Can the Unspeakable Peak the Unpeakable?

I've often sung the praises of Bari Weiss and her commitment to free speech. I think she's a liberal of the traditional form: On most matters of policy, wrong but not crazy. But on the topics of free speech, open inquiry, and (most recently) Israel, I think she's wise beyond her modest years.

In this Honestly podcast yesterday, Bari interviews a woman named Sheryl Sandberg. I gather Ms. Sandberg is a big deal in feminist circles, a prominent and powerful woman of the left. (I've never heard of her, but that's hardly surprising: She works for Meta/Facebook, and we likely agree on essentially no contentious issues.)

Until now.

Ms. Sandberg has made a documentary about the reality of the October 7 attack on Israel and the plight of the women the murdering, raping, Jew-hating Hamas butchers kidnapped. It isn't a documentary I will watch; I made it through the Bari Weiss interview and that was more than graphic enough for me. Anyway, I don't need convincing.

In the so-called "gender critical" community -- that is, among those of us who express criticism of the unhinged "trans" movement -- the term "peaking" is used to describe the moment a person realizes that something is dreadfully wrong and so begins the process of returning to what I consider to be a sane worldview. (I suspect the term is used to mean the same thing in other contexts as well.) People routinely say things like, "I was peaked when I read..." or, "What was it that peaked you?"

Ms. Sandberg has clearly been "peaked" on the matter of anti-Jewish jihad, and I welcome her adding her voice to the conversation. Let me be clear about that: She's doing noble work highlighting the fate of those murdered by Hamas and the plight of those still in the clutches of those human animals.

But "peaking" is not necessarily a holistic thing, not something that transforms an entire worldview. I wonder at the internal contradictions that must arise in someone who has had her eyes opened on one important topic, but remains steadfastly dogmatic on others I think of as equally obvious.

When the discussion turned to education in America and the question of why college students are so ignorant of, among other things, the situation in the Middle East, Ms. Sandberg said this (about 57:00):

My child who's elementary-school age, and one of my children who is in high-school age, have both said, one in more sophisticated language than another, that they're not really taught much that's positive about the United States in their school. They're just not taught that.

That was encouraging. But then:

There's a lot in our country's history to be upset about, like a lot. Let's be clear. We should be teaching how horrible slavery was, how horrible racism is, how those two are tied. But there's probably some positive things too. [emphasis mine]

And there it is: "Probably"

Again, I applaud Ms. Sandberg for being a loud voice on behalf of the victims of Hamas, and I thank her for that. At the same time, I marvel that one can look with wide-open eyes at such grotesque inhumanity and not clearly see the contrast between that and the situation of people of every race and ethnicity here in America. Ms. Sandberg continues to support Biden; I would wager substantial money that she perceives American Christians as the greatest threat to our freedom.

The blinders fall slowly.

Incidentally, Bari's shocked response was illustrative of the reasons I so appreciate her.

Probably?!