The Line
OpenAI, summary of events: The board fucked up and fired CEO Sam Altman, but over the next several hours/days the situation was unfucked. As of this writing, the state of play is Altman is back as CEO and a majority of the board has resigned. Whether or not that status survives the long weekend, the ultimate outcome has been clear since Sunday night: Altman reinstated at OpenAI. The board’s last stand was Darryl Hannah in a tree, refusing to come down in protest — illusory relevance with the half-life of a Planet Fitness seven-day pass.
Microsoft hiring the entire OpenAI workforce was never realistic, despite the made-for-TV moment of 500 people boarding a plane for Seattle. Some of the problems: broken employee and partnership agreements with OpenAI and infringement of its IP rights; Microsoft’s assimilation of 500 different comp/equity agreements; the response of OpenAI investors (a16z, Khosla Ventures, Sequoia, Thrive, and Tiger) to their multibillion-dollar stakes getting effectively transferred to MSFT; and antitrust concerns over greater concentration in AI power. Satya knew this and was careful to say he welcomed the opportunity to work with OpenAI again should Altman return. Which was the better/more viable outcome for both of them all along.
The near-collapse of the Valley’s most important and successful startup is a $90 billion lesson that profit and mission don’t mix. OpenAI was founded as a nonprofit, then birthed a for-profit subsidiary. Serving “all of humanity” was adorable until 90 billion distractions showed up and the management team and investors began avoiding eye contact with the original mission. Altman and the board were supposed to straddle that divide, but it proved impossible. If this was a battle between capital and (concern for) humanity, capital smothered humanity in its sleep.
We should abandon the mythology that the market alone can produce the great taste of capitalism (shareholder returns) without the calories (pick your poison: climate change, labor exploitation, autocracy). Nothing drives innovation and value creation like the profit motive. But it can’t be trusted to do anything but make money. That’s why we need stronger government regulation and greater enforcement. The best ESG investment of ‘23 was the taxpayers’ investment in the SEC and DOJ, which are sending the CEOs of FTX and Binance to jail. The fiduciary obligation to “humanity” belongs with democratic institutions; it can’t be dependent on the better angels of billionaires.
The Line
However … the pursuit of profit has limits. And that brings us to the other major news of the week, which I believe is more serious and consequential. Last Wednesday, what Elon Musk had previously cloaked in dog-whistling retweets and bluster broke into the open with an explicit public endorsement. “You have said the actual truth” he wrote in response to the claim that Jews are pushing “hatred against whites” and “flooding their country” with minorities. This follows months of warnings from outside groups that antisemitic and other hateful content has surged on X. Mr. Free Speech has sued several of these groups and blamed the Anti-Defamation League for undermining X’s advertising business.
What has ensued is apologists “contextualizing” the statements of their friend, idol, and potential client. These same “leaders” were quick to judge the idiocy of a 19-year-old at a campus rally, but they’ve decided there’s “nuance” when it comes to one of their own. It’s fucking gross. You don’t need to be able to see into his Ketamine heart — you are your actions and your words, and Elon Musk is an antisemite.
Whether you agree this is what the man is, think he’s cosplaying a Nazi for business reasons, or believe he’s just a misunderstood genius, the question remains: What is to be done when the richest man on the planet, who controls the world’s most valuable car company and a global satellite communications network, uses his wholly owned social media platform to increasingly and unapologetically aid and abet bigotry and antisemitism?
This is the latest incarnation of an old problem. I wrote about it a year ago, when another well-known figure was promoting the same dangerous feculence. The post wasn’t about him (Kanye) but the appropriate response to his statements. We’re running it again, because our response to Elon is more important. Not only because of his power and reach, but because the situation has grown more dire. Hate crimes in the U.S. have been rising for a decade, and were up another 7% in 2022 — while antisemitic incidents were up 36%. In 2021 there were eight bomb threats against Jewish institutions. In 2022 there were 91. That was before October 7 and the war in Gaza. This October saw a nearly 400% increase in antisemitic incidents. And violence begets violence: Islamophobic incidents nearly doubled in the same period.
As we argued when we ran the following post last year, these trends have tragic historical echoes: the price of doing business with those who traffic in hate is not measured in dollars, but in lives. What this post is ultimately about is the difference between opinions and principles. Opinions are easy to hold and cheap to change, and their value is commensurate. Principles, on the other hand, are things for which you are willing to sacrifice. Willing to draw a line.
The following was posted on October 28, 2022
There was controversy this month involving Kanye West. You can catch up here; I won’t reiterate it. I believe Kanye is ill, and I’ll return to ignoring him soon after this post. This post is about Adidas, Gap, CAA, and his other corporate partners. It is about the moral obligation we have to draw a line.
Familiar Target
Authoritarian power, fascism especially, often rests on the persecution of a group. Fascists ascribe the problems of society to the influence of a minority and argue that controlling or eliminating that group will solve a social ill. The most popular target for this form of social weaponization, for hundreds of years, has been the Jews.
Making up 2% of the U.S. population, and only 0.2% of the world’s population, Jews are, year after year, the target of more anti-religious hate crimes than any group. In the two-year period 2001-02 bookending 9/11 — when Islamic terrorists killed 3,000 people — the FBI identified 636 anti-Islam hate crimes in the U.S., up from just 61 in the two prior years. Over the same period the FBI identified 1,974 anti-Jewish hate crimes — three times as many as directed at Muslims, more than half the religious hate crimes committed during the period.
The anti-Islam number was the anomaly. Year after year, more hate crimes are committed against Jewish Americans than against any other group except Black Americans. (There are six times as many Black Americans, and in total they suffer twice as many hate crimes.) The situation is similar abroad and over time. Persecution of the Jews is so common, there’s a Yiddish word for being massacred: pogrom. QAnon is strange and vile, but likely ends up only a stain on this American era. Antisemitism is history’s most enduring and deadly conspiracy theory.
That’s why special attention should be paid to tropes like “the Jewish media.” The real demon, of course, is demonization, of any target. The history of discrimination and violence against “out” groups is extensive, from the Armenian genocide, to the mass killings of Christians by ISIS, to China’s detainment of Uyghurs, and much, much more. In fact, the Nazis did not limit their attacks to Jews alone. They targeted Romani people, Black people, homosexuals, and the handicapped. Whoever the target, identifying a group, blaming them for society’s problems, and encouraging persecution, including violence, against them is the fascist playbook. We cannot ignore these tactics in the rantings of billionaire celebrities, regardless of what we think of their music, their shoe designs, or their mental health.
A companion tactic is the assertion of victimhood by the fascists themselves. “Replacement theory” is the noxious combination of both, asserting that the persecuted minority will somehow supplant the majority. The rhetoric of fascism is like a battery, drawing energy from contradiction. A self-proclaimed billionaire, for example, wailing about how oppressed he is.
New Normal
We have incorrectly conflated the liberal tradition of “free speech” with neutrality, with protecting the dark shoots of fascism in the name of tolerance. By the time speech has flowered into actions that cannot be ascribed to a “lone wolf” or the “mentally ill,” it has ripened into a movement. Movements are harder to stop, and the cost of resistance becomes so high that good people stop doing and saying the right thing as the understandable instinct for self-preservation kicks in. Later, we find eloquence and grace only in our regret.
I have the feeling that we let our consciences realize too late the need of standing up against something that we knew was wrong. We have therefore had to avenge it, but we did nothing to prevent it. I hope that in the future, we are going to remember that there can be no compromise at any point with the things that we know are wrong.
— Eleanor Roosevelt
Standing up against the rhetoric of hatred has nothing to do with censorship. There is no law forbidding people from employing the rhetoric of oppression, nor should there be. But no principle obligates us to accept them in media or business relationships.
A pillar of state-sponsored horror is the steady normalization of stereotyping and blaming. One person ranting about the Jews or anyone else is readily identified as an outlier and ignored. But as these claims multiply, as they have recently, they seem less outrageous. Political scientist Joseph Overton postulated that at any time there is a range of policies the population deems acceptable, but this “window of discourse” is not constant. It’s become a strategic objective of extremist groups to shift the “Overton window” over time toward their position by using rhetoric and advancing policies just outside the current scope of societal acceptance. And as the volume of hateful rhetoric rises, as research has shown, so too does hate crime.
Normalization Inc.
The rise of fascism — the normalization of hatred — is concomitant with the accommodations of powerful people who register political and financial gain by looking the other way. “Appeasement” is historically associated with Neville Chamberlain, the U.K. Prime Minister who caved to Hitler’s territorial demands rather than risk war with Germany — only to make the eventual war more costly. Chamberlain is unfairly singled out. Much of the British ruling class supported his position, and the U.S. Congress passed law after law barring aid to those threatened by the Nazis until Pearl Harbor made such a position untenable. Accommodation inside Germany began years earlier, with Hitler’s rise to power (via an election) in 1932.
Although Chamberlain is the poster child for appeasement, often the key enablers of fascism are not politicians, but corporations. Large companies benefit from stability, the expansion of their nation’s sphere of influence, and the centralization of power at the expense of the individual — many of the central themes of fascism. It’s no surprise that corporate power is often the handmaiden to authoritarian rule. I write that not as an indictment of corporations — corporations are essential. They are how we organize human effort to accomplish extraordinary things, from electric cars to vaccines. But as corporations become more powerful, their rejection or enablement of hate speech takes on additional importance.
Corporate accommodation of and support for the Nazis is well documented, from Adidas to Volkswagen to Krupp to IG Farben. Multinationals flooded into Pinochet’s Chile as he murdered his political opponents by the thousands. Vladmir Putin’s Russia has made “oligarch” (once simply a term for a member of a ruling clique) into a synonym for business leader. The risk is even greater today, considering the role corporations play in modulating our national discourse. The pure pursuit of profit can lead to dark places. There has to be a line, a moral consideration in place.
Drawing that line can be hard, because the leaders of large companies are culturally inclined toward, if not political neutrality, avoiding political adventurism. Corporations take political positions for business reasons, and 99% of the time, the best position is none. Donate to both sides, lobby for regulatory capture, and then stand on the sidelines.
But neutrality in the face of evil is not neutrality. Amorality is too easily hijacked by the immoral. Hannah Arrendt was fascinated by Adolf Eichmann, the architect of Hitler’s death camp system. He evidently had no ideology of his own, just a “manifest shallowness,” she wrote, “which made it impossible to trace the incontestable evil of his deeds to any deeper level of roots or motives.” If Meta were to change its name again … “Manifest Shallowness” strikes me as a decent fit.
If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.
— Desmond Tutu
Drawing the Line
Which brings us back to Kanye. And to the corporations that did business with him. Their decision to sever ties is important. Not because they need to “cancel” Kanye. It’s not about Kanye, but drawing a line, arresting the normalization of the demonization of a minority.
In the case of Adidas, the ink for this line will cost shareholders hundreds of millions, if not billions, in shareholder value. The shoe maker has been criticized for waiting 10 days to cut ties. Ten days is an eyeblink in history (and even if management made the decision in 10 minutes, the logistics and legalities of responsibly disentangling a multibillion dollar relationship take time). The company should be commended for its actions.
As expensive as it was, Kanye did Adidas, the corporate world, and maybe America, a favor. As John Oliver put it, “The answer to where you draw the line is literally always ‘somewhere.’” If you never draw one, you forget how. So when someone goes to “death con 3,” society’s writing hand rediscovers penmanship. It helps to practice our cursive so we know we can do it. Drawing a line is a chance to remind yourself, your employees, your shareholders, and your customers that you’d rather take a stand now, when the cost is only profits vs. something much worse.
The Line to Here
In writing and presentations, I often point out that much of my success is due to my circumstances — being born in America, getting a state-sponsored education, etc. But the real roots of my good fortune run even deeper. During the Blitz, my mom was a 4-year-old Jew, sleeping in the London tube. Had the British not drawn a line, and then the Americans and Russians, it’s likely that a 21-mile-wide strip of water would have been breached, and my mother’s life would have ended with a train ride. And someone else would be writing this newsletter.
It should be noted: The allies drew a line against fascism and potential invasion, not antisemitism. The costs would have been less dear had we drawn those lines earlier. The line on Kanye should have been drawn sooner. Every elected leader, citizen, and CEO must ask themselves, Where is my line? To answer the question: We must first decide there is one.
Life is so rich,
A masterful, beautifully written piece that I will come back to again. I feel that you have woven so many threads together to make this work one of the best you have written. Jews have been a constant in history. Even the killing of six million Jews could not change the narrative, and here we are some eighty years later, and we are still the world’s most hated people. As long as Jews remain, there will always be those that feel nothing is vile enough, nothing so abjectly hostile than those that wish to destroy us. We are not perfect, but we honor life over death, education over ignorance, and love over hate. Some cannot feel anything but hatred, but it won’t stop us from trying to repair the world.
The same old worn-out comments. Move on from the second world war. Jews are not the only religious sect to be singled-out for death. Christians and muslims have been slaughtered since the middle-ages. Stop dwelling on the past!!!
I don’t think he’s living in the past. He’s talking about current events and citing data from 2021. WWII was 80 years ago, sure, but obviously major enough to reflect on. He talked about Jews because they’re the most persecuted, but plenty of groups (including Christians and Muslims) were mentioned as targets of hate in this article. He clearly stated that the problem was demonization of minorities, not anti-Semitism specifically.
You miss the real problem with the OpenAI board. The board was populated with members of a doomsday cult who believe that AI could kill every last human on earth. They were given a single bullet which they were supposed to use to stop development at OpenAI in case they thought the AI was about to destroy of all humanity. They thought we were all about to die and these trigger happy doomers fired their only round.
Religion has to go. Jews are such an easy target because everyone can say they are Christ Killers. So first let’s publish all the ample and factual content that JC never lived. He is a made up character that has existed so people can feel they are SAVED since they believe they are not really good enough.
Whether Jesus of Nazareth was God is a big question, but whether he physically lived is another. If you believe Flavius Josephus and Tacitus are wrong, please link some sources that strongly dispute their claim.
Scott’s obsession with Elon is omnipresent, and green…with envy.
Musk is in Israel right now, 5 days after this article was posted. He’s shown support for the peiple there, and the victims of terror. The thesis that he’s an antisemite has gotten a lot weaker.
Don’t confuse PR stunts with lines crossed.
Many of us have opinions on many things, but to be honest with oneself is choosing what to comment on, based on expertise. Why I don’t like this episode and other religious and culturally charged discourse you have is your bias. Which is okay, and the reason why I don’t like this episode is because we stand on 2 opposite bias. We can’t ignore that there is hate crime towards Jewish people, but to think Jewish people have it worse is bonkers. Any data proving that, is flawed by every possible measure. This isn’t a race towards victimhood, but a score on hypocrisy. Calling out Jewish media about sidelining anything not-Jewish is not demonization (for the most part) but an unfair advantage of making use of their public platforms to benefit the Jewish community. You are Jewish and are chastising everything that is not Jewish. Technically, you are going from Prof G Media to yet another Jewish Media.
Strange interpretation of the article. I thought it was about choosing when enough is enough regarding hate speech etc. Galloway uses the current situation with anti-semitism as an example. Not the example.
Musk is in Israel right now, 5 days after this article was posted. He’s shown support for the peiple there, and the victims of terror. The thesis that he’s an antisemite has gotten a lot weaker.
The data doesn’t say Jews have it worse, just that they are the victims of more reported hate crimes per capita. Maybe they are more likely to report than other groups, but just the fact that they report so many is a problem in itself.
This article isn’t about whether Jews are the most persecuted. It’s about what we should do when we see people or groups moving toward persecution of any minority. How do we respond? Where do we draw the line?
Thank you for sharing your thoughts.
So Galloway is working overtime to remind us that he has this long standing, one-sided feud with Musk. He just spent 2 blog posts in a row thrashing on Musk and telling us we need to draw the line with him, yet Galloway still has a quote from Musk that he’s using to promote his own book and that quote is even on the front page of Galloway’s twitter page and linkedin page.
So picking a fight with the guy who is far more famous, successful, richer, and has far more game than yourself so that you can get their attention and get a quote that you can use to promote your own book.
Yeah, there’s nothing creepy or stalker-like about that.
The evidence by Desmond Tutu cited here is a form of “you’re either with us or against us” and is a false dichotomy.
I don’t like when people use logical fallacies to support their argument.
I reject that evidence, my trust in you has gone down and the argument is weaker.
I hope you choose to do better next time.
Right on!
Kant vs Mill, how do you find your line? Do only leaders need to find their line or does everybody? I think Prof G needs to study moloch game theory to understand what an enormous monster humanity is facing.
‘see into his Ketamine heart’ = GOLD! 🙂
Excellent commentary. Succinct and sobering.
Agree with the sentiments but everyone has a mind of their own. Let people decide as they want without restrictions. If Musk has his opinions so do others have theirs and the majority can make up their own minds, just as Scott does.
I think that’s exactly the point of the article. Make up your mind about what you are willing to tolerate. Don’t not have an opinion.
Elon Musk is my idol.
Elon is your line.
Hi Scott. I am a relatively new peruser of your newsletter, which I have been enjoying in the past few weeks (especially your stuff on the Middle East). I do want to raise a flag with this newsletter – your numbers on Islamophobia are off. Here’s why: most Muslims do not report hate crimes. Why? It is similar to the issue with sexual assault, or communities of color and their relationship with authorities like the police – when you have had a historic association where you are considered suspect and are villainized by authorities, along with the systemic underinvestment of Muslim civil organizations (post-9/11, many major nonprofits were shut down over fear that they were fronts for funding terrorism, which goes to show you how high hysteria and prejudice was), you are not going to get accurate rates of reporting. Every single American Muslim I know (and I know thousands because of my work as a community organizer for a decade) has experienced Islamophobia – whether it be employment discrimination, physical harassment (shockingly common), verbal harassment, etc.
An example – a few years ago, I did a presentation on how to deal with bullying at a mosque for a high school youth group. I showed them a video o bullying and then asked, how many people had experienced bullying in school? Not a single hand went up. I was shocked but thought – maybe it’s not an issue in this relatively affluent suburb? Maybe things have changed since I was in public school? We then had an activity where we put up butcher paper on the wall, had them break out into small groups, and draw a layout of their school. I asked them to draw if they’ve ever had an experience where someone has said or done something to them. As we got into the small group conversations, I heard the kids say, “Here is where my principal asked me if I was related to Osama Bin Laden.” “Here is where my classmate asked me if I was a terrorist.” “Here is where I had my hijab pulled off.” I said to the kids — this is bullying! This is discrimination! Why didn’t you raise your hands? The overwhelming response – oh, this is normal. We deal with this all the time. It’s just part of being Muslim. It’s not bullying.
You have to believe you are worthy of being treated equally, and you have to have trust and courage to report discrimination. I would argue that, overwhelmingly, Muslim Americans don’t have those things and that is because of a decades-long campaign to show them as suspect and less than equal.
I live in France where 15 % of the population are Moslem and there are similar figurtes for the UK and Germany. Moslems come to Europe from their own countries of origin and want housing and benefits and work but then complain that they don’t like local ways of life. They refuse to assimilate and form their own groups in their own mosques and obey the law of the Koran which allows them to have several wives, and not English law. They are basically parasites feeding off another person’s culture which they then disapprove of. They should not be allowed entry and should return to their own origins.
Amazing that Scott will write an article crying and whining about hate speech but lets comments like this stand without any way to report. It’s almost like it’s not about hate speech at all and entirely about driving pro-Israeli interests at the expense of Muslims
Scott will write an article crying and whining about hate speech but lets comments like this stand without any way to report. It’s almost like it’s not about hate speech at all and entirely about driving pro-Israeli interests at the expense of Muslims
I certainly agree that Muslims likely underreport hate crimes. But I think we need to take a step back.
Antisemitism is bad. Islamophobia is bad. This article focuses on Jews because of the Israel-Hamas War and Kanye’s antisemitic comments. But Scott clearly states that this isn’t about just antisemitism. It’s about drawing a line at hate speech before it morphs into hate crimes or a hateful movement.
Scott. Thank you for the post and insightfulness regarding the courage to do what is “right and important” and draw a line. Thank you for the conviction to challenge us all to stand up for principle.
Scott, Thank you for this clear, uncompromising statement.
Back to the Open AI shenanigans- whatever happened to your warning about idolatry of tech bros? You seem to have forgotten your own important rule when it comes to Sam Altman. Now that he has put together an all-white, all-male board, and put safety in the trunk while massive profits drive at lightspeed, maybe Sam deserves a harder look. Kara seems to have been taken in too. How does she feel about the complete lack of diversity in their leadership now?
Great article, Thanks- Brave new World with all the old toxic characters
Thank you.
Your children should and your mother would be proud. Managers do things right. Leaders do the right thing.
I worry that with OpenAI we have crossed the Rubicon. Altman has been fired before, is widely viewed as duplicitous and (very) obsessed with power.
Have we just anointed the future global emperor? Can a polarized country struggling to pass a budget adequately regulate this?
Scott, despite some loosely rational comments by some of your followers on your piece about the Gaza war and the Massacre – I appreciate your firm stance on the side of good vs. evil, truth vs, fake.
where is your line with qatar and saudi arabia?
Maybe your best and most important writing to date. Critical at this time in the evolution of our ‘civil’ as fragile as it may be. Keep your voice and your heart strong Scott, it’s extremely valuable.
Fully agree but Adidas was founded in 1949, could not collaborate with the Nazi regime
Bravo. Thank you.
The evident, face value message of the Tweet, that Jews are particularly being victimized by the very liberal immigration policies that the majoriry of Jews supported, is true.(I’m Jewish)
I dont think it’s fair to judge Musk in hindsight with the massive amount of post hoc curated information we now have about the origins, authorship and context of the tweet he was responding to. It’s unlikely he was aware of these, and was simply agreeing with the evident, face value message.
You obviously hate him, but labelling him an anti semite seems very unfair. The pro Hamas college kids know what they’re saying. Musk got looped into a context that I don’t believe he was aware of. Unless I’m really missing something
thanks mike, i fully agree
thanks mike, i fully agree with your comment
Has Musk deleted his tweet or walked it back?
I agree with Mike. Scott your animus toward Musk colors your otherwise goof analysis.
Brilliant, as always. I don’t remember any university president saying bugger all when Bush fabricated that transparently fraudulent casus belli to justify the invasion of Iraq. If you replace each use of the word “corporations” with “universities” in the 3 paragraphs toward the end where Prof. G. hammers home his point about how passive or profit-seeking corporations facilitate the rise of fascism, you get a very good argument for universities taking a moral stand once in a while, donors be damned.
Spot on–thank you. Yes, THIS is the moment and Elon Musk is far more formidable than Kanye.
Your keen insight into the Worlds greatest issues are always a good read. Thanks Prof!
Can’t praise this article highly enough. Best argument on the topic I’ve had the privilege of reading.
Great article, Prof!
Fun fact: according to historian Stephen Kotkin, the main reason for Chamberlain’s appeasement of Hitler was not lack of backbone but a desire to have Germany stymie the USSR’s desire to bring continental Europe into its hegemony.
Thank you, Scott. I think I was taught the difference between right and wrong. I don’t understand how so many people can’t seem to get the difference, or otherwise don’t care.
Galloway, you make the world a better place.
Can someone explain Bill Ackman to me? His “line” is very unclear. As Scott references, attack a 21-year old at Harvard who is expressing perhaps not well formulated, maybe even immature opinions. But support Musk because, seemingly, you have an investment in X. You must be kidding me. I hope he reads both of Scott’s posts.
I have been reading your posts for years, this is your best work. The usual Prof G honesty, quality charts & graphs but today a direct demand of all of us.
Draw a line! Thank you!
Best and most important thing you have ever written Scott. Thank you for sculpting and delivering.
The souring of the public discourse is deeply concerning and has undoubtedly accelerated with the advent of social media. The cloak of anonymity it allows encourages this souring, which is an easy stepping stone to hate. We have created the vehicles upon which hate can flourish and flourish very quickly. It’s deeply worrying.
I’m so proud of you. In the eyes of Judaism, you were born a Jew and I respect the fact that you are an atheist. However, I can’t help but feel that your soul, outpouring towards decency and kindness, and your Semitic routes keep coming through louder and louder.
It would be easy for you to not give yourself up and look the other way, but something keeps stirring inside of you more and more. These feelings reflecting your posts. Thank you for calling out. The cruelty of people consumed by hate.
Forever your fan!
Your words are powerful. I hope people see the beast of antisemitism for what it is, before more lives are lost.
Sending love and blessings from Jerusalem!
My line includes stopping my monthly contributions to Doctors Without Borders (MSF). It seems that Hamas has indeed been using hospitals in Gaza, to what extent? But after spending time this week looking into MSF’s public statements I think there are too many questions about their employees in Gaza and if they looked the other way. Also while MSF demands an immediate cease fire, MSF does not demand immediate release of hostages. I drew the line, and it hurt emotionally to give up on this organization that I have contributed to for years.
These groups need to be held accountable- Had the WHO or Doctors Without Borders reported Hamas activities in hospitals years ago, it would have prevented the eventual collapse of their medical system over the past few months. They protected Hamas leadership with their silence, and Gazan citizens are paying the price.
“The real demon, of course, is demonization, of any target. The history of discrimination and violence against “out” groups is extensive, from the Armenian genocide, to the mass killings of Christians by ISIS, to China’s detainment of Uyghurs, and much, much more.”
Scott, there is a demonization of Palestinian people by the government of Israel. Israeli people and Palestinian people are suffering because they’ve been let down by their leaders. We shouldn’t be afraid to say this. But the content I have been consuming has been surrounding the suffering of Palestinian people and I wonder if you’re seeing the same thing. Hate will only aim to divide us, love will always win. I’m choosing to focus my love on those that I think are suffering the most at this time.
You have an enormous platform that you do great good with. I understand the seedy underbelly of a platform like TikTok. But the immense suffering of the Palestinian people that I have seen on the platform has really been humbling. I hope you can catch a glimpse of what those children are going through. It’s heartbreaking for Israelis and Palestinians. The people. The government of Israel has failed them both. The way America fails its people during Maui fires or homelessness or teen depression or gun reform. We can do so much better and we can demand better from our leaders. We should never tolerate hate or terrorism in any form. I appreciate you.
Good comment.
I agree with Scott’s point about drawing a line.
One reason why I believe there is a rise in antisemitism at the moment is because of Israel’s reaction to António Guterres, Secretary-General’s remarks to the Security Council on the Gaza conflict. He stated “It is important to also recognize the attacks by Hamas did not happen in a vacuum. The Palestinian people have been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation.” He also made it very clear that this did not justify the attack by Hamas.
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations is calling for António Guterres’ resignation. He called Guterres’ speech “shocking” on X, formerly Twitter, saying “the Secretary-General is completely disconnected from the reality in our region.”
Guterres simply stated the truth about the situation that the whole world knows, even though most people are afraid to say it out loud.
The US is currently sanctioning Syria so the country cannot be rebuilt. Much of the Muslim world believes that the Israeli goal is for it to own Syria’s land. This is probably also causing some antisemitism.
No doubt Palestinians suffer horribly. How many billions have the Kleptocratic Thugocracy “government” they apparently freely chose (except Hamas in Gaza, but they’re money grubbers as well) have been stolen by their leaders. When again was Abu Mazen elected?
The Arab states surrounding Israel have also kept the Palestinians as pawns, an irritation for Israel. As many as 65 million people were “Displaced Persons” during and after WWII. They got resettled and millions were permanently displaced from their homes.Poland was moved half a country. By contrast, maybe 300k Palestinians were affected after the 1948 war started by the Arab countries, and despite all odds, Jews took land. There was and is ample opportunity for them to be allowed in other Sunni Arab countries. Or they could fund development projects. What’s $100 billion from Kuwait, UAE, Qatar, Saudi, etc. Egypt has the Rafa crossing for Gaza, and they can use that, instead of relying on Israel. If people want peace, its a world problem.
Great column once again. Keep going, Scott.
> which are sending the CEOs of FTX and Binance to jail.
CZ is going to jail?
Perhaps this is easier to solve than we would think… perhaps there’s a point where we realize lines are 2D, and we’re dealing with a multi-dimensional problem… a problem that can be solved if we move beyond the typical “red vs blue” or “side A vs side B” or “nation vs nation” nature of how humans speak about issues.
What I mean is that we as humans seem to be caught in a process of separating into groups and taking sides, then categorizing all members of groups as a whole. Even worse, innocent people are consistantly paying for the sins of the most extreme members of their group.
When we refer to Jews as a whole, or Russians as a whole, or Ukranians, or Palestinians as a whole, or Liberals as a whole, or Conservatives as a whole, etc. Etc. Etc. All of a sudden we start lumping in peaceful people with non peaceful people. We start lumping in babies with adults. We start lumping in citizens with terrorists… etc.
At some point we need to step over the line where we seperate everyone into large categories… and start speaking to the fact that the actions of a few should not be classified as the actions of a whole.
Amen dude. People are so strong and resilient. Jewish people and Muslim people are more united by love than they are divided by hate. People are also becoming smarter than the vast amount of propaganda being thrown around. The truth will come out and humanity will find a way to win like it should. Labels seek to undo all that and so does extremism. We can choose love and we can choose an end to violence as a people. We can be a collective spirit seeking peace despite our different backgrounds and different beliefs. I gotta believe that spirit wins out in the end.
Curious to know … will you sell your beloved Tesla car ? Tesla shares ? Drawing a line comes with a cost …
What is needed is a lists of advertisers by corporation they use to advertise. Who advertises on X, Fox News etc. So then folks will know what advertisers they should not patronize. So Galloway perhaps that can be your “to do”.
I disagree the board fucked up. The constitution of the organization did not ultimately work but the board members operated within their defined duties and Sam Altman did not. In addition, the employees did not appear to understand the operating rules of the company. I agree the corporate structure was doomed to fail and the board may have been naive and over optimistic. I’ve issues with many aspects of the EA philosophy but the board members who challenged Altman remained true to their charter. Altman did not.
YES.
Thank you Scott! This needed to be said. Humanity is frequently absent. Its presence here is refreshing. Happy Thanksgiving to you and everyone else. Jeff
Your column is important to me because it makes me think more carefully about these topics. Thanks for the nudges.
Bless you, Scott!
I couldn’t love you more. Thank you.
Bravo!
In a perfect world, No Mercy / No Malice would be sued for false advertising and forced to rebrand itself under a much more honest name of Galloway’s Neverending Grudges and Petty Vindictiveness.
Everybody remember:
BILL GATES is an evolved philanthropic well-intentioned elder statesman of tech businessman that loves to rape children with Jeffery Epstein = GOOD!
MUSK = BAD!
These endorsements will come back to haunt you, Galloway.
Wow. Just Wow. Where do people like you come from? Disturbing, but hey that’s what the entire column was about then wasn’t it.
Blah blah blah. Nothing constructive to say? Just opinion. No principle. No logic. No explanation. Maybe you should try to do something constructive?
Scott’s brand is digging it’s own grave as he collectively blames Palestinians for their plight and calls any criticism of Israel “anti semitic”. It’s disgusting how many people are getting canceled for not toeing the Zionist line. Israel has destroyed it’s goodwill and only old fools will keep advocating for throwing good tax payer money after bad spending on maintaining an apartheid/Jim Crow state in the middle east. Apparently it’s anti semitic to say 100 imprisoned Palestinian lives are more valuable than 1 Jewish colonist life. What a bizarre world Scott wants to drag us into. He doesn’t care about equality, just dominating others
Totally spot on. I’m curious about what is considered to be an antisemitic crime and how the count has been done. I’ve been called antisemitic for advocating for a #ceasefire (?).
P.S. I totally acknowledge that there is way too much hate and antisemitism in the world and Jewish people deserve love, respect and to be safe – but let’s not forget that the situation in Israel-Palestine is not a religious conflict, it is a political / colonialist conflict.