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Meaning or lack of meaning for the concept of “incitement”

שו”תCategory: generalMeaning or lack of meaning for the concept of “incitement”
asked 6 years ago

In recent election campaigns, there has been a lot of talk about “incitement” on both sides. Incitement against Arabs, against the “left” and against the Haredim (Arabs are flocking to the polls, the Haredim are voting in high rates, go vote too, only if you vote for me will a left-wing government not be formed that will destroy the country, and so on and so forth). It seems to me that the concept of “incitement” needs clarification and a definition and clarification of whether it is really useful at all. It seems to me that this is a classic example of a concept that is emotionally and normatively charged because of its original meaning – a call to harm a person or group – but now its definition has been expanded so that it is applied to cases of more innocent statements – for example, pointing out statistical truths about groups and the fact that they have effects in large numbers – when the application of the concept is supposed to import the emotional charge from the original meaning of the concept into the cases that fall within the expanded definition.
I would love to hear the Rabbi’s opinion on the matter.
gift


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מיכי Staff answered 6 years ago
I don’t know why I didn’t see this question. Most of these statements (like the Arabs flocking) are not incitement and there is no trace of incitement in them. On the contrary, the statement that they are incitement is incitement itself. I have already dealt with the question of incitement here more than once, and you can search the site.

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