PRO-PALESTINE NYU LAW STUDENT SPEAKS OUT AFTER JOB OFFER WAS RESCINDED
PRO-PALESTINE NYU LAW STUDENT SPEAKS OUT AFTER JOB OFFER WAS RESCINDED
With tensions exploding on campuses across the country over Israel's war against Gaza, NYU Law student Ryna Workman lost their job offer.
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Cool .freedom and democracy. As long as you don't oppose Israel. Then its all hands on deck to fuck you up and still you are treated as a criminal but hey, it's a free world unlike some countries who discriminate against women and lgbtq
Read the text they wrote in the newsletter (I've posted is in this thread) and make up your own mind. Bear in mind this was not sent as private email expressing her views; they wrote it for (and published it in) the weekly Student Bar Association newsletter and signed it as SBA President.
I doubt the NYU Law Student Bar Association is a political organisation.
It is what was actually written and the context that matters in this story, both of which are largely missing from the theintercept.com coverage. The reaction was for them to lose their position as SBA President and have a job offer rescinded.
EDIT: To be clear I don't see how freedom or democracy has been curtailed here. People are free to say and do what they want, but actions have consequences. The SBA membership is entitled to remove their student president and the law firm is entitled to rescind a job offer.
Seems like a clear case of freedom of expression, not freedom of consequences to me.
Everyone knows that true freedom is when law firms are forced to hire you /s
I don't believe this student has been prosecuted and imprisoned.
No one has the right to work at a particular Big Law firm, and if they don't have the awareness to know that publicly blaming a country for its own citizens being murdered isn't exactly a good look, I can't say I really blame the law firm for not wanting this student around.
Not working biglaw may be dodging a bullet anyways
You're not wrong haha, but repaying those loans just got much much harder.
Basic ethics and professionalism aside, just from a pragmatic perspective, I can't imagine what would possibly make some think it's a good idea to express support for a thousand dead Jews as a wannabe lawyer in god damn New York City.
Like, an NYC law firm is just about the highest concentration of Jews you can find outside of Israel.
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Want to review your victim blaming ?
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Yes, countries like Palestine in which women are second class and lgbt people are treated with violence
Cool. So how is this any different? What moral supremacy does supporting this hounding someone for something they wrote or supports any different from Palestine as you say which discriminates against women?
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Uh... Hospital bombing is not a war crime so no repercussions, right?
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What do you think happened to babies in that hospital?
There's no justification for killing civilians. Both Hamas and the IDF need to be destroyed
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I was going to say that there's a difference between opposing Israel and supporting a massacre. But if what the article say is true, the guy never outright supported Hamas' actions. It looks like the worst you can accuse him of is to sweep it under the rug by not mentioning it.
In the current climate and context, it is an absolute shitbag move on his part for doing that. If you're going to condemn one side doing atrocities, you have to condemn the other as well in order to not be a shitbag in my book.
I would generally think that this should still not be sufficient cause to fire an employee in general (or rescind an offer), unless your reputation and political alignement is inherent to your job function.
I don't know enough about how the law firms work to know for sure if this is the case here. But I've seen many stories of law firms letting go of low level lawyers due to them failing to maintain a certain level or reputation. Either way it's not specific to Israel.
I was going to say that there's a difference between opposing Israel and supporting a massacre. But if what the article say is true, the guy never outright supported Hamas' actions. It looks like the worst you can accuse him of is to sweep it under the rug by not mentioning it.
Here's what the Student Bar Association's (former) President wrote:
Israel bears full responsibility for this tremendous loss of life. This regime of state-sanctioned violence created the conditions that made resistance necessary. I will not condemn Palestinian resistance.
But if what the article say is true, the guy never outright supported Hamas’ actions. It looks like the worst you can accuse him of is to sweep it under the rug by not mentioning it.
It's worse than that. He said all of the bloodshed was Israel's fault, and went on to issue several apt condemnations of Israel. He very pointedly did not condemn Hamas for the attack.
He blamed the context of how we got to the murders instead of the actual murderers. It was never swept under the rug.
Why? Why should this person have said something about both sides?
In a court of law, when an attorney goes to plead their case, do they have to plead their case or both sides equally?
What about their opponents? Does netanyahu or bush or any pro Israel supporter who condemns only hamas for "massacre" also say that Israel commits war crimes by doing collective punishment or by using white phosphorus or killing thousands of babies in the last week alone ?
Why should a job offer be affected by your persnla views unless you say you only hire people who have shared values and only those shared values ? Isn't.... That ... discrimination?
Why? Why should this person have said something about both sides?
Bobby punches Danny
Danny punches Bobby in response
Teacher scolds Danny in front of entire class
Danny visibly upset
Can you really not understand why failing to address both sides of a conflict might be seen as problematic to an outside observer, and as a personal attack by one group or another?
Note: I'm not assigning first cause blame to one party or another in the Israel-Gaza case, just to be clear.
Why should a job offer be affected by your persnla views unless you say you only hire people who have shared values and only those shared values ? Isn’t… That … discrimination?
A law firm has a right to refuse to hire an actual neo-Nazi, too. They can associate with or disassociate with anyone they want. You're torturing the definition of "discrimination" to the point where it's lost all utility in this conversation.
You are running in circles. I am saying why isn't pro Israel lobby saying something about the POV of Palestine ? Why does it have to be only pro Palestine people who have to recognize the other side?
No, you quite literally said: "Why? Why should this person have said something about both sides?"
I'm not engaging your whataboutism. I'm specifically responding to the exact words you used. This person should have been more sensitive to the broader context than they were, as the president of the university's Student Bar Association and a person with a considerable audience. In the event of a violent conflict it's poor taste to come out and lambast the actions of one party but sidestep or ignore the actions of the other.
I didn't say anything about any "lobby", or the fact that one person should be instructed to do something and the other given a pass.
Go back and read my comment again, because you clearly didn't get it the first time.
Why should a job offer be affected by your persnla views unless you say you only hire people who have shared values and only those shared values ? Isn’t… That … discrimination?
Only if you're a fucking idiot.
Why? Why should this person have said something about both sides?
Because failing to acknowledge the major differing and valid viewpoints in a complex situation contributes to echo chambers and radicalization which can ultimately lead to or contribute to political disfunction, civil war, war and deaths.
Because of the several layers of indirections I think it's completely unreasonable to expect people to live up to the expectation of acknowledging differing valid viewpoints, but people who fail to do so are still engaging in shitbaggery, in my opinion, because they contribute to the deterioration of the political discourse which can have catastrophic consequences.
As I said I generally think that engaging in shitbaggery in political discourse shouldn't harm your job /career. Unless your job relies heavily on your reputation, which lawfirms seem to weirdly believe is the case for lawyers. I personally don't get it, a lawyer's argument should always be just as a valid regardless of which lawyer makes the argument, but I know very little about law practice.
This reads like a chatgpt response.
This reads like a middle schooler's response.