious:
In any event, one can excuse some random person on the Internet’s not knowing what the “chosen people” claim means, out of simple ignorance. It is a lot harder to excuse a writer who specializes in the history of religion and philosophy not knowing it.
It’s very, very interesting that some anti-Israel folks seem to have latched onto that claim so strongly, especially given the actual evidence. I think I’ve seen one person ever actually allege that criticism of Israel was anti-Semitic, and that was a poster here who was banned and who may very well have been a troll. But the claim that you can’t criticize Israel without being called anti-Semitic gets trotted out in almost every debate, virtually exclusively preemptively.
Reminds me of how Carter said that he’d written his book in order to spark debate, and then when Dershowitz challenged him to a debate, Carter claimed that Dershowitz knew nothing about the situation in Israel/Palestine and refused to debate with him on the same stage. In fact, in a show of true chutzpah, while refusing a request to debate, Carter went on TV and claimed that “There is no debate in America about anything that would be critical of Israel,”.
And then of course, there are some who’ll even defend actual anti-Semitism when it’s used as a club with which to flail around during a discussion over the I/P issue. Newcomer provided a nicely packaged object lesson on that point.
I suppose there is a fine distinction between asserting that someone is “complicit with” or “willingly collaborates with” anti-Semites, and simply calling them an anti-Semite.
Finkelstein, of course, is as Jewish as Dershowitz is, and is further the son of Auschwitz and Majdanek survivors, so to accuse him thus is rather extraordinary.
You seem to have shifted your claims from asserting that Dershowitz claims anyone who criticizes Israel is an anti-Semite(which would make him an anti-Semite as well:eek:) to stating that Dershowitz has denounced Finkelstein for collaborating with vicious anti-Semites.
Aren’t you fully aware that for years Finkelstein been a writer for Counterpunch, a truther website which is filled with anti-Semitic articles often claiming that various Jewish conspiracies were responsible for 9/11?
You’re also aware that Finkelstein has for a long time been a fan of Hezbollah and praised Hezbollah declaring “we are all Hezbollah now”. Hezbollah openly has called for the killing of all Jews and used to allow people to download the Protocols of the Elders of Zion off it’s website. Hezbollah was also behind the bombing of Jewish community centers in Argentina.
Furthermore, Finkelstein has appeared on Holocaust Denial programs in Lebanon claiming that Holocaust survivors are liars and that the Swiss Banks that have agreed to pay back money withheld from Jews had never actually withheld that money in the first place.
Finally, I assume you’re aware, since Dershowitz points it out in the same article that you’re quoting from, Finkelstein was originally going to appear at Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s “Holocaust conference” but backed out at the last minute because the Iranians wouldn’t give him enough time.
You seem to be complaining about Dershowitz for making factually accurate statements unless you want to insist that blowing up Jewish community centers isn’t anti-Semitic, that claiming that 9/11 was a Jewish conspiracy isn’t anti-Semitic, and that it’s wrong to classify people who claim the Holocaust is a hoax are Holocaust deniers.
If not, how can you deny that Finkelstein has collaborated with vicious anti-Semites and Holocaust Deniers?
I’m also a bit confused by your referencing Finkelstein being Jewish.
So what, their have historically been plenty of Jews who collaborated with anti-Semites and held anti-Semitic views just as there have been blacks who held racist views and collaborated with racists.
What one does with it is one’s issue to deal with.
My issue is this claim that only “knowledgeable people” and “people deep into the study of the field” can have a proper understanding of this concept. And if mine or someone else’s understanding is slivery different they’ll call you on it with the simplest borderline offensive argument – derived from above quoted phrases – “you are not knowledgeable” and “you’re not deep into the study of this field”.
My point is also there is no soft conceptual workaround for this kind of claim for a paradigm defined as such; i.e. any use of “chosen” will have negative connotation; it is exclusionary. Of course, if you are in the paradigm of “choosiness” you will find any other paradigm offensive because most likely it is exclusionary and goes counter to yours (e.g. “supersessionism”).
He’s criticising the Zionist nuts who run the country. He’s criticising their “God’s chosen people” mentality. That’s being anti-Zionist, not antisemitic.
