Letters to the Editor
Xanthro
Published Letters: 522 Editor's Choice: 47
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While Israel is where it is.
[Read the article: Up against the wall]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]For instance, I have some very serious questions about the wisdom of locating Israel smack-dab in the middle of sworn enemies of the jews. Sworn enemies since *biblical times"!!!!!!! How could this ever work? When Israel was created out of whole cloth and forced upon Palestinians who had lived on the land for centuries, if not millenia?
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When I read posts like this, I'm not sure if it's because of a wholesale disregard for history, or an appalling ignorance.
Israel is located where it is because that's where the traditional Jewish homeland has been for over 2,500 years, and Jews have lived there constantly since then.
Every year the Seder ends with the promise, "Next year in Jerusalem.” The problem for the last 2,000 years is a foreign conqueror has controlled Jerusalem. The Romans, the Byzantines, Arab Caliphates, Crusaders, Mameluks, Ottomans, and British.
Note, that only the Crusaders ever used Jerusalem as a capital of a state.
Jews have been a majority in Jerusalem since 1844, and would have always been a majority except for violence commited against them.
It’s simple, Jews had to flee their homeland because of the violence commited against them in their historic lands, part of this diaspora had religious roots, that God was punishing them and thus their lot was divine judgment until God rebuilds the Temple. When violence in their adopted countries, especially the Holocaust, because unimaginable, a number of Jews decided that if they are going to die, it might as well be in their historic homeland.
Yes, it’s sad that the Syrians and Jordanian and Arabs living there were displaced, but they moved into a land claimed by another, launched and lost a war, and thus lost land. This is how war works.
I don’t see many Americans spending time debating the plight of Sudeten Germans, who were all forceably removed from their homes, a land as large as Israel. Despite their forced relocation taking during the same time period.
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How the question was asked
[Read the article: George Allen and the "aspersion" of Judaism]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Look, I think Allen is a bigot and a bully, but something about the tone of the question struck me as out of place.
The questioned seemed much more, "Are you a JEW!!" rather than "Are you Jewish?" To me, her tone seemed accussatory in some manner.
Now, why did Allen feel the need to say he was raised Christian right after saying one's religion didn't matter? I think we know the answer.
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Assessing one's own Accomplishments
[Read the article: Panel: Female scientists are not actually dumber]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"IT COMPLETELY SUCKS TO DEVOTE YOUR LIFE TO A CAREER WHERE PEOPLE ASSUME THAT YOU HAVE AN INFERIOR INNATE ABILITY TO HAVE THAT CAREER REGARDLESS OF YOUR ACTUAL ACCOMPLISHMENTS."
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How do you know you don't have an inferior ability in your field? People are notoriously poor at assessing their own skills, and this has nothing to do with gender or sex.
Perhaps you simply are not as good in your field as your peers.
I’ve worked with many people who felt their skill level was far higher than it actually was.
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The panel also wants Quotas.
[Read the article: Panel: Female scientists are not actually dumber]
[Read more letters about this article: Here][b]And departments should be held accountable for the equity of their search processes and outcomes, even if that means canceling a search or withholding a faculty position. [/b]
That means a quota system. They'll deny it with the same twisted logic I've encountered before. I'll give an example, while I was in politics there were votes for central committee seats, and 50% of the seats had to be assigned to females, yet the next line of the bylaws stated that no quotas could be used to determine the make up of the committee.
Obviously, these two are mutually exclusive to rational people, but when I asked how it was possible to require 50% of the committee to be female and not have quotas, I was informed that there were no quotas. If it’s a quota call it a quota, but don’t be in denial as to what you are doing.
If you are going to cancel an applicant search or withhold a faculty position until you find a female when you’ve found a qualified male, you are both discriminating against males and instituting a quota system.
Any process that requires a percentage outcome is a quota, and it’s morally wrong.
No women should be held back because of gender, but women shouldn’t be forced into a profession just so there are equal numbers.
If 20% of the professors in a given field are women, this doesn’t necessarily equal discrimination. It might be an indicator, and if 50% of the applicants were women and only 20% of those accepted are women, you might have a problem, but if women only equal 20% of the applicants you don’t have a problem.
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The Anti-Military Left
[Read the article: Virtually dead in Iraq]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Reading these letters brings home a fact that the left wing of the U.S. has simply become anti-military.
You hate the military and look down on every soldier serving.
This leads you to post stupidity such as
"magine a conversation with a VFW member - he got a purple heart in WW II, he has trhe cap, and the flag pin - the whole nine yards. And he asks you what you think of the war. What are you going to say? Do you think it doesn't take courage to politely and respectfully tell the truth about your beliefs?"
No, it doesn't take courage to politely and respectfully tell the truth about your beliefs to a military vet. If that's your definition of courage, you either have no idea what the term means, or you think every military person is some crazy pyscho that will kill you for disagreeing.
Courage is pulling your buddy back to safety under fire, courage is treating Iraqis with respect when you have no whether they are enemies or not, courage is going into the South during Jim Crow and risking your life to register black voters.
Courage is not talking respectfull to a vet about any war.
It's sad that Choe is still in college and is far more intellectually mature than those "adults" arguing with her.