Skip to content

Take a flying leap

Published by Tom Sullivan on October 15, 2023

To the rude, inappropriate and manipulative

Kat Abughazaleh of Media Matters is sick of being asked.

One of the most outrageous features of the public response to any mass terror attack is the assumption that everyone from the ethnic group of the terrorists is expected to publicly and immediately condemn the villains or be condemned themselves as a terrorist sympathizer. (Unless the perpetrator is a white American, naturally.) The premise behind the demand is assignation of mass guilt by association.

Plus, the demand itself is annoyingly manipulative, and not just limited to (in this case) Palestinians. It kind of works like, “If you are outraged by this act of terror, if you are horrified and sickened, we, your neighbors (and political adversaries), demand you shout your outrage from the rooftops. We demand you feel the way we feel and express your feelings about the attack the way we do, now, performatively, publicly and loudly. That is, unless you want to draw suspicion and condemnation yourself.”

Despite the wailing mothers seen on TV, not all people express their feelings the same way. Not all people experience grief the same way, nor express them as openly and immediately. It is rudely and inappropriately manipulative to insist you either join us in our performance of outrage or you are with the terrorists. But some people are just that rude, inappropriate and manipulative. They’re too busy trying to score points to care.

I’ve not met Abughazaleh and have no other connection to Palestinians except for my humanity, but I too respond poorly to being manipulated.

Published inUncategorized