In Defense of Helen Thomas

[California Girl]

I disagree with you calgirl. I feel the last remarks and the anti-semitic view she expressed are indefensible but the career of Helen Thomas for over half a century is still impressive. I don't thijnk Helen Thomas is evil. Hitler was evil. Helen Thomas is no Hitler.

All people who hold views like hers are evil. They represent the worst of us.

 

[Sky Dancer]

I disagree with you calgirl. I feel the last remarks and the anti-semitic view she expressed are indefensible but the career of Helen Thomas for over half a century is still impressive. I don't thijnk Helen Thomas is evil. Hitler was evil. Helen Thomas is no Hitler.

All people who hold views like hers are evil. They represent the worst of us.

I have a higher standard for evil than one anti-semitic remark. Pol Pot, Hitler, Saddam were evil.

 

[Bfgrn]

The point is for sixty seven years she made no such remarks.

You reach the heart of the matter. Helen Thomas has never made any similar remarks. Yet, a Rush Limbaugh can use incendiary language, spread hate and divisiveness every single day, but that is defended as exercising 'free speech' because no 'action' is attached to it.

When you read Thomas' full quotation, it is not clearly bigoted. There is some room for doubt. I am willing you give her that doubt.

What's truly sad, is how quick people are to diminish a person's life work and then easily dismiss, belittle and throw away that human being.


We have all made mistakes. But Dante tells us that divine justice weighs the sins of the cold-blooded and the sins of the warm-hearted on different scales. Better the occasional faults of a party living in the spirit of charity than the consistent omissions of a party frozen in the ice of its own indifference.
President John F. Kennedy

 

[syrenn]

SkyDancer I have a question.

Do you think HT would have gone so far and achieved so much had her personal views had been public record as they are now?

I don't know that Helen Thomas or any journalist would have advanced in her/his career if his personal views were known.

There is a code of ethics in journalism to be objective unless you're writing an editorial. We're living in a time where the boundaries between news and opinion are blurred.

Agreed. Which is why her career is now in question. The awards she received and the positions she gained would most likely never have happened. She would have achieved none of it had her views been known. Lies of omission advanced her career.

Evil? No I dont think she is evil, I think she is incredibly stupid.

 

[midcan5]

Amazing how an established gutsy old lady gets the boot so quickly? Talking heads say the most absurd nonsense day in day out and they remain on radio and TV. Even that idiot Imus is back! Israel is occupying land legally given to the Palestinians. In a moral situation where neither is right how is it we judge. We pick our friends and condemn all others. After all we are just humans and not very perfect ones. I have spoken to a few Israelis and I am amazed at their attitude and hope, it is like talking to a person of peace in the US after 911 created such fear, anyone was fair game. Life is full of the most perplexing paradox.

 

[California Girl]

I disagree with you calgirl. I feel the last remarks and the anti-semitic view she expressed are indefensible but the career of Helen Thomas for over half a century is still impressive. I don't thijnk Helen Thomas is evil. Hitler was evil. Helen Thomas is no Hitler.

All people who hold views like hers are evil. They represent the worst of us.

I have a higher standard for evil than one anti-semitic remark. Pol Pot, Hitler, Saddam were evil.

But it wasn't just one remark, was it. Now that her fellow journalists are coming forward and saying they knew of her rabid anti-semitism before this incident, it is clearly not a one off. Defend the indefensible if you want - I certainly won't. I'll support her right to say it.... I just wish she'd been honest years ago instead of hiding her abhorrent views. I am, however, kind of disappointed in you.

 

[Lonestar_logic]

She has a defense?

 

[Samson]

The point is for sixty seven years she made no such remarks.

If I make no such remarks for the next 30 years, can I get a teary-eyed send-off from George Stephanopolis?

 

[midcan5]

I find it amazing how so many can look into the heart of a person they do not know except from a single comment, and come to such definitive knowledge. You all should tackle a really tough topic and see if the answer is as obvious as this one is. Your special powers are wasted on usmb. Gawd has nothing on you guys.

More info will come forward and just suppose Helen is angry at policies that hurt the Palestinians - is that really such a horror.

Good information below, I often think the Europeans still tell a fair story, we are lost in personal partisanship.


Helen Thomas: good riddance to a garden-variety antisemite | Dan Kennedy | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

"Those of us who consider ourselves to be pro-Israel liberals have plenty to be angry about these days, as Binyamin Netanyahu's government has handed the enemies of Israel a propaganda victory of incalculable value. The liberal Israeli newspaper Haaretz has been a refreshing counterpoint to the timidity of the American media. So have harshly critical pieces by supporters of Israel like Leon Wieseltier, writing in the New Republic, and Christopher Hitchens, in Slate. (Hitchens, you may recall, used to hold rather different views.)"

Israel | World news | guardian.co.uk

U.S.: International probe into Gaza flotilla raid is 'essential' - Haaretz Daily Newspaper | Israel News

 

[Barb]

The part about going back to certain countries may have been unfortunately ill thought, but I wouldn't brand them anti Semitic. Palis are Semitic. She was pissed at the government and should have qualified that.

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

 

[jillian]

The part about going back to certain countries may have been unfortunately ill thought, but I wouldn't brand them anti Semitic. Palis are Semitic. She was pissed at the government and should have qualified that.

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

no...it was not 'unfortunate'... it was as racist and disgusting as if it were directed toward blacks and africa. i think you need to lose the bias and look at the words, perhaps.

 

[WillowTree]

The part about going back to certain countries may have been unfortunately ill thought, but I wouldn't brand them anti Semitic. Palis are Semitic. She was pissed at the government and should have qualified that.

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

Africans enslaved the Jews though.. Remember that little debacle in Egypt 3000 years ago?

 

[Barb]

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

no...it was not 'unfortunate'... it was as racist and disgusting as if it were directed toward blacks and africa. i think you need to lose the bias and look at the words, perhaps.

Its possible you're right about my bias, but mine is towards the Israeli government. I see the context differently, and we come at this from very different perspectives. Peace, Jillian.

 

[Samson]

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

Africans enslaved the Jews though.. Remember that little debacle in Egypt 3000 years ago?

No, 'fraid I wasn't born yet.

 

[Bfgrn]

What an intelligent thing to say. You must be so proud of yourself. Loser.

Why post it publically?

Because I felt like it.

Because she is a haughty little narcissist that craves attention.

 

[HUGGY]

Maybe Thomas did what she did on purpose... Perhaps better to go out with a splash promoting her feelings for her countrymen and women.

She got her precious chair back.....what was left for her to accomplish?

 

[Bfgrn]

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

no...it was not 'unfortunate'... it was as racist and disgusting as if it were directed toward blacks and africa. i think you need to lose the bias and look at the words, perhaps.

I don't think it is clearly racist.

Thomas was asked by a guy who stuck a video camera in her face, for any comments on Israel and she said, "Tell them to get the get the hell out of Palestine. Remember, these people [the Palestinians] are occupied and it's their land. It's not Germany, it's not Poland." She was asked where they should go and she answered, "They should go home, to Poland, Germany and America".

 

[JW Frogen]

Helen was not in Op Ed, she was a reporter who was expected to grill every President without an agenda.

She blurted out her personal agenda

Go into Op Ed Helen.

You are now sitting in a dishonest seat.

 

[California Girl]

allow me to put it in perspective for you....

if you heard someone tell someone black to 'go back to africa', would you think they were racist?

Yes. African American's did not come here and enslave the Europeans though. I'm not saying she was right to say it though, or that it wasn't an unfortunate choice of words.

no...it was not 'unfortunate'... it was as racist and disgusting as if it were directed toward blacks and africa. i think you need to lose the bias and look at the words, perhaps.

I would rep that but I'm out.

How anyone can defend her views is beyond me. It wasn't an 'unfortunate choice of words', it wasn't a one off stupid remark, it was her voicing her real opinion and her real opinion sucks. I just wish she'd come out of the closet years ago.

 

[editec]

These insultfests wreck the discussion about the issue at hand, kids.

What you guys need is a chatroom where you can hurl insults at each other in real time.

What we need is a place where we can discuss the issues without having to wade past this childish nonsense.