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Why Does Anti-Semitism Always Follow Anti-Racism?
We’ve spent the last few weeks having a necessary conversation about racism in our country. I’m all for it. But I can’t help but wonder: Why is it when we promote anti-racism does anti-Semitism creep in, and why do the same folks claiming to care about racism stay silent when the hatred is directed towards the Jewish community?
In the past 24 hours, Jameela Jamil, Chelsea Handler & Jessica Chastain have shared on Instagram a video of vicious anti-Semite Louis Farrakhan discussing racism.
They say: "Extraordinary." "Powerful." They have over 10M followers. @jameelajamil @chelseahandler @jes_chastain pic.twitter.com/xfdr4aKRch
— John-Paul Pagano (@johnpaulpagano) June 16, 2020
When made aware of Farakkan’s statements on “Jewish termites” Handler doubled down.
Anyone talking about Chelsea Handler's defense of Farrakhan as fine because his anti-Semitism didn't lead to six million dead Jews and really when you think about it, it's sorta their fault he's anti-Semitic anyway? No? OK, just checking. pic.twitter.com/GRqI6vw0mN
— neontaster (@neontaster) June 16, 2020
It’s not just stupid celebrities elevating anti-Semites just because they say the right things on racism. In Los Angeles, a Nation of Islam leader, Tony Muhammed spoke to the Mayor and city leaders and was welcomed with open arms, despite his long history of anti-Semitism. Muhammed has deep ties with the Scientology community, which is why this anti-Scientology Twitter account tracks his movements closely:
Fact that #Scientology Freedom Medal Winner Nation of Islam Minister Tony Muhammad is #Antisemitic did not stop him from speaking before @MayorOfLA at 6/4/20 Justice Matters meeting. See — https://t.co/kru4cxLtdy
cc @LA_ADL @UltioetVeritas https://t.co/kE3s4IDF9a
— ISNOINews (@ISNOINews) June 14, 2020
What does this moment stand for if it only stands against some hatred? Is it too much to ask for those countering hatred against black Americans do the same for Jewish ones as well?
Published in General
Unfortunately the answer is apparently often yes. Lord knows the beloved Mayor of NYC is proud to espouse his anti-racism credentials (to the point of instructing contact tracers not to ask about BLM protest attendance) yet has not problem bullying the Jewish community.
I suppose it’s because of the fact that Jews are, as a group, practically in and of themselves a repudiation of the most basic premise of the perpetually-aggrieved: “Our current struggles and dissatisfactions are because of the atrocities committed against our ancestors.”
It lacks principle to oppose prejudice against one group but not all groups.
This infuriates me. Racism is systemic and the most anodyne comment is met with scorn and fury (see Drew Brees). Virulent anti semitism is ignored at best, rationalized at worst.
The activist left never simply wants to deal with with racism as a stand-alone issue — it’s always part of their bundled package where racism is the foot-in-the-door to get people to try and support their other pet causes, one of which is ‘othering’ Jews using anti-Semitism.
That’s got a number of different sources, including the European left’s long-standing anti-Semitism, while in the U.S. you have factors like the urban interactions over the years between blacks and Jews and how the angry left has tried to use class warfare to stir up anger (they’ve also had no problem stiring up anger over the years between blacks and Asians, as the early 1990s targeting of Korean groceries in New York and Los Angeles showed). Anti-Semitism also increased over the past 40 years in part because Israel is no longer seen as a partner in big government, as it was during its first 30 years when Labor was in control. With Likud running the country most the time since 1977, many on the left view Israel as akin to a U.S. Red State, where the hatred stems from how Jews vote there, even if a majority of Jews still are loyal Democrats in America.
The phenomenon of seeing Israel in Red State/Blue State terms (only Britain among other nations is viewed in the same way) means the left bonds with the most radical of Israel’s opponents — Iran, Hebollah, Hamas — and merges their anti-Israel feelings into their own Jew hatred (in the deepest Blue areas, it also goes on to explain someone like Ilhan Omar or Rashida Tlaib to Congress; both base their anti-Semitism on religious ground, though Omar’s really more of a secular socialist than a Muslim and comes at the Jews from that direction as well, with her “All about the Benjamins” quote from a year ago).
Combined, all those paths to anti-Semitism feed on each other as part of the left’s overall set of greivenaces designed to stir up hatred.
Obama went repeatedly on Al Sharpton’s radio show and the MSM yawned (see Crown Heights). His picture with Farrakhan was suppressed for many years. Jesse Jackson used an anti-Semitic slur to describe NYC. Alas, this has been a pattern recently.
Maybe your premise is faulty. Maybe the last two weeks hasn’t been “a necessary conversation about race in our country”, but a smokescreen for the promotion of progressive ideals. Progressivism divides people into identity groups and pits them against each other, establishing a hierarchy. As a subset of whites, Jews are near the bottom.
Because bigotries, and also bigots, are not all the same. Because hatred and contempt – and their signaled opposites – are often fashion statements. Because when groups feel that they are considered low, they often console themselves that they are at least not as low as other groups.
Antisemitism is quite unlike other bigotries; it is ancient, it is perennial, it requires effort on the part of the bigot to discover his target, and it meshes easily with religious beliefs, nationalism, and class warfare. It seems almost alive – or at least undead.
To the main question in the post, though, I don’t believe that Antisemitism and anti-racism are linked, but that anti-racism and anti-non-cis-phobia* are so ascendant, religion so devalued, and Jews so easily accused of white privilege, that there’s not just not much pushback at large. Additionally, the Chelsea Handlers of the world would never have the spine to criticize anyone speaking positively about BLM, least of all a man of Farrakhan’s regrettable stature and unfortunate popularity.
___________
*New Coinage?
Anti-semite hall of famer Al Sharpton is on his way to Tulsa to stir things up with his own particular brand of garbage in advance of Trump’s visit.
I’m confused by this. Did Farrakhan say something anti-Semitic in the video that these celebrities shared? (I assume that they are celebrities, though I’ve only heard of one of them.) Did Tony Muhammad say something anti-Semitic at this meeting in LA?
I don’t have the time or inclination to listen to their statements. I watched a small portion of Muhammad’s speech, in which he said that this country was founded on looting and violence. It looks like an anti-white diatribe, which is what I would expect, but I don’t care to parse it in detail.
Did they say something specifically anti-Semitic, or just generally anti-white? Is the problem just that you think these two guys ought to be cancelled, due to prior statements or associations?
The left lacks principle.
Or maybe that movie stars who claim to be against bigotry and hatred ought not to be enthusiastically sharing the views of those who have repeatedly made anti-Semitic statements in the past and never renounced anti-Semitism. Given how much downright athletic apologizing whites are supposed to do for things they’ve never said and sins they haven’t committed, there is the usual, blindingly obvious double-standard at work.
I don’t see Bethany or anyone else suggesting that Twitter should ban anybody, or that either the movie stars or Farrakhan himself should be de-platformed.
No, I think that Bethany is suggesting again, in the absence of evidence, that there’s some serious outbreak of anti-Semitism. She has to look pretty hard to find a scintilla of evidence of this. We’re having an outbreak of accusations of white-on-black racism at the moment, largely unfounded in my view, and accompanied by unapologetic anti-white racism (as usual).
This has nothing to do with Jewish folks, as far as I can tell, except that they are (sometimes) lumped in with the rest of us palefaces.
Why does everyone hate the Jews? You set a bad example of overcoming slavery, prejudice and genocide to become productive and affluent citizens in a capitalist democracy. What’s not to hate?
We’re swimming in an ocean of lies. The anti-racists are the (systemically) racist. The anti-fascists are the fascists. The anti-capitalists whine to their comrades about having their Mac Book reallocated out their tent.
It should come as no surprise that the anti-bigots are also anti-Semites. It’s the perennial, everlasting bigotry.
I have the same question.
We’ve had the same argument before—and I’ll just say that, perhaps like Bethany, I am hypervigilant when it comes to anti-Semitism.
Black Lives Matter is about as far-left as it gets and among it’s many other faults is also anti-Semitic. Their policy agenda supports the Boycott, Divest and Sanction (BDS) movement.
They’re not alone.
“Can’t we all stop focusing on our differences and look at what we have in common . . . our hatred of Jews”
Honestly, these people should call themselves Racists Against Racism.
Yes, I know. I worry that hypervigilance is not necessarily helpful in this area, as it can lead to excessive and perhaps unfounded accusations, which exacerbates tensions.
The OP mentions Farrakhan, and another guy (who I don’t think that I’ve ever heard of) with the Nation of Islam. I am no fan of the Nation of Islam, and my own opinion is that Farrakhan has an anti-Semitism problem. This goes for Al Sharpton, too, though he’s not mentioned in the OP.
I just don’t see the current unrest having anything to do with anti-Semitism. It looks like a combination of anti-Americanism, anti-white racism, anti-cop sentiment, Trump Derangement Syndrome, and some legitimate concerns about racial issues in policing.
I find issues of racism generally, and anti-Semitism specifically, to be complicated. There’s a tendency to focus on individual sensational incidents (usually sensationally bad, or apparently bad). Such incidents are generally not representative of anything widespread. It’s a confirmation bias issue, as we tend to see what we’re looking for.
Getting to the facts requires careful, empirical research. This is not very exciting, and doesn’t get many clicks.
I think that it’s worth asking whether such hypervigilance can, itself, amount to racism or some other -ism in the other direction.
In addition, I’m not particularly fond of the “canceling” tactic that is evident in the OP, I think. So Farrakhan says something about race. Maybe he’s making good points, maybe not. Accusing him of anti-Semitism doesn’t seem to be a helpful response, and it’s even worse to use the sort of guilt-by-association tactic that is explicitly used in the OP, to criticize people who merely shared a video of someone else.
I don’t think that this is true. Hatreds between different racial and ethnic groups, and between people of different religions, seems to be as old as history. The Israelites do it quite a lot in the Old Testament.
It is true that Jews are one of the oldest surviving, readily identifiable groups, so I guess they have a longer history of being on the receiving end of such strife than other groups. The Edomites and Moabites don’t seem to be around as an identifiable group any more.
Hostility toward Finance generally winds up manifesting itself as anti-Semitism. (I’m sure there are a lot of people who think Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan is Jewish). People who are not doing well financially quite often focus their hostility toward the finance industry, as do some people who doing OK financially but are unsettled by the complexity of modern society. Finance seems mysterious, and hence makes a good target for conspiratorial thinking. And, in the folk imagination, finance is Jewish, regardless of how many Dimons and Moynihans there may be.
I still think GD’s point stands on vocal celebrities and their specious quest for cosmic justice. They’re talking about Nazi’s and systemic racism after all. It’s one thing that they don’t speak for Jews as major victims. It’s another that they’ll defend people who want to throw them under the bus.
I agree with you that there isn’t much of an uptick in anti-Semitism, just an uptick in racism. The Left has a real racism issue and we ought to shove their words back down their throats.
Vandalism of 8 synagogues and Jewish schools in Los Angeles.
Pretty sure this wasn’t don’t by Young Republicans or Southern fundamentalist Christians.
The US doesn’t have anything like traditional European levels of anti-Semitism, but there is a fair amount among Democrats. Here is some comparative survey data…this is from 2012, but I doubt if Democrat attitudes toward Jews have gotten more positive since then.
Israel, Obama, Democrats, and Jews
We also have seen how de Blasio has specifically targeted Jews.
You also had this in Los Angeles the first weekend of the rioting. Anti-Semitism may not be the driving force here, but the anti-Semites are taking advantage of the situation where they can to get in their shots…
Perhaps the people “conversing” against racism are not, after all, against racism. Perhaps they are only using superficial anti-racism as a cover for less noble pursuits.
About LA: How many other businesses, churches, and buildings were vandalized? It’s hard to tell whether these particular 8 reported vandalisms reflect a specific targeting of Jews, or just a small part of general mayhem.
I’m also not sure what you mean about de Blasio specifically targeting Jews. I seem to recall that he made an issue of a Jewish funeral, or something like that, in violation of COVID restrictions. But that’s not proof of having “targeted Jews,” absent evidence that some other religious group was allowed to act in the same way.
These offers of proof of anti-Semitism rely on the same flawed methodology as the racist-cops narrative. Rather than rely on a comparison of similarly situated individuals, a small number of anti-Jewish actions are held up as representative, without context.
Churches have been vandalized, too, including the fire at the church near the White House.