Narrative

I'm so fascinated by this concept of narrative. Everything is a narrative. History is a narrative. Even if everything you tell is absolutely true, you still have a storyline and you tell the stories that fit it.

For example, I was listening to an interview with a man who lives in Northern Israel and works for mainstream media (he didn't say which channel). He's displaced, as are most residents of the north, so since the war started he's been living in Tel Aviv. At one point his media outlet asked him to write an article about families (like his) who'd evacuated their homes up north. He found ten families who agreed to be interviewed, but of course each family had a different opinion about the situation. He was told to pick the family who was most outspoken against the government and was not planning on going back to their home.

So see? There are all sorts of stories out there, but this media outlet has a narrative saying that the people in the north are unsafe and it's all the government's fault, so that's the story they chose to publish. 

But I don't want to do that. I'm going to try to write down all the war stories as I've heard them and I hope that anyone reading this can appreciate that people are complicated. Stories are neither good nor bad, they just are.

Trolling

Have I mentioned that internet trolling is my new fun hobby? I like to respond to anti-Israel commenters on Instagram and Facebook, it fills my days with meaning ><

I try to only post comments on Israeli/Jewish pages because I want to boost engagement on their posts, so if someone writes something rude or wrong or anti-Israel I'll respond. Also, sometimes I write on random international parts of the internet. Like, for the people out there who know nothing - here's a taste of what being Israeli is actually like. For instance, I'm kinda proud of this comment I left in a group called "Dull Men's Club:"

The group is for people (not just men) to post silly and mildly-interesting things they notice. It's quite cute, all kids of distracting content that's usually somewhat entertaining. This one post was about bus stops somewhere in northern Ireland (maybe? Don't remember), where they build cement structures to block the wind in case of severe storms. This Trevor guy said it looked like rocket launchers (it didn't, but fine), and I took the bait and responded with a picture of a migunit in Sderot. I thought I'd get hate comments, but here are just 5 random people who saw my picture and learned something new. Maybe they'll remember it? Maybe when someone mentions the war in Gaza they'll be able to say something about Palestinians shooting rockets into Israeli cities?