Weasel words? Kidnapped and arrested literally both have implied meanings related to innocence. What is a non weasel word for that to you? I feel like you’re just arguing to argue at this point.

Wrong. Israels actions of blockade and starvation are illegal. Full stop. The law you’re referring to does not apply to a nation in violation of these laws. Israel doesn’t get to point to a law to protect them as they violate other international laws and genocide a population. You’re just wrong. That’s not how laws work. You can’t just read one law and then say “welp, guess they can do this”. They can’t when the very blockade itself is illegal. The blockade itself has to be a legal blockade that does not starve a population of aid and committing acts of genocide.

You’re just so embarrassingly wrong.

You (I hope) recognize that

the state kidnapping a pedophile and puting them in prison.

vs.

a pedophile kidnapping a child and putting them in their basement

are different beyond just the material action of forcefully taking someone against their will. There is context that matters. So we use different words to describe the different contextual relationships. This example is a clear difference. I really hope we don’t have to debate that. It’s why I’m using it as an example. So we can remove the moral ambiguity and agree to this distinction.

There are obviously less extreme examples of this. That is the why understanding how language is used is important. In reality we say “the child was kidnapped” and “the pedophile was arrested”. It is vocabulary that describes the relationships of morality that we as a society assume to uphold.

By your reasoning they “are both acts of violence and taking someone against their will and imprisoning them”. I get that mate. But the world you want to live in where we describe both these actions as “kidnapping” does not exist.

Like, in what reality is your opinion even useful to reality? We don’t live in a world where language is used the way you want it to be. You need to understand the world you live in and the way language is used.

Understanding how and why the media uses words like “arrest” vs. “kidnap” to infer a false justification is significantly more helpful than saying “well we should simplify language”. Human language isn’t a programming language. It can’t be. It needs to deal with significantly more ambiguity, emotions, and morals.

Like, how are you even trying to apply this type of reasoning to the world? It’s useless for describing reality. Language isn’t used the way you want it to. And it never will work that way. What you’re trying to argue for isn’t useful to describing reality.

Yeah. We just fundamentally disagree then. These words are not interchangeable. I would not say a pedophile was “kidnapped” by the state. The context matters. There is a difference between materialism and dialectical-materialism. You seem to be removing the tool of dialectics and saying only the material action is what matters. The way words are used to shape material actions (or lack thereof) and concent matters.

The use of specific vocabulary is important in how media normalizes the actions of “the powerful”.

What you’re saying is similar to how “died” could be a synonym for “killed”. This was used constantly during the genocide. Israelis were “killed” or “slaughtered” on October 7th. Soldiers in tanks were “kidnapped” that day. But every day in Gaza children just “died”. Like the news articles were describing some natural disaster event and not a genocide. The people spending decades in Israeli prisons camps with no trial were “prisoners” exchanged for “hostages”.

Words matter. Especially when media is forming a narrative. Yes, legality is “fiction” but that doesn’t mean the majority of the Western world doesn’t believe that fiction. The entire idea of a justice system is “made up” it’s power comes from the collective belief in that system and the use of “justified” violence it maintains a monopoly on. You may not believe it. But most people in the west still do.

It is important to call out the inconsistent and unfair use of the vocabulary the media uses to describe Israels actions. If we stop labeling their crimes because “it doesn’t matter anymore, clearly no justice exists” but at the same time that language is still used to describe anyone’s resistance to Israel then they have won the narrative.

Legality. Israel can’t arrest someone in international waters. They can kidnap someone in international waters. But an arrest implies they have any legality to it. They do not. They’re the ones committing a crime not her.

It’s like saying the bank robber arrested their hostages.

The white supremacist neo-nazi is a pedophile? I’m shocked! Shocked I say!

Vietnam would like a word.

Edit: I’m not pro death penalty (latest update has Vietnam actually removing it for this crime due to this case) but just showing the absolute night and day difference between how they treat capitalist that cause death and poverty through their greed.

When they inevitably try to pretend they are pulling business from new York when Mamdani becomes mayor. Please, everyone, use this as an opportunity to show how evil the structures of capitalism are.

It will be a perfect time to explain class conflict to your liberal friends. The interest of the people of New York will be held hostage by capital. And overwhelmingly popular policy will be talk about as “unrealistic” and “poor economics”.

Yes, that is why capitalist must lose their power. They are holding the popular policies of the people hostage. That power should not exist in their hands but the hands of the people.

Capitalism is incompatible with democracy. The economy and politics are not separate. We cannot have a dictatorship controlling our companies and economy and call it a “democratic process”.

The West is transitioning to defend themselves from the consequences of their two year campaign of genocide.

They are attempting to wash their hands. This is a part of Israel enacting their final solution to the Palestinian question.

Remember, Israel is not an independent state in the traditional sense. It is the fascist colonial project of western civilization in west Asia.

Been avoiding it because I don’t want to just cry. I literally cried during Superman when the little kid was raising the flag. Trying to stay quiet in the theater. It just reminded me of so much.

I know everything that’s in it. I’ve started 5/7 days of every week, for the last two years, listening to Amy Goodman (Democracy now) tell me what awful things happened the nights before.

I just avoid visuals now. After the call of the 9 year old in the car I don’t think anything beyond that is anything useful to “make me understand”. I don’t think it does anything but disable me for some time. The story of the pregnant women dead from an attack as the doctors tried to save her child. My wife was 7 months pregnant then.

I’m a stay at home parent with a kid right now. Lost my job at Microsoft because I spoke up about it’s support of genocide. I can get to a protest or picket line every couple weeks when my wife can watch our kid.

I just think for some of us that more witness of suffering is just disabling and no longer effective. Maybe I’ll watch it with my daughter someday. Gaza has defined a lot of my love and appreciation for her.