UK Politics: Unboldy Go There Where No Country Has Gone Before

[Heartofice]

11 minutes ago, john said:

No, he was speaking about British Zionism generally and extrapolating from his experience at this previous event some lessons which he thought British Zionists needed to learn.

Unless you are seeing something I’m not seeing, that is not what he is doing.

[mormont]

1 hour ago, Derfel Cadarn said:

I think the point they’re trying to make is the polls are opinions, and unless they exclusively polled those who’ve met or communicated with corbyn, their opinion will largely be shaped by a mostly anti-corbyn media.

This is a real head-scratcher of an argument for me. It's absolutely begging the question - assuming, as a premise, that Jewish people have been conned by the press and so can't possibly have, or acquire, any valid knowledge about antisemitism in the party. As if Jewish people are unable to critically assess press coverage. As if the direct experiences of Jewish people with personal experience of antisemitism in the party are unable to be communicated because the Mail on Sunday thinks Corbyn is a commie. It's infantilising, and yes, prejudiced. It's just crying 'fake news!'

[A Horse Named Stranger]

18 minutes ago, mormont said:

This is a real head-scratcher of an argument for me. It's absolutely begging the question - assuming, as a premise, that Jewish people have been conned by the press and so can't possibly have, or acquire, any valid knowledge about antisemitism in the party. As if Jewish people are unable to critically assess press coverage. As if the direct experiences of Jewish people with personal experience of antisemitism in the party are unable to be communicated because the Mail on Sunday thinks Corbyn is a commie. It's infantilising, and yes, prejudiced. It's just crying 'fake news!'

I don't think that was the argument.

The argument was, whether an opinion poll is valid measure of whether Corbyn is an anti-semite. And you can reasonably argue it's not, and that an opinion poll on Corbyn's anti-semitism is not really measuring his anti-semitism, but rather people's believe of him being an anti-semite.

A vast majority of Christians believe God exists, so going by your logic, God does indeed exist.

The anti-semitism problem in Labour is not really contested.

[Derfel Cadarn]

8 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

I don't think that was the argument.

The argument was, whether an opinion poll is valid measure of whether Corbyn is an anti-semite. And you can reasonably argue it's not, and that an opinion poll on Corbyn's anti-semitism is not really measuring his anti-semitism, but rather people's believe of him being an anti-semite.

A vast majority of Christians believe God exists, so going by your logic, God does indeed exist.

The anti-semitism problem in Labour is not really contested.

Yes.

The poll was linked on this thread as ‘proof’ that Corbyn is an anti-semite (or “hates jews” as the poster stated at one point).

But it’s a poll. It’s just proof that the majority of those polled believe Corbyn is an anti-semite.

[john]

1 hour ago, Heartofice said:

Unless you are seeing something I’m not seeing, that is not what he is doing.

That’s exactly what he’s doing. He was making a speech about British Zionism informed by what he witnessed in another speech by the Palestinian ambassador. Do you think he just interrupted his speech on British Zionism to tell a totally irrelevant anecdote about a few Zionists he once saw?

[DaveSumm]

4 hours ago, dornishpen said:

As has been pointed out multiple times one of the large polls comes from a legitimate polling company was commissioned by a large umbrella Jewish org that appears to be non-partisan and asked about all the major political parties and leaders. However some of you in this thread keep ignoring that and attributing it to right wing press because it fits your narrative better. This is exactly the sort of gaslighting Bael and I are talking about.

 

This is twice you’ve used the phrase “fits your narrative better” whilst completely ignoring my posts to fit your own. Not one person has questioned the poll, or who it polled. Let’s assume from here on out, it was the greatest and most impartial poll ever conducted and try and move on.

To try and play both sides, I wanted to link a twitter thread I found which compiled the evidence of Labour antisemitism, but it seems to have been deleted which is a shame. From memory it was mostly times that he’d appeared at events alongside dubious groups but I can’t really remember. As far as the evidence on this forum goes, “he maybe accused people of lacking irony but maybe not” doesn’t strike me as particularly damning.

[DaveSumm]

1 hour ago, mormont said:

It's absolutely begging the question - assuming, as a premise, that Jewish people have been conned by the press and so can't possibly have, or acquire, any valid knowledge about antisemitism in the party.

It really isn’t. If we’re trying to discover what effect the media has on people’s perceptions of this issue, we need two pieces of information: the polls (measuring how people feel about it) and the actual extent of anti-semitism in the Labour Party. The media effect is, crudely speaking, the distance between these two. You can’t be suggesting we use the same polls for the actual extent? Are you not arguing the equally absurd opposite position, that the media have done a perfect job of imparting the truth and Jewish people have an opinion that precisely matches reality? 
 

I really don’t understand the difficulty here: polls are not used to find evidence of things. Except “what do people think of this thing.”

[mormont]

1 hour ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

I don't think that was the argument.

The argument was, whether an opinion poll is valid measure of whether Corbyn is an anti-semite. And you can reasonably argue it's not, and that an opinion poll on Corbyn's anti-semitism is not really measuring his anti-semitism, but rather people's believe of him being an anti-semite.

Fair, but unfortunately, some posts did not stop there. There has definitely been an argument that Jewish people are being duped by the press into a false belief about antisemitism in Labour, as here for example:

6 hours ago, Rippounet said:

If the evidence for that is a couple of polls from right-wing papers then you basically have none and you're the one desperately trying to spin this thing. 

1 minute ago, DaveSumm said:

It really isn’t. If we’re trying to discover what effect the media has on people’s perceptions of this issue, we need two pieces of information: the polls (measuring how people feel about it) and the actual extent of anti-semitism in the Labour Party. The media effect is, crudely speaking, the distance between these two. You can’t be suggesting we use the same polls for the actual extent? Are you not arguing the equally absurd opposite position, that the media have done a perfect job of imparting the truth and Jewish people have an opinion that precisely matches reality? 

No. If I were arguing that position, I would not be discussing the ability to 'critically assess' the coverage. My argument is that we should not assume the media effect to be so distorting as to render polls like this meaningless.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

21 minutes ago, mormont said:

Fair, but unfortunately, some posts did not stop there. There has definitely been an argument that Jewish people are being duped by the press into a false belief about antisemitism in Labour, as here for example: 

I don't mean to speak for Rippounet, neither do I really need to, as in he is perfectly capable of speaking for himself.

But his statement was again a reaction to one poster repeatedly banging on that Corbyn is an anti-semite because the poll, and actual discussion of whether Corbyn is truely an anti-semite and the difference between anti-zionism and anti-semitism were shrugged off as mere gaslighting (by likely other anti-semites or sympathizers?). Which really read like the narrative often put forward by the right wing elements within the Jewish community to shrug off criticism of Israel as mere anti-semitism.

I was about to tell the poster in questions off, too. I was merely fortunate enough that our French friend responded earlier, thus saving me the troubles.

Anyway, I am sure Rippounet himself will post a word or two on the subject himself.

[Rippounet]

5 hours ago, dornishpen said:

As has been pointed out multiple times one of the large polls comes from a legitimate polling company was commissioned by a large umbrella Jewish org that appears to be non-partisan and asked about all the major political parties and leaders.

Fair enough. Anyway, best case scenario Corbyn was ridiculously stupid. 

[dornishpen]

If there was a Conservative party leader during a time when the party was having a public problem with xenophobia, who had handled it poorly and not done enough to get it out of their party, who had been a member of Tory Facebook groups extremely xenophobic memes, but there was no evidence that they participated in or even read the group, who had decades of associations with xenophobic organizations for political reasons, who defended a xenophobic mural painted in their district claiming they couldn't see how it xenophobic and said something questionable caught on video that may have been a xenophobic dog whistle or may have been really poor judgement. Would you all be giving them the benefit of the doubt and saying you don't know whether that person was really xenophobic?

[Bael's Bastard]

This idea of not being able to judge someone you have never met in person is utter bullshit, and those making such arguments must know how full of shit such arguments are.

The political and celebrity threads on this forum are full of people making judgements about what sort of people different politicians and celebrities they have never met are based on things they have said, done, etc.

When 80% of Black Americans believe Trump is racist, only a real piece of shit would denigrate the polling, or blame media spin, or say he is just bad at handling his administration's racism, or that even if that many Black Americans really think that, that is just their belief but they don't really know him or his mind.

This sort of shit is absolutely frustrating coming from actual liberals, leftists, and progressives, many of whom would never stand for let alone defend or espouse such racist views against other minorities. 

Look at how many Jews used to historically vote for Labour, even somewhat recently, and look at how few Jews voted for Labour this time around. The concerns of British Jews are not spin or exaggeration, and are not because British Jews are falling for media spin or exaggeration.

By all means, if you want to ignore what your opposing mainstream media sources are reporting out of distrust of them, so be it. But at least listen to what Jews themselves are saying without knee jerk looking for excuses to discount them.

Or don't, if your are intent on giving the benefit of the doubt to those who have squandered it, and denying benefit of the doubt to the minorities who feel threatened by anti-Jewish racism in England. Your choice. 

[DaveSumm]

8 hours ago, mormont said:

No. If I were arguing that position, I would not be discussing the ability to 'critically assess' the coverage. My argument is that we should not assume the media effect to be so distorting as to render polls like this meaningless.

They aren’t meaningless. But their meaning begins and ends with “what do people think?” It has nothing to do with the topic, nothing to do with the Jewish community, it’s just what polls are and what they’re for. If an official investigation or enquiry ever relied on polling as evidence, it would be rightly dismissed.

7 hours ago, dornishpen said:

If there was a Conservative party leader during a time when the party was having a public problem with xenophobia, who had handled it poorly and not done enough to get it out of their party, who had been a member of Tory Facebook groups extremely xenophobic memes, but there was no evidence that they participated in or even read the group, who had decades of associations with xenophobic organizations for political reasons, who defended a xenophobic mural painted in their district claiming they couldn't see how it xenophobic and said something questionable caught on video that may have been a xenophobic dog whistle or may have been really poor judgement. Would you all be giving them the benefit of the doubt and saying you don't know whether that person was really xenophobic?

OK thank you for this, these are actual accusations that we can work with. I would say two things: yes, if there were clear elements of the media seeking to exaggerate or falsify these claims for their own ends, then I would like to think I would try and scrutinise the issue. To use the phrase ‘give the benefit of the doubt’ implies I’ve reached a conclusion on the matter which I haven’t. I would also add: if Corbyn ever said anything about Jewish people which was the equivalent saying Muslim women looked like letterboxes (I’m not sure what that would be though), it would immediately rise to the top of your list of reasons to condemn him. It would have been perceived as utterly devastating for Corbyn and given far, far more coverage than Boris saying it. I don’t see how he could have recovered from it and he would have had to quit as leader.

6 hours ago, Bael's Bastard said:

The political and celebrity threads on this forum are full of people making judgements about what sort of people different politicians and celebrities they have never met are based on things they have said, done, etc.

When 80% of Black Americans believe Trump is racist, only a real piece of shit would denigrate the polling, or blame media spin, or say he is just bad at handling his administration's racism, or that even if that many Black Americans really think that, that is just their belief but they don't really know him or his mind.

I don’t know how else I can explain it. If I were to ask you “do you think Trump is racist?”, what’s your response going to be? Will you hunt down a poll demonstrating that everyone thinks he is? Why on earth would you bother, when you can get to the heart of the issue and cite direct evidence from things he’s said and done? Why add the extra step? All a poll will show is that half the country don’t think he is, if it’s conducted fairly between both sides of the spectrum. Great, so is he or not? We won’t know ... because that’s not what polls are for. 

[A Horse Named Stranger]

6 hours ago, Bael's Bastard said:

This idea of not being able to judge someone you have never met in person is utter bullshit, and those making such arguments must know how full of shit such arguments are.

The argument was provide examples (likesay quotes) of Corbyn being an anti-semite, and not anti-zionist (for defenitions check upthread).

6 hours ago, Bael's Bastard said:

When 80% of Black Americans believe Trump is racist, only a real piece of shit would denigrate the polling, or blame media spin, or say he is just bad at handling his administration's racism, or that even if that many Black Americans really think that, that is just their belief but they don't really know him or his mind.

Christ this is getting painful. So do you have Corbyn going on a campaign stage announcing: Israel is not sending us their best people anymore, they are sending us their rapists and murderers (Trump on Mexican I just replaced Mexicans with Jews), or him Corbyn saying, where's my Jew? There he is look at him? (Trump on an African American voter during an campaign event), and so on and so forth. Not to mention Trump's love for eugenics, or his history as a landlord in NYC.

Show me the equivalent of Johnson's infamous piccaninnies with watermelon smiles written by Corbyn about Jews, then you will also see me in agreement about him being an anti-semite.

So there's a lot more to back up the claims of Trump being racist then a mere poll among black folks. But I suspect you will just want to point out the poll again.

7 hours ago, Bael's Bastard said:

Look at how many Jews used to historically vote for Labour, even somewhat recently, and look at how few Jews voted for Labour this time around. The concerns of British Jews are not spin or exaggeration, and are not because British Jews are falling for media spin or exaggeration.

Yes, again. Labour has a systematic problem with anti-semitism. Nobody is disagreeing with that assessment. And also nobody is disputing that Corbyn's handling of it has been poor/disgracefuul/shit/whatever word you want to use. And Labour really has to properly address it now. Again, no argument there.

 

[john]

9 hours ago, DaveSumm said:

“he maybe accused people of lacking irony but maybe not” doesn’t strike me as particularly damning.

Conflated Zionists and Jews and suggested they needed lessons in history and irony.

[mormont]

1 hour ago, DaveSumm said:

They aren’t meaningless. But their meaning begins and ends with “what do people think?”

I don't think so, no. Not unless we are to accept that people just think things for no reason.

Trump's approval ratings are just an opinion poll, after all, and he would have you believe that they're evidence of nothing but the 'fake news agenda'.

More to the point, concrete evidence of why people believe the Labour party has a problem with antisemitism abound in this thread. Things like the experience of MPs such as Luciana Berger have been cited. I've pointed out that antisemitic remarks by party members have been accurately reported. You know, presumably, that Jewish people have access to these same pieces of evidence. Yet you're trying to maintain this agnostic stance on why Jewish people might think the party is antisemitic, as if you don't have any idea what might be causing it. You may imagine that to be a neutral stance. It isn't.

[Rippounet]

10 hours ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Which really read like the narrative often put forward by the right wing elements within the Jewish community to shrug off criticism of Israel as mere anti-semitism.

Yeah, when it comes to discussing this stuff (if people really want to) I'm going to be looking at the sources really closely.

For instance anyone coming from a group called "Friends of Israel" is not going to get my trust on anti-semitism since it's clear from the get-go that they have their own pro-Israel agenda.

58 minutes ago, mormont said:

More to the point, concrete evidence of why people believe the Labour party has a problem with antisemitism abound in this thread.

Labour, not Corbyn.
The case presented here against Corbyn on antisemitism is weak.
Having checked the polls (there are several in fact) they seem to be genuine, which hints at a much better case than has been made here.

I think it can reasonably be said that Corbyn is guilty by association and he's obviously comfortable with or tolerant of antisemitism. That is damning enough already.
To go the extra step and say that he himself must be antisemitic, and try to argue the point with dubious evidence is really lowering the standard of proof too much for me.

1 hour ago, john said:

Conflated Zionists and Jews

No.
To say that's what he did you need to assume he's antisemitic and using a dogwhistle. Except the video is supposed to be evidence of his antisemitism...

Generally speaking a 40 second clip from more than 6 years ago, obviously taken out of context and referring to past events doesn't impress me much. No one in their right mind should derive any conclusion from that kind of "evidence." At the very least you'd want many more clips like that to show that Corbyn's comments even mean anything outside a very specific context. Or perhaps his entire speech to make sure that he wasn't just criticizing two guys. Or perhaps the Palestinian amabassador's speech to see what "British humor" was in this context. ... etc.

[john]

3 hours ago, Rippounet said:

No.
To say that's what he did you need to assume he's antisemitic and using a dogwhistle. Except the video is supposed to be evidence of his antisemitism...

You don’t need to be using a dogwhistle to be antisemitic. There’s lots of different ways of being discriminatory. Here it’s a derogatory statement about British Zionists, which by his word choice appears to mean British Jews. It might be careless, it might be revealing of his true feelings, either way it’s antisemitic language. The context of the situation is irrelevant.

[Derfel Cadarn]

Senior Home Office civil servant quit, and intends to claim for constructive dismissal. Basically calls Priti Patel a bullying liar.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-51688261

[A wilding]

Also, it appears that they had offered him a large sum of (taxpayers) money to go quietly, but he turned it down. Either he is angry enough to want blood, or he feels speaking out is the correct thing to do and is willing to put himself through all he is going to get hit with now.