Freud, Kant, hate and war for Israel
From Nation magazine thread 8.11.2005 - Under “Why AIPAC indictment is bad news for Rove” – David Corn’s BLOG | Posted 08/08/2005 @ 1:20pm
“What Is This Thing Called Hate? (Freud's answer: cathexis of libido (love) that has undergone repression due to abuse)” -- posted by Jones 9.24 pm
“I guess we should just accept all of the things Jones said as "love that has undergone repression due to abuse." – posted by HHEMWM 9.32 pm
A Ph.D. thesis could well be devoted to the psychodynamics of this exchange….
As a matter of fact, to give the devil his due, as associate professor at SUNY Binghamton (upstate NY) I was vilified for challenging the authenticity of an alleged anti-semitic incident November 5, l988, right after George H. Bush was elected president, which consisted of the Jewish Student Union being spray-painted with large swastikas and “kill kikes” on the wall.
SUNY-B draws a large, mostly excellent, undergraduate group of Jewish students from downstate, and they, along with the community, were rightfully outraged; none more so than I. Although there were rumblings of jealousy on the part of locals at the extra fine facilities the NYC kids enjoyed, nothing remotely resembling an incident of this sort had EVER happened before (I had taught there since ’64). But there were suspicious peculiarities. The spray painting and scrawling seemed half-heartedly splashed, the timing also coincided with a krystalnacht memorial service, the papers were full of IDF personnel clubbing stone-throwing youth in the first intafada, so I went off in class to the effect that “they had it coming – lucky the attack was only symbolic.”
Well, shit hit the fan. Ethics committee hearings, job loss pending, wife pleading ‘how could you?’, classes severely crimped, more. Got written up in “anti-semitic incidents on campus”. Then, after the investigation, the JSU president, James Oppenheim, was charged. He had been there late that night, a spraypaint can with his finger prints was found inside, and as the one responsible for the memorial service, he got a record turn-out. Along with making public statements calling for my dismissal.
The case drug on until the end of the semester, when he graduated. High-priced NY City lawyers got him off on a technicality. So it was never proven he did it in a court of law. He retreated into the bosom of the family and I got a suspended (with pay) for a semester. Ordeal over. Until now. It remained a mess until hh’s post suddenly shed new light.
****/
It could be said I put Jews, particularly the liberal community here, on a pedestal. Although in the Vietnam war, I was far out front, a mere Abbie Hoffman wannabe, and they were wimp city, as far as protest was concerned. “A media campaign is what we need,” most said. Not all. There were a few who were up there WITH Hoffman, the Ramparts crowd, and one really remarkable student came back from the ’68 Chicago riots to radicalize many of us. I was the only professor to stand on the steps of the Adminsitration building with a rag-tag longhaired bunch the day we actually blocked military recruitment on campus. But it should be said there was also a contingent of right-wing Jewish profs who opposed us, proto-Perles who were never politically beyond the level of Ronald Reagan, and efasily went over to judeofascism.
And then came their role in this war. The original “neocon watch” was on the Original Dissent Forum (key words), and it began documenting the planning of this war for Israel and the onslaught of deserved pure hate they deserve. They are all James Oppenheim-ers, who support it; and yellow bellied sapsuckers who won’t dissociate, as one NYU prof did who called himself “diaspora” Jew and renounced any identification with others.
But this gets back to what hate is and when it is deserved. When (using Freud’s definition, which I accept) any person or group use the regard and consideration others spontaneously extend, to abuse those who extend it, they act on a principle it is logically impossible to generalize. “Give us your love; we’ll give you death in return.” Kant’s morality (which I have defended in print: “Generalization in Ethics”, many years ago) states as a categorical imperative “Act only that maxim that can at the same time be willed as universal law,” and this one cannot. It is like his example “Lend me some money; I promise to repay (but will not do so)” – noone could could lend on the basis of such lying promises, although the perpetrator might get bucks, for various reason, by pretending to promise.
As for the hate: that comes in when the act concerns life or death, as in lying wars. Ms. Sheehan used the word “hate’ in her statement regarding the murder of her son by the Bush-neocon lying war for Israel. And kindred souls, would examine her words to see if they can pick holes in them to discredit her.
“What Is This Thing Called Hate? (Freud's answer: cathexis of libido (love) that has undergone repression due to abuse)” -- posted by Jones 9.24 pm
“I guess we should just accept all of the things Jones said as "love that has undergone repression due to abuse." – posted by HHEMWM 9.32 pm
A Ph.D. thesis could well be devoted to the psychodynamics of this exchange….
As a matter of fact, to give the devil his due, as associate professor at SUNY Binghamton (upstate NY) I was vilified for challenging the authenticity of an alleged anti-semitic incident November 5, l988, right after George H. Bush was elected president, which consisted of the Jewish Student Union being spray-painted with large swastikas and “kill kikes” on the wall.
SUNY-B draws a large, mostly excellent, undergraduate group of Jewish students from downstate, and they, along with the community, were rightfully outraged; none more so than I. Although there were rumblings of jealousy on the part of locals at the extra fine facilities the NYC kids enjoyed, nothing remotely resembling an incident of this sort had EVER happened before (I had taught there since ’64). But there were suspicious peculiarities. The spray painting and scrawling seemed half-heartedly splashed, the timing also coincided with a krystalnacht memorial service, the papers were full of IDF personnel clubbing stone-throwing youth in the first intafada, so I went off in class to the effect that “they had it coming – lucky the attack was only symbolic.”
Well, shit hit the fan. Ethics committee hearings, job loss pending, wife pleading ‘how could you?’, classes severely crimped, more. Got written up in “anti-semitic incidents on campus”. Then, after the investigation, the JSU president, James Oppenheim, was charged. He had been there late that night, a spraypaint can with his finger prints was found inside, and as the one responsible for the memorial service, he got a record turn-out. Along with making public statements calling for my dismissal.
The case drug on until the end of the semester, when he graduated. High-priced NY City lawyers got him off on a technicality. So it was never proven he did it in a court of law. He retreated into the bosom of the family and I got a suspended (with pay) for a semester. Ordeal over. Until now. It remained a mess until hh’s post suddenly shed new light.
****/
It could be said I put Jews, particularly the liberal community here, on a pedestal. Although in the Vietnam war, I was far out front, a mere Abbie Hoffman wannabe, and they were wimp city, as far as protest was concerned. “A media campaign is what we need,” most said. Not all. There were a few who were up there WITH Hoffman, the Ramparts crowd, and one really remarkable student came back from the ’68 Chicago riots to radicalize many of us. I was the only professor to stand on the steps of the Adminsitration building with a rag-tag longhaired bunch the day we actually blocked military recruitment on campus. But it should be said there was also a contingent of right-wing Jewish profs who opposed us, proto-Perles who were never politically beyond the level of Ronald Reagan, and efasily went over to judeofascism.
And then came their role in this war. The original “neocon watch” was on the Original Dissent Forum (key words), and it began documenting the planning of this war for Israel and the onslaught of deserved pure hate they deserve. They are all James Oppenheim-ers, who support it; and yellow bellied sapsuckers who won’t dissociate, as one NYU prof did who called himself “diaspora” Jew and renounced any identification with others.
But this gets back to what hate is and when it is deserved. When (using Freud’s definition, which I accept) any person or group use the regard and consideration others spontaneously extend, to abuse those who extend it, they act on a principle it is logically impossible to generalize. “Give us your love; we’ll give you death in return.” Kant’s morality (which I have defended in print: “Generalization in Ethics”, many years ago) states as a categorical imperative “Act only that maxim that can at the same time be willed as universal law,” and this one cannot. It is like his example “Lend me some money; I promise to repay (but will not do so)” – noone could could lend on the basis of such lying promises, although the perpetrator might get bucks, for various reason, by pretending to promise.
As for the hate: that comes in when the act concerns life or death, as in lying wars. Ms. Sheehan used the word “hate’ in her statement regarding the murder of her son by the Bush-neocon lying war for Israel. And kindred souls, would examine her words to see if they can pick holes in them to discredit her.
posted by Sid Thomas | 3:49 PM
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