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Readers! A November fund-raising drive!

 

It is unfortunately time for another November fund-raising campaign to support my work here at Behind the Black. I really dislike doing these, but 2025 is so far turning out to be a very poor year for donations and subscriptions, the worst since 2020. I very much need your support for this webpage to survive.

 

And I think I provide real value. Fifteen years ago I said SLS was garbage and should be cancelled. Almost a decade ago I said Orion was a lie and a bad idea. As early as 1998, long before almost anyone else, I predicted in my first book, Genesis: The Story of Apollo 8, that private enterprise and freedom would conquer the solar system, not government. Very early in the COVID panic and continuing throughout I noted that every policy put forth by the government (masks, social distancing, lockdowns, jab mandates) was wrong, misguided, and did more harm than good. In planetary science, while everyone else in the media still thinks Mars has no water, I have been reporting the real results from the orbiters now for more than five years, that Mars is in fact a planet largely covered with ice.

 

I could continue with numerous other examples. If you want to know what others will discover a decade hence, read what I write here at Behind the Black. And if you read my most recent book, Conscious Choice, you will find out what is going to happen in space in the next century.

 

 

This last claim might sound like hubris on my part, but I base it on my overall track record.

 

So please consider donating or subscribing to Behind the Black, either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. I could really use the support at this time. There are five ways of doing so:

 

1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.

 

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Real pushback? 1600 Harvard alumni demand the university take action against campus anti-Semitism

Is Harvard really willing to oppose bigotry?
Will Harvard really shut down to its racist programs?

Bring a gun to a knife fight: In what is certainly an encouraging sign that many Americans are finally waking up to the utter bankruptcy of modern academia, a group of 1,600 Harvard alumni on November 11, 2023 sent a letter to Harvard demanding it make some forceful response to the growing anti-Semitism on its campus.

Of the group’s six demands, these two stand out as most likely to accomplish some good:

  • An immediate plan and robust commitment by the College and University to curb the dissemination of hate speech and to limit the disruptiveness of rallies so that they do not interfere with students’ abilities to participate in their classes, to enter into their own dorms, and to move peacefully through the campus. In particular, we ask for the addition of religion as a targeted category for harassment in the College Handbook and for the University, and the codification of calls for violence targeting civilians as outside of acceptable behavior for University students or faculty.
  • The creation of a commission to study the roots of antisemitism on campus by investigating whether aspects of the university curriculum, the DEI framework, faculty training (or the lack thereof), and certain campus events perpetuate unreflective narratives about Jewish people and the state of Israel.


The last point is especially aimed at the prime cause of this uptick in hate. College DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) departments, all based on critical race theory that puts race and ethnicity first and specifically favors some minorities over others, have acted to enshrine bigotry and Jew-hate nationwide. These bureaucracies do nothing to encourage good will and inclusion, but actually encourage discrimination, segregation, bigotry, resentment, and hate.

The letter however does not do what this CNN report suggests, “threaten to withdraw donations” if these actions are not taken. Nowhere in the letter is this threat expressed, though the threat is obviously implicit. That the group refrained from saying so directly suggests that there are many within it who are still denying reality, still unwilling to believe that the modern racial-based identity movement — based entirely on the left and within the Democratic Party — is as powerful and as dangerous as it is.

Nonetheless, the large number of people who signed up is encouraging. It suggests the tide might finally be turning and we might finally see a real effort to end such bigoted programs.

Genesis cover

On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.

 

The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.


The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
 

"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News

11 comments

  • DEMOCRAT = “PROGRESSIVE” = JUSTIFY ANYTHING

    “If you are a knee jerk Democrat. If you are a mindless supporter of former President Barak Hussein Obama who has amazingly attempted to create a moral equivalency between the existence of Israel and the inhumane and diabolical actions of murderous and blood thirsty terrorists. ”

    Read the rest and remember to share with a confused friend on social media. They need to read such things.

    https://www.sigma3ioc.com/post/democrat-machine-progressive-support-of-hamas

  • Questioner

    I have a few questions seeking clarification:

    Who actually is a Semite? Does the term extend beyond the Jewish people? If there is anti-Semitism, then logically there must be Semitism, right? Then what does this term mean?

  • Cotour

    Semite: “a member of any of the peoples who speak or spoke a Semitic language, including in particular the Jews and Arabs.”

    Questioner, do you not know that you can enter just about any term into your search bar and the definition will instantly be displayed.

  • Questioner

    Cotour:

    Thank you for your efforts. I also wanted to ensure that the factual findings of someone other than myself were presented here. We can see that in Palestine and Israel, Semites are killing Semites. Madness! I don’t just assume that there is a linguistic connection. I also assume that there is also a genetic relationship between Arabs and Jews, because with the Islamic conquest of Eastern Roman Palestine in the 7th century, the mass population was certainly not replaced, but only the very top leadership. The mass of people simply converted to Islam. I also assume that the Jews in this area were not completely expelled by the Romans in the 1st century. But I’m not entirely sure.

  • tregonsee314

    As Cotour has noted in modern usage (definition by Oxford Dictionary) it is a speaker of the Semitic languages (a somewhat recursive definition). In the traditional views of English language the derivation is from the sons of Noah (remember in the biblical story of Noah ONLY Noah his three sons and their wives survive of humanity). The sons were Japheth, Ham, and Shem, the ite ending turns it into a descent group. So Shemites (later semite) are those descended from Shem. Most of the tribes/people groups in the modern Middle East would have been considered Semites along with the descendants of Abram/Abraham who are the Hebrews/Jews. I think in modern usage (i.e. 20th century and later) this has been practically limited to Jewish/Hebrew peoples other than special cases (as in Semitic languages).

  • roger

    “An immediate plan and robust commitment by the College and University to curb the dissemination of hate speech and to limit the disruptiveness of rallies so that they do not interfere with students’ abilities to participate in their classes, to enter into their own dorms, and to move peacefully through the campus.”

    The unadorned fact that this needs to be articulated on an American campus of Higher Education is, in and of itself, a clear measure of the loss of common values which used to be universally recognized as the foundation for beneficial and free society.

  • Cotour

    Questioner:

    Want to understand what is underway in the middle east?

    The Palestinians, who are a conquered people and should have long ago been absorbed by their conquerors, are being utilized by the radical Islamists in their efforts to destroy any sense of cooperation between the Western Judeo / Christian’s and other Muslim based societies / countries who seek such things that would make the radicals and their religious zealotry moot.

    No one wants to be passed over no pun intended) and made moot.

    The radical Islamists use Marxist / Communistic and brutal Nazi methods of control and strategy in order to ensure that they prevail and remain relevant.

    And they are directed by their religion, which is a construct of man in order to accomplish their stated strategy.

    This is an existential struggle and the now too Liberal West being infiltrated by these Leftist minded radicals within is attempting to play both sides of the game. Weak. No one respects weak leadership.

    And in this logic of the now radical Liberal Leftist leadership within the West there can be no natural resolution to the struggle.

    What is needed in order for some measure of resolution? A strong leadership in the West.

    The radical Leftists within the West are attempting to deliver America to the Globalist agenda where America is no longer dominant, and in that model most civilization IMO becomes absolute authoritarian. And you can see it now in everything that this administration is attempting to pack into its time in the sun.

    I say………..No thank you.

  • Questioner

    Cotour:

    The Palestinians are (or were not) accepted into the Israeli people because, firstly, Israel is an ethnically based, strongly nationalist state that does not want this at all, secondly, population dynamics are on their side and thirdly, Israel is a small island in a sea of Islamic States, whereby these states ultimately keep the Palestinians alive as an ethnic group through support (which, by the way, many Western states have also done).

  • Questioner wrote, “The Palestinians are (or were not) accepted into the Israeli people…”

    You are wrong on this point. The Palestinians today are the descendents of the Arabs who fled Israel after the partition in 1948, most because of lies told them by Arab leaders. The Arabs who did not flee have all become Israeli citizens, have equal rights under the law, and in fact support Israel whole-heartedly in its action in Gaza.

    Had they not fled Israel, they would have been much better off.

    Moreover, Israel gave them the chance to establish a peaceful independent neighbhoring country when it unilaterially left Gaza in 2005. Had they done so (as Egypt had done), the walls would have come down and both countries would have prospered. Instead, the Gazans chose Hamas to lead them in an never-ending campaign of genocide against all Israel. That campaign is why Israel cannot nonchalantly accept Gazans as citizens.

  • Cotour

    Questioner: Like I said, the Palestinians are a conquered people as cold as that may sound. But that is in fact the facts.

    And they are being used by “others” to further their religious and political agenda in opposition to their sworn enemies in the West.

    Something else you can look up:

    Conquered: To bring under one’s control by force of arms.
    subjugated
    enslaved
    subdued
    bound
    captive
    fettered
    subject
    dependent
    unfree
    nonautonomous
    subordinate
    non-self-governing
    subservient
    inferior

    They are conquered, but in todays modern “civilized” more Liberal world they are used for other purposes and will never be allowed to live a real and fulfilling life until this paradigm they exist within is broken one way or the other.

    Their best bet is with the West / Israel but those religious zealots who dominate them from afar would rather see them all dead before that will happen.

    So, tell me, what is the only reasonable humane alternative?

  • Jeff Wright

    We are told how brave it is to get in another’s face and scream.

    People need to remember that one person’s protestor
    —is another person’s bully.

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