context: the debatejak-fan high school friend I’ve complained about before, I’m pressing him on his debate daddy’s claim that nuking the Gaza Strip and annihilating the entire population of it would not be an act of genocide

He tries to say it depends on the context, and I’m like, ‘elaborate’ interviewer

Here is the hypothetical scenario in which an Israeli nuke is launched into the Gaza Strip, killing everybody in it, where purportedly no one is guilty of genocide. I am going to try my best to quote this conversation as close to how it played out as I can.

Let’s say, a rogue IDF soldier sees one Hamas guy in the Gaza Strip, and he launches a nuke to deal with him.

That would still be genocide, dude, the rogue IDF soldier would have committed an act of genocide.

It wouldn’t, because–

What do you mean it wouldn’t?

Because he’s using the nuke without the special intent to kill everyone in the Gaza Strip, he’s using it to get the Hamas guy-

No, wait, when you’re launching a– if you unleash a WMD the results of the action is a responsibility you take on and can be assigned to your– unless a fucking breeze literally takes your nuke and puts it somewhere else, it’s– you assume responsibility for the consequences of your actions, especially if you can comprehend them, which I’m not even going to consider people not knowing what nukes do to be valid.

But it wouldn’t be genocide! He doesn’t have the special intent.

How the fuck did this rogue soldier get the nuclear codes anyways strangelove-wow

  • edge [he/him]
    ·
    9 months ago

    Intent is definitely important in determining genocide, but acting like someone would launch a nuke with the intent to just kill one person is insane. The effects and radius of nukes are well known, it would obviously kill more than just the one guy and the person who launched it would know that. How can he not hear how insane that sounds?

    • ToxicDivinity [comrade/them]
      ·
      9 months ago

      Because he started out with the assumption that the actions of Israel must be defended, then he started coming up with an argument and this is the best he could do. People like this don't learn things or come to realizations, if the argument they're making falls apart they will just start looking for another argument that defends the same point and if they can't come up with another one they'll just assume that someone smarter than them must have a good reason even if they can't point to any evidence for that

    • JohnBrownNote [comrade/them, des/pair]
      ·
      9 months ago

      but acting like someone would launch a nuke with the intent to just kill one person is insane.

      OP's friend's concept of nukes coming from fallout 3