Is the Middle East War megathread not generated anymore?
There used to be lively discussion about this topic.
For context: I find it fairly obvious that the Israeli government is deliberately attempting to wipe out the Palestinian people in a way that is slow/ambiguous enough to perhaps not officially qualify as genocide in a legal sense, but that is nevertheless effectively genocide from an emotionally aware human perspective.
I've mostly steered clear of the related conversation because many people seemed to have gotten tangled up in the legal definitions, as if Tildes were a branch of the International Court of Justice, which made me feel like the humanitarian view is getting dismissed or implied as being inferior. I wanted to see if this approach or its popularity on Tildes might have shifted with the new developments, such as Israel blocking humanitarian aid to Gaza and its recent plans to seize the area and hand aid distribution to private companies.
Am I somehow just not able to find the megathread? I believe I may have tried to filter it out earlier but it's not on my filters list and I'm unsure if there are other ways to hide content on Tildes that I may have forgotten about.
The megathread no longer gets regularly made afaik, but there is still lively discussion whenever there's a topic about a related news story. And luckily most of the people who'd yell at you for calling it a genocide no longer do so.
If only I knew how to feel about that!
Similar to the temporary (and now defunct) ~health.coronavirus subgroup and recurring Coronavirus topics, the recurring Middle East war / Israel-Hamas war megathreads were created in response to an overwhelming volume of submissions being posted about the subject. But once the news and submissions related to those subjects significantly slows down, any temporary subgroup created to house them get folded back into its parent group, and the recurring threads typically get shut down too. It's not necessarily because the subject is any less important or relevant to world affairs, and the recurring threads being discontinued is not a value judgement on the subject itself. It's merely that the whole reason for them being created in the first place (the submission volume about said subjects overwhelming other content on the site) is no longer occurring.
So basically…be the spam you want to see. ;-)
That makes sense, thanks for explaining.
I think it was turned off around the time that ~society was created. But actually, for most of its life it was manually created by users, which was a bit of a problem when the user who created some of them left the site and their topics were deleted.
Someone could create one manually if they think there is enough news to justify it, or alternatively, you could post news links at top level in -society.
Ohhhh. I just thought one day all those discussion threads just disappeared and figured I shouldn't ask.
I keep stumbling upon this phenomenon on here where past input written by a bunch of people becomes effectively inaccessible after one person flips out and deletes a topic - or multiple topics - that they started.
(I can't say that I like such extensive decay potential. People shouldn't have to repost things that may have taken a lot of effort to write just because one person wanted to walk back their own expression.)
I haven't been keeping up with how the Palestinian people are doing ..... Lia, now that you've made this thread, could you share a couple news items?
On an anecdotal level, I'd say things are worse again.
I have a few friends here in the US that are Palestinian and many more both within Israel, the occupied territories, and formerly ones in Gaza. The ones in the US got a small reprieve during the ceasefire, but since Israel broke it they are once again looking to move back to Spain where their tax dollars don't literally buy the bombs. They are researchers here as postdocs so it was planned to be a shorter stay anyway - in the years vs decades - but I'll be very, very sad to see them go. They are a huge part of my local community.
For the folks in Israel, they are having a tough time with it. Like the folks here who were optimistic with the ceasefire, they are dealing with a lot again. One had been imprisoned for echoing support for Palestine with a simple "my <3 for Palestine" with is crazy, but she is back home now - be it with her phone on airplane and not doing anything visible (she is a public figure). The others are in a similar boat, keeping silent. In one case a Palestinian friend leads a cross cultural dance troop that was half Jewish Israeli and half Palestinian, but it has since stopped at many of the folks in it no longer trust the other group. Her husband is Jewish Israeli and many of his family - including his brother and brother in law - are both actively serving in Gaza so family relations are very, very fraught for them at the moment.
For folks within occupied territories, I haven't heard from them for the last few months. In one case I know it's because they are taking a break from communicating with everyone outside her immediate community (informed via social media post). The others I'm not sure about. Giving them space and hoping they are ok. There has been a strong expansion of activities in both active bombing in Gaza and settler lead violence in West Bank that I'm not super confident that they are.
I added a link to an article from Associated Press that explains the main developments. Quote:
I was never a prolific conversationalist on this topic and I am frankly unable to make myself follow these news regularly. The same goes for some political content on the USA.
When it comes to the latter, I find it easier to just read conversations on Tildes where people summarise the main developments and share their perspectives on them (usually more knowledgeable than my own, given that I'm European). As for the former, I have yet to find a place - online or in real life - where conversation would feel worth exposing myself to. The comment section under this Shaun video is a rare exception (at least parts of it were, when last I checked).
A few weeks ago I saw an AI video sent from a world leader's social media account, and it looked like a really distasteful ad for turning Gaza into a resort. It was so disgusting and unbelievable I cried.
But I think most countries still have sane leaders, and there are good people working on being helpful like Senator Bernie. "Look for the helpers"
If you have not yet watched “No Other Land” I think you should.
The very fact it was censored in certain places is enough of a reason to watch it.
I sailed the high seas to find it, wasn’t too hard ;)
Will I be super sad? I will probably be super sad. But yeah I will find it and watch ut. Thank You.
It is sad for sure. But also necessary.
There is overt violence just fyi.