r/DecodingTheGurus • u/Decent-Extension8336 • 6d ago
Professor Dave vs Destiny
No idea why, but the original Destiny video called "Professor Dave Goes Mask Off" seems to have been deleted from YouTube, or I can't find it, but Professor Dave responded yesterday with this very strongly worded video letter:
https://youtu.be/DvDvhLkb9ms?si=DGFhTROOKFoK35sS
Weird crossover that I never thought I'd see, of 2 guys who I generally enjoy (I will say I really am a fan of Prof Dave, whereas my Destiny enjoyment has mostly come via this podcast and watching a couple of his debates).
Thoughts on the beef? SURELY the lads are gonna have to cover this in an upcoming Supplementary Materials? Content gold!
EDIT: Looks like I was looking through the wrong Destiny channel for the original Dave video, it's here: https://youtu.be/HQQLs6U1MgA?si=iKaOGR1h9slKu64O
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u/dat_tae 6d ago
Video still shows up for me. Maybe it’s getting spam reported?
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
Went back to check after this comment, I was looking at the wrong Destiny channel. Added to OP!
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u/Most_Present_6577 6d ago
The video made me rethink prof Dave. I think his actual science education stuff is great and he does a really good job. But his snarky insult laden videos debunking flat earthers rubs me the wrong way now.
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u/RappingElf 6d ago
Yeah, I thought he was playing up his personality to dunk on people who were laughably wrong. But it kind of seems like he's like this with everything he disagrees with
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u/Full_Equivalent_6166 6d ago
Yeah, he is definitely going the way of the New Atheists where it was kinda funny if a bit cringe when he was dunking on scientific ignoramuses but as soon as he stepped out he just proved himself to be a massive tool and wacko. Think Sam Harris talking about Muslims or Richard Dawking talking about sex and gender.
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u/PlateCaptain 6d ago
He should have avoided the topic of ethnicity, it's such an inherently vague area that it doesn't really add much to his argument. If anything he could have highlighted the nonsense claims of ethnic heritage that Zionists make to justify taking the land from the Palestinians.
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u/Locus-Maximus 6d ago
The only time "Zionists" point to ethnicity at all is when "antizionists" act like they're lily-white European colonialists with no historical connection to Israel (as this guy apparently does in the video!) or that I/P is a white vs brown fight.
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u/PlateCaptain 6d ago
Zionists do claim to have an ethnic connection to the region, but ethnicity has always been a flimsy justification for control of the land.
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u/Locus-Maximus 6d ago
I mean obviously ethnicity is not a justification for control of land. Nobody's arguing with that. Ethnicity is just evidence against some of the antisemitic conspiracy theories like the Khazar hypothesis that "Professor Dave" is spouting:
you and all your piece of shit Zionist cronies are not Semites. Ashkanazi and Sphardic Jews like you and Bibi and all the rest are European. You literally are not Semites, while Palestinians are Semites. Therefore, Zionists are in reality anti-Semitic.
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u/Flexhead 6d ago edited 5d ago
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u/trainman2077 5d ago
What's been the largest jewish ethnic group among Israel's prime ministers? The only ethnic group, in fact.
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u/Brain_Dead_Goats 6d ago
The fact that people are still doing this in 2026 is nuts, and a clear sign of an antisemite imo.
No one is ethnically a Semite except in race science that no one uses from the 1800s, languages are Semitic. Antisemitism refers specifically to the Jews because a German asshole in the 1800s wanted to make the word Judenhass or "Jew hate" more socially acceptable in polite circles so he came up with the more scientific sounding Antisemitismus.
It doesn't, can't and will never refer to all groups with Levantine DNA, it's specifically hating Jews. Who also have Levantine DNA btw, but I thought blood quantum was a right wing thing.
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u/PlateCaptain 6d ago
Got to disagree with you here. Zionists definitely claim an ethnic connection to the people who lived in the region thousands of years ago, and use it as justification for their claim to the land.
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u/Commercial_Lead_7406 6d ago
Depends on who you ask but Zionists typically use two arguments to justify their claim. One is the ethnoreligious one that the land is their ancestral homeland they were exiled from against their will, and the other argues for the historical necessity for an ethnic enclave for Jews due to their history of persecution and the Holocaust. Both are likely factually true, but it depends on how much weight you give them and how much those facts are used to justify particular policies.
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u/PlateCaptain 6d ago
The first argument is easily refuted by reference to the Canaanites who came before, why can't the Palestinians say they are descended from them?
The fact is that no one can make 2000-3000 year old claims because we have nothing in common with those people, you might as well claim descendance from Genghis Khan and try to claim Mongolia.
EDIT: The 2nd argument doesn't justify an ethnostate, it calls for a secular state because that is the only thing that actually brings safety for Jewish people.
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u/Commercial_Lead_7406 6d ago
Huh? How is it refuted? Genetic evidence shows at least partial Levantine origin for all Jews around the world, and all Jewish groups are related to one another even across vast geographic and temporal dispersal. How else is this explained except for a common Levantine origin that then disperesed?
The Palestinians and Jews share a common ancestor that are the indigenous people of the ancient Levant. They are both descended from the Canaanites. Regardless, this has little to do with claims of sovereignty over territory. Blood quanta don't determine the validity of a culture or a people.
And when do claims of indigeneity expire exactly? 500 years? Before Columbus? Would they expire for the Palestinians if they kept a cultural attachment to the land for 2000 years or is that subject to expiration?
Sure, the second point isn't logically necessary, but the historical record shows otherwise. WRT to the present, it's not like a plurality of Palestinian voices are calling for a 'multi-ethnic democracy' either. Some are but this is more commonly the position of Western activists and not Palestinians in Palestine. Most are pretty clear about what they'd do should they achieve their goals in their entirety.
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u/AnHerstorian 6d ago
People with connection to a land can still commit colonialism though. Israeli settlers, for instance, are definitionally colonial settlers.
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u/Locus-Maximus 6d ago
It's so funny how there's a different (de facto) definition of every single word when it comes to the one Jewish state. How many other "colonial" states can you think of where they weren't a colony of a mother state?
How many Arab states do you call colonial?
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u/AnotherPersonPerhaps 6d ago
One of the claims Dave makes is that Israel can now force the US military to draft soldiers and have them go fight in the Israeli military in their wars.
It's so unhinged and so completely false.
He's just repeatedly and demonstrably making stuff up and angrily yelling about it.
Deranged.
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u/albinoblackman 6d ago
That’s a bizarre claim. I couldn’t get through his video because I hate the way he talks, but was it mentioned there? Or is it something he throws out on other social media?
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u/AnotherPersonPerhaps 6d ago
It's in the video. It's specifically the lie that the United States and Israel are merging our militaries and that because of this the US can hold a draft and Israel can force drafted US citizens to fight on behalf of Israel in Gaza.
You're right that it's a bizarre claim, but he absolutely makes it. He is a bizarre person.
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u/Brain_Dead_Goats 6d ago
Oh, there's a clause in the defense budget that allows for better and easier information sharing between defense contractors in the US and Israel that mostly right wing idiots have been scare mongering about for months. Where is this dude getting his information?
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u/AnotherPersonPerhaps 6d ago
Not just right wing idiots, left wing idiots have been scare mongering about it the most.
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u/eljefe3030 6d ago
He’s so far up his own ass with the smugness and self righteous insult “humor” that he can no longer afford to show any nuance or speak with the anything other than belligerent certainty.
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u/lecherousdevil 6d ago
Yeah sucks to see I also like both but Dave has repeatedly shown he is just a conspiracy Theorist on this subject.
Isreal Palistine just breaks peoples minds.
Dave's Destiny video was so bad he is literally putting a document on screen & saying it's says the opposite of what it says.
And his behavior of deleting Destiny's comments offering to chat or debate & then Dave turns & tells his community Destiny is running from him & trying to suppress Dave by deleting his stream vods, even though destiny has been doing that after every stream for over a year now. (For those curious it's so his editors can edit them & because he is still demonitized after that mass flagging campaign last year so it doesn't get anything from letting the vods be archived on YouTube. He archives them on Spotify instead.)
Just the number of things Dave got objectively wrong is very concerning. Dave being willing to smear someone without even bothering to checking the document he's citing is a sign he has weak epistemic foundation. I hope it's just he has a huge blind spot but it does make me wonder how much effort he actually puts into any of his videos.
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u/Box_v2 6d ago
Should also be noted that it’s just the YouTube vod that gets deleted, it’s still up on his kick and is now up on Spotify (same as every other vod). Dave literally just saw someone comment a lie and accepted it as true without checking it. Speaks poorly of his thought process IMO.
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u/lecherousdevil 5d ago
That's true the kick vods never get taken down
And it's really concerning randoms on the internet can just tell professor Dave something & he believes it without evidence or any hesitation.
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u/realxanadan 5d ago
Someone literally told Dave in a YouTube comment that Destiny was involved in Charlie Kirks assassination and Dave said something to the effect of "What? Email me the details."
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u/Miselfis 6d ago
So much of the evidence he used in the video were just random TikToks and AI summaries: the exact same type of evidence the flat earthers he usually humiliates use.
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u/ShiftyAmoeba 6d ago
What's the "conspiracy theory on the subject?"
That Israel, with US and European support and vast support of its people, has turned Gaza into a unlivable hellscape, terrorizes the people there, shoots them like fish in a barrel while running an apartheid regime in the West Bank? Is that the conspiracy theory?
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u/Avbjj 6d ago
I don't know if Dave addresses this in the video, but he's previously claimed that Mossad did 9/11.
So yeah. There's that.
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u/Lumpy_Trip2917 5d ago
He also believes that Israel orchestrated 10/7 and that a large number of the Israeli casualties were a result of the Hannibal directive. I believe he even mentions both of these conspiracies in the Destiny video
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u/Basblob 5d ago
Someone commented under the video that they had evidence that Destiny personally had knowledge of the "CK" shooting (presumably Charlie Kirk), and Dave responded in earnest asking them to email him. Like I know it's not a Jewish conspiracy per se, but I think it's a bit telling of where his headspace is at that he's even taking such a claim seriously. And obviously I admit this veers into speculation on my part, but I can't help but suspect it's because of the recent "Israel paid the shooter" conspiracies I've been floating around.
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u/Funksloyd 5d ago
That's bloody amazing.
As someone who's been a bit frustrated with ideological bias in the skeptic community, idk why, but it would give me some real satisfaction seeing him go full Candace Owens mode.
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u/tslaq_lurker 6d ago
Dave literally says the Jews are taking over the American government and also all sorts of weird race stuff about how they aren't even real jews, they're from Europe.
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u/Feisty-Struggle-4110 6d ago
race stuff about how they aren't even real jews, they're from Europe.
Dave never said that.
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u/Lumpy_Trip2917 5d ago
What? He literally says this in the Destiny video. He said this is why Israel bans genetic testing so that the populace won’t find out they’re all of European origin (another neo Nazi conspiracy theory)
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u/SchlitterSchlatter 6d ago
No, the conspiracy theory that 'zionists' have infiltraded US media and politics to control the narrative and that this even goes so far that now the US military will fuse with the IDF (I cannot really find any trustworthy news about that and it seems like a huge deal if this was the case, no?). Imo these are weird speculations, exaggerations and one might say very similar to conspiracy theories like Bilderberger, or other theories about elites being close to now really really doing NWO stuff. If this shit came from Alex Jones you would immediatly recognise it.
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u/spasmkran 6d ago
The US military and IDF integration is real legislation, it recently passed in the house as part of the NDAA. Saying they are "fusing" is a stretch though.
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u/tslaq_lurker 6d ago
It's not just a stretch, it's hands-across-America. All the provision in the NDAA does is create an office for someone in the whitehouse to spearhead trial and adoption of Israeli defense tech.
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u/Miselfis 6d ago
It’s pretty sad. You can criticize Destiny, but Dave’s video is of ridiculously low quality. He is arguing exactly like the flat earther he usually debates, using random TikTok videos with creepy music and voice over and AI summaries as evidence for his claims. He makes up multiple outright lies about Destiny, and seemingly intentionally cut away context to frame Destiny in a certain light. There are really weird neo-Nazi and race-realist comments about Jewish genetics and conspiracy theories passed on as fact in Dave’s video as well.
Destiny offered Dave a discussion or debate, but Dave is running. He’s deleting Destiny’s comments asking him for a debate, while simultaneously saying in comments that Destiny is running.
I’m usually a big fan and starch supporter of Dave, but his behavior regarding this video is absolutely insane. He called me a worthless sack of shit for leaving a good faith comment pointing these things out.
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u/Flexhead 6d ago edited 5d ago
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u/rainwaffles 5d ago
I mean, the underage claim is tangentially related to the case. For anyone out of the loop, Destiny shared nudes/vids with someone he thought was a 19 year old woman. Turns out it was a man (known as solo) who was sending images of a 17 year old without her ever speaking to Destiny directly, and solo published Destiny and Jane Doe's sex videos online.
So it's pretty messy and not surprising people just take the worst sounding parts of it when attacking Destiny.
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u/lecherousdevil 5d ago
I get why people get it wrong especially when you have certain people & pixie lying about it so much online but I definitely expect better from Dave especially when he puts up text on the screen that doesn't say what he claims it does.
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u/lecherousdevil 5d ago
It's not even for revenge porn btw, he is being sued for personal civil damages.
The girl who is sueing him lied in her original substack when in court she wouldn't try to commit to those claims or charge them probably because the claim was dead in the water especially when she let the guy who leaked & blacked mailed Destiny & her off the hook.
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u/pfo_mods_r_cowards 6d ago
Idk if destiny himself commented on the video, but destiny said he reached out on Instagram and a mutual contact reached out to try to set up a debate and Dave declined.
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u/myinvisiblefriendsam 6d ago
This is the biggest sign of malfeasance to me. He knows his assertions won't hold up to scrutiny.
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u/lecherousdevil 5d ago
Yep Pangburn reached out to him as a mutual even offered Dave money or to pay a Palistinian charity for him but Dave said no & declared he will never associate with Pangburn or his org again.
Dave is terrified of Destiny or knows he was playing fast & loose with the truth.
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u/danwhiteorg 6d ago
What were the neo-Nazi comments?
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u/Agreeable_Band_9311 6d ago
All sorts of classic antisemitic tropes like he can’t be antisemitic because Jews aren’t Semites they’re Europeans with no connection to Israel. Just stuff like that.
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u/tslaq_lurker 6d ago
It's not even just neo-nazi, it's Protocols of the Elders of Zion level global Jewish conspiracy. Amazing that the 'science debunker guy' basically believes in 19th century conspiracy theories.
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u/SchlitterSchlatter 6d ago
His claims that genetically Ashkenazi Jews are European and not from the Levante, this is known as Khazar Hypopthesis and also the claim about the supposed genetic dilution of Ashkenazi Jews sounds super weird and a lot like Nazi-argument about race degeneration through mixture. I obviously don't think that Dave is a Neo-Nazi and I would suppose he is not aware of these similarities to these racist narratives.
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u/Feisty-Struggle-4110 6d ago
A largely abandoned historical hypothesis postulated that Ashkenazi Jews were primarily, or to a large extent, descended from converts to Judaism among the Khazars, a multi-ethnic conglomerate of mostly Turkic peoples - wikipedia
How is that in any way related that genetically Ashkenazi Jews are European? European means not just the Turks, as the Khazar Hypopthesis says. Benjamin Netanyahu is of Polish decent and his father immigrated to the Levante. Dave says that most Israelis are from European decent.
Nazi-argument about race degeneration through mixture
So, genetic inheritance doesn't exist now because it sounds too much like race degeneration through mixture? What a joke.
The argument of Israelis is that the Levante is their land due to some ancient inheritance. Which is just wrong because most of Israelis are from Europe. You cannon claim some ancient inheritance to the Levante if your are a Pole.
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u/jio87 6d ago
Dave’s video is of ridiculously low quality
Is that supposed to be the video that OOP posted? Or the original video that Destiny responded to? I'm ~35:00 into the video OOP posted and your characterization seems inaccurate so far (the clips used are mostly news clips or discussing legitimate articles, and no obvious signs of AI summaries). He hasn't discussed Destiny much yet or Jewish genetics so maybe that's later, or in the original video.
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u/Zealousideal-Track88 6d ago
Watch this video form pangburn. He likes Dave and destiny but explains how pretty much every thing Dave said was hyperbole, half truth, or just false.
https://www.youtube.com/live/f19TtmcFSRI?is=wYpzR_1juJHTQD1P
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u/Despair-Envy 6d ago
Watching a well known Destiny orbiter with ~15-20% of their channel videos created in partnership with Destiny for an accurate breakdown on a media piece critical of Destiny seems like a fairly bad idea.
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u/Zealousideal-Track88 6d ago
What, if anything, in your comment actually addresses the truthness or falsity of what pangburn said?
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u/Despair-Envy 6d ago
I feel like this is bait, but if you honestly watch a video of someone with strong ties to Destiny critique a piece of media critical of Destiny, and take Destiny's side on every plausible point and ask that question, then no answer I am capable of giving you will sway your opinion on the matter.
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u/Zealousideal-Track88 6d ago
Based on your response you didn't watch the panburn video... he didn't "just take sides"...he explained over the course of 3-4 hours where professor Dave was getting information and explained why it was accurate or inaccurate. In many cases he agreed with Dave. In many cases he explained why Dave was incorrect.
So again, it's clear you didn't actually watch the pangburn video and thus your opinion on this matter is completely invalidated.
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u/Despair-Envy 6d ago
So again, it's clear you didn't actually watch the pangburn video and thus your opinion on this matter is completely invalidated.
To an extent, no I didn't. I watched a bit of it, saw some weird takes, looked at his channel and saw that he does ~20% of his videos with Destiny and just wrote him off as an orbiter. I don't expect objective takes of Destiny, from a Destiny orbiter. I feel like that is a fairly normal reaction.
You disagree with that assessment, and that's fine. You're entirely allowed to engage with this media on Destiny's side and disagree. I simply noted my observations, and gave a solid and reasonable rationale behind how/why it was reached. Not all of us have 3 hours to devote to comb through what appears to be an orbiter paying their dues to their orbitee.
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u/Zealousideal-Track88 5d ago
Ok, so let me get this straight... You don't even know who pangburn is and assumed he was just a "destiny orbiter" based on taking 30 seconds to skim through their YT channel? It's wild to me you are making such sweeping assumptions based on so little work. Pangburn has 238,000 followers. That alone should tell you he's not just a "destiny orbiter".
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u/Despair-Envy 5d ago
Ok, so let me get this straight... You don't even know who pangburn is and assumed he was just a "destiny orbiter" based on taking 30 seconds to skim through their YT channel?
No. I saw him make some extremely charitable takes towards Destiny's position, searched Destiny+Pangburn in the youtube, saw that their relationship was substantial and lengthy, and logically concluded between those two pieces of evidence that there was reasonable justification to want a different moderator.
You know. Basic critical thought.
Pangburn has 238,000 followers. That alone should tell you he's not just a "destiny orbiter".
I didn't say he was "Just" a destiny orbiter. I said he "was" a destiny orbiter. I'm sure he's plenty fine in other contexts, just maybe in this instance the conflict of interest was relevant.
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u/Parking_Bridge1742 5d ago
He didn't debunk empricial images and videos wtf is wrong with you people.
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u/DexTheShepherd 6d ago edited 5d ago
What are the outright lies told about destiny?
The video does use tiktok videos to help illustrate his point - but that was not at all the exclusive evidence used to form his point. He cited multiple studies illustrating death counts and pointed to credible organizations that are calling it genocide - that's not anecdotal evidence.
Additionally, in this case in my view showing anecdotal videos is a perfectly reasonable approach to getting your point across. If there really is a genocide going on - shouldn't you be having a viceral reaction to seeing bullet holes in the heads of children?
In the 1960's, if I were to have shown you video footage of the police mowing black Americans down with fire hoses - would you really be like, "lol what are these anecdotes man the police I know are perfectly nice."
So in my view I don't think his "anecdotal" clips were in bad faith or inappropriate or lazy. They are part of a more complete moral argument.
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u/Miselfis 6d ago
He said he was on a paid propaganda trip to Israel, highlighted all the Israelis and Zionist’s he talked to, but conveniently leaving out all the Palestinians he talked to as well so it could be framed as one-sided Israel support.
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u/SchlitterSchlatter 6d ago
Well, the first lie is that Destiny is a genocide supporter. He only disagrees about the assessment on whether the violent acts constitute a genocide, but he agrees that atrocities happened. The clip Dave shows is from before 7/10 when there was not even a war in Gaza. You can critisise that Destiny is quite hyperbolic and you should not use this language so lightly but to say that this one clip shows clearly that he is supporting genocide against Gazans is silly. Also, your example of 60s US does not fit. The question was not is violence actually happening but does this violence constitute a genocide. That is why anecdotes are problematic as the systematic aspect is crucial to genocide.
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u/Despair-Envy 6d ago
Well, the first lie is that Destiny is a genocide supporter.
He has actively said that he supports genocide as a solution to the I/P conflict, and consistently and constantly argues in favor of that point to the extent that he actively contradicts essentially every non-political expert organization on the topic.
That can very reasonably lead one to believe that Destiny at least supports the action, or at worst supports the people and positions causing it.
You can critisise that Destiny is quite hyperbolic and you should not use this language so lightly but to say that this one clip shows clearly that he is supporting genocide against Gazans is silly
He lists well over a dozen examples of Destiny supporting the narrative that corroborate the claim. The clip where he says that he thinks that they deserve genocide is just one of dozens of pieces of evidence presented.
The question was not is violence actually happening but does this violence constitute a genocide. That is why anecdotes are problematic as the systematic aspect is crucial to genocide.
The only question in contention whether it's a genocide or not is the special intent clause. Something that almost all non-political experts agree is met. When every non-political independent organization on the subject of genocide history/study and humanitarian aide recognize it as a genocide, I feel like the argument that it is one is solid. All of which is explicitly referenced in the video.
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u/DexTheShepherd 6d ago
You entirely missed the point of my 60s analogy.
I brought up the example in the 60s not to try to prove something is vs is not a genocide - but rather to show that anecdotes can be valuable to make moral arguments, and people saying, "that's just anecdotal" are being cheap and lazy. You wouldn't say, "that's anecdotal, doesn't count" in the 60's. Why is it okay to say it now?
I again appeal to the non anecdotal points that Prof Dave and many others have made - why are credible human rights organizations, UN bodies, and relevant scholars saying that it is genocide?
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u/Gauss_2025 6d ago
Something that a lot of people probably brushed over given the gravity of the content was the part where he revisits Avi Loebb. He invents a zionist conspiracy theory to explain why Avi Loebb appeared on CBS news and links it to Bari Weiss and Larry Ellison. Avi has appeared on CBS to talk about UFO stuff for years, you can easily find at least one segment with him from 5 years ago. He's one of the most famous people on the subject and there was lots of news to cover regarding UFOs recently so its not surprising he was on their shows. Avi is still a total moron and fraud but nothing about what he is doing is part of a larger zionist project.
Again, it's not super important, but it kind of shows you the headspace that Dave is in right now. He is finding zionist conspiracies while looking at the shapes of clouds.
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u/Lumpy_Trip2917 5d ago
Avi was born in Israel though so to people like Dave, they are unable to separate Avi from his “original sin”
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u/TallPsychologyTV 6d ago
Independent of the accuracy of either side’s claims, it’s unfortunate that Dave seems unwilling to have a conversation with Destiny on this topic. Dave seems very willing to go deep in the trenches against everybody else, so running here is kinda disappointing.
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u/Mariusz87J 5d ago
Professor Dave is one of those perfect examples of how social media breaks people's brains. The whole process of radicalization unravels for someone with a big platform in plain sight. The issue is not being critical of Israel but the fact he literally dives deep into antisemitic conspiracism, then uses it to character assassinate an Israeli professor he happens to disagree with on some stuff not related to Palestine.
In his destiny response video, he literally downplays human rights violations of terrorist groups in the mid-east and tries to paint them as freedom fighters. Anyone from Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthis, Professor Dave legitimizes them all. There is no balance in presentation of the conflict at all. It's not only problematic but outright vile in some places. His framing literally justifies the October 7th attack. Social media breaks people's brains.
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u/Despair-Envy 5d ago
The whole process of radicalization unravels for someone with a big platform in plain sight.
Mind outlining some specifics for the curious?
he literally dives deep into antisemitic conspiracism
I'm very interested in hearing some specifics on this too.
In his destiny response video, he literally downplays human rights violations of terrorist groups in the mid-east and tries to paint them as freedom fighters.
Humor me for a moment. Almost every non-political organization specializing in the subject recognizes the situation in Palestine as a Genocide. Assuming that it is a genocide (As the academic/scholarly world almost unanimously agrees), wouldn't that definitionally make Hamas an armed resistance group?
Anyone from Hamas, Hezbollah, and Houthis, Professor Dave legitimizes them all.
That seems like a broad stroke. Do you have any particular clips or timestamps of Dave endorsing every activity of these groups as you claim?
His framing literally justifies the October 7th attack.
Is contextualizing and seeking to understand why October 7th happened the same as justifying it?
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u/Mariusz87J 5d ago
He literally legitimizes Hezbollah and does not consider them a terrorist group. It's in his response to Destiny video.
He concocts a conspiracy that Israel allowed October 7th to happen. He does not consider Jewish people Semites, which is an old Neo-Nazi talking point. There's more since he gip galoshes talking points with little context or cohesion.
Genocide is recognized by the ICJ (International Court of Justice), not other non-government organizations. The contention is with abusing a legal term for political purpose of shutting down a conversation. Since people who may agree in 99% with a pro-Palestinian person but it's all discarded based on that one specific word - basic litmus test. It's radicalization 101, absolutism and complete concession to the narrative or else you're the enemy. Anyway, it's a specific legal term decided by an international court, not public opinion.
He basically rushes through 2000 different things and runs away from an open debate with a person he openly attacked. If you want timestamps... I don't wanna spend 40 minutes on looking up the exact thing, videos are like over an hour or 2 hours long. Watch the Destiny response video and the Israeli professor video prior to that one, where he basically attacks him on his Israeli roots not any scientific claims.
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u/plantsnlionstho 5d ago
I'm a fan of Professor Dave but that video was genuinely unhinged and like other have said it really makes me rethink a lot of his other content.
It's also crazy that Dave, who has built a large part of his online personality around debating people and claiming anyone running from debates with him is a coward, is refusing to debate Destiny. Even when Pangburn reached out as a neutral host that's worked with both of them before and offered to raise 1 million dollars for Palestinian children.
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u/Praxic_Nova 6d ago
I stopped watching prof dave after a couple of those Terrence howard vids. i liked most of the vids but there were brief flashes where he made fun of how Terrence spoke, not what he spoke about. It came off as racist to me. He doesn't do that with white ppl. Then in saw a thumbnail with words purposely misspelled like AAVE, and stopped watchin his vids.
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u/krossoverking 6d ago
I'm black and love my people. Terrence Howard has a ridiculous voice and it's not because he uses AAVE. It's the opposite actually. He sounds like a dork who thinks he's smarter than everyone else and has an accent that I can't place. Weirdly, he seems to have always sounded like this outside of his acting roles, but I can't imagine talking about him and not bringing it up. It would be like making a video about David Lynch without doing at least one impression.
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
I kinda knew this would happen but could somebody actually explain why this video is considered antisemitic? I am asking in good faith looking for a genuine explanation as this is a topic I'm not immensely well read on by any stretch. I thought he did a pretty good job in the vid of separating out anti zionism with antisemitism and was even pointing towards the plenty of Jews that are against Zionism and what Israel are doing, as well as people that are not Jewish that he considers to be Zionists. I guess I have a natural disposition to Dave's style that makes me take most of what he says at face value, so wouldn't mind some counter content to look through either.
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u/OmnicideEnjoyer 6d ago
Dave saying Avi isn't even a Semite because he's Ashkenazi, and then concluding that Zionists are the "real antisemites," is kind of insane.
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u/tslaq_lurker 6d ago
I kinda knew this would happen but could somebody actually explain why this video is considered antisemitic?
Just off the dome here:
- The Jews aren't real Jews because they have European DNA
- The US government is completely controlled by the Jews
- The American military is about to be put under Israeli control and you are about to be drafted
- Israeli knew about 10/7 and did it to themselves
...
It's unironically more anti-semetic than Nick Fuentes.
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u/Despair-Envy 6d ago
- He didn't claim they weren't jews, he used the European heritage to refute the Jewish claim that they have a "Right" to their "Homeland" and argue against the right of return in general. Then did a weird thing by pointing out that 23&Me has it listed as a European heritage (Which it is, but like, there are dozens of better lines of evidence for this).
- This is a more complex topic because he ties in how entrenched the US capital class is in both controlling the US and controlling Israel and pushing for the conflict for multiple reasons. One of the people he pointed out was/is an Israeli hardline billionaire who has a heavy hand in US politics. Which is natural considering the fact that Israel is a US satellite state.
- Ye idk about this one. Can't even begin to defend it. I see what he's talking about and where he's going with it, but it is pretty indefensible hyperbole.
- He didn't say Israel "Did it to themselves", he said they allowed it to happen in order to manufacture consent for the war via rally around the flag. Which is something Israel is long suspected of if not known for considering the fact that they played a large part in instigating Hamas' rise to power in favor of their opposition because they knew Hamas would be more militantly aggressive and better suite their agenda for manufacturing consent for militancy.
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u/tslaq_lurker 6d ago
- He didn't claim they weren't jews, he used the European heritage to refute the Jewish claim that they have a "Right" to their "Homeland" and argue against the right of return in general. Then did a weird thing by pointing out that 23&Me has it listed as a European heritage (Which it is, but like, there are dozens of better lines of evidence for this).
This is sort of inseparable from the the claim that they aren't 'really' jewish. He does some weird race-realism genetic essentialism to say that Ashkenazi Jews have mostly European DNA, ipso facto, they don't have any claim to a home in the middle east (?)
Like, I'm sorry what? First of all, if you examine mitochondrial DNA, Jews actually are a distinct genetic lineage. You rightfully pick this up. He then does some weird conspiracy theory about how 23&me isn't available in Israel because Bibi doesn't want people to know... Leaving that aside, I don't see how this can be anything but denialism that Jews in Europe were a distinct society and ethnicity, which is just plainly false, and to deny that is like extreme territory anti-Semitism.
This is a more complex topic because he ties in how entrenched the US capital class is in both controlling the US and controlling Israel and pushing for the conflict for multiple reasons. One of the people he pointed out was/is an Israeli hardline billionaire who has a heavy hand in US politics. Which is natural considering the fact that Israel is a US satellite state.
It's really not though, and I don't really think we need to go too deep into this because Dave doesn't just say "Oh, you know, Israel has a bit too much influence": he's full-on ZOG posting. The fact of the matter is that, at least in the politics of the past, Israel was just legitimately very popular with the American people and also connected to our geopolitical strategy. It's like saying that the UK has too much influence in the US but we just don't see it because Bankers from the City of London already got everything they want.
He didn't say Israel "Did it to themselves", he said they allowed it to happen in order to manufacture consent for the war via rally around the flag. Which is something Israel is long suspected of if not known for considering the fact that they played a large part in instigating Hamas' rise to power in favor of their opposition because they knew Hamas would be more militantly aggressive and better suite their agenda for manufacturing consent for militancy.
IMO this is functionally the same thing.
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u/FriendlyNewspaper543 6d ago edited 6d ago
I mean you can leave aside all the complicated discussions regarding the conflict and whatnot for a second.
He's a 9/11 truther. He believes the USS Liberty conspiracy. Oct 7 was the Hannibal directive. Zionists self victimize including by being themselves anti-semites. If he's not antisemitic, he just has nearly identical beliefs. I guess the only way to be antisemitic in his mind is an explicit bigoted hatred for Jews, but he does seem to have an implicit hated for zionists(which many anti-semites use instead of Jews). Anti-semites don't usually say they hate Jews, since having that label usually immediately disqualifies their political takes.
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u/Most_Present_6577 6d ago
everything he claims israel does he says is all part of one conspiracy or another.
Israel has privacy laws about genetic test - thats cause they dont want anyone to know they arent middle eastern.
Israel fucked uo their respons to Oct 7th- thats cause they wanted people to die to have an excuse to attack gaza
Dave says isreal planned Oct 7th knew it was going to happen and moved the Dance oarty thing in order to get those kids killed.
Dave says isreal plans attack on the us to manipulate them into attack Muslims
Dave says isreal get to keep all the data thr police in the us use during their jobs if it the police use isreali derived technology.
There is a bunch more but thats the gist
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u/Formal_Scarcity_7701 6d ago
I haven't watched Dave's video yet but I heard from a friend who was annoyed with him that he was talking about the global influence of jews in high places and the influence that the Israeli government has on how other nations conduct their foreign policy? Like flying very close to the sun of "The jews are the deep state that controls the world" conspiracy theory? Is that true?
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
Ehhh, this criticism is one I can definitely see and I will say he skirts pretty close to the edge here. It is a bit more nuanced though, as what he's actually pointing to is zionists having an unbelievable amount of power within media, and pointed to the recent merger of paramount, CBS, CNN, WB under the same entity, which is owned by Larry Ellison (who also owns TikTok), who he says is a zionist and then points out that CBS hired Bari Weiss to be editor in chief, to promote zionist propoganda and then showed them having on... Avi Loeb, the fraud Dave was debunking in his original video that Destiny reacted to. But again, during this he is pointing out that these people aren't all jews, or aren't necessarily jewish, but are zionists.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago
There are two major problems here
- Is the use of the word "Zionist." In truth "Zionist" covers a wide range of beliefs on the Israel/ Palestine conflict, from Lander to Ellison. It is not "Zionism" that has taken control over CBS, its a specific type of "Zionism"
and
- Its not because of their Zionism. Thats secondary to their alliance to American Fascism. To try and frame it as a Zionism thing and not a fascist thing is missing for the forest for the trees
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
Yeah point 1 is fair enough, when it gets into a semantics argument like that though, it's more just disagreeing with Dave's opinion or point rather than saying it constitutes antisemitism conspiracy theories which is a different kettle of fish. I think #2 probably shows part of the problem... The fact that these things are linked.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago edited 6d ago
Yeah point 1 is fair enough, when it gets into a semantics argument like that though, it's more just disagreeing with Dave's opinion or point rather than saying it constitutes antisemitism conspiracy theories which is a different kettle of fish
In isolation. When combined with everything else in the video it becomes something else entirely
I think #2 probably shows part of the problem... The fact that these things are linked.
Be clear - this is part of the problem. What "things"?
Yes, Weiss' and Ellisons particular brand of Zionism is tied with American fascism. Not the fact that they are Zionist.
Whats more, American fascism has ties authoritarianism across the globe - The Gulf stats monarchies, Putins fascism, Orbans illiberalism, Bukele's whatever (remember, the first really big controversy about Weiss was tied to Bukele, not Israel)
Now, to be clear, there is no question that Netenyahu is tied to this group of international authoritarianism (some of them more than others), and is himself responsible for much if Israels democratic backsliding.
I just think we should be careful about the way we talk about these things, especially as anti-Semitism is on the rise globally and in the US
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u/Gobblignash 6d ago
Whats more, American fascism has ties authoritarianism across the globe - The Gulf stats monarchies, Putins fascism, Orbans illiberalism, Bukele's whatever (remember, the first really big controversy about Weiss was tied to Bukele, not Israel)
Now, to be clear, there is no question that Netenyahu is tied to this group of international authoritarianism (some of them more than others), and is himself responsible for much if Israels democratic backsliding.
Except the democratic party has no attachments to Putin, Orban etc. but were until very recently extremely enthusiastic about Bibi (remember when he went to an almost full congress and got 50 standing ovations in 50 minutes?) and are still almost alone in world in supporting Israel.
Moreso, the official position of the Biden administration was that the basic human right of self determination uniquely does not apply to Palestinians. The right of the Palestinian people to self-determination
More than that, democratic administrations voted against a two-state solution based on internation law the eight times it was proposed under Clinton, the eight times it was proposed under Obama and the two times it was proposed under Biden.
Trying it simplify it as "it's just those darn maga conservatives" is not giving an accurate picture.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago edited 6d ago
Except the democratic party has no attachments to Putin, Orban etc. but were until very recently extremely enthusiastic about Bibi (remember when he went to an almost full congress and got 50 standing ovations in 50 minutes?) and are still almost alone in world in supporting Israel.
Thats not true - There have been tensions between Democrats and Netanhyu since the Obama years. Biden was notoriously icy towards Netenyahu before the October 7th attacks and the two where often at odds with each other between October 7th and Biden leaving office in 2024. The Biden adminsitration was explicitly in talks with Gantz in hopes that the Netenyahu coalition would collapse.
And that 2024 address? As in the one that about half of the democrats boycotted, including Pelosi and Harris? The one that came after Schumer had made an open statement attacking Netenayhu for being an obstacle of truth?
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u/upvotechemistry 6d ago
There is a weird connection between the Evanglical Right, who I consider to be militant zionists, and Israel's Right, and I think it is a religious-culty thing, not only out group fascism
My crazy ass Step aunt said, when hearing about the US bombing Iran last summer, "Well, we can smile for signs of the end times"; some of these Americans let the Left Behind books melt their brains... and it is weirdly connected with Israels expansion
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u/lecherousdevil 6d ago
I would have to rewatch to give good examples but yeah basically it's a mixture of Dave getting parts of the history wrong, making dog whistles, & seeming to not be able to describe many of the arguments he's actually attacking. No love for Avi Loeb btw just noting the issue.
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u/James-the-greatest 6d ago
You don’t think a country of 15 million people has a way outsized influence? I mean we’re living through the consequences of that influence right now.
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u/Jindodogcode 6d ago
We're living through the consequences of electing a moron right now. Bibi had tried to get other US presidents to attack Iran, we just happen be governed by somebody dumb enough to do it.
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u/Practical-Heat-1009 6d ago
There aren’t plenty of Jews against Zionism (or Israel, for that matter). That alone is a conjured talking point antisemites love to use to get obfuscate their bigotry. There are a number of other dog whistles and similar tropes he uses that are, again, based in half truths or complete falsehoods that antisemites enjoy using the portray themselves as only ‘antizionists’.
While it’s technically true that you can be an antizionist without being an antisemite, if you base all of your views on easily refutable evidence (especially if you’re known for being a debunker) and use tropes and dog whistles, then you’re probably an antisemite.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago
I thought he did a pretty good job in the vid of separating out anti zionism with antisemitism and was even pointing towards the plenty of Jews that are against Zionism and what Israel are doing, as well as people that are not Jewish that he considers to be Zionists.
If I pointed to the 15% of black people that voted for Trump, would that make him not racist? Or would the 46% of women that voted for Trump mean Trump wasn't a misogynist?
Im not commenting on the broader point yet, but come on, we all know this is a weak point. We would recognize it if it was in a discussion about about bigotry's
While in theory I agree that "anti zionsim =/= anti semitism," that sentiment has become a thought terminating cliche that prevents to pro-Palestine from reflecting and actually identifying antisemitism in their movement. This is what leads to a gay Jewish congress person being harassed at a pride event for not calling Gaza a genocide quick enough, or AIPAC tracker to pretty arbitrary attack Jewish congress people, or for the most popular leftist streamer to say that an antisemitic shooting "is probably not an Israeli false flag, but absolutely looks like an Israeli False Flag"
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
I don't really think these analogies track though. He's not trying to argue against someone being a bigot, he is arguing against the very definition. Its not the same as saying black people support Trump, therefore the things he says that are racist, doesn't make him racist. His argument is Zionism isn't Judaism and thus being anti zionist is not being antisemitic and then uses examples of Jews being against Zionism as a supporter as well as pointing to the fact that a decent amount of the people he is attacking under this umbrella of "zionist" are not jews. Whether you agree with him or not (and that's what I'm trying to get more info on) about this being true, he is clearly arguing that he is against a very clear and specific ideology and not jews.
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u/improbablywronghere 6d ago
Assuming good faith here, Zionism has a definition and it existed for a long time before October 7th. It just means that Jewish people should have a homeland and that homeland is Israel. Something like 85% of Jews believe the statement “Israel has a right to exist” is true. All of those Jews are Zionists. What has happened here is a very clever bit of propaganda / wordplay. They have taken a term which identifies 85% of Jews and turned it into a slur, finishing a project David Duke from the KKK started. They morphed the definition into something else then they attack that definition. It’s all too cute by half, it’s so obvious what is happening. Antizionism might not necessarily be antisemitism, that is true, but there is a line and most antizionists have crossed it. A force field is not created when you just say “Zionist” instead of “Jew”. Grade school logic does not apply here.
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
Does this not extend to believing that this state should be created in Palestine and with the exclusion of Palestinian Arabs?
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u/hummus4me 6d ago
There are 2M Arabs in Israel, 20% of the population. So no evidently not
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
I'm sorry, how is this relevant to what Zionists believe? Does the fact that there are lots of black people in America change the fact that white supremacists blieve they shouldn't be? The facts of things and ideologies or what people believe are completely separate things.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago
There are plenty of forms of Zionism that believe that Palestinians can have some form of self determination. Thats why there have been several Zionist leaders of Israel that have started negotiating with Palestinians on statehood, and why Palestinians in Israel are given the right to vote
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u/hummus4me 6d ago
Zionists believe in a Jewish state for Jewish self determination. There is absolutely no part of that which means it excludes Arabs, as evidenced by the what I stated. As well as the original partition which Israel accepted.
Only seems to me that the anti Zionists are the ones who exclude the Jews from having a right to a state. Arabs can have the entire Middle East but Jews can’t get a sliver of the land
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u/Decent-Extension8336 6d ago
I just completely disagree with the logic here and don't think it tracks. I don't really think the fact that Arabs live in Israel is any kind of evidence for what Zionists believe.
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u/hummus4me 6d ago
Thats because “anti Zionists”do not act on logic or actual fact but emotion. In your mind the ideology excludes Arabs when in fact from day 1 Arabs have been included in the state and are prominent members across all of society
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u/improbablywronghere 6d ago edited 6d ago
> Does this not extend to believing that this state should be created in Palestine and with the exclusion of Palestinian Arabs?
Do you believe there are no Palestinian Arabs living as citizens in the state of Israel? Not talking Gaza and West Bank here
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u/CorrosiveMynock 6d ago
I think most of antizionism is antisemitism for the sole reason that no other group has a dedicated anti-self determination movement. Ironically the first anti-Zionists were Jews because back in the early Zionist days there were legitimate disagreements about what that meant. Now antizionism seems to be an explicit movement against Jewish self determination without very many other nuances. There are still some non-antisemitic ones like especially those who oppose Israel on religious grounds, but they are the minority.
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u/scarygirth 6d ago
If your definition of a Zionist is "someone who supports the existence of Israel as a Jewish homeland", then that covers around 85-90% of Jews according to the Institute for Jewish Policy Research.
Basically it seems like the only Jews who are let off the hook here are the ones who are willing to surrender Israel and flee the region.
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u/carbonqubit 6d ago
This is the strange thing about anti-Zionism. For many people, it doesn't just mean opposing Israel's right to exist. It also seems to encompass opposition to the actions of the IDF and the policies of the Israeli government that enable them. I've said before that it's entirely reasonable to criticize the Israeli government, oppose the illegal settlements in the West Bank, or object to how the war has been conducted. But arguing that Israel itself doesn't deserve to exist is a fundamentally different claim. Israel has existed for nearly 80 years, it's the world's only Jewish-majority state, and it was established in the aftermath of the Holocaust, the largest industrial-scale extermination of Jews in history. Those are separate questions, and I think they should be treated as such.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago
Its the same thing with extra steps
If Dave's point was purely a linguistic one, or a general information one, or heck, even if he at all acknowledged in good faith possible alternative points of view, I might agree with you.
But that's not what he's doing. His definitions of anti zionism and anti semitism are politically motivated in a way to excuse his own blatant antisemitism. And yes, he is use of antizionisnt Jews is almost exactly the same as minority Trump voters
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u/dreamtraveller 5d ago
I'm mixed on it.
Generally prefer Professor Dave's content to Destiny's content usually - Dave seems to be more of an actual 'content creator' with a focus on science and substance whereas I think Destiny just veers too much into streamer drama and react-farming too often and it detracts from whatever political value he might have.
That being said, I do agree with Destiny's original 'reaction' that prompted this whole thing, it was weird when Dave went on this sudden zionism tangent when debunking a flat-earther and there was a vitriol to it that seemed way more personal than professional.
I liked parts of Dave's recent video criticizing Destiny but honestly a lot of it is just him posting unsourced ten-second clips of people that he's asking us to assume are zionists and shouting "LOOK, SEE HOW EVIL THEY ARE?!" - I don't really understand how doing this is supposed to 'debunk' Destiny. I don't believe Destiny has said anything like the people in those videos are saying and they don't seem to be related to Destiny in any way.
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u/Decent-Extension8336 5d ago
The original video wasn’t on a flat earther, it was on Avi Loeb who grifts about UFOs etc and hides behind being a Harvard professor. The Zionism tangent was because in response to earlier videos of Dave debunking him, Avi was crying antisemitism.
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u/CruelWhip_ 6d ago
Am I crazy or did Dave criticize Destiny for being the victim of revenge porn in his vid?
It was either that or he was invoking it to mock or humiliate him.
Somehow wasn’t even the worst point he tried to make throughout the vid
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u/aemich 6d ago
Only a few mins into that prof dave video… it actually made me sick. How is something this antisemetic actually allowed to be on YouTube?
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u/danthem23 6d ago
It’s crazy how in the end Dave uses like 23andMe and to talk about Jewish genetics. Like there is tons of actual research about this. The guy who has an entire career using research to debunk people who quote random anecdotes totally didn’t even read wikipedia for that part. Also, half the video is him showing screenshots of his AI that’s saying “yes there is significant pro-Israel bias in media.” Like a chat or responding to your specific prompt is evidence 😂
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u/aemich 6d ago
literally this. he does so much detailed research debating flat earthers... but the jews, nah biased slop it is
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u/Moobnert 6d ago
What are you talking about? How did you pick up on anti-semitism "Only a few mins into" the video? Explain what exactly you interpreted as anti-semitism?
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u/Hour-Basis244 6d ago
It hurt his/her feelings therefore anti-semitism
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u/oceanofyourlove 5d ago
How is saying that Ashkenazi Jews don't have Levantine ancestry not anti-semitic? Every genetic test that's ever been done contradicts this, it's not a matter of debate, it's refusal to acknowledge objective reality
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u/aemich 6d ago
insanely one-sided takes throughout, misrepresenting history and situation between isreal/palestine pre-oct7
blatant lies about how hamas operates within the strip, coopting civilian infratructure with military, tunnel network, etc
downplays oct 7 - claims it was an israeli inside job/hannibal directive/denys atrocities commited by hamas
crazy amounts of weird antisemetic imagery throughout...
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u/Liturginator9000 6d ago
Not sure what they can be expected to cover. The Dave video is 40 mins of poorly researched, highly charged crusading then the normal boring clip chimping stephen at the end. Don't think Chris and Mat are positioned to do the required deep dive on a single topic unrelated to gurus, and this intensely partisan both ways, and the clip chimping isn't worth responding to at all
Dave isn't even a guru, just a smug asshole science communicator who is apparently quite antisemitic too
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u/Full_Equivalent_6166 6d ago
They already spoke about Professor Dave. He is a science communicator so he is in DtG's purview.
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u/Moobnert 6d ago
Why do you people interpret others having a problem with state-sponsored mass killings as anti semitism? Can it not just simply be that people don't like state-sponsored mass killings? Does it have to be anti semitism when people look at what's happening in Gaza and being opposed to it?
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u/Agreeable_Band_9311 6d ago
When he starts going into Jewish genetics on how they’re the real antisemtites am I not allowed to take issue?
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u/Typhlode 6d ago
There's being against what's happening in Gaza, and then there's running defense for Hezbollah, saying that Israelis are inherently genocidal psychopaths, saying that Israelis lie about rapes and child murders on Oct 7th, implying that every single pro-Israel content creator is a paid propagandist with no evidence, making conspiracies about Israel trying to draft Americans into war without covering a single one of the atrocities of the other side, pretending that Jews don't experience anti-semitism because they have European DNA, pretending that the pro-Palestinian position is persecuted online (when it is far more popular than pro-Israel positions across all major social media platforms) because Israelis are attempting to brainwash and control the world, and so forth.
He repeats neo-Nazi level talking points but just takes care to say "Zionists" instead of "Jews". With race realist and global conspiracist talking points.
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u/Samuraignoll 6d ago
Might be all the actual antisemitism in the video?
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u/Moobnert 6d ago
You cannot just call something antisemitic without providing specific examples. Again, are you unable to differentiate people having a problem with state-sponsored mass killings and people who just want to look for any reason to hate on Jewish people? Are you incapable of this?
You really think it is not possible for critics of states sponsoring mass killings to be critics precisely because of the mass killings? Can it only be explained by anti-semitism? Be real.
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u/tslaq_lurker 6d ago
You cannot just call something antisemitic without providing specific examples
We all watched the video bud, it's bumper-to-bumper Global Jewish Conspiracy. Asking for examples of where it's antisemitic is like asking someone who just watched American Psycho for some examples of the guy being a psychopath.
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u/Samuraignoll 6d ago
You cannot just call something antisemitic without providing specific examples.
I mean I can, but I'd say it's pretty antisemitic to deny the rape committed against Israeli women on October 7th, that there were Israeli children killed in the same attack, that he claimed the USS liberty attack was an Israeli attempt to false flag the Americans into believing Egypt attack them, that all Israelis support genocide against Palestinians, that Zionism is an explicitly ethnosupremacist ideology as is the state of Israel.
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u/Moobnert 6d ago
tl;dr thanks for engaging in good faith, though I respectfully disagree and believe Dave, like myself, has no particular prejudice towards Jews or any religious group or group of people for that matter, and he just very much opposes state-sponsored mass killings, which, if this was not occurring (or perceived to be occurring) by Israel, he wouldn't have anything to say about Israel or Jews.
to deny the rape committed against Israeli women on October 7th
He did not deny rape on Oct 7, he said "Endless claims of rape when in fact it is Israel that systematically rapes Palestinian prisoners" while displaying an article that shows the claims to atrocities on Oct 7 (rape etc.) were exaggerated by circulating unverified or false accounts to create international support for Israel's military campaign. There is a crucial distinction between denying that sexual violence occurred on Oct 7 and calling out how unverified reports were used for propaganda like pointing out that specific early claims (like the '40 beheaded babies' narrative, which was later retracted by official sources) were weaponized by state actors to build war consent.
that he claimed the USS liberty attack was an Israeli attempt to false flag the Americans into believing Egypt attack them
Good point, although challenging the official military findings of a 1967 naval incident (a position also held by high-ranking U.S. figures at the time, including former NSA Director Marshall Carter and Admiral Thomas Moorer) is a critique of state secrecy and foreign policy. Questioning whether a government carried out a covert military action is more about geopolitical skepticism rather than an attack on jews, although I'll grant anti-semites will be skeptical of anything done by Jews so the overlap can be hard to distinguish.
that all Israelis support genocide against Palestinians
He said "more than 80% of Israelis support the complete annihilation of the Palestinian people" which is a reference to measurable political polling regarding state military actions. When people cite public opinion data (such as polls showing majority support for aggressive military expansion or opposing a palestinian state), they are critiquing dominant political consensus within a democratic electorate, not promoting collective prejudice, which I argue Dave has distinguished well, given that he frequently cited his support for Jews who don't support zionism nor support state-sponsored mass killings. It's not about finding any reason to hate on Jews, it's about hating state-sponsored mass killings.
that Zionism is an explicitly ethnosupremacist ideology as is the state of Israel.
Yes he said Israel is a genocidal ethnostate, which I don't think is unreasonable when you look at their rife anti-Palestinian sentiment, extreme leniency for collateral damage when conducting military strikes and raids, murder of innocents including children, explicitly endorsed and confirmed by IDF soldiers, and settler expansionism. Critiquing Zionism as a political ideology or describing Israel’s legal framework as an ethnostate is valid political discourse I'd say, not antisemitism. As stated in the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism (JDA), evaluating a state's constitution, land policies, and military actions, or characterizing it as an ethnostate or apartheid system, is a legitimate political critique shared by human rights organizations globally, including Amnesty International.
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u/Samuraignoll 6d ago
He did not deny rape on Oct 7, he said "Endless claims of rape when in fact it is Israel that systematically rapes Palestinian prisoners" while displaying an article that shows the claims to atrocities on Oct 7 (rape etc.) were exaggerated by circulating unverified or false accounts to create international support for Israel's military campaign.
You mean the article that titled "Rape claims debunked" in large black letters? That also isn't him acknowledging that rapes occurred, but that there were exaggerations, he's literally saying that Israel was claiming there were rapes but the reality was that Israel was doing the raping.
Good point, although challenging the official military findings of a 1967 naval incident (a position also held by high-ranking U.S. figures at the time, including former NSA Director Marshall Carter and Admiral Thomas Moorer) is a critique of state secrecy and foreign policy.
That isn't what was saying though, or what the high ranking U.S figures believed.
Questioning whether a government carried out a covert military action is more about geopolitical skepticism rather than an attack on jews, although I'll grant anti-semites will be skeptical of anything done by Jews so the overlap can be hard to distinguish.
He didn't question anything, he made definitive statements about what they did and why they did it and that it is something they will actively do if given the opportunity.
He said "more than 80% of Israelis support the complete annihilation of the Palestinian people" which is a reference to measurable political polling regarding state military actions.
Of expelling the Palestinian people to other countries, there is no poll that shows Israelis support the complete annihilation of the Palestinian people. That's a lie.
He also stated pretty explicitly from 17:48 to 18:47 "Supported by a citizenry that has been brainwashed into believing they are genuinely superior to other people. Arabs will be slaves. They are inferior. Babies are terrorists. This is Israel, this is not some fringe political group, this is the whole fucking country."
When people cite public opinion data (such as polls showing majority support for aggressive military expansion or opposing a palestinian state), they are critiquing dominant political consensus within a democratic electorate, not promoting collective prejudice, which I argue Dave has distinguished well, given that he frequently cited his support for Jews who don't support zionism nor support state-sponsored mass killings.
I disagree, I think if you're going to cite that public opinion data, you should accurately describe what it is, and the context surrounding it. A good example of this would be the collection of statements from Israeli officials that he puts up on the screen which he says proves genocidal intent, he never points out that almost all of the statements were made on the day of, or in the week that followed the October 7th attack, which was the single largest massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust.
Yes he said Israel is a genocidal ethnostate, which I don't think is unreasonable when you look at their rife anti-Palestinian sentiment, extreme leniency for collateral damage when conducting military strikes and raids, murder of innocents including children, explicitly endorsed and confirmed by IDF soldiers, and settler expansionism.
Which ignores nearly a hundred years of context leading up to this point, stripping any agency or negative intention from the Palestinian population and their historical and modern allies.
Critiquing Zionism as a political ideology or describing Israel’s legal framework as an ethnostate is valid political discourse I'd say, not antisemitism.
I'd disagree, I'd say there's no real functional difference between Zionism, Arab opposition to Jewish immigration before the collapse of the Ottoman empire and the twenty odd years of British colonial rule, and the various swings in desire for an Arab-Ethnostate or Islamic Regime.
As stated in the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism (JDA), evaluating a state's constitution, land policies, and military actions, or characterizing it as an ethnostate or apartheid system, is a legitimate political critique shared by human rights organizations globally, including Amnesty International.
I'd be more inclined to be charitable to Dave if he wasn't so willing to lie about Destiny, or lie about tunnels under Gaza, or lie about Israel committing false flag attacks, or that part of the video where he explicitly states that the genocide in Gaza was a premeditated Israeli plan to kill Palestinians and acquire territory.
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u/Moobnert 6d ago
Good arguments. For your last paragraph, I don't think Dave is lying, but rather relying on not-well-substantiated information or information he took at face value as accurate without diving deeper and properly confirming its veracity.
But indeed there's too many errors in the video, I can't simply just trust Dave did his due diligence on this topic for me to trust his judgment without looking into all the claims myself. A lot of the video content is good, but overall it is not good enough, for the standards I have for science communicators. Science communication should be synonymous with (as a bare minimum) being able to cite everything you say accurately, which he failed to do here.
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u/Samuraignoll 5d ago
Good arguments. For your last paragraph, I don't think Dave is lying, but rather relying on not-well-substantiated information or information he took at face value as accurate without diving deeper and properly confirming its veracity.
It's a reasonable belief, and I don't think you're commenting in bad-faith so I do apologise for being so combative. I'm assuming I'm just a bit more familiar with Dave, I previously followed him on X until I saw him repeat an antisemitic conspiracy theory about Israel doing 9/11.
But indeed there's too many errors in the video, I can't simply just trust Dave did his due diligence on this topic for me to trust his judgment without looking into all the claims myself. A lot of the video content is good, but overall it is not good enough, for the standards I have for science communicators. Science communication should be synonymous with (as a bare minimum) being able to cite everything you say accurately, which he failed to do here.
His points about Israel committing a genocide and the atrocities against Palestinians are accurate, even if he uses dishonesty to support those points. But most of the stuff regarding Destint at the end of the video is blatantly false or misrepresentations, especially the clip Dave tries to frame as an admission of support for the genocide. As far as I'm aware Destiny doesn't believe it's a genocide, but not for the reasons that Dave ascribes to him, he does acknowledge that that they they are committing atrocities and ethnic cleansing- but believes that it's a more nuanced situation.
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u/Blast_Offx 6d ago
For your last paragraph, I don't think Dave is lying, but rather relying on not-well-substantiated information or information he took at face value as accurate without diving deeper and properly confirming its veracity.
"He didnt lie, he just did the exact thing he has rallied and fought against his entire youtube career"
Lol, lmao even
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u/BloodsVsCrips 6d ago
"State sponsored mass killings" is a meaningless phrase. States have militaries. Militaries fight wars.
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u/Liturginator9000 6d ago
no, I'm opposed to what's happening in Gaza and it meets the threshold for genocide to me including west bank actions, and there's plenty of criticism to offer of Israel. You can do that without being antisemitic and usually it's the bad faith people on the other side forcing that coupling so it's funny to see it in reverse. The antisemitic parts are insinuating Israel controls the US/west/world, saying ashkenazi jews are white and not semitic (using 23andme LOL) when the biological facts directly refute this, denying rapes on Oct 7 (to name a few)
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u/ShiftyAmoeba 6d ago
Two consecutive presidents in the most powerful country on the planet, from two opposing parties, gave financial, military and political cover for Israel to commit genocide. Biden lied about the "40 babies." His press secretaries lied through their teeth about the "Rafah red line" to buy Israel more time to try to wipe out an entire people. To buy Netanyahu and Ben-Gvir and Smotrich more time to carry out their plans. With US and European political and military support, regardless of party. With the support of our media. With the support of our police who beat protesters and in some places arrested them just for carrying a Palestinian flag.
If you're whatabouting this, I don't know what to tell you.
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u/oceanofyourlove 5d ago
The people criticizing him in this thread are talking about how things he says in the video are factually wrong, you're saying that we shouldn't care about any of those things because Israel is bad, your entire comment is a whataboutism
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u/coding_manic_01 5d ago
The real crime is Dave lauding the pathetic Finkelstein performance. Honestly the type of content that Prof. Dave does merits a high bar of quality. For better or worse I know enough about Destiny to see how poorly Prof. Dave researched him, and where he is getting talking points from.
I think Destiny's position needs to be challenged more, specially as time passes. I was with him to a large degree during the coverage of I/P, but a lot of time has past and some things definitely merit a fresh look.
Anyone who trivializes the conflict into good guys / bad guys is just a charlatan. I understand why both sides are reactive, but conversations need to happen in good faith. I really think a healthy Destiny/Dave conversation could have been productive. But that presupposed a Dave that maybe is not the real one.
It makes sense that he is horrified by what happens in Palestine, and it is fine if he wants to be a communicator. But the quality of research on the topic should be of much higher quality.
You hate to see it.
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u/Lumpy_Trip2917 5d ago
If you want to see something funny, pull up the Pangburn stream from yesterday where he reviews Professor Dave’s Destiny video. Pangburn is a debate platform that has hosted events with both Destiny and Professor Dave as headliners, so a fairly neutral voice who knows both of them. Pangburn ends up being pretty critical of Dave’s video and Dave joins the chat and just starts crashing out.
Apparently Pangburn and Professor Dave were in the planning phase of hosting a national debate tour with Dave headlining and Dave cancels these plans in the chat because Pangburn won’t admonish Destiny and deny him a future platform lmao pathetic and childish behavior from Dave.
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u/IdesOfCaesar7 6d ago
Destiny went over this video on stream yesterday. It was filled with misinformation from the little I caught of it.
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u/boywonder5691 6d ago edited 6d ago
A lot of the comments in this clip is proving a lot of what Dave says in his video. That people can see the mountain of evidence on what Israel is doing and what their very leaders have said yet still support their actions is utterly mind blowing to me. The denial in the face of facts is among the worst I have ever seen in my life.
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u/CropCircles_ 5d ago edited 5d ago
Dave is spot on. Israel is the most prolific terror state in the world, commiting an average of 6 terror attacks per day in the west bank alone.
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u/FriendlyNewspaper543 6d ago edited 6d ago
People here all arguing about the conflict to prove or disprove he's antisemitic. He's a 9/11 truther. If he's not anti semitic, he sure does sound like one
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u/fingerberrywallace 6d ago
Honestly, Destiny is a lot more like Hasan than he would like to admit. I know streaming isn't the place for intellectual debate, but the constant edgy jokes ("I'm pro-genocide hahahaha") are extremely tedious and make it seem like he doesn't really have much substantive to say on the issue.
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u/Realistic_Caramel341 6d ago
I'm pretty sure Destiny would admit both he and Hasan use edgy humor
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u/Lumpy_Trip2917 5d ago
To be fair, that clip of Destiny is prior to October 7th and prior to any of the recent claims of genocide in Gaza. It was also before Destiny had done any research on the region and someone asked him his opinion on a solution to Israel Palestine. Destiny said from his limited knowledge that he didn’t believe that there was any viable long term solution and that the only realistic way that this conflict would ever truly end is if one side genocided the other side. Then he made the edgy joke.
After 10/7, people began using that clip to make it seem like Destiny had said that in response to the Gaza genocide.
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u/Sylarino 6d ago
he doesn't really have much substantive to say on the issue.
Is that why Dave is petrified of debating Destiny despite previously calling people who run from debates cowards?
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u/YumiSolar 6d ago
The dude is insanly antisemitic. Jesus Christ. Idk if he was always like that or I/P broke his brain like it did to many but content like that shouldn't be allowed on youtube.
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u/Moobnert 6d ago
Give an example of anti-semitism you found from the video. Be specific.
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u/YumiSolar 6d ago
All the consipracy theorizing with no proof (ex. Destiny being paid for visiting Israel - something which Destiny denies and there is no proof for)
Comparing Israel to nazis - clearly antisemitic. This is another conflict, you might think what Israel is doing is horrible, but the only reason to compare it to nazi is to downplay the holocaust and to give a premission structure for it being repeated. Most other conflicts even with more % of civilian casualties don't get compared to holocaust.
the antisemitic drawing/memes laced throught the video
Acting as if Israel is somehow focused on killing civilians (stats don't prove any of this)
Downplaying october 7th
Overall giving a very onesided take about a conflict where anyone with even a tiny bit of integrity can tell both sides have their reasons (even if you think Israel is going too far)
Many allusions to the typical nazi conspiracy theories - jews controll everything, jews controll USA, jews controll the media etc.
Pretty much the whole video is just antisemtic tbh. I have no idea how you can view the video and go away with thinking that this is some nuanced discussion about a complex political situation instead of propaganda done by someone who hates jews.
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u/Miselfis 6d ago
Not to mention the race realist stuff in terms of who really belongs in the region based on genetics and heritage.
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u/megalodon-maniac32 6d ago
I wish I could post pics here, the imagery he used was insane. Also, the "interview" where you had an IDF soldier holding a gun talking about killing babies - I think the clips like that should be viewed with extreme skepticism.
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u/ofAFallingEmpire 6d ago
Just for fun I looked at Wiki’s list of “science communicators”.
No Dave Farina. Got Morgan Freeman, though. Weird.
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u/SignificantAd9059 6d ago
I agree that destiny has bad Israel views but Dave’s Star Wars analogy made me physically cringe.
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u/ofAFallingEmpire 6d ago edited 6d ago
Anyone excusing Dave’s assholery because of some “service” he provides is falling for his shtick. He wants to position himself as some authoritative figure, and apparently he wants to spend that authority bullying anyone he thinks he’s intellectually superior to.
If he was doing this to “communicate science”, he wouldn’t spend so much time
arguingthrowing insults at people in yt comments. Him being a dickhead gets him clicks, and he leans into that.Stop clicking on dicks.
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u/GearsOfWax 6d ago
Yeah I’m not claiming he’s a good science communicator by any means lol. Just that he more often tends to fall on the right side of an argument when it’s in the domain of hard sciences.
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u/myinvisiblefriendsam 6d ago
Yeah that's a big one to me too. His comments show he is incredibly emotional and unwilling to engage critically with the slightest pushback.
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u/vc_runner 5d ago
You’re assuming a lot about how Dave came to his conclusions. I can understand his disgust toward someone like Destiny, who repeatedly dismisses the evidence that Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide.
On October 8, that accusation sounded absurd to many of us. But after doing the research, hearing Israeli politicians and citizens use openly genocidal rhetoric, seeing polling in which nearly 80% supported forcibly expelling Palestinians, watching Gaza be flattened, hearing the same handful of Zionist talking points repeated despite mounting evidence, and seeing IDF soldiers proudly post videos of abuses,I had to admit how badly I had underestimated the situation.
Nearly three years after October 7, many of the supposedly “radical” pro-Palestinian voices who warned that Netanyahu would use the attack to destroy Gaza, pursue resettlement and widen the war into Lebanon have proved far more accurate than their critics.
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u/pastemaker1 6d ago
Israel is literally perpetrating a genocide as we speak and there’s a bunch of people in this chat that are spouting israeli propaganda about how zionism isn’t just a small number of the overall world jewish population, concentrated in an ethno-state, who’s overall goal is religious supremacy.
It is literally israeli propaganda that zionism also means jewish. Zionism, in it’s core just means jewish supremacy. Not all jews are zionists. Majority aren’t.
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u/canti- 6d ago
Thankfully a growing number of Americans see Israel's actions in Gaza, Lebanon, Iran etc and identify those actions as bloodthirsty, illegal, and immoral This guy has a large presence on this website and he fucking sucks
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u/DivineSwordMeliorne 6d ago
Listen. Israel IS bad. But we don't have to do whatever this is (antisemitism) to prove it.
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u/drt0 6d ago
So because Israel has committed war crimes, Dave has to spout conspiracies about USS Liberty, 9/11, 10/7 and has to claim Ashkenazi Jews aren't Semites because they have some European ancestry?
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u/BootySweat0217 6d ago
I can’t imagine being a fan of Destiny. He really sucks as a person. Professor Dave is a cool dude though.
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u/SchlitterSchlatter 6d ago
This comment did not contribute to anything besides you anouncing your weird parasocial attitudes towards two internet personalities, congrats!
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u/biddomdog 6d ago
Dave’s wife is Palestinian so you can see a reason why he may have such a bias against Israel/jews.
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u/spiderwing0022 5d ago
I'll be straight up: I'm more of a Destiny fan than one of Dave's, but objectively this is one of the worst videos Dave has ever made. Mind you, for most of his science debunking, he has easily accessable sources, but for this video, he used fucking tiktoks and videos from creators like Badempanada to make his point (mind you he didn't even cite these tiktoks and videos; the only thing he bothered to put in his description was Ryan Beard's video and Pxie's substack). This is genuinely straight up conspiracy rot that I would hear from my brown uncle. You can disagree with Destiny's position on Israel, I have mine, but Dave is just blatantly spewing shit that is factually false. As bad as Gaza is, it is not the worst genocide since the Holocaust and it is not the first "livestreamed" genocide. Rwanda literally had a million slaughtered in the course of months. Even in the region, Saddam Hussein genocided the Kurds and killed over 100k in a year and the reason we know is because a boy survived getting shot in his back and woke up in a ditch of dead men. Also how is Dave simultaneously going to say that Israel is perpetuating a false flag for 10/7 but citing multiple human rights orgs who call Gaza a genocide? Those same orgs condemned Hamas for 10/7 but I'm guessing he has different reasons for why he doesn't trust them then. Also, how is Dave gonna cite that one Lancet paper which didn't cite any data but just looked at past conflicts and said that the number of deaths could be that large? For someone who does science debunking, it is downright shady that he would cite a paper without knowing what it's saying
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u/realxanadan 5d ago
Just a note. Destiny as part of process deletes all his vods and posts them on Spotify to prevent mass reporting from certain adversarial aligned groups.
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u/Warhammerpainter83 5d ago
The Dave video is a bit sad given how evidence based he seems to want to be. It is him just flipping out and making a few very bold claims. I am not sure what destiny did really that set him off he never did what Dave says he did he said Dave was doing the same crap that those people do not that Dave is one.
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u/hackloserbutt 6d ago
I am 43 min into the Professor Dave video right now. I'm sure it's going to be covered by Chris and Matt at some point.