You need no better example of how twisted parts of academia have become than to look at an anti-Israeli conference being organized at The City University of New York devoted to the issue of “homonationalism and pinkwashing.”
I have posted before about the “pinkwashing” charge leveled by anti-Israel gay activists.
Israel, the only country in the Middle East with a humane record on treatment of gays, is singled out for scorn by anti-Israel gay activists who fear that giving Israel credit on gay rights may take away from the war on Israel launched by groups and countries openly hostile to gays.
The pinkwashing charge rightly is described as part of an attempt to exterminate any semblance of Israeli legitimacy:
Anything that could blunt the demonization of the Jewish state is by definition as evil as the Jewish state itself is.
The City University of New York is a hotbed of the anti-Israeli pinkwashing movement, as detailed in this article at The Times of Israel:
In academic conference planned for next year in New York will use Israel’s largely positive record on gay rights to denounce its treatment of Palestinians.
City University of New York last week announced Homonationalism and Pinkwashing, a gathering that will provide “an opportunity to examine Queer Resistance and Complicity globally” — but with a special emphasis on Israel. Hosted by CUNY’s Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies, the conference will take Israel to task for “pinkwashing,” a term that accuses the country of promoting its progressive treatment of sexual minorities as a way of diverting attention from its conflict with the Palestinians. “Faced with intensifying criticism and the threat of economic boycott,” the conference website states, “the Israeli government expanded their marketing plan by harnessing Homonationalism to reposition its global image.”
From the conference website:
The co-opting of some LGBT people by anti-immigrant and in particular anti-Muslim political forces is widespread and growing. Rutgers Professor Jasbir Puar has coined the term “Homonationalism” to define collusion between LGBT people and identification with the nation state, re-enforcement of racial and national boundary, and systems of supremacy ideology no longer interrupted by homophobia. Homonationalism has spread far from its roots in European xenophobia and US militarism to become an increasingly potent tool in the long-running Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Mere political argument cannot fully diagnose the condition from which the organizers of this conference suffer. Call a doctor.
Update 3-30-2012: Keith Burgess-Jackson has a diagnosis for it, Academentia.
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Comments
Next the chimpanzees of the world turn on Jane Goodall.
A better analogy would be PETA hosting a conference calling on all whales to attack the Cousteau family.
“Cetaceanationalism and whalewatching.”
I am not getting the reference…but I only can connect Jane Goodall with Gorillas.
Gotta love chimps though.
Someone explain again, for the umpteenth time, why we need to be “civil” to people like this?
Please. Explain it to me. Why do conservatives always have to be reasonable when dealing with people who think like this and act to demonize anyone who doesn’t? Explain it to me. Again. Please.
Explain to me why so many so-called conservatives feel such a need to be the first to criticize Rush Limbaugh calling a slut a slut when they know that the people waiting to feed on his carcass are the very same people who go out of their way to not only promote hate like this but feed off the energy of the hate they create.
Somebody explain it to me. Why am I the bad guy when I refuse to be reasonable with people who deserve to be scorned and cast out of polite society? Why?
I asked that question once. In response to being told I hate someone because I don’t approve of their lifestyle. My friend couldn’t seperate disapproval from hate.. “Don’t you know it hurts their feelings? “, he wailed.
I said …”that’s life, feelings sometimes get smooshed.. get over it. I mean how do you think i feel about you calling me hateful… that’s just hateful.”
Sometimes, the very kindest thing you can do is simply tell the truth.
A real friend is about the only person you can count on to do that.
This has gotten me into a great deal of trouble with women.
Word…
1. Somebody explain it to me. Why am I the bad guy when I refuse to be reasonable with people who deserve to be scorned and cast out of polite society? Why?
If somebody like Bill Jacobson, who has established a track record of credibility and integrity with me, blows his stack, I take it one way. If somebody I don’t know from Adam (or Eve), blows their stack, I take it another.
2. Someone explain again, for the umpteenth time, why we need to be “civil” to people like this? (p)Please. Explain it to me. Why do conservatives always have to be reasonable when dealing with people who think like this and act to demonize anyone who doesn’t? Explain it to me. Again. Please.
With respect, I wonder if you’re setting up a false choice. When opponents are abusive, the only alternatives are not to either roll over or to be abusive back. Ideally one retaliates in a time, place, and manner of one’s choosing.
Also, swing voters are the target audience for Leftist provocations. If swing voters perceive two sets of crazies screaming at each other, they may go with the side that brandishes the compassion card, the race card, the free stuff card, etc.
It is difficult to be positive and civil—but not weak—in the face of provocation, but conservatives like Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley demonstrated how it can be done.
This is the difference between attaining a victory and allowing things to devolve into a scene reminiscent of a domestic dispute at full tilt.
Read your last paragraph again. Ronald Reagan and William F. Buckley are dead. Then look at how their legacies have been corrupted by their own children.
We are losing the country. Israel won’t survive a second Obama term. Islam is sweeping the world. And yet the only people who understand that and want to stop it care more about how reasonable they appear to be to blog commenters because, heaven forbid, some other blogger disses you because you are rude. Rude? We are up against people who hate this country and everything it stands for, hate Western Civilization and see IT as the biggest problem facing the world, make excuses for the deliberate targeting and murder of children, and we’re supposed to be reasonable?
Nuts.
Doctor, I think I suffer from homonationalismphobia.
(Clearly they suffer from exploit us interrupt us.)
Standard operating doctrine for the morally superior Left:
1. There is always a pretext to demonize an opponent, no matter how worthy their overall record. There is always a pretext to extenuate an ally, no matter how vile their overall record.
2. In any interaction between savages and civilized people, the onus is on the civilized people no matter how viciously the savages behave.
What is us militarism? It brings to mind Hitler youth type images from the words; surely that isn’t what was meant, I mean our children don’t wear school uniforms and chant their love of the state….
Oh … nevermind. The odd thing about this *militarism* is that it isn’t from or supportive of the *military* I find that a bit ironic.
“the conference will take Israel to task for “pinkwashing,” a term that accuses the country of promoting its progressive treatment of sexual minorities as a way of diverting attention from its conflict with the Palestinians.”
It’s racist to for anyone to point out that Israel is the only State in the ME which treats gays as normal human beings.
Or something.
Ironically, the same people accuse pro-Israel Christians of liking Jews solely to fulfill biblical prophecies that benefit Christians. Which is to say, in their opinion, there’s no good reason to support Jews/Israel on any matter, regardless.
I’ve run across Christians here and there who do think like that, but they’re an absurd minority. Every group has its quacks (see that one loony-tunes Jewish sect which supports Iran’s mullahs because they don’t think Israel should have been reborn until the Messiah arrives).
Most however, in my experience at least, support Israel because they recognize that Israelis are not the ones airing children’s shows in which the protagonists gleeful speak of dreams of genocide and world domination.
Crazy idea, I know. I guess some people would call it genocidophobia or perhaps Idonotwanttobeterriblymurderedby7thcenturyyahoosnationalism.
.
I wasn’t accusing most Christians of believing that. I’m accusing anti-Semites of dismissing Christians’ love and affection for Israel on what they consider illegitimate, selfish grounds. It’s stupid.
Besides, even if it were true that Christians are only in it for the Rapture, so what? Bad-mouthing them, as many Jews do, is akin to not accepting your lost dog from the guy who found it if he admits he did it only for the reward.
Anti-Semites find it inconceivable that anyone could feel differently, so they question the motives of everyone but themselves.
I was talking politics with an old friend who is Jewish and very liberal a couple years ago and he asked me why I was so adamant in my support of Israel, especially since I’m not Jewish.
My answer: Because it’s the right thing to do.
Another Jewish childhood friend calls the Israelis “Nazis.”
When we were in high school he gave me a book (a propaganda pamphlet) in support of the Palestinians. I read it … and threw it away.
It’s bizarre to me that they can’t see the obvious truth of the situation. And, needless to say, they love to mock Christians. The more radical one loathes Christians.
I just don’t get it. The truth, (having looked at both sides) is obvious. And, I’ll be friends with anybody who wants to be my friend. I don’t exclude anybody. So, I also don’t get the animosity on their part.
Where you live (if I remember correctly) is near where I live. Thus we’re surrounded by my co-religionists for whom liberalism and “being nice” and “enlightened” and “siding with the underdog” and “being loved” by people who’d just as soon slit our throats is the true religion.
I’ve yakked about this endlessly with my ferociously Zionist uncle, always to no clear conclusion other than to blame the last 2,000 years. Constantly being hunted and hated and scapegoated has, it seems, created a kind of gene for survival that appears, on the surface, to require obeisance. Remember, this is the first time in more than two millennia that Jews have had a military force of their own, so among certain Jews–a disgustingly large percentage–embarrassment at success seems natural and appropriate.
I wish I didn’t have to argue so frequently with other Jews that the Christians who love them, like you, love them for the right reasons–even if the “right” reason relates to the Rapture. I always ask, “Do you believe in the Rapture.” Of course not, they say. “So what do you care why they pray for Israel and Jews?” Of course, motive is the sine qua non of liberalism. If your motives are pure, what you do is irrelevant–even if it’s destructive. That’s what they believe. Oy.
“Oy” is right.
By the way, my support of Israel is not because of religion. I pray occasionally, but I can’t really call myself a Christian.
My views are a result of critical thinking and reasoning.
I feel that if you take the Palestinian side in this, you’re either not too bright (if you’ve actually looked at it carefully), or, like my otherwise intelligent friends, have a psychological “defect” (for lack of a better word) that compels you to side with underdogs, no matter how evil some of those underdogs may be. It seems to completely blind reason in some instances. That’s a mighty unstable perch atop Maslow’s Pyramid.
Really, you might be able to bring Orwell back from the dead using this “homonationalism and pinkwashing” insanity as smelling salts. This is beyond insanity. A LGBT group fighting for its rights and equality … which has a death wish.
“…Mere political argument cannot fully diagnose the condition from which the organizers of this conference suffer. Call a doctor….”
Most would assume you call for a psychiatrist. No sir, they need a proctologist to diagnose this crap! Dr. Puar is a
product of that prestigious institution-Berkeley. Nuff said.
I read that several times and still can’t figure out what it means.
For example, is a LGBT person in America guilty if he/she has feelings of patriotism for the United States? If he/she believes that we shall enforce our immigration laws?
Is a straight person guilty of ‘heteronationalism’ if he/she is patriotic?
I think part of what these nutters try to do is to own the vocabulary.
It’s called Selective Reality Syndrome (SRS). It is a progressive condition that prevails in a decadent society. It is clearly observable in the context of history, science, etc. Individuals who suffer from SRS are motivated by dreams of physical, material, and ego instant gratification through the marginalization and demoralization of their competing interests.
SRS is the explanation for individuals and cooperatives which are capable of ignoring murder, rape, torture, and slavery throughout much of Africa; and softer variants which manifest themselves as denigrating individual dignity and devaluing human life (e.g. elective abortion) as has become progressively popular in America and Western civilizations generally.
This syndrome is generically classified as a delusion motivated by selfish interests, but it is best specified by its characteristic quality which is a selective perception of reality.
That said, SRS can only be understood in a world with objective standards. With a progressive rejection (or perversion) of the natural order and enlightened (i.e. individual consciousness and dignity) order, the concept of SRS becomes less meaningful and, in fact, less relevant.
There is only one known therapy for SRS: suspension of disbelief.
Hey Roswell: I think you let some of those aliens loose and they are now running CUNY. Could you please pick them up and remember to bring their special air, because they apparently aren’t breathing the same stuff that the rest of us are.
Roswell is the homeplace of some of my relatives. Their joke is “All our aliens have their green cards. Do yours?”
New Mexico is trying hard to overcome the stench of having a white Hispanic/Mexican Bill Richardson as governor(play for pay) with new Republican governor the blonde Chicanita, Susanna Martinez. New Mexicoites don’t care if her grandfather crash landed in Roswell in 1947, cause she is bringing jobs to New Mexico.
The Left needs to own the vocabulary to fulfill their goal of utterly destroying any recognition of the concepts of fact, truth, and reason.
For our part, Conservatives certainly need some new words to adequately describe the activities of the Left. For example, we sure could use a synonym for “low” that gives some indication of the sub-Marianas-Trench depths that had to be trawled to invent the concepts of “homonationalism” and “pinkwashing.”
If I remember my Sunday School lessons correctly, Israel was established about 3500 years ago (give or take a few years). It’s a beacon of western civilization; it’s the only light in the region for love and freedom. I’m a Christian Zionist for those reasons.
sigh..another example, this time from the loony left, of dragging gay folks into the middle of some issue. using israel’s positive record on gay rights against them because of the plight of the so-called palestinians (who persecute gay people) is the kind of twisted logic we’ve come to expect from academia.
Experts and psychiatrists have long thought that liberalism harms the brain.
Modern brain science and scanning technology has shown this is true. This is the reason these people’s thinking does not make sense.
More about this tomorrow…I’m too tired to type any more tonight. Haven’t gotten used to the new time change.
[…] This, Gay Fucktards Posted on March 29, 2012 6:13 pm by Bill Quick » Another low for academia: Anti-Israel “Homonationalism and Pinkwashing” Conference at CUNY &#… You need no better example of how twisted parts of academia have become than to look at an […]
This is the kind of nonsense that never ceases to amaze me. It is like those morons who put the “COEXIST” bumper stickers on their cars.
The question I want to ask is, “how will you coexist with someone whose primary objective is either to forcibly convert you, enslave you or murder you?”
Frankly, the Muslim world is perfectly happy with either of the three outcomes. A rational person should object to each.
Leftists have become utter morons completely separated from rational thought and reality. And when we point this out to them we are “uncivil” at best or racists monsters at worst.
Meanwhile, they keep on attempting to violently oppress all opposition to their tyranny, as they demand we “sit down and shut up.”
Increasingly, I fear this will all end very badly for America. Leftists don’t respect freedom, democracy, limited government or rule of law. How will we manage to “coexist” with them?
You can’t win an argument with a moron. It just brings you down to their level.
I refuse to support my children’s universities when they come hat in hand and ask for money which will be used to fuel their rabid hatred of Israel. Let them eat cake.
Here’s the dirty little secret behind the homosexual hatred of Israel, who can only offer them rights and freedoms: Muslim countries are deeply homosexual. The men use boys and men for pleasure and women for bearing children. The hatred of the female is so deeply ingrained that the female form and face can be publicly shown only upon pain of whipping or death. Yeah, Muslim countries kill homosexuals, but the ones they don’t kill sure do have a whole honkin’ heap of fun. The birds in Kandahar fly with one wing for a reason. Given a choice between lots of monkey sex and rights, guess what trumps?