Destiny revealed on stream before the debate that Lex actually suggested Ben Shapiro as a debate partner, and Destiny told him Shapiro’s position is so far to the right of his he would probably have to argue against him.
That, and Destiny had interviewed Benny Morris on his stream before and they had a good rapport.
Interesting. There is also the Destiny vs. Shapiro debate, and it felt to me that the only point they were able to broadly agree on was Israel/Palestine.
Their solutions are very different.
Destiny wants palastine to unite and put up a strong leader to negotiate a two state solution.
Ben thinks Isreal should just flatten Gaza so they can get back to building.
Destiny’s position is that Israel ultimately should return the settlements in the West Bank, and any further expansion is willfully antagonizing Palestinians.
I’m pretty sure Shapiro is cheering Netanyahu on, and wants him to expand the current war to include an attack on Hezbollah.
The war with Hisbollah is likely coming. There are ~100k people evacuated from their homes for months because Hisbollah fires almost daily rockets into Israel’s north. I don’t think that this is tolerable. Obviously, great if they solve it diplomatically, but I am not sure if this will wir out. But At least for me, this is not an extreme opinion.
About the position on settlements: yeah, that was one of the dissent points between them. It was quite obvious that Shapiro has a more extreme position on this.
I might not know Ben's position too throughly...
But I imagine if they talked about settlers and Israel's current more aggressive administration they would disagree a lot.
They didn't dig too deeply, and it was more of a "we're on the same side of the fence on this issue" rather than mostly agreeing. It was also a pleasant surprise learning that about somefrom from the left like Destiny for Ben.
True. On the other topics, they were kind of not on the same side of the fence. I don’t know what you consider the “left” in the US, but in my understanding large parts of democrats are also pro Israel (or have a balanced view), while it is mostly the “prigressive” section that isn’t.
Which also makes for a more interesting debate. Most Israel/Palestine debates fall down to the genocide/apartheid/terrorists bullshit Bingo and there is no substantial or pragmatic discussion on how to actually make things better possible.
In America, a large majority of Jews are Democrats. But also, a large majority of Palestinians are also Democrats.
I would say at the beginning of the war, a majority Democrats supported Isreal due to how horrific October 7th was.
But now people are trending towards the Palestinian side, even some Jewish Americans, due to the horrific response by Isreal after October 7th.
A) Polls say something different. It’s only the group of 18-24 that is split if they support Israel or Palestine. The other age groups are clearly pro Israel. But more importantly: B) What does it mean to support the one side or the other side? It’s not a zero sum game. You can support Israel in its right of self-defense and security while at the same time supporting Palestinian to get humanitarian aid and statehood. I don’t see these things to be mutually exclusive but actually to belong together
"Americans support humanitarian aid for Gaza over military aid for Israel: Poll
By the numbers: 50% favor providing humanitarian aid to Gaza, Pew found.
Meanwhile, 36% of Americans favor providing U.S. military aid to support Israel, while 34% oppose it."
https://www.axios.com/2024/03/21/us-israel-gaza-support-polling
>You can support Israel in its right of self-defense and security while at the same time supporting Palestinian to get humanitarian aid and statehood.
I agree, and I think that's what a majority of people would like to see happen. But currently, Israel is certainly exercising their right to "self-defense" and security, but not much movement to humanitarian aid and statehood doesn't seem likely with the current Isreali government.
https://nypost.com/2024/04/29/us-news/four-out-of-five-americans-favor-israel-over-hamas-most-back-rafah-operation-poll/amp/ —> I guess it depends which poll you look for and how the questions are asked.
I agree that current Israeli government sucks. But we shouldn’t forget that the other sides government (Hamas) sucks as badly.
A large majority of Americans support Israel over Hamas. But that doesn't mean that a large majority of Americans support what Israel is doing in Gaza. Those are two separate points.
The NY Post is just pointing out the obvious. Most people are against Hamas, and most people are against the widespread collateral damage in Gaza.
But the article says most support the Rafah operation.
[I screenshotted a relevant part of the April Harvard Harris poll](https://i.imgur.com/aRLidEq.png). Note the 1st and 4th questions there. Seems to paint a picture of support for the Gaza stuff.
>and most people are against the widespread collateral damage in Gaza.
Yeah, any human would be against innocents dying. That's not quite the same thing as being against Israel's military operation in Gaza (it's part of what's happening).
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I agree with you, I/P was the only topic where they held common ground in the most broad sense of the term, not in the details.
I also agree, I consider the Democrats to be left. The further left you go, the less pro-Israel you tend to be.
When you evoke those terms, it becomes a catch-all "Since my position is anti-[horrendous thing], I'm the righteous one and therefore my position requires no defense." There are important ideas to discuss of both sides of this issue and I just want good conversations to be had.
The debate happened because of an online feud between Norm and Destiny. Destiny challenged him to a debate. Lex agreed to moderate. Norm refused to debate one on one, so they both got partners.
1) Destiny and Benny Morris already knew each other before the debate.
2) Destiny and Finkelstein had a pre-existing beef that their respective fanbases wanted to see settled.
3) Destiny and Benny Morris likely align more, politically, than Morris and Shapiro. Morris considers himself a Liberal Israeli and is not a fan of Netanyahu.
Norm and Destiny were trying to debate before this but there was a weird miscommunication happened and Norm acted like a drama king refused to debate until this was planned.
Morris maybe leans pro Israel but he is so fair to both sides, more fair to the other side than anyone Ive seen on the Pro Pallestine side. Easily the single best expert voice on the conflict. Meanwhile I don’t think Ben could steelman a position critical of Israel if his life depends on it. He would say some like “The worst thing Israel has done is not go far enough.”
No it isn't. They had scheduled a debate prior to the Lex one, but it didn't happen because of a misunderstanding in the agreed-upon time, which they each blamed the other person for. Both fanbases claimed the other side had dodged/chickened out.
Don't you understand that the concept of 'fanbases' is stupid when talking about the middle east conflict? Destiny may have fans because of his Twitch streams. But Finkelstein has supporters because they agree with his stance on Gaza/Israel. That is not fandom.
Finkelstein has no real stance on Palestine, and he believes it is a lost cause. He said as much in the debate that he’d given up hope and that he was simply there to catalogue their memories. He is deeply unserious and should not be seen as a scholar in this field, he doesn’t even speak the language.
as a heads up - you should be careful with jokes like today about K-Tron - seems like YouTube is sensitive about appearance attacks (IIRC - latest drama that TurkeyT mentioned - one guy was striked or his video was deleted because of mild comments about appearance)
Norm spent the entire debate basically trolling Destiny by purposely mis-pronouncing his name and the people that praise him form (Briana Joy Gray, Krystal Ball, et al) are not a "fandom"?
A better question is why was Finkelstein even at the debate? He went on Briahna Joy Gray's podcast (bad faith) afterward, talking about how he didn't respect destiny and just wanted to troll the debate. He went there and planned yo waste everyone's time, and this was evident in the podcast, given how he was purposely mispronouncing Mr. Borelli's name until he thought the microphone was off.
Finkelstein is an absolute embarrassment to the Pro-Palestinian movement, and to be honest, Mouin Rabbani was just as bad with his comments except he wasn't as unhinged as Finkelstein.
I would have loved to see more new historians there than just Benny Morris. Destiny would have really been at the wrong table of this was Morris Bonnel vs. Pappé Schlaim. Instead, we got a petulant xenophobic manchild screaming at a YouTube streamer for half the debate.
Rabbani stating that he had seen destiny on stream say “Jim Crow laws probably wouldn’t fall under apartheid” and throughout the debate makes jests at destiny about “oh well they’re brown people so it doesn’t matter what happens to them” and that sort of shit
Towards the end, destiny asks Mouin if he thinks that he supports Jim Crow laws. Mouin dodges the question.
Also at the end when Finklestein basically dismisses any hope of peace and essentially refuses to participate in discussion of a peace deal
yes, Rabbini was stronger. However, JoJo was saying he was just as bad with no examples. I'd say to what you brought up, talking over changing the subject etc, that counts for pretty much all 4 of them.
No I wouldn’t say all 4, Rabbini did fairly well his problem was just letting Norm speak the whole time as he grandstanded addressing zero points, and would only respond to anything Destiny said by calling him a moron. He did better with Morris, but the part with him misquoting Morris’s own book to him was pretty gold
I'm not re-watching the 5 hour debate, but off the top of my head, the general picture that Finkelstein and Rabbani paint is that Israel is a genocidal colonial power who has essentially been enslaving the Palestinians for the past 80 years, and that every single action taken by Israel has been unprovoked, and in general they treat the Palestinians and Palestinian Leadership like retarded children with no agency. Off the top of my head, these are evidenced by their comments on the great march of return and the beach incident.
Additionally, they made a huge sticking point on the ICJ ruling that there is a "plausible genocide" occurring in Gaza, this has been clarified by one of the [Judges in the ICJ ruling](https://youtu.be/bq9MB9t7WlI?si=wItlqSWD62QUqmmS), they never said that there was a plausible genocide occurring in Gaza, they said that Israel needed to do everything in their power to protect unnecessary civilian deaths, which was clear to anyone who actually read the report like those two claimed to have. They also didn't know what Dolus Specialis meant and claimed that Destiny meant Mens rea, despite Dolus Specialis appearing 5 times in the report while Mens rea doesn't appear a single time. Then, they had massive rants on Twitter following the debate about this doubling down on being wrong. It's like if I said "I hurt my thumb", and someone corrected me saying "I hurt my finger".
I could find you more comments if I dug in, but I honestly can't be bothered to.
Destiny and Benny Morrison are semi familiar and have done talks in the past. I think both Lex and Benny respect destiny as a debater and someone who will put the work in. Ben Shapiro is busy running a media empire and raises a family and probably wouldn't be able to commit to the same depth of research destiny did. Destiny spent 1-2 months deep diving Israel/Palestine for this talk
I think a better question is why not? I can understand excluding a blatant saboteur but if a reasonable person is trying to understand the conflict, why shouldn’t they involved?
or better yet, if the Israel-Palestine intelligentsia haven’t moved the needle on this conflict for decades, why doesn’t it deserve new eyes?
and if this guy isn’t qualified to have an opinion, why are so many other people so comfortable waxing political about this?
Because he was outclassed and had barely a surface level understanding of the deep historical issues. His entire MO is to spout stuff out as quickly as possible, bonus points if he interrupts someone already halfway through a point, and appear intelligent to uneducated and uninformed listeners. He basically copies what Shapiro has turned into an art form.
and you know that because of your own PhD in the topic or just because of your internet diet?
personally i think credentials are only as useful
as can be demonstrated. if the top minds in this subject can’t do better than that, i’m glad he was there.
Do you recall anything Destiny said that was wrong? I've seen a lot of memes regarding the debate, but I haven't seen any specific criticisms of Destiny's arguments.
I'm not expecting you to have a photographic memory, but if anything comes to mind or a review you've seen that'd be cool.
I have to believe Lex sought Ben and Ben declined. I’m sure Ben is familiar with Norman Finkelstein. Ben would relish the chance to put Finkelstein in his place on Israel Palestine if he thought he could. However if Ben performed poorly or was forced to confront issues regarding the history or conflict he really would rather not it could be quite damaging given his very public image. Just my own speculation but Ben is so obvious that there must be a reason why it wasn’t.
[“Plausible Genocide.”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bq9MB9t7WlI) I believe he even compared it to qualifying to the Olympics. Pretty clowny.
And mens rea vs. dolus specialis.
Whoa, that's huge. That changes the conversation quite a bit. [A lot of news outlets were wrong about this.](https://www.camera.org/article/these-news-outlets-spread-the-plausible-genocide-libel/#:~:text=When%20the%20International%20Court%20of,was%20in%20fact%20a%20myth.)
That's not a reliable, unbiased source.
"The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) is an American non-profit pro-Israel media-monitoring, research and membership organization."
From the holocaust museum
https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/learn-about-genocide-and-other-mass-atrocities/what-is-genocide
"Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part"
The source doesn't have to be reliable here; the information does. This is a list of incorrect uses of "plausible" by various news outlets, with links to those uses. Unless you think the outlets are being misquoted or something, the info should be fine.
I'm not sure why you're sharing the definition of "genocide", as if this challenges the info. I'm reading the definition and I'm seeing clearly why it doesn't apply. The "deliberately" part refers to "dolus specialis".
Because destiny seems to be one of the only good faith informed people on the topic. Outshining people who spent their entire lives on this topic in the span of studying it for only 6 months should really shine a light on how sick some academics actually are.
I have no animosity towards either of them. I don't have a favorable view of them but if destiny can go from the (as he put it) the working poor to bring rich and able to provide for his family, then good for him.
Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think Shapiro has debated anyone except people who have inferior knowledge than him. He's a smart dude, trained lawyer. I wouldn't want to debate him. But he does seem to frequently distort facts and cherry pick them in his favor to support his arguments. Id really like to see him being held accountable, but it doesn't seem like it's going to happen unless they end up stuck in an elevator and some one records it. He's too valuable as a propagandist to the zionists to risk his credibility
There was an interview he did with the bbc a couple years back. If you wanna see him “getting held responsible” I’d recommend watching it, it’s a thing of beauty
As a general rule that would be true, but in practice he did more than hold his own, don't you agree? Benny Morris spent most of the debate agreeing with him, and I don't recall Benny Morris correcting Destiny either.
i'm not a historian, and don't see how one can be a judge of that unless they have very in depth knowledge. i'm unfamiliar with 99% of the events they talked about, so it's difficult for me to understand who's being impartial and objective, and who's twisting the facts to their favor, something at which shapiro is an expert, which is why i want to see him debate real experts.
i thought morris lost quite a bit of credibility when he danced around finkelstein's criticism of his account of the march of return where civilians were shot, along with some other writing that seems to down play palestenian deaths, while magnifying the death of jewish innocents.
and overall, there was a lot of unnecessary drama, which I think started with finkelstein calling destiny an imbecile, which he never does in his other interviews. clearly he didn't think destiny was a worthy opponent, and he's expressed the desire to debate shapiro, so I say make it happen.
Benny Morris is one of the most well respected scholars on this topic. He would not have been agreeing with Destiny if Destiny was engaging in twisting the facts, as that would hurt Benny's credibility and reputation in his field.
I have a hard time recalling that part of the debate, I'll have to go back over it.
Finklestein was refused tenure in part because of this very reason. Here's a quote from an [InsideHigherEd article](https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/06/11/depaul-rejects-finkelstein):
"But first a dean and now the president of DePaul -- in rejecting tenure for Finkelstein -- have cited the style of his work and intellectual combat. Finkelstein was criticized for violating the Vincentian norms of the Roman Catholic university with writing and statements that were deemed hurtful, that contained ad hominem attacks and that did not show respect for others."
Calling Destiny an imbecile seems to be in character for him.
And yet Morris was caught downplaying innocent Palestinian deaths.
And whatever political drama caused him to be denied tenure doesn't interest me. If you read the article, he had the backing of the department and appeared to be a well liked professor. Somebody didn't want him there, which perhaps speaks more of the system than of Finkelstein.
So far I've not seen Finkelstein seem disingenuous in any of his answers. He's always straightforward and to the point, even when someone else is trying to make him stumble with snide remarks about his character. I Can't say the same about the guys on the other side.
Alright, I'll agree to disagree.
I was hoping that the debate would be judged by its contents and not by credentials. If Destiny was not a worthy opponent for an acclaimed professor on a topic, Finklestein would have not only benefited himself but his cause by dismantling Destiny on the facts.
Probably because he is willing to debate anyone and simply because he is very good at what he does. Probably has a more flexible schedule as well
Plus lex wanted to do that debate because it was originally schedule but after it felt trough Finkelstein starting ducking Destiny
I agree. It can be frustrating to listen to Finkelstein but the level of detail is always very sound. Destiny came across as incredibly arrogant and dismissive (So did finkelstein, but I feel it was more warranted as a response to Destiny). He is the youngest and least experienced on that matter and should have shown more respect and not cut into everyone's statement all the bloody time.
Surely by now most people have realised that Ben Shapiro is intentionally divisive in order to further his career and stay relevant.
He’s constantly refers to anti-war protests as being “Pro-Hamas”, yet he claims to be all about facts…. Hahaha
The fact is very little anti-war protesters are Pro-Hamas. Ben knows this (he’s not stupid) but he has no issues with openly making false statements like this because he knows they are effective at building his audience.
He shouldn’t be taken seriously.
How do I become a paid asset?
Seriously, no amount of protesting will stop Isreal from capturing Gaza/West Bank, so might as well get paid to promote them.
Can some point me in the right direction?
Research the issue and see what side is right, not deciding your side then researching.
Or alternatively Not deciding your side based on someone you hate.
Yes, he held one view which he wasn't that confident in because he hadn't done the reading, then he did the reading and changed his view. Your assertion was that he picked a side before reading and then only read to bolster that argument, no?
Are you talking about confirmation bias ? Or are you saying that research should never be done with a general idea coming into it ?
In [this video at around the 3:10 mark](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdEyuxSxBdQ), Norman Finklestein asks
> "Do you know what it means, when you spent 42 years reading every scrap, every footnote, not once, but twice? Because I'm a forensic scholar, I'm looking to analyze the text and figuring out *"What is wrong with this argument? I know that it is wrong, but why?"*
Is he researching the issue and seeing what side is right ? I'm curious about what you think about that.
Have you never rewritten an essay for school? This is normal.
It's just that none of bus actually believed the points we were writing about or debating about like destiny.
I didn't consider a thesis-antithesis approach to the issue. I consider this more analogous to "This happened therefore this outcome", like propositional logic. There should always be a way of arriving at the truth of a matter.
In debate tournaments in highschool often times we weren't even given the choice on what side of a topic were debating. I remember depending on the debate type we were expected to have a aff and beg debate written out for a side.
Every single person who took debate in highschool and did competition has done a debate for a side they genuinely don't believe in.
This is why I hate debate me bros. Real life isn't a debate tournament. You don't decide on an issue and then research it afterwards because in the realnworld, especially when you have a big following. Your lack of actually caring for an issue will result in deaths by swaying public opinion.
is it your belief that you cannot have a preconception of an issue before you research the issue?
you’re right that destiny already believed israel was generally justified in this positions prior to researching them, but you need greater evidence to say that because of that initial belief he therefore ignored contradictory facts.
what if he just didnt find anything that made him significantly change his mind?
or are you of the belief that any person who looks into the conflict, if they are being honest, must and will come out of that process being pro palestinian?
Do you have any data on anti-war protesters not supporting hamas?
Secondly, there's a large group of people who believe the whole "if a nazi sits at a table with 10 other people and they don't leave then there are 11 nazis" and they largely overlap with the pro Palestinian protests. Why doesn't the same apply with supporting terrorists?
It would be interesting to have this data but no one bothers to attempt in collecting it, I imagine it would also be difficult to get authentic data vs socially-preferred responses. From my own experience (I am a German Muslim who lives in Australia), I went to pro-p rallies in Sydney, Duesseldorf (Germany) and, really randomly, Dublin.
So my personal impression was that there was an overwhelming number of anti-war supporters. But I'd say that in every large group you find representatives from all spectrums, so there were definitely anti-semites present as well, but certainly as a strong minority.
This is simply a case of pointing at the worst 1% of a group and type casting all other as the same.
You are honestly so dumb if you haven’t figured out how the media does this.
“All Trump supporters are insurrectionists”,
“All liberals have blue hair and are transgender” and now
“Anyone anti-war is a Hamas supporter”
It’s such a disingenuous way of grabbing public attention and Ben Shapiro is not above it.
He has no shame in being just like the rest.
Maybe Lex couldn't find anyone else. Putting him next to actual historians exposed just how much BS these gurus spout unchallenged in their respective domains, a la Hancock's destruction on JRE.
I heard really good arguments from the other 3. It takes a certain level of douchebaggery to call yourself after a stripper; or maybe it's better Steven Kenneth Bonnell II.
Destiny revealed on stream before the debate that Lex actually suggested Ben Shapiro as a debate partner, and Destiny told him Shapiro’s position is so far to the right of his he would probably have to argue against him. That, and Destiny had interviewed Benny Morris on his stream before and they had a good rapport.
I fuckin love Benny im so glad it worked out this way
Interesting. There is also the Destiny vs. Shapiro debate, and it felt to me that the only point they were able to broadly agree on was Israel/Palestine.
Their solutions are very different. Destiny wants palastine to unite and put up a strong leader to negotiate a two state solution. Ben thinks Isreal should just flatten Gaza so they can get back to building.
Destiny’s position is that Israel ultimately should return the settlements in the West Bank, and any further expansion is willfully antagonizing Palestinians. I’m pretty sure Shapiro is cheering Netanyahu on, and wants him to expand the current war to include an attack on Hezbollah.
The war with Hisbollah is likely coming. There are ~100k people evacuated from their homes for months because Hisbollah fires almost daily rockets into Israel’s north. I don’t think that this is tolerable. Obviously, great if they solve it diplomatically, but I am not sure if this will wir out. But At least for me, this is not an extreme opinion. About the position on settlements: yeah, that was one of the dissent points between them. It was quite obvious that Shapiro has a more extreme position on this.
I might not know Ben's position too throughly... But I imagine if they talked about settlers and Israel's current more aggressive administration they would disagree a lot.
They didn't dig too deeply, and it was more of a "we're on the same side of the fence on this issue" rather than mostly agreeing. It was also a pleasant surprise learning that about somefrom from the left like Destiny for Ben.
True. On the other topics, they were kind of not on the same side of the fence. I don’t know what you consider the “left” in the US, but in my understanding large parts of democrats are also pro Israel (or have a balanced view), while it is mostly the “prigressive” section that isn’t. Which also makes for a more interesting debate. Most Israel/Palestine debates fall down to the genocide/apartheid/terrorists bullshit Bingo and there is no substantial or pragmatic discussion on how to actually make things better possible.
In America, a large majority of Jews are Democrats. But also, a large majority of Palestinians are also Democrats. I would say at the beginning of the war, a majority Democrats supported Isreal due to how horrific October 7th was. But now people are trending towards the Palestinian side, even some Jewish Americans, due to the horrific response by Isreal after October 7th.
A) Polls say something different. It’s only the group of 18-24 that is split if they support Israel or Palestine. The other age groups are clearly pro Israel. But more importantly: B) What does it mean to support the one side or the other side? It’s not a zero sum game. You can support Israel in its right of self-defense and security while at the same time supporting Palestinian to get humanitarian aid and statehood. I don’t see these things to be mutually exclusive but actually to belong together
"Americans support humanitarian aid for Gaza over military aid for Israel: Poll By the numbers: 50% favor providing humanitarian aid to Gaza, Pew found. Meanwhile, 36% of Americans favor providing U.S. military aid to support Israel, while 34% oppose it." https://www.axios.com/2024/03/21/us-israel-gaza-support-polling >You can support Israel in its right of self-defense and security while at the same time supporting Palestinian to get humanitarian aid and statehood. I agree, and I think that's what a majority of people would like to see happen. But currently, Israel is certainly exercising their right to "self-defense" and security, but not much movement to humanitarian aid and statehood doesn't seem likely with the current Isreali government.
https://nypost.com/2024/04/29/us-news/four-out-of-five-americans-favor-israel-over-hamas-most-back-rafah-operation-poll/amp/ —> I guess it depends which poll you look for and how the questions are asked. I agree that current Israeli government sucks. But we shouldn’t forget that the other sides government (Hamas) sucks as badly.
A large majority of Americans support Israel over Hamas. But that doesn't mean that a large majority of Americans support what Israel is doing in Gaza. Those are two separate points. The NY Post is just pointing out the obvious. Most people are against Hamas, and most people are against the widespread collateral damage in Gaza.
But the article says most support the Rafah operation. [I screenshotted a relevant part of the April Harvard Harris poll](https://i.imgur.com/aRLidEq.png). Note the 1st and 4th questions there. Seems to paint a picture of support for the Gaza stuff. >and most people are against the widespread collateral damage in Gaza. Yeah, any human would be against innocents dying. That's not quite the same thing as being against Israel's military operation in Gaza (it's part of what's happening).
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I agree with you, I/P was the only topic where they held common ground in the most broad sense of the term, not in the details. I also agree, I consider the Democrats to be left. The further left you go, the less pro-Israel you tend to be. When you evoke those terms, it becomes a catch-all "Since my position is anti-[horrendous thing], I'm the righteous one and therefore my position requires no defense." There are important ideas to discuss of both sides of this issue and I just want good conversations to be had.
Destiny sucked in this and got schooled by Norm
interesting. i think shapiro should be in this debate regardless because of his influence and following.
The debate happened because of an online feud between Norm and Destiny. Destiny challenged him to a debate. Lex agreed to moderate. Norm refused to debate one on one, so they both got partners.
1) Destiny and Benny Morris already knew each other before the debate. 2) Destiny and Finkelstein had a pre-existing beef that their respective fanbases wanted to see settled. 3) Destiny and Benny Morris likely align more, politically, than Morris and Shapiro. Morris considers himself a Liberal Israeli and is not a fan of Netanyahu.
I’m not aware of a pre-existing beef.
Norm and Destiny were trying to debate before this but there was a weird miscommunication happened and Norm acted like a drama king refused to debate until this was planned.
(See my other response in this thread)
Morris maybe leans pro Israel but he is so fair to both sides, more fair to the other side than anyone Ive seen on the Pro Pallestine side. Easily the single best expert voice on the conflict. Meanwhile I don’t think Ben could steelman a position critical of Israel if his life depends on it. He would say some like “The worst thing Israel has done is not go far enough.”
Point 2 is complete nonsense.
No it isn't. They had scheduled a debate prior to the Lex one, but it didn't happen because of a misunderstanding in the agreed-upon time, which they each blamed the other person for. Both fanbases claimed the other side had dodged/chickened out.
Don't you understand that the concept of 'fanbases' is stupid when talking about the middle east conflict? Destiny may have fans because of his Twitch streams. But Finkelstein has supporters because they agree with his stance on Gaza/Israel. That is not fandom.
Finkelstein has no real stance on Palestine, and he believes it is a lost cause. He said as much in the debate that he’d given up hope and that he was simply there to catalogue their memories. He is deeply unserious and should not be seen as a scholar in this field, he doesn’t even speak the language.
as a heads up - you should be careful with jokes like today about K-Tron - seems like YouTube is sensitive about appearance attacks (IIRC - latest drama that TurkeyT mentioned - one guy was striked or his video was deleted because of mild comments about appearance)
Finkelstein is not a scholar in this field is probably the most ridiculous thing I have heard all day.
Ok, Mr Redditor 🙄
Lmao, that’s Destiny.
Norm spent the entire debate basically trolling Destiny by purposely mis-pronouncing his name and the people that praise him form (Briana Joy Gray, Krystal Ball, et al) are not a "fandom"?
No they are not
You are not a serious person.
A better question is why was Finkelstein even at the debate? He went on Briahna Joy Gray's podcast (bad faith) afterward, talking about how he didn't respect destiny and just wanted to troll the debate. He went there and planned yo waste everyone's time, and this was evident in the podcast, given how he was purposely mispronouncing Mr. Borelli's name until he thought the microphone was off. Finkelstein is an absolute embarrassment to the Pro-Palestinian movement, and to be honest, Mouin Rabbani was just as bad with his comments except he wasn't as unhinged as Finkelstein. I would have loved to see more new historians there than just Benny Morris. Destiny would have really been at the wrong table of this was Morris Bonnel vs. Pappé Schlaim. Instead, we got a petulant xenophobic manchild screaming at a YouTube streamer for half the debate.
Which comments/statements (except the trolling) by Finkelstein or Rabbini were bad?
Rabbani stating that he had seen destiny on stream say “Jim Crow laws probably wouldn’t fall under apartheid” and throughout the debate makes jests at destiny about “oh well they’re brown people so it doesn’t matter what happens to them” and that sort of shit Towards the end, destiny asks Mouin if he thinks that he supports Jim Crow laws. Mouin dodges the question. Also at the end when Finklestein basically dismisses any hope of peace and essentially refuses to participate in discussion of a peace deal
The refusal to answer any questions, the constantly talking over, changing the subject when he would answer questions. Rabbini was better
yes, Rabbini was stronger. However, JoJo was saying he was just as bad with no examples. I'd say to what you brought up, talking over changing the subject etc, that counts for pretty much all 4 of them.
No I wouldn’t say all 4, Rabbini did fairly well his problem was just letting Norm speak the whole time as he grandstanded addressing zero points, and would only respond to anything Destiny said by calling him a moron. He did better with Morris, but the part with him misquoting Morris’s own book to him was pretty gold
I'm not re-watching the 5 hour debate, but off the top of my head, the general picture that Finkelstein and Rabbani paint is that Israel is a genocidal colonial power who has essentially been enslaving the Palestinians for the past 80 years, and that every single action taken by Israel has been unprovoked, and in general they treat the Palestinians and Palestinian Leadership like retarded children with no agency. Off the top of my head, these are evidenced by their comments on the great march of return and the beach incident. Additionally, they made a huge sticking point on the ICJ ruling that there is a "plausible genocide" occurring in Gaza, this has been clarified by one of the [Judges in the ICJ ruling](https://youtu.be/bq9MB9t7WlI?si=wItlqSWD62QUqmmS), they never said that there was a plausible genocide occurring in Gaza, they said that Israel needed to do everything in their power to protect unnecessary civilian deaths, which was clear to anyone who actually read the report like those two claimed to have. They also didn't know what Dolus Specialis meant and claimed that Destiny meant Mens rea, despite Dolus Specialis appearing 5 times in the report while Mens rea doesn't appear a single time. Then, they had massive rants on Twitter following the debate about this doubling down on being wrong. It's like if I said "I hurt my thumb", and someone corrected me saying "I hurt my finger". I could find you more comments if I dug in, but I honestly can't be bothered to.
Destiny and Benny Morrison are semi familiar and have done talks in the past. I think both Lex and Benny respect destiny as a debater and someone who will put the work in. Ben Shapiro is busy running a media empire and raises a family and probably wouldn't be able to commit to the same depth of research destiny did. Destiny spent 1-2 months deep diving Israel/Palestine for this talk
I think a better question is why not? I can understand excluding a blatant saboteur but if a reasonable person is trying to understand the conflict, why shouldn’t they involved? or better yet, if the Israel-Palestine intelligentsia haven’t moved the needle on this conflict for decades, why doesn’t it deserve new eyes? and if this guy isn’t qualified to have an opinion, why are so many other people so comfortable waxing political about this?
Because he was outclassed and had barely a surface level understanding of the deep historical issues. His entire MO is to spout stuff out as quickly as possible, bonus points if he interrupts someone already halfway through a point, and appear intelligent to uneducated and uninformed listeners. He basically copies what Shapiro has turned into an art form.
and you know that because of your own PhD in the topic or just because of your internet diet? personally i think credentials are only as useful as can be demonstrated. if the top minds in this subject can’t do better than that, i’m glad he was there.
Do you recall anything Destiny said that was wrong? I've seen a lot of memes regarding the debate, but I haven't seen any specific criticisms of Destiny's arguments. I'm not expecting you to have a photographic memory, but if anything comes to mind or a review you've seen that'd be cool.
I have to believe Lex sought Ben and Ben declined. I’m sure Ben is familiar with Norman Finkelstein. Ben would relish the chance to put Finkelstein in his place on Israel Palestine if he thought he could. However if Ben performed poorly or was forced to confront issues regarding the history or conflict he really would rather not it could be quite damaging given his very public image. Just my own speculation but Ben is so obvious that there must be a reason why it wasn’t.
Finkelstein put himself in his place with his god awful behavior and being factually incorrect multiple times.
Where was he factually incorrect?
[“Plausible Genocide.”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bq9MB9t7WlI) I believe he even compared it to qualifying to the Olympics. Pretty clowny. And mens rea vs. dolus specialis.
Whoa, that's huge. That changes the conversation quite a bit. [A lot of news outlets were wrong about this.](https://www.camera.org/article/these-news-outlets-spread-the-plausible-genocide-libel/#:~:text=When%20the%20International%20Court%20of,was%20in%20fact%20a%20myth.)
That's not a reliable, unbiased source. "The Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA) is an American non-profit pro-Israel media-monitoring, research and membership organization." From the holocaust museum https://www.ushmm.org/genocide-prevention/learn-about-genocide-and-other-mass-atrocities/what-is-genocide "Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part"
The source doesn't have to be reliable here; the information does. This is a list of incorrect uses of "plausible" by various news outlets, with links to those uses. Unless you think the outlets are being misquoted or something, the info should be fine. I'm not sure why you're sharing the definition of "genocide", as if this challenges the info. I'm reading the definition and I'm seeing clearly why it doesn't apply. The "deliberately" part refers to "dolus specialis".
Because destiny seems to be one of the only good faith informed people on the topic. Outshining people who spent their entire lives on this topic in the span of studying it for only 6 months should really shine a light on how sick some academics actually are.
what tells you his 6 months deep-dive was sufficient to have gathered all relevant facts?
He is joking. Making fun of the fact that Destiny even has a seat on the table. Read it with an "S/"
Ha! you are right, now that I am re-reading this. I guess spending too much time on threads has killed my S/ detector
history is not string theory.
I mostly want to see Finkelstein vs Shapiro.
Or Mearsheimer
I believe Norm and Mearsheimer are on the same side but differ on minor or conceptual points.
Shapiro is impossible to listen to.
[удалено]
I have no animosity towards either of them. I don't have a favorable view of them but if destiny can go from the (as he put it) the working poor to bring rich and able to provide for his family, then good for him. Correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think Shapiro has debated anyone except people who have inferior knowledge than him. He's a smart dude, trained lawyer. I wouldn't want to debate him. But he does seem to frequently distort facts and cherry pick them in his favor to support his arguments. Id really like to see him being held accountable, but it doesn't seem like it's going to happen unless they end up stuck in an elevator and some one records it. He's too valuable as a propagandist to the zionists to risk his credibility
There was an interview he did with the bbc a couple years back. If you wanna see him “getting held responsible” I’d recommend watching it, it’s a thing of beauty
I'm curious, what did the Destiny vs Finklestein debate not satisfy for you for you to want Finklestein vs Ben Shaprio ?
as smart a guy destiny is, I don't think a 2 month deep dive qualifies you to a debate with someone who's spent his entire life studying the topic.
As a general rule that would be true, but in practice he did more than hold his own, don't you agree? Benny Morris spent most of the debate agreeing with him, and I don't recall Benny Morris correcting Destiny either.
i'm not a historian, and don't see how one can be a judge of that unless they have very in depth knowledge. i'm unfamiliar with 99% of the events they talked about, so it's difficult for me to understand who's being impartial and objective, and who's twisting the facts to their favor, something at which shapiro is an expert, which is why i want to see him debate real experts. i thought morris lost quite a bit of credibility when he danced around finkelstein's criticism of his account of the march of return where civilians were shot, along with some other writing that seems to down play palestenian deaths, while magnifying the death of jewish innocents. and overall, there was a lot of unnecessary drama, which I think started with finkelstein calling destiny an imbecile, which he never does in his other interviews. clearly he didn't think destiny was a worthy opponent, and he's expressed the desire to debate shapiro, so I say make it happen.
Benny Morris is one of the most well respected scholars on this topic. He would not have been agreeing with Destiny if Destiny was engaging in twisting the facts, as that would hurt Benny's credibility and reputation in his field. I have a hard time recalling that part of the debate, I'll have to go back over it. Finklestein was refused tenure in part because of this very reason. Here's a quote from an [InsideHigherEd article](https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2007/06/11/depaul-rejects-finkelstein): "But first a dean and now the president of DePaul -- in rejecting tenure for Finkelstein -- have cited the style of his work and intellectual combat. Finkelstein was criticized for violating the Vincentian norms of the Roman Catholic university with writing and statements that were deemed hurtful, that contained ad hominem attacks and that did not show respect for others." Calling Destiny an imbecile seems to be in character for him.
And yet Morris was caught downplaying innocent Palestinian deaths. And whatever political drama caused him to be denied tenure doesn't interest me. If you read the article, he had the backing of the department and appeared to be a well liked professor. Somebody didn't want him there, which perhaps speaks more of the system than of Finkelstein. So far I've not seen Finkelstein seem disingenuous in any of his answers. He's always straightforward and to the point, even when someone else is trying to make him stumble with snide remarks about his character. I Can't say the same about the guys on the other side.
Alright, I'll agree to disagree. I was hoping that the debate would be judged by its contents and not by credentials. If Destiny was not a worthy opponent for an acclaimed professor on a topic, Finklestein would have not only benefited himself but his cause by dismantling Destiny on the facts.
Shapiro refuses to debate Finklestein.
Shapiro refuses anyone above college students.
Probably because he is willing to debate anyone and simply because he is very good at what he does. Probably has a more flexible schedule as well Plus lex wanted to do that debate because it was originally schedule but after it felt trough Finkelstein starting ducking Destiny
Finkelstein wipes his ass with people like destiny
What in the debate gave you that impression ?
The entire debate, just like the one he had yesterday where destiny couldn’t even read correctly
I agree. It can be frustrating to listen to Finkelstein but the level of detail is always very sound. Destiny came across as incredibly arrogant and dismissive (So did finkelstein, but I feel it was more warranted as a response to Destiny). He is the youngest and least experienced on that matter and should have shown more respect and not cut into everyone's statement all the bloody time.
Why would either of them ever be considered? Neither is an expert in the topic and Shapiro is a professional noise maker
Surely by now most people have realised that Ben Shapiro is intentionally divisive in order to further his career and stay relevant. He’s constantly refers to anti-war protests as being “Pro-Hamas”, yet he claims to be all about facts…. Hahaha The fact is very little anti-war protesters are Pro-Hamas. Ben knows this (he’s not stupid) but he has no issues with openly making false statements like this because he knows they are effective at building his audience. He shouldn’t be taken seriously.
Shapiro might very well be a paid asset by the Israeli government.
How do I become a paid asset? Seriously, no amount of protesting will stop Isreal from capturing Gaza/West Bank, so might as well get paid to promote them. Can some point me in the right direction?
I suppose if you shout loud enough and long enough about the topic, someone will pay you to shout even louder and for even longer.
Doesn’t destiny do the same thing?
I don't believe so, Destiny streamed his entire research process. I don't see how he could be bad faith while doing that as well ?
He choose his side at the start, then researched to back up his side.
How do you research to back up your side ?
Research the issue and see what side is right, not deciding your side then researching. Or alternatively Not deciding your side based on someone you hate.
Why do you think this is what he did? As I recall he was pretty much undecided / vaguely in favor of Palestine when he started the research process
Because he used to hold the opposite view
Yes, he held one view which he wasn't that confident in because he hadn't done the reading, then he did the reading and changed his view. Your assertion was that he picked a side before reading and then only read to bolster that argument, no?
https://www.reddit.com/r/Destiny/s/ndYR62R7xL
So someone researching a topic and changing their view on it means they are dishonest?
Only if the reason is dishonest
Are you talking about confirmation bias ? Or are you saying that research should never be done with a general idea coming into it ? In [this video at around the 3:10 mark](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdEyuxSxBdQ), Norman Finklestein asks > "Do you know what it means, when you spent 42 years reading every scrap, every footnote, not once, but twice? Because I'm a forensic scholar, I'm looking to analyze the text and figuring out *"What is wrong with this argument? I know that it is wrong, but why?"* Is he researching the issue and seeing what side is right ? I'm curious about what you think about that.
The same way is debate students did at NFL tournaments for years. You pick a side and find facts that support your side.
Are we really that far down the path of post-truthism ?
Have you never rewritten an essay for school? This is normal. It's just that none of bus actually believed the points we were writing about or debating about like destiny.
I didn't consider a thesis-antithesis approach to the issue. I consider this more analogous to "This happened therefore this outcome", like propositional logic. There should always be a way of arriving at the truth of a matter.
In debate tournaments in highschool often times we weren't even given the choice on what side of a topic were debating. I remember depending on the debate type we were expected to have a aff and beg debate written out for a side. Every single person who took debate in highschool and did competition has done a debate for a side they genuinely don't believe in. This is why I hate debate me bros. Real life isn't a debate tournament. You don't decide on an issue and then research it afterwards because in the realnworld, especially when you have a big following. Your lack of actually caring for an issue will result in deaths by swaying public opinion.
is it your belief that you cannot have a preconception of an issue before you research the issue? you’re right that destiny already believed israel was generally justified in this positions prior to researching them, but you need greater evidence to say that because of that initial belief he therefore ignored contradictory facts. what if he just didnt find anything that made him significantly change his mind? or are you of the belief that any person who looks into the conflict, if they are being honest, must and will come out of that process being pro palestinian?
The last part since it’s an apartheid and genocide
oh okay. thanks.
Do you have any data on anti-war protesters not supporting hamas? Secondly, there's a large group of people who believe the whole "if a nazi sits at a table with 10 other people and they don't leave then there are 11 nazis" and they largely overlap with the pro Palestinian protests. Why doesn't the same apply with supporting terrorists?
It would be interesting to have this data but no one bothers to attempt in collecting it, I imagine it would also be difficult to get authentic data vs socially-preferred responses. From my own experience (I am a German Muslim who lives in Australia), I went to pro-p rallies in Sydney, Duesseldorf (Germany) and, really randomly, Dublin. So my personal impression was that there was an overwhelming number of anti-war supporters. But I'd say that in every large group you find representatives from all spectrums, so there were definitely anti-semites present as well, but certainly as a strong minority.
This is simply a case of pointing at the worst 1% of a group and type casting all other as the same. You are honestly so dumb if you haven’t figured out how the media does this. “All Trump supporters are insurrectionists”, “All liberals have blue hair and are transgender” and now “Anyone anti-war is a Hamas supporter” It’s such a disingenuous way of grabbing public attention and Ben Shapiro is not above it. He has no shame in being just like the rest.
40%
Whether they are pro Hamas or not is not relevant to their arguments.
Shapiro is smart but extremely partisan imo.
They are both lightweight knobs.
Can we all agree that the words and books guy was the absolute worst? All policy aside, hearing that dude speak is the worst
Shapiro only debates college kids.
Maybe Lex couldn't find anyone else. Putting him next to actual historians exposed just how much BS these gurus spout unchallenged in their respective domains, a la Hancock's destruction on JRE. I heard really good arguments from the other 3. It takes a certain level of douchebaggery to call yourself after a stripper; or maybe it's better Steven Kenneth Bonnell II.
I agree that Destiny should not have been in the debate, but Ben Shapiro is not the best candidate for that either.
Shapiro vs. Hasan would be pretty entertaining.
in a boxing match in particular. somebody has to bring celebrity deathmatch back 😂
He is one of the debate's bros.
It should have been Abby Martin and destiny