How to Have Difficult Conversations

If you're feeling heartbroken over the suffering in Israel and Gaza, consider supporting some of these humanitarian organizations: https://www.npr.org/2023/10/13/1205235922/help-israel-gaza-humanitarian-organizations This is an excerpt of this week's bonus show. To listen to the full episode, get all episodes ad free, invites to exclusive events, submit questions for regular Q&As, and more, subcribe on Patreon by signing up at Patreon.com/Gaslit.

It's been a week since the Hamas terrorist massacre targeting Israeli civilians, followed by Israel dropping 6,000 bombs on Gaza in a matter of days. The cruel PR spin of Israel calling on civilians to leave Gaza only puts more lives in danger. It was never about helping the civilians, as Israel's bombing of that so-called "exit route" shows, as reported on by MSNBC.

Many Israelis grieving over the loss of their loved ones call for peace, and protests grow against Netanyahu and his government whose extremist chaos and genocidal political movement left Israeli civilians vulnerable to Hamas's attack. Netanyahu finally got the genocide and mass displacement of Palestinians that he wanted, but at what cost to him, Israel, and the world?

Our collective grief and anger make conversations about this extraordinarily tragic time, the countless loss of innocent lives on both sides of the war, incredibly difficult. In this conversation, Terrell Starr of the Black Diplomats podcast joins Andrea to discuss how to protect your relationships when talking about global tragedies, including setting and enforcing boundaries when needed. The discussion includes a look at U.S. foreign policy in relation to Russia, ending on a check list of protecting your mental health while engaging online. There's no video for this bonus show as the discussion was a spontaneous continuation of the emotional public episode, and the video feature had already been turned off. Apologies for that.

If you have children or work with children, below is a list of resources on how to address this news and tragedies in general with young people:

Helping Kids Cope with Frightening News (Child Mind Institute) https://childmind.org/article/helping-children-cope-frightening-news/

Explaining the News to Our Kids (Common Sense Media) https://www.commonsensemedia.org/articles/explaining-the-news-to-our-kids?overridden_route_name=entity.node.canonical&base_route_name=entity.node.canonical&page_manager_page=node_view&page_manager_page_variant=node_view-panels_variant-csm_blog&page_manager_page_variant_weight=-6

Talking to Kids About Violence (National Association of School Psychologists) https://www.nasponline.org/resources-and-publications/resources-and-podcasts/school-safety-and-crisis/school-violence-resources/talking-to-children-about-violence-tips-for-families-and-educators

How to talk to your children about the violence in Israel and Gaza (NPR) https://www.npr.org/2023/10/11/1205017249/how-to-talk-to-children-violence-israeli-palestinian-gaza-hamas

Show Notes:

How to help humanitarian efforts in Israel and Gaza https://www.npr.org/2023/10/13/1205235922/help-israel-gaza-humanitarian-organizations

Israeli Air Force Says It Has Dropped 6,000 Bombs on Gaza https://www.wsj.com/livecoverage/israel-hamas-war-gaza-strip/card/israeli-air-force-says-it-has-dropped-6-000-bombs-on-gaza-QK1aSnupiGqytMVO86PU

People in Gaza describe living through bombings with no way to escape https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/people-in-gaza-describe-living-through-bombings-with-no-way-to-escape

MSNBC: 70 killed after Israeli strikes hit three convoys of evacuees trying to leave northern Gaza. https://twitter.com/MSNBC/status/1712911792106602608

Israel Must Not React Stupidly If this is Israel's 9/11, it can learn from America's mistakes. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/10/israeli-government-response-hamas-attack-gaza-9-11-lessons/675622/

Victoria Brownworth @VABVOX: Veteran Israel-Palestine reporter @NTarnopolsky tells @MSNBC calls for Netanyahu to resign are rising, that families of the hostages feel abandoned by the PM and there is a protest of more than 1k people outside the Israeli Defense Ministry. https://twitter.com/VABVOX/status/1713183956097548446