Go to Patreon.com/miniondeathcult for every episode delivered straight to your podcast app The Death Cult earns its name today by celebrating the carnage in Gaza this week, and we're documenting it. We also cover the arguments for slave labor, and one peculiar argument against it.
| Time | Text |
|---|---|
| There are parallels, this, uh... | |
| This Israeli-Gaza-Palestinian conflict has a lot of parallels in American domestic politics, including our immigration policies and including our policing policies. | |
| And so keep that in mind as we go through these comments, we go through this episode. | |
| There's a lot of things that the right wing sees happening in Israel that they love. | |
| And that they wish would happen over here. | |
| Okay, so the first thing we're going to go through is a New York Times op-ed. | |
| We're not going to go through the op-ed itself, but this is an op-ed called a grotesque spectacle in Jerusalem. | |
| And what this is referring to is this is referring to Ivanka Trump Smiling and serenely gesturing at the new embassy in Israel while unarmed people are dying by the dozens nearby. | |
| And this has been described as her Marie Antoinette moment. | |
| Basically partying and having a gala while poor, desperate people are being murdered on the other side of a fence. | |
| Yeah, literally. | |
| What was it? | |
| It was as close as like 40 miles away? | |
| Yeah. | |
| It's insane. | |
| Good job on that meme, by the way. | |
| That meme was a work of art. | |
| It's a good meme on the instas. | |
| Well, you can't do a flat hand out in front of your face without making it into that anime meme. | |
| She did half the work for me. | |
| MinionDeathCult on Instagram to see that baby. | |
| But yeah, so somebody in the New York Times pointed out, this is Michelle Goldberg, pointed out the horrific, just sort of ghoulish Juxtaposition between these two events and images and it's truly horrific. | |
| It's truly like a staggering thing that people aren't, that people paid attention to that day and now it's already out of the news. | |
| Like this is old news. | |
| It's, you know, it's, it's not being, uh, it's not being really reported on much as, as at least as much as it was. | |
| And like, so much of it was so wild. | |
| There was just layer upon layer of disrespect. | |
| At the end of the day, they can't even really call it a pro-Jewish move. | |
| Because, I mean, they literally brought over ambassadors, and Ivanka was there, and they brought over this pastor. | |
| You guys hear about the pastor? | |
| Yeah, there was a couple of them. | |
| Pastor Robert Jeffress, in particular. | |
| Yeah, bring a pastor, not a rabbi. | |
| Yeah, not only bring a pastor, but bring a pastor who's literally on record saying, Jews go to hell, Muslims go to hell, Mormons go to hell, Catholics go to hell, which is like super OG. | |
| Let me just say real quick, as a fucking agnostic, proud agnostic, I'm Jewish, and I'm going to heaven. | |
| Like, that's what's happening. | |
| All Jews go to heaven. | |
| Like, that's what happens. | |
| So, pastor, you don't know, dude. | |
| Why would you bring that guy? | |
| Well, because it's like, all, uh... | |
| The subtext is now text. | |
| In American politics. | |
| And that's the whole reason for our support of Israel, is the fact that, uh, oh yeah, just get all the Jews over there, and then we Christians can go to heaven. | |
| Yep. | |
| We can save them too. | |
| God. | |
| It's... Like I said, they can't even fake it anymore, it's just so blatant. | |
| And what's crazy is, why did that guy even do it? | |
| And it was exactly that, he was like, well, I mean, I gotta be the better Christian than these Jews. | |
| No, he loves it. | |
| He loves this shit. | |
| I gotta be a better Christian than the Jews. | |
| I love that. | |
| Okay, so we're not gonna go through this article. | |
| It basically, you know, was a much more eloquent way of saying all the things that we just said. | |
| But what was interesting about this article were the top comments. | |
| You got a frog in your throat over there? | |
| Yeah. | |
| All clear? | |
| All clear, baby. | |
| So, if you've ever been in the New York Times op-ed section online, there's like a comments section, which is interesting, and you can sort the comments by New York Times picks and readers' picks. | |
| And, you know, the readership of the New York Times skews liberal, so often the readers' picks are just the naturally upvoted, just whoever upvotes the most upvoted comments. | |
| Are the readers picks and then the New York Times itself will try to bolster some Centrist voices or try to try to oh well this this right-leaning person made a good point here You know so they'll so they'll elevate that comment, but these these were just interesting so the the number one readers pick it had 1900 up votes | |
| It says the obscene photos of Jared and Ivanka cheerfully opening the new and improved Trump-branded Jerusalem American Embassy juxtaposed against the photos of Palestinians being slaughtered by Israelis is one of the most disturbing contrasts I have ever witnessed. | |
| The obliviousness of Trump DNA to the real plight of ordinary humans is family genetic defect. | |
| Is the family genetic defect. | |
| It's as if all Trumps and Trump swampers have no conscience, and they don't. | |
| It doesn't matter if people get hurt and die, etc, etc. | |
| Jared and Ivanka celebrate while Palestinians are murdered. | |
| There's your Trump doctrine. | |
| Like I said, number one reader voted post. | |
| Now let's go over here to the number one New York Times pick, which is by the way the default top comment because you have to toggle over to see the reader's picks. | |
| There's like tabs at the top of the comment section and so it's just automatically on the New York Times picks. | |
| So this was the top comment that you see when you look. | |
| Dude, they're censoring us. | |
| Well, that's what happens when you get rid of net neutrality, I assume. | |
| Yeah, this says, this comment by Solomon says, a miraculous day in Jerusalem, a wash in American and Israeli flags as throngs of Israelis celebrated the dedication of the American embassy in the capital of Israel. | |
| And I thought this was like maybe sarcastic at first when I first started reading it. | |
| But no, the fantasy the Arab world continues to perpetuate on the West proclaiming their demands to a state based on 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital does not exist in reality! | |
| Hey, this agreement we made, did you know that an agreement is actually just words on a paper? | |
| Yeah, that's why they're fighting and killing and caging up all the Palestinians. | |
| Well, that's, yeah, I mean, that's the reality. | |
| I'm saying, like, it's like... Well, no, that's, you know, they don't have a real estate. | |
| They just gotta fight everyone for it, you know? | |
| Well, I'm just saying, like, did you know when you make an agreement with somebody, it's just words on a paper, and you can, like, tear it up, or just not do it, like... I'll set it on fire, you can just say, no, I'm good. | |
| It's not actual reality. | |
| As long as you Xerox it. | |
| It's funny when, like, people put stock in something that other people agreed to, like, it's not tangible, it's like an idea, what are you talking about? | |
| All contracts are now in void after seven years. | |
| May as well speed up the process. | |
| You know? | |
| Yeah, no, the statute of limitations is long expired. | |
| Yeah, Trump has merely acknowledged that reality and has enacted the law passed by Congress acknowledging Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. | |
| Defeated parties do not make demands. | |
| The Arabs who call themselves Palestinians and whom occupy Israeli territory have repeatedly declined generous offers for statehood rather than create a future for its citizens. | |
| Yeah, anyway, this is all bad. | |
| King David established Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. | |
| King Bibi officiates at the opening of the U.S. | |
| Embassy. | |
| This was the number one New York Times staff pick. | |
| Just knows we're like a Christian nation. | |
| Like, you can't use religion or like King fucking David, some fictional fucking character, that may or may not have existed, as a basis for how you operate the infrastructure of a country. | |
| Yeah. | |
| It is terrifying how many people just believe that shit. | |
| A lot. | |
| They have no clue about any modern history of what's going on over there at all. | |
| But they'd be the first to say it doesn't even matter what's happening over there at all. | |
| It was written in the motherfucking Bible. | |
| Yeah. | |
| So, we gotta run it. | |
| That's scary, dude. | |
| Yeah, so, like I said, the number one reader-recommended comment, 1,900 upvotes. | |
| The number one New York Times-recommended comment, 18 upvotes. | |
| 18 upvotes. | |
| 18 upvotes. | |
| So this is the default top comment on that op-ed. | |
| That helps me a little. | |
| That makes me feel a little better, at least. | |
| It was so buried in the comments section, you know, organically, that it only had one response. | |
| And the one response was like, tell us how you really feel. | |
| I like that. | |
| Libs are the best at owning folks. | |
| The reader's comment ended with calling them despicable. | |
| Or deplorable. | |
| I like a good Lib take. | |
| The second most biting response to that was, you don't say. | |
| It just refreshes the palate. | |
| Okay, so another one of our prestige comments. | |
| I like the fact that we're getting these comments from more reputable sources than, like Matt said, IJR Red or, you know, U.S. | |
| Conservatives for a Constitutional America on Facebook. | |
| This one's from Politico and this was a really interesting one to me because I saw this post. | |
| This is a post that predates uh the specific the actual opening of the embassy so it was the week leading up it wasn't the week it was the day leading up to the embassy this is 513 when this was written 514 is when everything you know a lot more stuff went down i should say the title of this article is trump's jerusalem bet defies diarist predictions | |
| So this is like an article all about how you guys were bitching and moaning about the changing embassy and don't you look foolish. | |
| And then the subtitle is, as a U.S. | |
| embassy in Jerusalem officially opens, Trump supporters claim vindication in a relatively muted reaction. | |
| Oh really? | |
| Like I said, this is written the day before the embassy actually opened by somebody named Nahal Tusi. | |
| And it starts, or it doesn't start, I just highlighted specific paragraphs. | |
| The relatively subdued reaction from the Muslim world, quote, helps confirm that Trump not only did the right thing, but also offered important doses of reality for the peace process, said Michael Makovsky, a Pentagon official in the George W. Bush administration who now leads the Jewish Institute for National Security of America. | |
| Hey. | |
| And then I was like, okay, this is, you know, I'm, I'm reading this, uh, the day that, that, you know, over 50 Palestinians were killed, gunned down by the Israeli defense forces. | |
| And I'm like, this is just really interesting that this article, uh, exists and is, is still up. | |
| And then it goes on to say the next paragraph, but by Monday afternoon, dozens of Palestinians were killed and over a thousand were wounded. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Like 2,700 at least were wounded. | |
| Yeah, it's over a hundred now. | |
| Dead. | |
| on the thousands of protesters trying to breach the fence between the gaza strip and is and israel according to media reports yeah it's over 100 now dead dead yeah uh and then the very next still there's a growing sense that a surge in violence now may not matter that much in the long run hey uh you know fuck it hey the Hey, there's a growing sense that the lives of Palestinians may not matter much in the long run. | |
| Dead. | |
| Yeah, don't cry over spilled milk or blood. | |
| You know, think about it. | |
| Just don't think about it. | |
| The thing is, this is like not wrong, you know, we've already kind of forgotten about it. | |
| The status of Jerusalem, and maybe even the overall status of the Palestinians, no longer galvanizes the Muslim world as it once did, analysts on both sides of the issue say. | |
| So, everything in the article remained the same from Sunday before this shit went down. | |
| I think it was Monday when, or was it Monday or Tuesday? | |
| It might have been Tuesday. | |
| When most of it popped off. | |
| Yeah, so this article was written Monday, and then the only update is, but by Monday afternoon, dozens of Palestinians were killed. | |
| So, it's like wedged in the middle of this article about how this doesn't really matter, and they had to figure out how to make it work, and they did that by saying, still, there's a growing sense that this doesn't really matter. | |
| Damn it, Politico. | |
| Be better, Politico. | |
| Y'all fucked up. | |
| We need you, Politico. | |
| Yeah, we really do. | |
| Okay, so those are our two prestige sections of this episode. | |
| One of the more insulting things about this whole thing is, because this is a very serious thing, but at the same time, they're getting so much credit for, like you said, just moving a plaque. | |
| That's all they're doing. | |
| They're just moving a plaque from one building to another building and moving the computers over. | |
| Truly. | |
| And it's just insulting. | |
| It's just insulting. | |
| That's all it's doing. | |
| Because of the implications. | |
| Yeah. | |
| Because of what it means to a group of people. | |
| And as much as I talk shit on religion, like... | |
| It still means something to a lot of people. | |
| It's a spite house. | |
| Yeah, exactly. | |
| Absolutely. | |
| You have a fucking... USB charger? | |
| Yeah, right over there. | |
| Yeah, so this, I got some, there's a Fox News article that was just, oh man. | |
| So great, posted the day of, and this is like the Facebook version of this post. | |
| The headline, like the headline within the link of the post says, several Palestinian protesters killed ahead of U.S. | |
| Embassy opening in Jerusalem. | |
| And then the caption on the post says, Just in, Gaza's health ministry said Monday 18 Palestinians are dead after a mass protest at the Gaza border amid the opening of the new U.S. embassy to Israel in Jerusalem. | |
| Israel has said it will prevent a border breach at any cost. | |
| And they were not wrong. | |
| Nope. | |
| And I love how it's referred to 18 Palestinians are referred to several states. | |
| So, 18 Palestinians killed are referred to as several. | |
| Yeah, that's like three. | |
| Eighteen's like three. | |
| No, it's the three-fifths rule, but even worse, it's one-sixth. | |
| It's a Palestinian is one-sixth of a person. | |
| In this article. | |
| You know what's crazy? | |
| They're like, like, they are like, either drones or planes, some kind of aircraft, dropping fucking, like, tear gas grenades on these people and killing them. | |
| But you're not mentioning that five minutes before they dropped the tear gas, they dropped the pamphlet that was like, hey, we're gonna drop tear gas, and then they dropped the tear gas. | |
| And also they were, like, praying in the direction of Mecca on the border. | |
| Really good reference to Islam. | |
| So this article that was posted on Fox News Facebook had 5.8 thousand reactions. | |
| The top three of which were like, love, and laugh. | |
| Which is going, which I'm getting stenciled on the wall at my new kitchen. | |
| Oh, tight. | |
| Like, love, laugh. | |
| But the emojis, like on a piece of wood? | |
| Yeah. | |
| You know, just millennial things. | |
| Make that your password for your Wi-Fi so it's easy for us to log right in. | |
| And then, um, top comment on this, not a top comment, one of the top comments, Mark Pellett says, that's what we need to do at A, our southern border, so here we go, tying it back to our immigration policies, and B, exactly what to do with Democratic protesters. | |
| Kill them. | |
| And this had, once again, 196 reactions, which were like, love, laugh. | |
| Dude, that civil war that's gonna happen will suck so much. | |
| Yeah, it's really gonna suck, dude. | |
| It's gonna be such a lame thing. | |
| Because there's no one far enough on the left to really give a shit. | |
| I mean, because... Mark, uh... Poipieter Fioretti, or whatever his name is. | |
| Uh-huh. | |
| This guy wants it. | |
| Yeah, but we need more people like Mike Fieri on our side. | |
| That's true. | |
| We need to bring them over to Flavortown. | |
| Yeah, we need a good spiked-haired boy. | |
| Um, so the, yeah, I mean, it's, it's just, this is like, it's, it's funny, like, killing protesters, killing human beings, it's like, it's funny, it's cool, um, that is, this is a mainstream Fox News post, this isn't Breitbart, this isn't, uh, You know, some fringe alt-right shit. | |
| This is just like boomer conservatism. | |
| Hey, let's kill some Democrats. | |
| It'd be pretty funny, and I'd love it, and I'd like it too. | |
| When's the last time a dead guy immigrated illegally? |