The death of more than 34,000 Gazans, mostly civilians, has enraged much of the world, especially college campuses.
That is understandable.
The lack of context is not. That has not been widely offered — until now.
Scott Galloway, a prolific, liberal professor of marketing at New York University, has just done that. He briefly touched on it in a long essay examining the outlooks of different age cohorts, along with the real threat TikTok presents to democracy.
He shows support for Israel is directly proportional to the age of Americans. The older you are, the more likely you strongly support Israel. And the younger, the less support, as can be easily seen in this chart that shows a majority of Gen Z actually supports terror attacks, such as the Oct. 7 massacre.
A lot of Gen Z beliefs are fostered on TikTok, which is overwhelmingly anti-Israel.
Not for nothing, Gen Z is the most gender confused, intolerant of free speech, and getting less sex than their older peers. No wonder they are angry.
In an interview on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” Galloway got more specific, revealing the double standard imposed on Israel by the West.
He noted that civilian deaths as a ratio of all deaths caused by the U.S. was much higher in Mosul, or Japan, than Gaza, yet no one accused the U.S. of genocide.
The genocide charge I have explained before is particularly sinister and false.
To Gen Z, which no doubt lacks historical and geographical perspective, Israel is Goliath. In reality, Israel in the area of the Mideast is like a box of Wheaties on a football field.
Is Israel’s military mighty?
Yes, because without it, there would be no Israel.
Gen Z doesn’t know that when the UN divided Palestine into Jewish and Arab parts in 1948, the Jews attacked the desert and built a democracy.
The Arabs attacked Israel, to destroy it, and have not stopped since. In Israel’s 75 years, she has never known a moment of peace, a moment to relax.
When she has — as in 1973, and precisely 50 years later, on Oct. 7 — she has been viciously attacked.
Gen Z is too young and ignorant to know that Israel voluntarily left Gaza in 2005, leaving the area for Gazans to run for themselves. In 2006, Gazans elected the terrorist group Hamas to govern them. In 2007, Hamas drove out Fatah, the PLO’s opposition party.
Students chant “Free Palestine!” Do they know there has been no free elections in Gaza since 2006, but since then Hamas has kept up a steady stream of rocket and other attacks on Israel, which Israel tolerated as a cost of doing business.
Oct. 7 changed that, when Hamas broke a cease fire to stage a massacre. That was too much to accept, and Israel vowed to destroy Hamas.
As the U.S. vowed to destroy Imperial Japan, Nazi Germany, al Qaeda and ISIS.
Anyone with a sense of moral equilibrium knows terror must be destroyed.
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Scott Galloway is amazing. He is one of the most perceptive individuals on the scene today. He is a regular with Michael Smerconish and over the years I have marveled at his ability to spot trends. With regard to his thoughts on the events today, he has been masterful in the face of the winds blowing the other way in his academic world. If you want another interesting dive into his thoughts on this, find a wonderful podcast called "Two Jews on the News" It is out of the UK
Never yet heard a podcast, but I might try this one.
A few reactions:
Well, apparently we don't need abstinence sex education. The kids already know about it.
I was a few years too young for them, but I'd always heard that demonstrations were "a great place to meet chicks."
Studies do say that sexual frustration "appears to increase the risks of aggression, violence, and crime associated with relief-seeking, power-seeking, revenge-seeking, and displaced frustration." https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0047235221000854
Forums for self-identified "incels" (the "involuntarily celibate") are notoriously antisemitic. Yup, you can add "I can't get a date" to capitalism, communism, globalization, immigration, feminism, war, crop-failures, space lasers, missing children, dairy cows going dry, plagues, and whatever else is the problem du jour to the list of stuff Jews are blamed for. Natch.
Take it from someone who began his teaching career when Generation X (‘64-‘78) were students, through the Millennials (‘79-‘96) and then struggled towards retirement for a few years with this weird group called Generation Z (Zombies?). They are unquestionably the most self absorbed, self centered, self important and narcissistic cohort ever birthed in our nation. They are so confident in their righteousness despite their appalling lack of understanding and the shallowness of their knowledge base. They did not get this way on their own however. For years, the great magoos who have administered our public education systems retreated from both high standards in learning as well as moral principles in the areas of student discipline and character development. The members of this generation have been coddled and cajoled by a pedagogy designed to develop them as social justice warriors in lieu of developing fully their literary and arithmetic skills. They rant about land stolen but would be hard pressed to draw on a borderless topographical map, both a political map of the entire Middle East, both present day and one from the days of the Turkish Ottoman Empire .This is truly a generation of fools who believe in the existence of 53 genders but who have no idea of the foundations of the Western Consciousness and how to seek truth by inquiry and empiricism.
From everything I’ve heard and read, the spirit of free inquiry is DOA at most colleges.
"Gen Z is too young and ignorant to know that Israel voluntarily left Gaza in 2005, leaving the area for Gazans to run for themselves. In 2006, Gazans elected the terrorist group Hamas to govern them. In 2007, Hamas drove out Fatah, the PLO’s opposition party."
Yup. Israel is a tiny island of Democracy surrounded by a massive sea of oppression and hatred. They damned well BETTER have a good military. If they did not, they would have been stomped out decades ago.
There is some weird stuff in the poll. Of course, as above it says that 51% of Gen Z thinks the Gaza attacks can be justified. On the other hand 54% of the same group thinks that "who blamed Israel for the violence killing 1200 of their civilians were condoning violence and terrorism." So it seems like a majority believes the attacks could be "justified" but that blaming Israel condones violence and terrorism.
So, it seems that the 49% who thought it wasn't justified were joined by another 5% that thinks blaming Israel is the wrong thing to do, even though the attack "can be justified" by Israel's actions. Were they thinking "can be justified" but aren't or shouldn't? "Dude, I think the killings can be justified, but I don't think they really were." Maybe the question should have been "were justified" instead of "can be."
Another head-scratcher is that 54% also think that law firms should refuse to hire law students who supported the attacks and Hamas. (This is a way higher number than their elders--59% of the over 65 crowd, apparently thinking kids'll be kids, think that law firms should hire these folks despite their politics.) So, again, you have 5% of Gen Z who think the attacks "can be justified" but think "support of Hamas" should mean no job. I guess that could mean, yeah it was justified, but Hamas shouldn't be supported.
But then, they turn around and are less harsh on Hamas than they are their peers--48% think Israel should eliminate Hamas, and 52% want an immediate end to the war.
You begin to wonder, too, if they are just answering randomly, because 62% of them think "that the attacks on Jews were genocidal in nature." Doing the math again, assuming the 49% who thought the attacks were not justified also thought the attacks were genocidal--that means that some crazy 13% thought that the attacks were both (a) "Justified" and (b) "Genocidal" Not a good look.
Or, it may just be that their opinions are incoherent.
Without going in to a long rant, I would like to say I support Israel 100%. No need to step in and stop them from finishing the job they are well equipped to carry out. If not this will never end. God Bless Israel.
We are reaping the 'rewards' of the 'education' of the radicals of the 1960s after their infiltration into education, the media, entertainment, politics, etc. The support for Hamas's desire to destroy Israel should not surprise us. A pox on progressives and their destructive beliefs. The ONLY thing keeping Israel alive is its possession of 'the bomb.' Pray it never has to use it, but it surely will if its survival is threatened.
Another excellent and factual article, Stu. I believe when the 1960's protests occurred they were about our male youth not wanting to die or be harmed for a war some believed was not in the interests of the United States or even South Vietnam. Protests also involved enforcing the civil rights of Black people and others who were treated as second class citizens.
Now the protests are about destroying the only democracy in the Middle East, Israel. They have also devolved into age old anti-Semitism. All this with a healthy dose of utter disrespect and hate for people who disagree with their ranting.
Really Stu? Younger adults are no getting laid so this explains why they are protesting? By that same rational because you are frustrated that you can't ride a bicycle that must explain your irrational fear of cyclists.
The Ride of Silence is on Wednesday, May 15, make sure your poison pen has lots of ink when you write a column about the Ride of Silence.