He told a joke about how a former Israeli soldier from the 8207 battalion was eaten by a shark. “The shark swam past Israeli children, but it didn’t hit the children,” Schirtzer said in the video. “So even a shark can tell the difference between a child and a soldier.”

lol

That may be true, but it doesn’t excuse the list at all.

My country is responsible for the majority of international violence since WWII. I find that morally unacceptable.

I make posts like this because I want my country to do better. But the sad reality is we have yet to learn our lesson. We have been aiding and abetting an ongoing Holocaust for almost two years now.

My best guess is that the Chinese government will admit fault long into the future, when most of the accountability and backlash has already faded into history.

Which is no different than how the US has handled many of the atrocities I mentioned.

When will the US acknowledge and release info on the 100s of Yemeni and Pakistani civilian targets that were destroyed by drone strike? When will the US release the warcrimes reports from the War on Terror? Does the US even still have these warcrimes reports, or were they destroyed (as whistleblowers and Amnesty International have suggested they were)?

If you can’t answer questions like these without resorting to cries of “Whataboutism”, then fuck off hypocrite.

Your comment ignores the context that the US is doing anti-Chinese propaganda here, and there is no parity.

Imagine if the shoe was on the other foot, and China was releasing PR statements on every anniversary of every US atrocity. They would still be issuing multiple statements every day.

The “pressure on the cultural zeitgeist” you speak of is just “shoot, then cry”. The victims are forgotten.

Yep that’s exactly my point, the US is doing Whataboutism when it issues these PR stunts to condemn Chinese atrocities.

I agree that declassification is a great thing, but it is not so black and white. Not all info becomes declassified eventually, so much is covered up and destroyed.

For example, much is known about the My Lai massacre in the Vietnam War. Most of this information is known due to declassified documents. But these declassified documents also mention that there were over 100 My Lai-level massacres that occured, most of which we know nothing about. Army Chief of Staff Westmoreland was quoted saying we do a “My Lai each month”.

One of the largest, codenamed Speedy Express, reportedly killed 11,000 people, and was covered up at the highest levels.

It is not my intention to give other countries a pass. Indonesia is guilty of genocide in the case of East Timor; the US is guilty as well.

The genocide in East Timor is analogous to the ongoing genocide in Palestine.

Both genocides are not conducted by US personnel, but the majority of arms are supplied by the US. The US gives international legitimacy to the genocidal party, while running defense for it’s atrocities. The genocide in East Timor was ended by a phone call from the US president, and I am of the firm belief that the genocide in Gaza could be ended by a similar call. Previous Israeli atrocities were ended by calls from Reagan and Bush Sr.

As an American I think it’s helpful to put this into some sort of perspective.

Things the US won’t forget:

• Tiananmen Square (thousands dead)

Things the US will forget:

• Korean War (3mil civilian dead)

• Vietnam War (2mil civilian dead)

• Iraqi War (1mil civilian dead)

• Violent overthrow of East Timor (widely considered a genocide)

• Violent overthrow of Afghanistan (twice, over 1 mil dead)

• Violent overthrow of Nicaragua

• Violent overthrow of Grenada

• Violent overthrow of Panama

• Violent overthrow of Libya

• Coup d’etat of Guatemala

• Coup d’etat of Iran

• Failed Coup d’etat of Syria

• Failed Coup d’etat of Indonesia

• Many failed Coup d’etat attempts on Cuba

• Coup d’etat of Congo

• Coup d’etat of Laos

• Coup d’etat of the Dominican Republic

• Coup d’etat of Iraq

• Coup d’etat of Brazil

• Successful Coup d’etat of Indonesia (1 mil dead)

• Coup d’etat of Chile

• Multiple Coup d’etat of Bolivia

• Coup d’etat of Haiti

• Multiple Coup d’etat attempts on Venezuela

• Coup d’etat of Palestine

• Mass civilian casualties, destabilization of many governments, people subject to a lifetime of torture without a trial, all under the War on Terror

This list could be so much longer, but I gotta get to work.

Yes, the current president is supporting genocide.

You don’t hear anyone on the left yelling about it? Maybe you should pay attention, protest movements are ongoing. Protest tactics and media coverage may change in the Trump era, but the anti-genocide movement is still strong in my opinion.

If you want to make some sort of political point then you should come out and say it. Hiding behind sarcasm is off putting when discussing a serious subject like genocide. Its almost like you don’t actually care.

Yes, the lie that Biden was pushing for a ceasefire gave him tons of political cover. It was one of his administration’s primary Gaza talking points. They used this lie to deflect against valid criticism for months.

Even AOC fell for the lie, saying Harris was working tirelessly for a ceasefire in Gaza

No, Gaza is still being bombed. Children are being intentionally starved. It’s still a crisis.

Probably discussing the latest news about how Biden never pressured Israel for ceasefire

It was just another lie to give political cover as he aided and abetted an ongoing genocide.

It’s not wasted at all, this is textbook Shock Doctrine (Naomi Klein, 2007). This is Steve Bannons’s “flood the zone” strategy that Trump is currently following.

The lies will be believed by dedicated Zionists. Paid Hasbara trolls will be repeating these lies forever.

For most news consumers, the story will come across muddled, confused, and open to personal interpretation. From their low-information perspective, a conclusion of “both sides” seems reasonable.

And for those who are paying attention and have a strong sense of morality, this will be one more battle we will have to repeatedly fight. We will have to expend time and energy to fight this lie, and it is just one of many.

Americans see protest as pointless right now.

Americans have seen a generation of peaceful protests that were crushed and villified. Anti-WTO, Anti-Iraq War, Occupy Wall Street, George Floyd, etc; all failed to achieve any of their stated goals.

And now that the fascists have taken control, peaceful protest is even less effective. For peaceful protest to succeed your opponent must have empathy, and fascists have none.

The last protest movement that accomplished something substantial was the civil rights movement. It was not peaceful, it was militant. I think we need a modern Black Panther Party.

Yes the British film Battle for Haditha received funding from the DoD’s Entertainment Media Office. It is difficult to find any military film that has not been funded in part by this propagada office.

I do have one fact incorrect though, they did not receive millions. It appears they received much less, although I couldnt find an exact number.

But here you are ignoring the thrust of my argument, that the insidious free market propaganda by the US is much more effective than the heavy handed authoritarian propaganda by China. Yes, you can go get an advanced degree and learn about Haditha freely, but that knowledge is effectively prevented from reaching the broader public.

Both US and China actively deny and suppress information. The Chinese method is more authoritarian, the US method is more effective.

I argue this point on another comment in this thread.

Well I thought we were discussing education, but as far as information supression is concerned, I think both countries are heavily supresssing information, but the US method is simply much more effective.

Take for example an event similar in scale to the Tiananmen massacre, the Haditha massacre. The US military actively suppressed all info after it happened, classifying everything related to the killings. The only information from the state dept about this incident were leaks to the press downplaying the severity of the incident. Later, the DoD spends millions funding a Hollywood film to whitewash the incident, focusing on the perspective of the poor sad soldiers who did the massacre.

The result, I would argue, is that the Haditha massacre has been whitewashed, justified, and erased from history much more effectively than the Tiananmen massacre.

So you were left ignorant of the other half of the atrocities I mentioned, just like we suspect Chinese citizens are ignorant of Tiananmen?

I went to high school in North Dakota btw.

I think there are many events in American history that could be analogous to Tiananmen.

Were you ever educated on the 1985 MOVE bombing? The destruction of black wall street? The house un-american activities committee? The battle of Blair Mountain?

Were you ever taught about any of the coups we did to overthrow democratic governments in latin america? The death squads we trained? The authoritarians and fascists we put into power, and the oppression and death they caused?

Or, in general, the 70-or-so countries we invaded since WWII? I think most Americans can only name Iraq, Afghanistan, and Vietnam.

And that’s just the stuff I can name off the top of my head, I’m sure there are countless American atrocities that I am unaware of.

Personally, the American education system taught me none of that. Many of these subjects are not discussed in broad American culture.