On Tue, 5 Feb 2002, Gabor Varnai wrote:
> OK, but please take into account that there are no databases which are
> not utilized as strategic, intelligence and military sources whomever
> finances it. And if you want, protest against this fact. Afterwards you
> can make a peace prophecy.
Any data base can be used (for welfare) or abused (surveillance) and may
threat privacy by the state and its agencies. If Mr. Varnai wants to
suggest a motion hat we the sociologists cease to collaborate with any
process of official data collection - this is a point for separate
discussion.
But here we facing a completely other issue. The issue is that since the
Sharon's government raised to power in Israel, the Israeli military are
used to dismantle systematically every Palestinian institution in order to
regain the control over all the territory of the Land of Israel/Palestine.
So, sociologists as sociologists have three options:
1.To raise professional voice against a small fragment of this policy,
directly connected to our profession.
2. To take position as human beings against this (immoral, in my own
view) policy.
3. To ignore the whole issue for various reasons.
I'll opt to the first option as sociologist and for the second as a Jewish
citizen of Israel and a human being.
Baruch Kimmerling
PS: I hope Mr. Varnai's attention was not to detract the issue to another
direction (it is great to be a Jewish patriot in Hungary...:-) ).
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