Yesterday, we were treated to the news that Hamas had officially violated the ceasefire when they took credit for killing three Israelis in a terrorist attack. However, there is some consternation of both sides as one side blames the other for violating the cease fire. Essentially, this is where this conflict has gotten us. The last couple of months has been a microcosm of the last 75 years since Israel was officially established by the United Nations in 1947. First, let’s take a step back for a second. The vast majority of animal behavior is predictable on some level.

Our cats and dog fight like, um, cats and dogs. One of them gets along with him (the dog) better than the others, but the dog weighs 100 pounds. He wouldn’t really hurt any of them, but they don’t know that. More importantly, they constantly fight with each other. You would think they could join together in common cause against the dog, but they can put aside their differences to do this.

This is where things are at in the Middle East. When you look at what Hamas has done it would appear that it is unprovoked. There were no direct preceding events that led up to their terrorist attack in October. However, there were tons of preceding events. Just like with my cats, there is a reason why one attacks the other. It may look like the victim was just minding their business, but it wasn’t always that way. The aggressor was responding to a time when he or she was the victim. So, even a seemingly isolated event has roots in something.

All human behavior is predictable. Even sociopathy is predictable and understandable once you get a fuller appreciation for it. Our ex-president’s behavior is predictable. Hamas’s behavior is predictable. Israel’s behavior is predictable. We respond based on previous experience and the facts on the ground as we understand them. If our experience is that you can’t be trusted and that you will attack beyond the scope of the current conflict then my response is certain to reflect that. So, here we are.

What is also predictable is our collective response. People that criticize Palestine are called Islamophobic. People that criticize Israel are called anti-Semitic. If you were to somehow criticize both then you would just be the world’s biggest bigot. This is where we are at. We cannot have a frank and honest conversation because those labels are going to be thrown around quicker than it takes you to finish this paragraph.

I fully understand the emotions involved. I feel deeply for the Israeli AND Palestinian people caught in the middle. Having empathy means actually mentally putting yourself in their place. Some have questioned why innocent people would not put themselves in harms way and turn in their neighbors if they knew they were Hamas and what they planned to do. How safe would feel turning in your neighbors? Maybe we could relocate across town in that scenario or in another state. These folks cannot.

On the Israeli side, they know they are the target of the Arab world. Most of the countries around them vacillate between reluctant tolerance and out and out hatred. If we put ourselves in their shoes it would make perfect sense to lash out at those folks to at least demonstrate strength and resolve. Knowledge and wisdom are two different things. Knowledge simply means I know all of this stuff. I’ve studied history enough to know this. Wisdom means I also know I don’t have a solution available. Humility also comes into play here. If they have been going through this since 1947 it makes perfect sense that someone would have suggested simple and obvious solutions before.

Nuance has become one of the four letter words. We might as well skip it and move on with the rest of our lives. However, I’m a wild and crazy guy, so let’s give this a try. We have been told that if we mention anything somewhat bad about Israel that we are anti-Semitic and horrible horrible people. I know this is a risk, but I thought it was well worth the effort. Let’s start with a notion. Hamas is a terrorist organization. Hopefully we can all agree on that. While Hamas is made up of Palestinians and primarily Palestinians, it does not mean that all or even most Palestinians are a part of Hamas or even supportive of their efforts.

The Proud Boys and Klu Klux Klan are American groups, They are made up exclusively of Americans. However, no one in their right mind would argue that all or even most Americans are members or endorse their activities. I know this seems basic, but it should inform our thinking moving forward when dealing with groups like Hamas. So, when I tell you that nearly 6500 Palestinians have died in this conflict, our reaction should not be “well, those sorry bastards had it coming.” That kind of talk is grotesque and serves to exacerbate the problem. The ratio of Palestinians killed to Israelis killed is more than 20 to 1. This is fairly normal historically. Logic would clearly dictate that we should all find that to be somewhat troubling.

Governments have the right to respond disproportiately to threats, but those rights come with responsibilities and consequences. If your response is not proportional you might have some blowback around the globe when other rational actors consider your behavior. We have seen this in Europe as it pertains to Israel. Their opinions of Israel seem to differ from ours. We have long had a blind spot as far as Israel is concerned. They can do no wrong and have an absolute right to “defend themselves” even if that defense goes well beyond the normal bounds of self-defense.

We can say that we understand someone’s actions without approving of them. This is where many of our friends are in the case of Israel. We understand what the Palestinians are thinking and feeling. We understand what the Israelis are thinking and feeling. We understand their actions from a clinical perspective. When people feel threatened they act. Sometimes they act badly.

We can look at what Israeli leadership is doing and keep that separate from what the people are going through. No civilian should ever live in fear. This is a basic human right. We can assert this human right to all places around the world. We may hate the Russians, Chinese, Iranians, and anyone else. Their people deserve basic human rights. Hell, most of the time our hatred for those governments stems from the fact that their people are not afforded those basic rights.

I can feel an affinity to the Israeli people. I can feel that same affinity for the Palestinians as well. No one deserves this. To bomb neighborhoods because someone in Hamas might live there is grotesque and horrific. Killing and threatening civilians is never okay. We absolutely have to say that without equivocation. Some Palestinians have done some very bad things. They should be punished as any other aggressor should. Some are minding their own business and trying to live their lives peaceably. If we are going to say they all deserve it because a few of them killed Israelis then that is the bigotry. If we don’t question Israel and their constant need to meter out extreme justice then we are guilty of the same bigotry that the pro-Israel crowd is accusing rational and sane people of containing.

There are moments when I simply have to put a story down and come back to it at another time. It seems in the estimation of our illustrious governor that I and my colleagues are regularly committing crimes against humanity. At least that was the implication of his latest letter.

I have to suspend disbelief for a moment and dedicate mental bandwidth to something that doesn’t deserve it. Essentially, the thought process is that children do not have the mental capacity to determine that they want to become a boy or girl. Therefore, a parent has to consent to any procedures that they may have.

If we further suspend disbelief we would have to come out and say what all of this means. It means that being transgender is a crime. So, what the governor expects us to do is to call Child Protective Services and tell them about the transgender students in our school.

This includes students that have nearly completed their transition and students in the beginning of the transitioning process. It assumes a world view where kids (or parents) wake up one day and just think, “I’d like to be a girl today.” Maybe dad was tired of watching John come in seventh at his track meet every week, so we’ll make John Jennifer and she will win the blue ribbons we’ve been expecting.

It ignores the truth about the transgender experience. It trivializes the transgender experience. I wouldn’t even begin to speak for anyone on this regard, but I can’t imagine it would be easy. It certainly isn’t something you dream up on a Tuesday and then go have the surgery on Thursday. It’s a difficult and painful process.

You spend more than ten years developing an identity of your child in your own mind and experience. You see them as a boy or girl. That identity comes with certain assumed experiences and they tell you they don’t see themselves the way you see them. It ignores the grief that must come when a parent comes to grips with the fact that their child needs to go through this transition to be happy. Your conception of them must die and rise up out of the ashes as something different.

So, what the governor and his cronies want us to do is to tell a government agency that what they’ve just done is a crime. We are supposed to report that student because their parents obviously don’t know what’s best for their child. We are calling another human being a crime. In case that didn’t sink in, it needs to be repeated. We are calling another human being a crime.

I hope I don’t have to spell this out, but I’m not doing that. Even if I for one second believed that being transgender was wrong or even somehow a sin against God, I wouldn’t dream of telling a kid that. Doing so would be absolutely cruel and would be antithetical to everything we should be about as human beings.

Of course, when we stop suspending disbelief we start to understand what this is really about. It’s about scoring cheap political points with a base that doesn’t need it. They don’t need their ego massaged. They don’t need to feel better about their bigotry. These kids deserve the love, respect, and kindness that Abbott is showing to his base. I’m sorry that they feel uncomfortable with the idea of transgender people. I don’t say this lightly, but they can go to hell if they think I’m about rat out a transgender kid just to make them feel better.

The irony of Conservatives complaining about “cancel culture” and “attacks on free speech” is thick.  They have been banning things other Americans do for decades – everything from being able to access healthcare to banning certain imagery from public grounds while promoting images of white supremacists, Bible verses, and crosses the size of sky scrapers. Ignoring all that, the inventors of bans and boycotts are now offended at measures to stop systemic GOP racism, racist dog whistles, brazen voter suppression, and just outright lying and are passing all kinds of laws outlawing everything from voter registration efforts to protesting police brutality.

So, the next time you are in a conversation with a conservative and they complain about “cancel culture” ask them if they agree with the 28 year ban on YOGA in Alabama schools.  That’s right, folks, since 1993, yoga and meditation have been banned in Alabama schools because The Hindu might rub off on students while exercising.  The effort to lift that ban has been tried the last legislative session and gained traction this session until it was killed by religious conservatives scaredy cat bigots in the Senate judiciary committee.  The blocked bill had even prohibited using the word “namaste” and forbade chanting and mantras, and required all yoga poses be named in English, but that wasn’t good enough.  In testimony, Christian activist religious zealot Becky Gerritson said, “Yoga is a very big part of the Hindu religion.  If this bill passes, then instructors will be able to come into classrooms as young as kindergarten and bring these children through guided imagery, which is a spiritual exercise, and it’s outside their parents’ view. And we just believe that this is not appropriate.”  Hilariously, representatives of Roy Moore’s Foundation for Moral Law, claimed yoga would lead to proselytizing in public schools by followers of Hinduism.  Recall that the weirdo and failed US Senate candidate likes little girls and was banned from the local shopping mall for harassing them.  Connecting the name Roy Moore with the word “moral” can cause whiplash in normal people.

So, when you get “Cancel Culture” from a conservative, just reply “Yoga ban.”  They’ll have no idea what you’re talking about, so you’ll enjoy explaining it to them.

You remember the story about the uncivil fellow who paid for the billboard on I-40 in the Panhandle telling “liberals” to keep driving and leave the state…Well, said billboard has been papered over after a nationwide brouhaha that arose after the photo went viral.  (We’ll take at least partial credit for our participation in that activity.)  Here’s what it looked like:

Here’s what it looks like now:

In response to the hateful billboard, a GoFundMe appeal raised over $4,000 to establish this billboard that’s gone up on I-40 in Amarillo.

That’s more like it.

Y’all have been wrong all along. Trump IS a uniter. He’s united the entire NFL and NBA against his hate a bigotry.

Boom.

Baltimore Ravens players, including former player Ray Lewis, second from right, kneel down during the playing of the U.S. national anthem before an NFL football game against the Jacksonville Jaguars at Wembley Stadium in London, Sunday Sept. 24, 2017. (AP Photo/Matt Dunham)