this post was submitted on 02 Apr 2024
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Anarchist Memes
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Basically, the meme says "if israel has no right to exist [because X], then U.S./Canada/Australia don't have a right to exist [because X too]"
I think most people interpret X is: actively settling/killing/displacing people from their homeland. I would call this "active colonialism." And it's not true that those other nations are doing this.
I don't have it specifically out for Israel. I am against Western imperialism in general. I do not wish to make shit up in order to help further the narrative that western imperialism is destroying the world. That would be detrimental to the goal of furthering the narrative that western imperialism is destroying the world.
Is this an honest question? Because this is obvious to me..?
Yes, this was an honest question. If Israel were colonial, then it would be a form settler colonialism. (So very different from the typical European kind). And even then, academic scholars aren't sure if it is indeed settler colonialist or not. The whole history of Israel/Palestine is really fucking complicated and I get sceptical if someone says it's actually simple (regardless of affiliation to any side). So why would you classify it as active colonialism?
And regarding the meme, your interpretation seems to be very narrow. Why would people necessarily need to interpret X to be active colonialism? X could also mean atrocities in general, not just narrowly defined atrocities. My interpretation was rather that people defending Israel's right to exist try to do so by tying it to other (western) nations' right to exist. But the punchline of the meme then is that they fail to see that no nation should exist in the first place. I strongly agree with that, no nation or border should exist regardless of how they act. That's how I would interpret the message of this meme (this is an anarchist community after all).
OK, granted, that's a much more interesting interpretation of the meme than mine and I prefer your take. I guess my interpretation was not the universal one. I'm split on whether the intended interpretation was close to mine or not. On the other hand, as they say, intent doesn't matter.
I would consider Israel settler-colonialist because, for instance, they encroach on west bank lands regularly, evicting people from their homes, construct new housing units in those spaces, and then build walls to keep Palestinians out.
This isn't to say the whole situation is simple. I don't claim to understand it entirely nor have a solution to the problem.
I think we both basically agree. And it makes sense that we just had a different interpretation of the meme.
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