I wanted to take a moment to explain why some of my posts from the past few days are closed to comments, and why there will be more of those to come.
I want to be able to share information and grief about the ongoing tragedies happening in Israel and Palestine, but unless I have the time and energy to moderate comments actively, I think there’s the potential for my posts doing more harm than good.
So this is my compromise solution – I’ll be posting more pieces, including some educational resources put together by my program in Global Asian Studies (resources from faculty who also cover the Middle East, which is sometimes defined as part of Asia, and sometimes not). But I’m going to keep comments closed unless or until I find time to actively moderate.
I’m sorry for this – I’d prefer to host an open conversation, the way I would in my classroom. But if Facebook chooses not to throttle my feed, this can be something of a megaphone, with over 10,000 friends and followers. I really, really don’t want to do harm through carelessness on my part.
(I’m still sort of startled that something I said in a school board meeting a few weeks ago was quoted recently in the Wall Street Journal. They didn’t ask or warn me before running the quote. I stand behind it, but still.)
I know I’ve already hurt one friend that way; I’ve apologized and we’re okay, but the last thing I want to do right now is add to anyone’s pain.
Benjamin Rosenbaum and I did record a podcast yesterday talking about this, and I’m glad we did, but we may or may not choose to release it – I think we’re going to take some time to review the conversation, possibly edit it, and think about whether it’s something we want to share publicly.
I will say one thing that the conversation clarified for me – the ‘sides’ are often depicted as pro-Palestine or pro-Israel. I would ask you to be very careful not to let yourself be coerced into taking such sides by social media pressures.
The actual ‘sides’ are pro-peace or pro-genocide. We may not know what a peaceful solution would look like, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t support those on the ground, working towards it. Don’t give up hope.