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From: david@fisher.UUCP (David Rubin)
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: "Sabotage of Humanitarian Efforts by Political Opportunists"
Message-ID: <559@fisher.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 25-Feb-85 10:49:42 EST
Article-I.D.: fisher.559
Posted: Mon Feb 25 10:49:42 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 27-Feb-85 07:41:20 EST
References: <21577@lanl.ARPA> <490@sfmag.UUCP> <540@fisher.UUCP> <500@sfmag.UUCP> <550@fisher.UUCP> <505@sfmag.UUCP>
Distribution: net
Organization: Princeton University Department of Statistics
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> My first answer to David Rubin was off the mark. It should have been:
> 	"Don't equate lying, malicious, instigation and emotional
> 	incitement with 'offering a free choice'."
 
I'd like to see what you consider to be a "free choice".

Your reply (below) still skirts what I consider the critical matter:
if your position is so manifestly just and without error, would not it
be inevitably accepted by the Ethiopians?  And if they will choose
"correctly", what harm will be done by giving them that choice
(whatever the motivations of those who would give them that choice)?

> My key charges were:
> 	1) The Ethiopians originally agreed to a quiet ceremony by
> 	their own free will.

This charge is contradicted by your earlier posting, which put forth
the far more modest claim that selected leaders had so agreed.

> 	2) No hint of racism was intended or involved.

As I've said, perhaps no racism, but definitely more than a hint of
moral superiority ("these people cannot be trusted to choose
correctly...")

> 	3) No stigma whatsoever would have resulted.

As long as they did it your way...

> 	4) Attacks charging racism and stigma were vicious lies.

Attacks charging racism were uncharitable, but only in the
motivation of the feeling of superiority, not in its existence.
Charges of threatening stigma are true.

> 	5) These lies were politically motivated. Their purpose was to
> 	propagandize against the Orthodox control of the rabbinate.
> 	The propagandists  exploited self-righteous humanitarian 
> 	rhetoric to incite public opinion.

Of course, asserting Orthodox control of state agencies is a political
act.  I suppose if you agree with Yitzchok, you are righteous, but if
you disagree, you are self-righteous.  And the Orthodox NEVER use
rhetoric to incite public opinion in Israel, I assume...

> 	6) The Ethiopians were exploited by instigators to be pawns in
> 	a political melee. The politicians gained at their expense.

The Ethiopians were exploited by politicians of both stripes.  That
is what politicians do for a living.  The politicians' motivations,
however, are irrelevent to our dispute; we (on the net) are only
discussing the "right thing to do", not the political advantages to
be gained in such a matter.

> Perhaps you take issue concerning the facts. But if you accept them
> as I've charged, I can't see why you would react differently.
> 
> 					Yitzchok Samet

The facts are not disputed, but we still react very differently.
Without choice, there can be no such thing as morality (at least, that
was the crux of the response given by my Hebrew school teacher (an
Orthodox rabbi) to the inevitable inquiry, "Why does God suffer evil
to exist?).  If you wish to PERSUADE the Ethiopians to go through
with the mikveh, by all means.... I just object to COMPELLING  them to
do so.

					David Rubin
			{allegra|astrovax|princeton}!fisher!david