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On the futility of I/P discourse here [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2023-10-26  

Look, I get it. I/P (Israel/Palestine) is in the news and folks have very strong opinions and an overwhelming compulsion to express them. I’ve been there. As a survivor of the dumpster-fire I/P fights here on the Great Orange Satan in the early and mid 2010s and as an observer of the current iteration of dumpster-fire I/P fights (mostly an observer… as Michael Corleone said, “just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in” ), I’ll offer a view from a longer-term perspective.

I/P discourse here has been—and remains—an overrehearsed and entirely predictable performance. I’ve seen a recent optimistic call here to “assume positive intent” among I/P authors and commenters. A noble call, to be sure, yet one contradicted by the stylized monotony of I/P discourse here over the years. While bit players may come and go, the script is unaltered.

The stage is set, resplendent in confirmation bias.

The actors appear, a novice chorus of the outraged behind the principal cast of edgelords, sealions, ideologues and propagandists.

The performance drags on with its tediously unoriginal plot lines scripted of insinuation and invective, of casual bigotry and overt hate, [entr’acte: seriously, head for the doors or at least duck outside for a smoke and/or drink to steel yourself for the second act], of misinformation rooted in confirmation bias, of decontextualized cherry-picked “facts” from dubious sources and of propagandistic disinformation.

What little movement there is among the wooden players is inevitably toward the right margin of the page stage.

The denouement resolves nothing. The curtain closes. A smattering of desultory applause for acquaintances in the cast ensues while the majority of the remaining audience—those masochistic season-ticket holders who stayed beyond intermission—departs hard-pressed to comprehend what they’ve just seen and conflicted among pity for the players and resentment of the wasted time.

If you’ve missed the show thus far, never fear. There are still many seats available for this evening’s and this weekend’s performances.

But my advice is to skip the Daily Kos production of “I/P: a Discourse” altogether and save up in anticipation of something more edifying... perhaps “Battlefield Earth: the Musical.”

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/10/26/2201487/-On-the-futility-of-I-P-discourse-here?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

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