Economics and similar, for the sleep-deprived
A subtle change has been made to the comments links, so they no longer pop up. Does this in any way help with the problem about comments not appearing on permalinked posts, readers?
Update: seemingly not
Update: Oh yeah!
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
From my email outbox, once more
This time, on the subject of online discussion of Israel/Palestine, and the alleged excessive, obsessive concern ....
"The thing is, how many well-educated middle class English speakers are active in the American and European press who are prepared to defend the Chechen occupation? One side causes the other.
Here's a thought experiment. Pretend that I only care about three things in the world - Burma, Chechnya and Palestine. Pretend also, that I care a hundred times more about Burma and Chechnya than I do about Palestine. Pretend also that I am confined to my house and all I do all day is argue on the internet. How much time am I going to spend arguing about Israel/Palestine, compared to Burman and Chechnya?
Answer; I am going to spend much more time on I/P. Because (this is
the important bit) - this is the only subject on which I will find
someone to argue with. Unless I speak Russian or Burmese, I am not
going to be able to find someone to address my polemics to on my real
topics of interest. But Israel has loads of people who are prepared
to do apologetics for war crimes in English, on prominently available
websites. A similar phenomenon accounts for the massively greater
salience of Zimbabwe compared to much worse places in Africa.
There is no different standard. It's the same standard; it's just
that if you go around condemning abuses in Yemen then you can get your
excoriation done in five minutes flat and get on with the day, whereas
if you get into an argument about Palestine then you can kiss the
morning goodbye.
Personally I am more than anything else outraged by the behaviour of
Idriss Deby's regime in Chad. It is a phenomenal time saver."
this item posted by the management 9/26/2012 03:51:00 AM
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