My best friend, who is an unbeliever and who is not a political conservative, is partially responsible for my current political direction. I used to be a conservative Republican. As such, I went into teaching computer science at a college. There I met my best friend. We are best friends for two reasons: we experience life 80% to 90% the same way and we always help each other do what is right. One of the most prominent traits of my best friend is her compassion. Perhaps there is only one other person whom I know who has her level of compassion.
And so a year passed since my best friend and I were working at the same campus--I live a significant distance from that campus--and then I decided that, because of my best friend's level of compassion, I would read a couple of nonconservative writers to see what I could learn. And so I picked up a book by Martin Luther King Jr and one by Noam Chomsky to read during that summer. What impressed me most about Martin Luther King Jr was his passion for winning people over. On a side note, perhaps our political discussions with others would be more civil if we shared that passion. What impressed me most about Noam Chomsky was his passion for fairness. In particular, he stressed our nation's need to judge itself using the same standards by which it judges other nations. This is another trait that is sorely missing from our world today.
It is this judging others using the same standards that a nation is judging itself is what Stewart channelled in one of his most recent stints on The Daily Show (proceed to the 5:43 mark of the video clip below).
In that episode, Stewart compared how our nation interpreted and spoke to Russia about its attacking Ukraine with how Israel is attacking Gaza. And what was immediately apparent was the vast disparity over how our nation is responding to the two military actions, or wars if you will. That though there were many similarities between the two conflicts, our nation's leaders spoke one way to Russia, who is an enemy, and quite another way to Israel, who is an ally. In other words, Stewart seemed to be saying that we need to use the same standards to analyze and respond to both attackers.
This using the same standards to judge one's ally as one uses to judge one's enemy is but a variation of Chomsky's use of the Principle of Universality (click here for the source):
Among the most elementary of moral truisms is the principle of universality: we apply to ourselves the same standards we do to others, more stringent ones if we are serious. A near-universal principle of intellectual culture is the rejection of this truism, sometimes explicitly.
Only instead of applying the same standards to ourselves, Stewart is made the point that we should apply the same standards to allies as we apply to others.
And what Stewart says later on in the video, the October 7th atrocities committed by Hamas seems not to be the determining factor in how Israel is attacking Gaza. For in the West Bank, there is Israeli violence against Palestinians, where Hamas is absent, as well as the confiscation of land.
The current blind support that American Zionists, many of the them being my fellow religiously conservative Christians, are giving to Israel would be similar to how G.K. Chesterton used the phrase, 'my mother, drunk or sober' to describe blind patriotism.
Of course the Principle of Universality flies into the face of patriotism, nationalism, and every other kind of tribalism--including the tribalism that can occur between allies. For with tribalism, comes the Principle of Moral Relativity. That principle says that what is right and wrong depends on who is doing what to whom. In addition, we should be able to see that the Principle of Universality aligns itself with the Rule of Law while the Principle of Moral Relativity embraces the Rule of Force.
The current form of Zionism, there are multiple forms of Zionism, is much like American Exceptionalism. It is passionately embraced by those who pride themselves on patriotism and national identity. And despite the idealistic notions that lovers of Zionism or American Exceptionalism have on their respective nations, in the end, they embrace the rule of force. In other words, those who are strong enough have earned the right to be a bully.
Though I disagree with their goal, there is a group that is challenging the rule of force that is being executed by Israel and enabled by the U.S. That group is the students who are camping out at their colleges in order to move their colleges to divest from Israel. I disagree with their goal because it is too big of a goal to achieve in such a short amount of time. But the students are protesting grave injustices that Israel is committing even though Israel's military actions are in response to the grave injustices it experienced on October 7th, 2023. And for that, the student protesters are being unjustly maligned by the liberal MSM as well as government and college officials. The anti-Semitic actions practiced by a few individuals at those encampments is inexcusable. But those actions are against, not just not a part of, what has been planned by Jews, Arabs, Muslims, and others for the encampments.
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