Admittedly, I would have jumped on the bandwagon for his banning when I had
my first RK experience.
RK has called me a few choice things in the past, but I been discovering
that RK is an essential part of the Wiki community since his edit wars
consistently yield the kind of synthesis that we want: quality, neutrality,
and a unique perspective that highlights what Wiki can offer that other
sourcebooks cannot.
We should disregard the mountain of grievances we have against him, and
accept him as an eloquent, forceful representative of a significant share of
hard-liners on the pro-Israel side, although I would certainly favor banning
if there were no counterweight. Since these are mass-based struggles, there
might be a substantive benefit to allowing partisans to engage in struggle
and yield syntheses, in that we might be better able to deal with the role
of public opinion, and political mobilization.
Actually, Ive been noticing that Wikipedias have been doing a better job
of conveying how the two sides see this conflict than the academic
literature and media articles (Reuters, NY Times, BBC, AP usually) that I
usually read.
All academic journals, sourcebooks, and media outlets have their strengths
and weaknesses when weighed against each other. And Wiki offers a unique
perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian dispute made possible by the dynamics
of RK and his enemies. Nothing else available online is going to be
synthesis of material written by- and also edited by - such a diverse group
of perspectives (the online medium makes it possible there might be
violence if this group were in the same room!). The articles convey all
facets of reality, being products themselves of an actually
Israeli-Palestinian proxy battle.
As a disclaimer, as the son of Holocaust survivors Ill state my solidarity
with RKs passions for a strong, secure state of Israel. However, my views
on his conception of Arab culture are closer to the late Edward Said than
Daniel Pipes. As a historian, I find myself cringing, and often gasping with
disbelief, when reading RKs tracts on the Palestinians, Arabs, or Islam.
Perhaps I can relate to RKs mentality better than most, but Ive wedded a
strong rebuke of RKs paranoia, obnoxiousness, and bully tactics to a
defense of the end result.
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