Why So Many People Still Don’t Understand Anti-Semitism: Unlike many other bigotries, anti-Semitism is not merely a social prejudice; it is a conspiracy theory about how the world operates
Yair Rosenberg oversimplifies below. The conspiracists he describes do exist but there are many non-conspiracists who simply dislike Jews on account of behavior they claim to have have observed among Jews. It is foolish either to ignore or demonize such people. I say more on varieties of antisemitism here:
http://jonjayray.com/semitism.html
Most people do not realize that Jews make up just 2 percent of the U.S. population and 0.2 percent of the world’s population. This means simply finding them takes a lot of effort. But every year in Western countries, including America, Jews are the No. 1 target of anti-religious hate crimes. Anti-Semites are many things, but they aren’t lazy. They’re animated by one of the most durable and deadly conspiracy theories in human history.
This past Saturday in Texas, another one found his mark. According to the latest news reports, Malik Faisal Akram traversed an ocean to accomplish his task, flying from the United Kingdom to America in late December. On January 15, he took Colleyville’s Congregation Beth Israel hostage for more than 11 hours. When it was all over, Akram was dead and his captives were not. The hostages escaped after their rabbi engineered a distraction, drawing on security training he had received from the Anti-Defamation League and other communal organizations. Something else most people don’t realize is that many rabbis need and receive security training.
Speaking about Jews as symbols is always uncomfortable, and that’s especially the case when bullet holes are still fresh in the sanctuary. But the sad fact is, that’s why the Texas congregants were attacked in the first place: because Jews play a sinister symbolic role in the imagination of so many that bears no resemblance to their lived existence.
After Akram pulled a gun on the congregation, he demanded to speak to the rabbi of New York’s Central Synagogue, who he claimed could authorize the release of Aafia Siddiqui, a Pakistani woman serving an attempted murder sentence in a Fort Worth facility near Beth Israel.
Obviously, this is not how the prison system works. “This was somebody who literally thought that Jews control the world,” Beth Israel Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker told The Forward. “He thought he could come into a synagogue, and we could get on the phone with the ‘Chief Rabbi of America’ and he would get what he needed.”
Gary Rosenblatt: Is it still safe to be a Jew in America?
I happen to know Angela Buchdahl, the rabbi of that New York synagogue, and I think she would make an excellent chief rabbi of America. But no such position exists. Jews are a famously fractious lot who can rarely agree on anything, let alone their religious leadership. We do not spend our days huddled in smoke-filled rooms plotting world domination while Jared Kushner plays dreidel in the back with Noam Chomsky and George Soros sneaks the last latke.
The notion that such a minuscule and unmanageable minority secretly controls the world is comical, which may be why so many responsible people still do not take the anti-Semitic conspiracy theory seriously, or even understand how it works. In the moments after the Texas crisis, the FBI made an official statement declaring that the assailant was “particularly focused on one issue, and it was not specifically related to the Jewish community.” Of course, the gunman did not travel thousands of miles to terrorize some Mormons. He sought out a synagogue and took it hostage over his grievances, believing that Jews alone could resolve them. That’s targeting Jews, and there’s a word for that.
The FBI later corrected its misstep, but the episode reflects the general ignorance about anti-Semitism even among people of goodwill. Unlike many other bigotries, anti-Semitism is not merely a social prejudice; it is a conspiracy theory about how the world operates. This addled outlook is what united the Texas gunman, a Muslim, with the 2018 shooter at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue, a white supremacist who sought to stanch the flow of Muslims into America. It is a worldview shared by Louis Farrakhan, the Black hate preacher, and David Duke, the former KKK grand wizard. And it is a political orientation that has been expressed by the self-styled Christian conservative leader of Hungary, Viktor Orbán, and Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of Iran’s Islamic theocracy.
The fevered fantasy of Jewish domination is incredibly malleable, which makes it incredibly attractive. If Jews are responsible for every perceived problem, then people with entirely opposite ideals can adopt it. And thanks to centuries of material blaming the world’s ills on the world’s Jews, conspiracy theorists seeking a scapegoat for their sorrows inevitably discover that the invisible hand of their oppressor belongs to an invisible Jew.
At the same time, because this expression of anti-Jewish prejudice is so different from other forms of bigotry, many people don’t recognize it. As in Texas, law-enforcement officials overlook it. Social-media companies ignore it. Anti-racism activists—who understand racism as prejudice wielded by the powerful—cannot grasp it, because anti-Semitism constructs its Jewish targets as the privileged and powerful. And political partisans, more concerned with pinning the problem on their opponents, spend their time parsing the identity of anti-Semitic individuals, rather than countering the ideas that animate them.
In short, although many people say they are against anti-Semitism today, they don’t understand the nature of what they oppose. And that’s part of why anti-Semitism abides.
This ignorant status quo has proved deadly for Jews, and that alone should be enough for our society to take it seriously. But it has disastrous consequences for non-Jews as well. This is because people who embrace conspiracy theories to explain their problems lose the ability to rationally solve them. As Bard College’s Walter Russell Mead has put it:
People who think “the Jews” run the banks lose the ability to understand, much less to operate financial systems. People who think “the Jews” dominate business through hidden structures can’t build or long maintain a successful modern economy. People who think “the Jews” dominate politics lose their ability to interpret political events, to diagnose social evils and to organize effectively for positive change.
For an example, just look at what happened in Texas. An anti-Semitic gunman took a synagogue hostage in the false hope that its parishioners could somehow free a federal prisoner. That prisoner herself was sentenced to 86 years in jail after she tried to fire her Jewish lawyers at trial, demanded that Jews be excluded from the jury, and declared that her guilty verdict came “from Israel and not from America.” One hateful person after another was destroyed by their own delusions. And such debilitating delusions can reverberate outward.
“Anti-Semitism has real impact beyond just hate crimes,” the civil-rights activist Eric Ward once told me. “It distorts our understanding of how the actual world works. It isolates us. It alienates us from our communities, from our neighbors, and from participating in governance. It kills, but it also kills our society.”
Yair Rosenberg: Removing a hyphen won’t stop anti-Semitism
Neither Mead nor Ward is Jewish. The former is a noted white historian and the son of a southern priest; the latter is a Black activist who fights white nationalism. Yet despite coming from different places, both have devoted much of their work to combatting anti-Jewish prejudice, and for the same reason: It threatens democracy itself.
“Anti-Semitism isn’t just bigotry toward the Jewish community,” Ward explains. “It is actually utilizing bigotry toward the Jewish community in order to deconstruct democratic practices, and it does so by framing democracy as a conspiracy rather than a tool of empowerment or a functional tool of governance.” In other words, the more people buy into anti-Semitism and its understanding of the world, the more they lose faith in democracy.
Numerous historical case studies attest to anti-Semitism undermining its adherents at a large scale, from the defeat of the Nazis, who spurned scientific advances simply because they were discovered by Jews, to European countries that hobbled themselves for centuries by expelling their Jewish populations.
“The rise of anti-Semitism is a sign of widespread social and cultural failure,” Mead writes. “It is a leading indicator of a loss of faith in liberal values and of a diminished capacity to understand the modern world and to thrive in it.”
Seen in this light, one attack on one synagogue is not just a hate-crime statistic. It is also a warning. The mindset of a madman in Texas might seem alien to us today. But if we do not find a way to confront the conspiratorial currents that threaten to overtake our society, we may find ourselves hostage to the very ideas that animated him.
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Enough with the political correctness
People are intrinsically good and want to please each other. We may have our quirks and foibles, but to be part of a successful society we need to get along, and the majority of us do.
I am a great believer in thinking outside the box, so I am a huge fan of people who innovate and create new paradigms in technology, science, philanthropy, and other ways of thinking that improve everyday life.
So I’ve been musing for a while now, how did we find ourselves in this perverse ‘woke’ culture where we are afraid of even thinking a politically incorrect thought? How does this happen to a whole society?
Most people believe in the premise of ‘treat others as you would like to be treated’. Common sense tells us that this especially applies to those that may be a little different. Different culturally, in appearance, or behaviour – all of these things require a degree of tolerance. It used to be called ‘respect’. It was given regardless of racial origin, sexual preference, gender, or medical situation. No one would force you to be best friends with strangers, but there was an understanding to be kind, courteous, and respectful when you happened to cross paths.
How on earth did we get to a place where we are legally forced to identify certain citizens and then subject them to regulations that diminish both their human rights and our common sense? How did Critical Race Theory worm its way into corporate, government, and even military training mandates?
I believe everyone should be treated with dignity and respect. I am advocating for no discrimination at all. But we need to understand how this transformation happened to our civilisation.
Australia has become a ridiculous place where some people have more rights than others. The colour of our skin determines both social privilege and whether we are allowed to feel shame or pride toward our heritage. It can even be used to deny access to a career in order to ‘positively discriminate’ in favour of others. How did it become politically incorrect to talk about these things with close friends?
Just as there are out of the box thinkers who advance society, there are those who do the opposite. They inhibit innovation and regress progress. The ‘People of Discontent’. Making the world a better place is just too much work… For them, it is easier to cover up their inadequacies and incompetencies by making others look bad – to discriminate and divide – blame and enrage – rather than build bridges. You cannot change the past, but you don’t need to destroy it either. There is so much opportunity in the ‘now’ and even more in the future.
The LGBT community, in all its current forms, has the right to expect to be treated like everyone else – with dignity and respect. All decent people would agree, but these People of Discontent needed more. And so we find ourselves living in a world where kindergarten children are being taught – not only about a myriad of genders – but finishing school unable to understand the basics of male and female. Surely kids need to understand the concept of gender before exploring the next few thousand variations?
The majority of us sincerely agree there should be no discrimination based on sexual preference, so why does society sanction ‘diverse’ workplaces based on sexuality rather than competence? Public corporations have adopted this lunacy, mandating workshops and training sessions to explore identities that should remain a private matter. No one puts a stop to this because everyone is afraid of being perceived as politically incorrect.
Riots, looting, and the burning of cities were excused because Black Lives Matter are an identity-based political movement. I don’t remember having different laws and courts for African Americans. There have been black lawyers, judges, and even a president for two terms. Yes, decent people acknowledge there were black neighbourhoods where it was tough to stay a law-abiding citizen, but circumstance does not define a generation. During the Black Lives Matter riots, black policemen in black neighbourhoods became the enemy – is the irony of that not farcical?
Those People of Discontent began by making us feel good about acknowledging obvious discrimination and saying ‘no’. Then they saddled us with ‘collective guilt’, and finally, they started going too far. They made us scared to disagree. We were intimidated into more and more extreme segregation and badgered into supporting causes that sounded good in principle but raged into the burning of cities, looting of businesses (ironically owned by hard-working black people), and total destruction of lives and livelihoods of those least able to afford it.
Those People of Discontent used our good intentions and good nature to pull us into a cesspool of wokeness that is now seeing history rewritten and its statues destroyed. Future generations will not be able to make their own judgements about history because of what good people have allowed in the name of being politically correct.
I would like to suggest we all congregate and be proud to be citizens of whichever country we have chosen to call home. Unite as Australians who do not tolerate discrimination of any kind, people who are respectful and kind to all and celebrate personal origins. We should go forward as true Aussies who can joke around with no one taking offence and everyone being embraced.
https://spectator.com.au/2022/01/enough-with-the-political-correctness
********************************************It’s Official: It’s OK to Be Racist If You’re the Left Pushing COVID-19 Mandates
Following the lead of other leftist-run cities, the District of Columbia just instituted a new COVID-19 mandate that requires anyone who wants to dine at a restaurant, go to a movie, or workout at a gym to show proof of vaccination.
But a big part of the story that many in the media seem to ignore is that in this majority-black city, run by a black mayor, the D.C. government is also requiring people to show a photo ID to prove that they are the actual owner of the vaccination card they present.
Hold on a minute! Wasn’t it just a few short months ago—as the battles over election reform raged in the states—that we were told requiring photo ID to vote was racist and discriminatory because black folks couldn’t get IDs? In fact, it was considered so racist that businesses, sports teams, and celebrities boycotted entire states.
Now, by the left’s own definition, the District of Columbia just instituted a whole new level of systemic racism. And it’s certainly affecting the black population—the District’s largest racial group—disproportionately.
Since the mandate’s announcement in late December, I’ve been scouring the legacy media looking for news reports and media pundits who are labeling this new photo ID requirement racist, “the new Jim Crow 2.0,” the marginalization of people of color, and the other assorted slurs that were hurled at proponents of voter ID just months ago.
Not surprisingly, I haven’t seen one such headline.
Back in December, District officials initially said citizens wouldn’t be required to present an ID with their vaccination card. While such an absurdity seemingly made sense to the left, it made the vaccination card system entirely useless. One could just borrow the card of a friend or relative and have free reign of the city.
Remarkably, this idea of unverified vaccination IDs raised eyebrows for one local news outlet. When Washington’s ABC affiliate questioned Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, about the inconsistency, she reversed course and stated that photo ID would be required.
Of course, requiring proof of identification—whether along with a vaccination card or at the voting booth—is not and never has been racist, and this majority-black city run by a black mayor just proved it. The real issue here is the government attempting to coerce people into getting injected against their will and taking away their ability to use public accommodations when they refuse.
While the District has created medical and religious exemptions to the mandate, individuals are required to take a COVID-19 test and present it within 24 hours to enter a covered business. Tests can be costly and, at present, have been in such high demand that they can be hard to find, making this a high hurdle. Requiring a new test every 24 hours will only make compliance costlier and tests scarcer.
Perhaps that was the intent.
The mandate will hit Washington’s black population the hardest. Nearly 45% of the population is black. And according to the D.C. government’s own coronavirus statistics, it is the least vaccinated racial group, with only 49% of the population partially or fully vaccinated as of last week. That means over half of the black population is now barred by the government from going out to eat, to a sporting event, or to the gym.
Essentially, Washington is forcing its largest—and its most vaccine-hesitant population—to either get vaccinated or be barred from most indoor venues. That is hypocrisy that only the left could get away with.
But it’s not just hurting patrons. Hundreds of thousands of tourists from across the country who would normally come to the nation’s capital and patronize restaurants, bars, and museums but aren’t vaccinated now won’t be patronizing them at all. The result? Another economic blow for D.C. businesses—nearly 30% of which are black-owned.
I won’t hold my breath waiting to see the massive protests form in the streets, as happened in many cities over voter ID requirements. I’ve heard zero calls for woke companies to stop doing business or hosting conferences in the District. And there are no celebrities or politicians condemning the mayor or the city council or threatening boycotts.
Is it because they actually realize that requiring photo ID was never racist to begin with and they’ve simply been using that lie to scare people into fearing commonsense voting reforms? Or is it because the photo ID argument is an easy way to demonize and marginalize those they disagree with politically? Or is it because, in the end, they really don’t care about the plight of black people or anyone else who gets in the way of their sacred leftist policies like vaccination mandates?
The answer is, of course, all of the above
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Fact Checkers Make Exception for Liberal-Leaning News Outfit
If there was ever a reason to doubt the authority and authenticity of the mission of the so-called “fact checker” organizations it is this: There are more than one of them.
You see, if “facts” and “truth” were binary, there wouldn’t be a glut of competing companies out there attempting to sell their services to social media corporations and other media outlets. We wouldn’t have any disparity whatsoever. There would be one fact-checking group because, as stated in their creeds, there should be but one set of “facts”.
The entire industry is a bit of a scam, if we’re ready to be that honest with ourselves. And, if we’re not, there are plenty of examples out there of these companies massaging the narrative in order to maintain their lucrative contracts.
NewsGuard, the establishment “news rating” project that claims to fight untrustworthy media outlets, is cautiously defending NPR as the establishment media outlet continues to claim that U.S. Supreme Court justices Neil Gorsuch and Sonya Sotomayor are at odds over masks, even after a statement from both Justices and Chief Justice John Roberts debunking the story.
On Tuesday, NPR released a story claiming that Justice Sotomayor had opted to work remotely after Justice Gorsuch refused a request from Chief Justice Roberts that all justices mask up when on the bench.
Later in the day, a Supreme Court source told Fox News that neither Justice Roberts nor Justice Sotomayor had made any such request.
But then:
Despite the total breakdown of the initial story, Newsguard refuses to make any judgments on NPR’s reporting, arguing that the situation is still unfolding.
Prior to the statement from Chief Justice Roberts, Newsguard maintained that the facts of the story were still unclear.
“There are two conflicting reports, one from NPR and one from Fox News, both citing anonymous sources,” said Matt Skibinski, general manager of Newsguard. “It’s hard to say anything definitive about either report without more information.”
But Newsguard cannot hide from this fact:
However, even after all three Justices named in the story – Gorsuch, Sotomayor, and Roberts – made public statements debunking it, while NPR refused to issue a correction, Newsguard maintained that the story was still unfolding.
Perhaps one of the several other “fact checking” corporations would like to take a stab at it?
https://flagandcross.com/fact-checkers-make-exception-for-liberal-leaning-news-outfit/
********************************************FINALLY! NBC Airs Segment on Biden's Crumbling Black Voter Support
The hits just keep on coming for President Joe Biden! On Thursday night's edition of NBC Nightly News, anchor Lester Holt sent his chief White House correspondent Kristen Welker down to South Carolina to interview African American voters about their softening support of President Biden.
As he did earlier in the show, Holt reported on "Biden's challenges as he begins his second year in office." Holt added that among these challenges is Biden's "falling support among black voters who lifted his once struggling campaign." Holt then handed the segment off to Welker for her report from South Carolina.
The first black Biden voter Welker interviewed was "Helen Bradley, one of President Biden's most fervent supporters telling us she is disappointed." Welker asked her if she thought that "President Biden has fought hard enough for the priorities of black voters?" Bradley didn't beat around the bush, she answered "I do not."
Bradley believes Biden didn't fight hard enough for the so-called "voting rights" bill. However, she didn't just criticize Biden from the left. Like most Americans, she is deeply concerned with skyrocketing inflation. She told Welker "when you go to the grocery store, you find things three and four times higher than it used to be. But our paychecks are not three and four times higher."
Welker also interviewed two other South Carolina voters, Langston Brooks and Fletcher Smith. Brooks, like Bradley, was also concerned with the rising cost of goods. While Smith was more concerned about Biden's failure to reach out to black voters in South Carolina and the country at large.
Welker then reported on the devastating NBC poll admitting Biden's crumbling support among black voters is "not just in South Carolina. Our NBC News poll shows black support for President Biden has dropped 19 points since April. Now it's down to 64 percent."
Once again, credit where it is due, NBC could've spiked the poll and ran a segment on another topic. Instead, they told their viewers the truth.
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My other blogs. Main ones below:
http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)
http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)
http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)
http://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)
http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)
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Kristina Pimenova, once said to be the most beautiful girl in the world. Note blue eyes and blonde hair
Bliss: What every woman wants: to feel safe and secure in the arms of her man. Robert Irwin and Rorie Buckey. See
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