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I was reading the Wall Street Journal yesterday (why, I have no idea besides the fact that it was there and handy and I was bored) and I read an article by Alan M. Dershowitz called "An Academic Hijacking" in which it detailed a British academic effort to boycott Israeli academics. WTF?! I was shocked -- I had no idea that British people were anti-Semitic...
Obviously, I had issues with this. I mean collaborations are part of academics! How often do you think of a solitary person working on breakthroughs? *shakes head* This is so wrong that I can't even comment on all the ways it's wrong. What makes Israeli people so terrible? Quoting the article by Dershowitz, "Israel without oil or other natural resources, lives by its universities, research centers and other academic institutions. After the U.S. Israeli scientists hold more patents than any nation in the world, have more start-up companies listed on Nasdaq, and export more life-saving medical technology" so it's not like they don't have anything significant to offer or their schooling is somewhat inferior... I don't understand this anti-Israel mindset at all... If people can contribute to the betterment of mankind, why not? Who cares what race they are, what religion they practice or where they're from.
I can't stand racist people. Or sexist people. Or bigots. Those types of narrow-minded thinking is what is holding mankind back and as long as they persist, I think we'll always be moving around in circles, unable to break the cycles of the past and unable to move on. So much could be solves if we just let go of these sort of sentiments.
Personally, I'm glad that Americans reacted to this type of news in typical indignant American fashion -- we were totally appalled and moved quickly to proclaim that we are extremely against this sort of boycott. In fact, thousands of academics from all around the U.S are asking to be known as "Honorary Israelis" for the purpose of any boycott. Several universities' presidents, including our very own John Sexton (yay for NYU!) have said that if the British academics are going to boycott Israeli academics then they might as well boycott the American ones as well. And I can't imagine them getting very far if we as a whole, decide we would drop working with British scientists on collaborations.
Realistically, I know this wouldn't work. I mean there are a lot of wonderful stuff being researched out there and we can't just drop it because of this issue -- the stakes can get rather high if the research were say on cancer or a cheap, renewable energy source and the cons would just outweigh the pros of any sort of boycott but it's nice to know that we hold such sentiment. It's times like these that make me proud that I'm an American, especially since in recent years being an American doesn't seem all that it's crack up to be.
Obviously, I had issues with this. I mean collaborations are part of academics! How often do you think of a solitary person working on breakthroughs? *shakes head* This is so wrong that I can't even comment on all the ways it's wrong. What makes Israeli people so terrible? Quoting the article by Dershowitz, "Israel without oil or other natural resources, lives by its universities, research centers and other academic institutions. After the U.S. Israeli scientists hold more patents than any nation in the world, have more start-up companies listed on Nasdaq, and export more life-saving medical technology" so it's not like they don't have anything significant to offer or their schooling is somewhat inferior... I don't understand this anti-Israel mindset at all... If people can contribute to the betterment of mankind, why not? Who cares what race they are, what religion they practice or where they're from.
I can't stand racist people. Or sexist people. Or bigots. Those types of narrow-minded thinking is what is holding mankind back and as long as they persist, I think we'll always be moving around in circles, unable to break the cycles of the past and unable to move on. So much could be solves if we just let go of these sort of sentiments.
Personally, I'm glad that Americans reacted to this type of news in typical indignant American fashion -- we were totally appalled and moved quickly to proclaim that we are extremely against this sort of boycott. In fact, thousands of academics from all around the U.S are asking to be known as "Honorary Israelis" for the purpose of any boycott. Several universities' presidents, including our very own John Sexton (yay for NYU!) have said that if the British academics are going to boycott Israeli academics then they might as well boycott the American ones as well. And I can't imagine them getting very far if we as a whole, decide we would drop working with British scientists on collaborations.
Realistically, I know this wouldn't work. I mean there are a lot of wonderful stuff being researched out there and we can't just drop it because of this issue -- the stakes can get rather high if the research were say on cancer or a cheap, renewable energy source and the cons would just outweigh the pros of any sort of boycott but it's nice to know that we hold such sentiment. It's times like these that make me proud that I'm an American, especially since in recent years being an American doesn't seem all that it's crack up to be.
