The Result of "It's Complicated"

Is there really such a thing as an objective point of view?

Recent escalations in Israel and Palestine have people trying their hardest to not draw lines and state their opinions on the current events. When Black Lives Matter was at its highest point and even more currently Stop AAPI Hate, one of the things people was calling on from people was radical empathy.

It was a phrase that was seen all across the internet in stories, hashtags, and anything that people could consume for information. It was as clear cut as one group was being discriminated against because of their otherness. When George Floyd died, it sparked something within people. It had people going out of their way to do anything to be heard about why they are practicing empathy for an entire culture that was not their own. We are seeing the same when violence against the Asian community happens.

Enough credit was not given to these people. We spoke to them about performative practices and about how to direct their efforts into something tangible that will help progress the movements. Yet the amount of praise these people got wasn’t enough. The people who took to the streets, who went against their families and friends, who were consistent in posting to social media, who took the time to educate themselves about the patterns of oppression and systematic racism – these people made a choice.

The choice was not between being on the right or wrong side of history. The choice was to see and acknowledge the contract that people have made with each other in order to exist peacefully with one another.

When the contract is violated, it asks the question of why.

The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is asking us that question now.

The conflict is being largely ignored by western media due to political entanglements. That says a lot in itself. If the struggle was being executed in a manner where the people in power felt that the people that they financially back were in the right then our news coverage would be flooded with information. The simple fact that it's not tells us as a whole that something is fundamentally wrong.

Right now, it seems neutrality is the path that everyone wants to take including the government. It feels like the right choice to make. It feels like it is the way to say while this is wrong, that was wrong too so let’s hope for a peaceful resolution. All in all – neutrality asks for humanity to win.

The backside of this is that while people are choosing neutrality, the parties involved are choosing violence. Blood is being spilled everyday whether it is Palestinian or Jewish.

So we have to ask ourselves, is this objective point of view in the face of violence the best decision to make? When BLM was at its height, people made a choice. When Stop AAPI Hate was at its initial height, people made a choice. When Palestine says help us, people stopped making choices.

Does it matter who you support? Yes it does. However, at the end of the day the choice is yours and it is something that you have to live with.

There is a pattern in the history of this conflict between these two. The violence we are seeing is not centered around one event or even recent events. Instead, it is centered on how the politics being enacted is driving the hate and rage on both sides.

When people say it’s complicated, most likely it’s not – there might be legitimate layers – but people use the word complicated in order to avoid saying ‘this will not serve me.’

What we are seeing is the result of when governments choose to say it’s complicated. The ideology gets passed down to its people. When the ideology gets consumed then the lines of right and wrong become blurred. Then that blurriness will begin to rationalize events that previously would have been seen as unacceptable. Then suddenly we start to see escalations because when does 'it's complicated' stop becoming the acceptable reason?

The natural social contract has been broken and neutrality is not the answer. We have to make a choice. Then we have to make each other give better reasons than it's complicated.