As presumably white skinned, do you feel outraged that racists twits in Sweden and elsewhere outside Ireland base their arguments on the good of the so called white race? Not outrage at them for being racist, but outrage at them for including you in their group who they claim to defend?

Absolutely, I am outraged and diminished by such actions.  My whole Masters thesis in Peace Studies in 1989 was based, inter alia, on the fact that Apartheid in South Africa elicited much greater outrage within Europe in Particular (than say Idi Amin's much greater death toll) because its apologists claimed to be white, western, European and Christian and thus claimed to Justify Apartheid by reference to our values.  For us to accede to that claim would be to accept racism within our societies as well, and thus that claim had to be resisted ferociously by anyone concerned with civil liberties here.

A similar argument can be made about Israel today.  Objectively Israel's depredations in Palestine might be considered to be much lesser than say Pol Pot, Rwanda, or perhaps even Zimbabwe today.  However Israel claims to share our western democratic values, beliefs and structures - claims in effect to be one of us fighting a common cause against Islamic terrorism.  For us to accept that claim would be to accept that bombing of civilian targets and ethnically cleansing those of a different ethnicity/religion from their own lands is ok by us.

I can't believe you wouldn't be outraged by that either even though it doesn't effect you directly.

PS - I have now published my new diary, so perhaps we could continue this discussion there.

notes from no w here