Ben & Jerry’s Co-Founders Defend Boycotting Israel, But Won’t Boycott Texas and Georgia
The founders parroted the incorrect “international law” argument people use to justify boycotting Israel.
Axios’ Alexi McCammond stumped Ben & Jerry’s co-founders Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield when she asked them why they will boycott Israel, but not states with laws they do not like.
McCammond asked the two progressive old men: “You guys are big proponents of voting rights. Why do you still sell ice cream in Georgia? Texas – abortion bans. Why are you still selling there?”
*silence* *crickets*
Cohen: “I don’t know.”
Cohen and Greenfield do not control the company. However, the two men “retained their right to be its social conscience.”
Ben & Jerry’s decided to boycott “occupied Palestinian territory,” including the ancient Jewish quarter of Jerusalem. It means no one in the West Bank and East Jerusalem can buy the overrated ice cream:
We believe it is inconsistent with our values for Ben & Jerry’s ice cream to be sold in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT). We also hear and recognize the concerns shared with us by our fans and trusted partners.
We have a longstanding partnership with our licensee, who manufactures Ben & Jerry’s ice cream in Israel and distributes it in the region. We have been working to change this, and so we have informed our licensee that we will not renew the license agreement when it expires at the end of next year.
Ben & Jerry’s “will stay in Israel through a different arrangement.”
Well, only parts of Israel.
So why not Texas or Georgia? How about other states? Man, Cohen should have stopped at, “I don’t know” (emphasis mine):
- “I don’t know,” Ben Cohen said with a laugh. “It’s an interesting question. I don’t know what that would accomplish. We’re working on those issues, of voting rights. … I think you ask a really good question. And I think I’d have to sit down and think about it for a bit.”
- When pressed on the Texas limits on women’s access to abortion, Cohen said: “By that reasoning, we should not sell any ice cream anywhere. I’ve got issues with what’s being done in almost every state and country.”
Greenfield piped in: “One thing that’s different is that what Israel is doing is considered illegal by international law. And so I think that’s a consideration.”
When I hear anyone invoke “international law,” especially with Israel, I think of law professor Eugene Kontorovich. He had a great thread in February 2020 about international law prohibiting doing business in occupied or disputed territories. He also had a podcast in 2019 discussing why the Israeli communities in the West Bank do not violate international law.
3) The UNHRC knows there is no rule against such business activity. As @KoheletForum has shown, many leading multinationals do massive business in occupied territories around the world, but UNHRC has not thought to blacklist them. https://t.co/w5jaYguA8U
— Eugene Kontorovich (@EVKontorovich) February 12, 2020
5) Even groups that have called for such blacklists get donations from companies doing business in occupied territories, and they see no problem with this, because it does not involve Israel. https://t.co/0qkB3CdsOJ
— Eugene Kontorovich (@EVKontorovich) February 12, 2020
Listen to my @tikvahfund podcast discussing why Sec. Pompeo was right to return U.S. policy to the view that Israeli communities in the West Bank do not violate international law. https://t.co/H0LzCFcI4H
— Eugene Kontorovich (@EVKontorovich) November 26, 2019
My new piece @mosaicmag: "The Many Incoherences and Hypocrisies of International Law on Jerusalem" https://t.co/IF3WqWscuE… Or, why int'l community think a 1947 GA recommendation sets borders, but not a 1948 Sec Council that was supposed to be "permanent'
— Eugene Kontorovich (@EVKontorovich) July 15, 2019
Israeli settlements are likely to cause some friction with Biden Administration. That's the politics. What does international law say? Read my paper (in @Harvard_Law's Journal of Legal Analysis) -the only comprehensive survey of settlements under int'l law https://t.co/Or19rHOYsr
— Eugene Kontorovich (@EVKontorovich) January 20, 2021
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Comments
Go ahead, grow a pair. We’ve got Blue Bell, it’s the best ice cream in the country.
And, folks out west have Thrifty’s, which is still good as far as I know.
Yup. Texas don’t need Josef & Vladmir’s Ice Cream, they got Blue Bell.
Arizona don’t need it either, they got Grand Mayan frozen margaritas.
Dunno what Georgia got, they on their own.
Rhode Island just got Del’s Frozen Lemonade; sorry, not sorry.
Never fear. The deep South has Blue Bell ice cream. I’ve seen it in the Publix just across the Florida-Georgia line the last time I went up North.
“International law” in of itself is a bit of a misnomer. It’s a set of international treaties, of which most have agreed to abide by. Assuming that the country and their government has signed those treaties. Anyone expect the Taliban to be signing any of those treaties anytime soon? Yeah, didnt think so.
Mayfield Dairy has better ice cream than the two self-loathing Jews product.
Fuck you, burnout hippies. Fuck what you stand for. Fuck your ice cream and fuck Joe Biden.
Sorry, I have to speak their language so they understand me.
Useful Idiots.
LET’S GO BRANDON
This weekend they were chanting “F*ck Joe Biden” at a sport event (racing) and the NBC announcer tried to cover it up by saying they were chanting “Let’s Go Brandon” (one the people racing).
To shame NBC and other mainstream media – as well as get the “F*ck Joe Biden” message across – people are now saying “Let’s Go Brandon”. It basically accomplishes two tasks – F*ck the media AND Joe Biden.
It’s catching on. Roll your window down next time you are waiting for the light to change, and yell it.
I get people joining in when I do it.
The pair of hem and their buddy Bernie are Marxist’s.
These two white men, like all liberals are dirty little fucking racists. They hate Jews for the crime of being Jews.
Fuck these guys…or as we are now saying, lets go Ben and Jerrys.
“They hate Jews for the crime of being Jews.”
Which would be hilarious, because they’re both Jews!
Except that it’s not hilarious. But it is true.
Self-Hatred seems in VOGUE
Self-hating Jews
Self-Hating Whites
Self-Hating Asians
Self-Hating Men
Self-Hating Americans
Self-Hating Middle-Class.
.
.The list is long. They are all idiots who believe the propaganda.
The worst are the sheep who just go along and repeat the slogans of the day.
They are perfect Democrats then 🙄
“occupied Palestinian territory.”
Oh, you mean the worldwide recognized nation of ‘Israel.’ Because there is no palestinian nation. The nation of ‘palestine’ has never existed. It was simply a geographic region that, until 5 seconds ago, no one gave a black-buttered goat bisquit about, except to run their armies through for greater conquest of the entire Levant (see: Egypt, Babylon, Greece, Rome, Europe, Ottoman, Europe again, etc.).
Likewise, there are no ‘palestinian’ people. There’s never been a ‘palestinian’ people. They are mongrel Arabs who no other Arab nation wants inside their borders. The arcane ‘Canaanites’ in a 21st century Canaan nation is just as absurd.
Stop your self-loathing Jew hate, Ben & Jerry. Gropey ol’ grandpa joe is waiting for his ice cream.
Because they know from experience, everything’s bigger in Texas.
It isn’t necessary for them to boycott Texas. We can just boycott them and the stores will stop stocking their overpriced crap.
BDS UNILEVER
Boycott, Divest & Sanction Unilever.
Sell all their stock – stop buying all their products.
They want to take a political position ? They can also take the consequences. We do not have to buy their products or invest in their stock. Or accept their messaging.
Why do corporations feel the need to get involved in political and social issues. Shouldn’t that be reserved to their shareholders and customers?
This is not Unilever’s decision. Unilever owns B&J but does not control it. B&J’s board is independent.
That was the agreement between Unilever and B&J at the time that Unilever purchased B&J. I question whether, under corporate law, Unilever doesn’t have options. Does Unilver, which ultimately has fiduciary duties to shareholders, need to comply with an agreement between it and its subsidiary if the subsidiary is violating the law 0r exposes to the parent company to litigation? Are there other factors that would permit Unilever to take control? I have to believe that some smart lawyers could find some way to “fix matters.” I just don’t think Unilever, which has its own anti-Israel (anti-Jewish) problems, feels motivated.
Milhouse, as I think about this, I realize that Unilver’s position that it cannot do anything about B&J’s policy is absurd. If B&J’s board is truly independent, then I assume that Unilver can sue its own subsidiary in court. Thus, if Unilver sustained any damages (monetarily, reputationally or otherwise) as a result of B&J’s actions, Unilvever would have a claim upon which damages may be awarded–including, potentially, an injunction.
Now, imagine that B&J’s board was composed of a bunch of white supremacists (the real kind; not the fake kind). And so B&J’s board decides to endorse the Ku Klux Klan. Do you think Unilever claim some lack of leverage? Of course not. But if the hatred is directed against Jews with a patina of misdirection using Israel, it’s different.
When Hillary released her book a few years back I made a habit of flipping them upside down.
Do the same with B&J ice cream. Turn a few upside down in the freezer case.
Make the people who work at the store for minimum wage work harder helps who exactly???
Try to think things through.
Or turn a few upside down OUT of the freezer case.
Better yet, pull them from the freezer and put them on a shelf.
Ruin their product as they would ruin our life. Make B&J ice cream a liability to grocers, and they will refuse to carry it.
It’s a modern day Vermont tea party.
Yes get yourself arrested for petty crimes that will hurt a mega corporation and not yourself…..
In all fairness, anybody, especially ice cream guys, are subject to brain freeze.
This is why I told my wife not to buy their ice cream. And she agrees and doesn’t buy it anymore. Hasn’t bought it for quite some time.
So small v virtue signaling that costs little as opposed to risking much more profit in Red States. Got it.
Red States are full of human beings. Israel is full of Jews. See the difference?
/sarc, sort of.
So all Jews reside in Israel? News to me. As well the designation as deplorable, bitter clinging, uneducated, rural rubes who manage to consistently vote against their own interests; what’s wrong with Kansas, for those in Red States indicates a less than whole hearted commitment to viewing their fellow Citizens as fully equal human beings on the part of the d/prog like these two guys.
Ben and Jerry are despicable hypocrites. Self-hating Jews, desperate to receive approbation and a pat on the head from their Dhimmi-crat peers, by bashing Israel, Israeli Jews and American Jews who support Israel. Aging hippie, anti-establishment hucksters cosplaying as authentic neo-communist radicals. Of course, selling their company to multinational personal products and packaged foods giant, Uniliver, for hundreds of millions of dollars somehow didn’t violate their anti-corporate ethos, and, is never mentioned by them.
I would so love to tell them stoner liberal were to put it but I couldn’t say it and have it published
They are probably contractually obligated not to denigrate anything the company owner, Unilever, says or does or risk their annual stipend. They are men without courage who have utterly failed their fellow Jews when faced with their moment of crisis.
But Unilever didn’t do this, and wants no part of it. On the contrary, their contract with Unilever requires it to let B&J’s independent board do this sort of thing.
our family owned a home in stowe for decades–actually went to middlebury and visited b & j’s when these guys were just getting their company started–met the both of them–they were stoners/weirdos then and appear to be the same now–how they could in any way be culturally relevant is beyond my understanding
That’s what they say, but they won’t be able to. Any Israeli distributor they contract with will be bound by Israeli law, which bans boycotts against the territories. The same will apply if they set up their own distributorship; they will have to comply with the law. And if they do decide to pull out of Israel altogether, Israel can and should expropriate their local trademark and renew the current licensee’s contract.
By the way, it’s wrong to say that B&J are self-haters. Of course they don’t hate themselves. In their mind they’re the good Jews, the ones who reject all Jewish values and grovel before the morally superior “victims” (whose identity changes from decade to decade). It’s those other Jews whom they hate.
If you previously had a habit of taking a butcher knife to your fitness with Ben and Jerry’s congratulations here comes your chance to adopt a healthier snack.
Ignoring that this should be a nail in the coffin of the idea that the free market will show up and solve all our problems. Corporate America hates us. Ben and Jerry’s of course is boycotting Israel. Republicans love Israel therefore….
We are about 47% of the country (the same as Democrats) corporate America doesn’t see that as a market to cater to it sees that as a cancer to remove.
I used to buy a pint of Ben and Jerry’s twice a month. And then I heard one of these two spouting off Far Leftist nonsense about the US Military. That was over a decade ago, and I have never bought another pint.
There are better brands that are worth buying in the US if it goes woke-let it go broke
Previously known as useful idiots, this interview has reduced their title to simply “idiots.”
“Cohen and Greenfield do not control the company.”
then why talk with them in the first place?
Israelis should be relieved that they will not longer have to choose between an over priced, second rate ice cream (Ben and Jerrys’) and the superior brands available for lesser cost.
Gee, per the British Mandate, what is now Jordan was part of “Palestine” and thus is now “occupied”. Are they selling their overpriced ice cream there?
Sigh. I do miss Cherry Garcia. But the first time I heard these little WokeScolds, Cherry Garcia was dead to me.
They’d lose too much money in sales if they removed their product from Texas. It’s not really about the ideology when all is said and done, it’s about selling the ice cream.