182 Comments
User's avatar
Susan T's avatar

I have to keep listening to music and looking at beautiful art to keep wanting to save myself. I have to keep looking at the squirrels and listening to the birds sing. And I have to be around other people who do not accept this brutality as normal.

Expand full comment
John Turcot's avatar

Susan, about squirrels..... When I was a teenager and shot squirrels , pinning their tail on my bedroom wall, one particular squirrel which had eluded me rang out with a staccato-like screeching stated to all present forest creatures that the human was leaving, and as I did so added '"You should be ashamed to be a human".

Expand full comment
Susan T's avatar

I would never kill a squirrel and my dog does not chase them. I am hoping a squirrel may someday decide to chase my dog.

Expand full comment
Too much work's avatar

A deer kissed my dog once; is that friendly wildlife or not?

Expand full comment
John Turcot's avatar

I did kill squirrels...I was developing my hunting skills.. Never for a moment did I think that squirrels would disapprove.... except for one....

Expand full comment
gypsy33's avatar

Hunting innocent squirrels for TARGET PRACTICE is shameful.

Expand full comment
John Turcot's avatar

Gypsy,

"Shameful", also idiotic, cruel, imbecilic, thoughtless and barbaric..., and utterly stupid. Couldn't agree with you more.....

Expand full comment
gypsy33's avatar

John It does my heart good that you’ve changed your ways! 🙂

Expand full comment
Gnuneo's avatar

Yes. <3

Expand full comment
Marianna Chambless's avatar

One reason I like your articles so much is because you frequently comment on how our actions can corrupt our souls. To speak that way doesn't necessarily imply a belief in an actual soul or in a divine being who created us all, but it is a way of addressing what evil does to us psychologically as well as physically - I am reminded of The Picture of Dorian Gray; you cannot commit sins without a mark being left, if only a numbing in the sensitivity you feel toward injustice and cruelty. Thank you for the person you are, you do help the rest of us.

Expand full comment
DLehman's avatar

Well said, Caitlin. I see this as a graduation from Nazism. At least that crowd resorted to hiding their barbaric acts. The Zionists and their enablers and cheerleaders are bragging about this. Even if Hamas is as horrendous as they believe them to be, what conscience justifies the sadistic murder of so many innocent women and children?! They have lost whatever moral ground they spent their billion-dollar PR machine building..

Expand full comment
Sera's avatar

That’s a very interesting point also because the Nazis were couching their murders in semi-legitimate warfare. Dropping 2000 lb. bombs on children in tents is not war; shooting unarmed civil activists, (see: 2018 march of return), is not war. And the Nazi death camps, as you say, were concealed.

My approach is to treat conversations with Zionists as I would with KKK members: I reject every tenet of your position, and refuse to accept any logical argument which attempts to defend the indefensible.

Expand full comment
Chang Chokaski's avatar

I perceive what Israel and the Zionists are doing to be worse than what the Nazis did (maybe I'm biased since I was not alive during the Holocaust and did not see it being live-streamed).

One difference between the Nazi Holocaust and the Holocaust occuring in Gaza is that there were many countries allied together and fighting against Nazi Germany in a war. In the Gaza and Palestine context, I see no such opposing force/countries (other than Ansar-Allah and Hezbollah (both small entities)) fighting against Israel. Instead, we see the opposite. We see the Allies of Evil (US, Canada, UK, Australia, Europe, maybe others) supporting Israel instead of opposing it. This fact alone makes it much worse than the Nazi Holocaust (IMO).

Expand full comment
Susan T's avatar

Actually, before the Nazis killed all those people, there was not much support at all for the Jews or other groups that were being threatened. Nobody saw the Holocaust being live streamed. That possibility did not exist. Canada and the US and other countries would not allow Jews trying to flee the hatred into their countries. The holocaust was a horrible time in history. One of the really ugly things about what Israel is doing right now is that they are using that holocaust as an excuse for their genocide. It is not worse, but it is equally horrible and additionally difficult to swallow because it is being done by the descendants of holocaust survivors. It is insulting and belittling to people who had friends and family that died during the Nazi holocaust. It was not only Jews who were murdered by the Nazis. The Jews were the main focus of the Nazis but they were not the only recipients of Nazi hatred.

Expand full comment
Chang Chokaski's avatar

Susan T, nothing you said above are things I do not already know.

>>"It is not worse, but it is equally horrible..."

It may be equally horrible to you, but it is worse according to me. To argue on that point is moot since we have different interpretations and perceptions of history and ways of anaylzing information, not to mention different morals and values and the weights given to them to arrive at any definitive right/wrong opinion.

So what is the point of your comment anyway? To say that you are right and I am wrong on a subjective matter with different basis for interpretation? Or to say that according to you it was equally horrible, while according to others the present Genocide is worse?

Expand full comment
Susan T's avatar

I had not intended to argue with you. You said "there were many countries allied together and fighting against Nazi Germany in a war" which suggested to me that you thought everyone was on the side of the people the Nazis were oppressing and killing.

Expand full comment
Chang Chokaski's avatar

No, WW2 was not about rescueing Jews (or homosexuals or romas or socialists or communists, or disabled people). It was about colonization and capitalism. Germany intended to colonize Europe just as many European countries had/were colonizing Africa, Asia, etc. It was imperialism. And as Lenin's book title suggests - "Imperialism is the highest stage of Capitalism". There were other factors too (like Germany's humiliation following WW1, hyperinflation, fascism in Europe & Japan, etc.)

And yes, my statement "there were many countries allied together and fighting against Nazi Germany in a war" still holds true.

Expand full comment
gypsy33's avatar

Hi Chang

Hezbollah is proving itself to far more than a small entity. Please see Richard Medhurst’s recent videos.

BOOM.

Expand full comment
Contrarian 33's avatar

Yes, Australia particularly. Now nothing but a compliant US / Israeli puppet where one party is the same as the other, both chanting "Israel has a right to defend itself", ad nauseam, now something of a pathetic statement from a sadistic Israeli state, a fact that is also often echoed in so many countries, particularly those mentioned above by Chang.

Expand full comment
Deltawhiskylima's avatar

I'm sorry, but this may be the absolute, most asinine comment I've ever read on the internet.

Expand full comment
Chang Chokaski's avatar

Not only have you not explained your reasoning, but your wording indicates an emotional response rather than a meaninful one. Your comment also indicates arrogance on your part by assuming that you are at a level of being able to judge an asinine comment when encountering one. Keep working on your skills - hopefully you will get there one day.

Expand full comment
Deltawhiskylima's avatar

It was an opinion I offered, and your right, there was a certain amount of emotion. In particular a great deal of incredulity that you could come to the conclusion you came to was appalling in it's own right, but you, justified in part, your conclusions as being based on the fact you weren't alive to bear witness to the holocaust. That point alone, that by itself, was enough to call your comment an absolute asinine statement.

Expand full comment
Chang Chokaski's avatar

You still haven't justified your "asinine" comment. I'm waiting to hear some logic, rationality, or anything that supports your statement/opinion. Or maybe you are facing a comprehension issue with the phrasing and logic of my comment?

Expand full comment
Jeff Syrop's avatar

I don't think you should be so quick to judge. If Jeffrey Dahmer's brother Donny only tortured and ate the body parts of 4 boys, while Jeffrey did that to 17 boys, would it be wrong to say their crimes are comparable?

Expand full comment
Deltawhiskylima's avatar

Okay, I'll play along.

No, but that's a 4:1 differential v. 6M:35K for one. We've got a long ways to go (roughly another 1.47M Palestinians)before we even get close to your proposed equivalency ratio, hence one of the reasons why the comment is so asinine.

Expand full comment
gypsy33's avatar

Too much whiskey, Delta?

Expand full comment
Jeff Syrop's avatar

You think the NUMBER makes a crime worse. THAT might be the asinine view. Is a small holocaust somehow worse than a big one? I'm not sure. Definitely about the same for the holocaust-ees. Hitler was Jeffrey Dahmer and Biden is his twin brother. Which is the better man?

Expand full comment
Boris Petrov's avatar

Gaza genocide is — US genocide of Palestinians.

Expand full comment
Lidija P Nagulov's avatar

So true. I have been thinking this for a while but it also felt weird to verbalize because it felt like an odd recentering. LIke 'doing something to save Gaza is going to benefit you because you're actually fighting to save your own soul' feels extremely true but also sort of weirdly self-serving, like I'm trying to say you should only help others because you realize it helps you too..... But at the core of it is this return to the idea that people need each other. And that we have made a world that tries to pretend that people don't need each other, that we have no responsibility to each other, that we should not care about the suffering of others as long as it is othered, we should all just sit in our little individual pods until they're ready to come for us too and by then, as the famous poem states, it will be too late.

Expand full comment
Peter Shepherd's avatar

Well said Lidija, I think a lot of us have gone through the same thoughts.

Expand full comment
Lidija P Nagulov's avatar

It's such a weird and paradoxical situation. I think also a lot of people who are purposely avoiding following the situation 'to protect their inner peace' and in the name of their 'self care and wellness' are on some level directly harming themselves.... Because you can't just successfully ignore something like this and talk yourself into believing things are fine, it just deepens that empty hole we already all have in our lives where purpose and human connection used to be. Like I have a bunch of friends who are in that mode and none of them seem any less anxious and stressed about life. This idea that you can just put a wall around yourself and ignore the terrible thing happening on the other side of an arbitrary line you made up is kind of the epitome of today's western society. Just like the billionaires think they can survive the apocalypse if they build fancy enough bunkers.

Expand full comment
bill wolfe's avatar

Gaza is the trial balloon, what's to come as billions of migrants flee climate chaos, deadly heat, droughts, floods, sea level rise, super storms, famines wars, and economic collapse.

Leonard Cohen wrote "I've seen the future - it is murder" in 1992

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LYzPVKg3wyo

I suspect that Aaron Bushnell saw the game plan for that.

Expand full comment
Jeff Syrop's avatar

Really good point, connecting Gaza to practice for dealing with the coming surge of perhaps a billion migrants. And what an awesome song by Leonard Cohen. I'd never heard it. Good job pointing out that he wrote it in 1992. Putin has killed 200+ children in Ukraine, while the Clinton administration admitted to killing 500,000 children in Iraq with his "sanctions". Like "Sam" says in a comment above, "...it's been lost for a long time, way before the current horrors occurring in Gaza. .... [T]he waves are bigger than ever and I fear it won't be long until they drown us all."

Expand full comment
Jody's avatar

Those fully encased in Zionism are oblivious to the destructiveness of their juggernaut and how much oppression and anger and resentment and pain and fear and death it’s caused worldwide. They’re committed to the rightness of their cause and will be utterly devastated when reality finally strikes them. And it will.

Expand full comment
jamenta's avatar

I sincerely hope it will. That these sadists will be held accountable for their unspeakable acts against all our humanity. :(

Expand full comment
gypsy33's avatar

Well said Jody!

Expand full comment
Christopher Kruger's avatar

Please don't hate me if I push back a bit.

TEN TIMES as many people have died, and will die in, Ukraine.

Same Blinken, Sullivan, Biden, Nuland, Lindsey Graham, the whole Neocon crew.

NO ONE GAF, or at least nowhere near as many, until October 7th.

So, the media and we as the media's lemmings undervalue Ukrainian and Russian lives.

By the way, Ukraine is pulling the West towards WWIII with a lot more gravity than Israel-Palestine, as Russia has 6000 warheads.

(Fun fact: Pakistan is the only Muslim country with nuclear weapons.)

I think the main cause is that you have to search a bit to see the horrors in Ukraine; you have to go to Russian or other international platforms. Ukraine is so bad it's running out of soldiers.

The Israel-Palestine conflict is fetishized when compared with other conflicts.

Being anti-war is about consistency. When MTG and her crew were railing against the Ukraine War, CODEPINK, with the exception of Medea Benjamin, didn't say sh*t. Medea to had write a book and do a book tour, explaining why war is bad to dumbass TDS liberals who believed in Russiagate.

I of course don't disagree with anything you are saying, I'm throwing some context out there.

Expand full comment
Dr.Who's avatar

I don’t like to use the word “pushback” because it implies disagreement. I agree with everything you’ve said about Ukr - it is the neocon road to WWIII. We are arming the fascists running the Ukr theater like we are the Zionists in the Middle East. My question to you is, how many children have been murdered in Ukr over the 2+ years of that misadventure? If we let them normalize the slaughter of the most vulnerable, most innocent among us, those we would give our lives to protect, then ALL IS LOST. Saving Gaza is about saving the soul of humanity.

Expand full comment
Jeff Syrop's avatar

Putin has killed 600+ Ukrainian children in 2 years.

Bidenyahu have killed 14,000+ children in 8 months.

Facts.

Expand full comment
Chang Chokaski's avatar

>>"Saving Gaza is about saving the soul of humanity."

Well said Dr.Who! I couldn't agree with you more. People need to rationally AND emotionally understand this one single statement deep down in their bones!

Expand full comment
Christopher Kruger's avatar

My main source for Ukraine is the Duran. I know alot of children are orphaned, then some are adopted, some exploited, it is terrible even in peacetime.

Expand full comment
martin's avatar

fully aware and fully ashamed here. palestine's got more in-your-faceness though. they did a much better job shutting down sputnik and rt, telegram's not as hot as tik-tok. the killing (slavs killing slavs) and mayhem is more slow grinding and (thanks to western weapon-'support') it looks more like a 'war'. but when you start to count all the ukrainian flags on the cemeteries...

Expand full comment
Christopher Kruger's avatar

I heard they are burying Ukrainians soldiers stacked 3 deep, so as not to fill up the cemeteries so fast.

Expand full comment
martin's avatar

they cleared russian ww2 cemeteries to make room (and stick it to the russians). jaw-dropping revisionism one can point to if people cry anti-semitism-holocaust, which is totally reduced to pearl-clutching by what they tolerate in ukraine.

Expand full comment
Christopher Kruger's avatar

The other kinda nuanced thing is that there are thousands of former Russian and Ukrainian citizens in Israel, some of whom sympathize with ethnic Russians in the Dunbas, such that Israel is trying not to take sides; Naftali Bennett tried to negotiate peace early in the conflict and Zelensky received a lukewarm reception when he addressed the Knesset. I am not recalling whether Israel sent aid to Ukraine or not...

Expand full comment
martin's avatar

i've heard some 30% of israel's immigrants come from eastern europe. recently i saw a tiktok checking on the roots of several famous leaders of israel. quite some polish (bibi, peres), ukrainian (golda meir, dayan), russian (sharon), baltic (barak) and other eastern european (rabin) roots. this might explain some of russian duplicity on the issue, allthough they kinda recognized the palestinian state back in 1988. but recently even putin could no longer avoid not calling it a war, but the complete destruction of a society and a people (diplomatic definition of genocide).

Expand full comment
Dr.Who's avatar

Afaik Israel has not sent military “aid” to Ukr, but that would be like saying…Connecticut hasn’t sent any either.

Expand full comment
Christopher Kruger's avatar

Nice to meet you Afiak. Is that name like African or Asian or something?

Expand full comment
John Turcot's avatar

Some Letters to the Editor... Saturday local paper ---- 'Money for Park should go to clean water' ---- 'Bicycle safety for kids' ------- 'Restaurants should consider induction cooking' ------ Going Green makes captives of Big Battery' ------

Not one mention of War, Gaza, Ukraine.... Israel, Russia..... NASA. In fact, go back 30 days.... no mention of anything related to the above.... NADA.... NADA NADA NADA....

Expand full comment
Johann Goergen's avatar

The rogue US Empire's CEO is a demented Mafia Don, the Europeans are hapless vassals, Australia and New Zealand no better. Those that speak truth like Assange and Snowden sidelined and tortured in plain sight, PLUS an outright genocide committed by the barbaric West on women and children with the Yemeni Houthis firing misiles on a US aircraft carrier in defense of Gaza, these are unprecedented times. Did I mention the proxy war in Ukr that so far cost 500k+ lives, and that may turn nuclear once the slave owners in the West realize they are losing on the battlefield?

Expand full comment
jamenta's avatar

A demented Mafia Don that literally just shit in his pants during an official ceremony at Normandy on the D-Day anniversary. The leader of the free-world ... can't even control his own bowels. :( And this is the guy with the finger on the button.

Expand full comment
Johann Goergen's avatar

On paper, the US is a Democracy, Congress is the Legislative and the idiotic elderly Supremes the Judiciary branch. On paper, these are independent branches of the Shining Beacon on the Hill (aka the fascist) US Government. Also, on paper, the Commander in Chief (our demented Mafia Don) is in charge of the US strategic nukes, has his finger on the button. All of the above are fiction, but sound good and are sold as the truth to those uninformed or naive enough to believe this fantasy. I do not think that those really in charge would let clowns like Obama, Clinton, Reagan, Bush, Trump, and now cleary demented Biden to make any decisions of consequence. Would you?

Expand full comment
jamenta's avatar

I'd like to think so. But do you really know? Suppose those behind the curtain want to push the button themselves? The NeoCon lunatics. Will Genocide Joe stop them?

Expand full comment
Ellen In NC's avatar

Yes it’s larger than Gaza. It’s about liberation from all forms of oppression.

Expand full comment
Jeff Syrop's avatar

Every line perfect.

Expand full comment
Erwin Cuellar's avatar

I just can't believe others, my friends included, aren't saving themselves. How could they not even comment or acknowledge the situation. It's broken my heart and distanced myself from many.

Expand full comment
Jeff Syrop's avatar

That's the problem I'm having. Talking politics with friends I used to consider progressive is like talking to a baby who can only say googoo gaga. They are still in the old paradigm. I had what I thought was a wonderful, intelligent conversation with my 89-year-old aunt, and then the next words that came out of her mouth, were, "I love Joe Biden."

Seeing intelligent progressives such as Bernie and AOC wave the flag for our Ukraine proxy war truly broke my heart. It FEELS broken. A scientist friend of mine who has ALWAYS been right on, who has led anti nuke rallies at Lawrence Livermore Labs and spoke at them, put the Ukraine flag as his Facebook background picture! WTF? Suddenly he's trusting basically the same Nazis who did Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, Yemen, etc. to be HELPING Ukraine -- even though the math says that we are using them for cannon fodder and they can never win.

It's pushing me near despair. I was near broken yesterday and walking down the street listening to Tim Foley reading a recent Caitlin post, and right when the pain in my heart became unbearable, I got on a swing in a little park I was walking by and started swinging. It was a beautiful day. I got to this part, 1 minute long, which I clipped from the podcast to share. It truly helped. Caitlin is an angel.

http://www.zenhell.com/sounds/online_comments/Caitlin_is_our_friend_we_are_not_crazy_meta.m4a

Expand full comment
Diane Engelhardt's avatar

You are so right, Caitlin! Gaza is the ultimate test of our humanity and our right to exist on this beautiful planet! https://dianeengelhardt.substack.com/p/salvation

Expand full comment
Lew A (Lincoln) Welge's avatar

Reading Caitlin’s typically brilliant peroration has me now reconsidering my thoughts and feelings about the heretofore dismissed concept of earthly salvationism. Ty.

Expand full comment
Howard Pearce - Libertarian's avatar

You want to save yourself ?

heed the warning from Tears and Fears

"Acting on your best behavior

TURN YOUR BACK ON MOTHER NATURE

Everybody wants (the state) to rule the world"

Expand full comment
Deltawhiskylima's avatar

Tears for Fears

Expand full comment