Discussing Hasan Piker being banned from the UK

 So, Hasan Piker and Cenk Uygur have been banned from the UK for "antisemitism" apparently. *sigh*

So...I'm not gonna lie, I aint surprised our government is acting in authoritarian ways, but the UK? Really? It seems ridiculous to me. Criticizing Israel is NOT antisemitism. You can be for freedom of religion and discourage hate actions against individual groups while still criticizing a government doing bad things. In my case, I dont like Israel OR palestine. yes, I do condemn Hamas. I dont believe in "from the river to the sea", but that doesn't mean what Israel is doing is morally correct either. Just because one side is bad doesnt mean the other is good. And I cant in good conscience support a faction of Jewish radicals who think bombing another people into oblivion on an industrial scale is acceptable. Nor can I support their massive lobbying efforts to influence western governments into...taking away peoples' free speech rights.

I mean, we love to talk about western culture this, liberal democracy that, but Hasan touched on this in his video and I wanna say I've been noticing the same thing here...nothing we're doing here is liberal. The highest virtues of liberal democracy are that of freedom of speech/thought, and limited government to stop tyrants from restricting peoples' freedoms and rights. Some might ask where those rights come from, citing 'god", but they're just human concepts that are good ideas. They dont have to come from religion. I justify many of them through structural functionalism. 

With that said, we are massive hypocrites as far as how we talk about those values. Hasan called our dedication to them a "sham" in his video, and he's right. The longer this goes on, the more it seems like we care about when we talk about western culture is white people, christianity, and work ethic. We seem horribly islamophobic, tbqh. If anything is an issue its that. We seem to be expected to foam at the mouth at muslims and those from islamic cultures existing and having opinions (like hasan and cenk), but then when it comes to judaism and christianity its like HOW DARE YOU CRITICIZE THINGS DONT YOU REALIZE THOSE ARE OUR CULTURE?! Now, the UK does claim to be a more overtly Christian country where the US is more secular, so maybe it CAN actually claim a higher level of cultural affinity there, but Americans kind of do this stuff too. And it irks me. Because we're supposed to have freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and freedom of religion. And if we wanna invoke the paradox of tolerance on anyone, let it be on the TRULY intolerant. Those who actively wanna take rights away from others. But does Hasan do that? or Cenk? Or me? (I didn't get banned but I also didnt apply for a visa). I dont think so. I never got that vibe from them. And in my own case, I view it like this. Everyone has the right to their own opinion, unless your opinion harms others, I don't see why we should regulate everything. And even with opinions harming others, i tend to have a relatively maximalist approach to free speech due to my American heritage. It's only in narrow cases that I would actually invoke some sort of restriction or punishment. Even if it comes down to cancelling people, I only believe in doing so if the offense is extreme and blunt. Like outright calling for concentration camps or something. Ya know?

So it comes off as hypocritical when western governments these days ride this high horse of western cultural superiority and the demonization of "the other" when "the other" are just peacefully expressing their views, while those screaming so loudly about western culture are themselves violating the most core tenets of it while pushing the parts of it that are either not that important, or even harmful. Like religion. I dont hold a judeo-Christian worldview myself. My views are closer to secular humanism. I have no inherent sympathy to israel. They're just another country. And they're a country for as much they scream about being western, the only thing 'western" about them is aesthetics and their obvious "colonizer" attitude. Meanwhile they're killing journalists and committing war crimes on a mass scale. Basically, they're not much better than Russia at this point. And that's the thing. if we wanna hold ANYONE accountable to western moral standards, it should be Israel. After 1945, we said "never again" (and to ask rhetorically, who were the ones genocided in 1945?....duh).  We established all of these international criminal courts and international organizations against genocide. And then....we just...look the other way when the shoe is on the other foot. It's fricking bizarre, man. 

Like, that's the thing. Not being a Christian, I have no special empathy for Israel. I dont see them as this "chosen people" elevated above other people. They're just...people. And are subject to the same morals and standards as the rest of us. So why the insane double standard? 

But this is what happens when we seem to define being western as...having the right religious outlook, and having the work ethic...which is...associated with said religious outlook. Again, it seems to come down to "judeo christian good, everyone else is bad." And that's not what western values are supposed to be at all. Western values are supposed to be secular and based on freedom of religion, freedom of thought, and freedom of expression. 

So yeah, I do agree with Hasan that there seems to be a weird double standard here, where the ones who scream loudest about western culture seem to support all the worst elements of it, while apparently being willing and able to rip up the best of them and pretend they dont exist. It's messed up, to be frank. Like they dont actually care about all that crap about freedom and democracy, and now that the facade is failing, we're seeing the evil racist colonizer narratives underneath it all. Again, it's like it's all about being white, judeo-Christian, and has the work ethic. That's all these guys seem to really care about. I throw in the white stuff because let's face it, you end up being brown and of muslim heritage? Suddenly these guys seem willing to scream about how you're an extremist when they're as normal as any one of us. Cenk certainly aint extremist. Hasan is cringey at times dont get me wrong, but he aint some nick fuentes type either. But yeah people act like these guys are ISIS or something and they're not. It's crazy. So...yeah.

Anyway, that's enough ranting, it should be obvious I'm against this and pro free speech. Because that's what being "western" is ACTUALLY about. If we wanna represent the actual good and moral version actually. It's like what Jon Stewart said once. When we think western values we think freedom and democracy, and they? Well, they're thinking knights templar.