I grew up in the afterglow of the revulsion to Hitler’s destruction of European Jewry. That a civilized country could be manipulated into such a program, however achieved was a very unwelcome revelation. It made no country exempt. It also undermined ethnic and racist based policies in the developed world by starkly revealing their fraud. A natural result for my generation was the civil rights movement throughout the west that largely succeeded.
This does not mean that one day that paradise arrived but that the promise of freedom itself became universal. Most of that freedom merely says that you can expect to be judged solely on your own merits.
Suddenly it has become acceptable to again spin the same anti Semitic doggerel that infested human discourse prior to the defeat of Hitler. Yes it is been actively promulgated by the Islamic types, but it is the appearance of these threads among the leftist dreamers in the West that I find disconcerting. I had thought we had won the battle of education. That is obviously not quite true.
And lest it becomes an issue, my own ancestry is best described as Saxon Celtic with no Jewish ancestors. I suspect though that most European Jews were converts of Saxon ancestry, something I am certain most Arabs would support (which is another reason they feel somewhat put upon). None of this really matters.
Judaism has been a resilient faith sustaining itself as a healthy minority community just about everywhere. This has provided a common language of ethnic exclusion that has pervaded Europe and the Islamic worlds and now appears to arise even in places were this is not true.
It is far easier to turn ethnic hatreds against a handful of Jews than say against a local minority supported by a strong next door nation state. In a way, Judaism has become the universal minority. What is new recently is that any numbers of bad actors are now suddenly able to play the anti Semitic card again.
The logic of hatred knows no limits. Anti Semitism is today the canary in the mine. We must all do everything necessary to stamp it out and also wonder how these ideas keep coming up, regardless how discredited.
sharonsj has left a new comment on your post "AntiSemitism":
ReplyDeleteJudaism is a religion, not a race. So you have people of every color; the idea that Jews are only Europeans who aren't really Jews is nonsense. Even if it were true, that my white Russian great-great-grandfather was not originally Jewish, so what? Your ancestors were Pagan; at some point they converted to Christianity. How would you feel if bigoted morons told you that you weren't really Christian?
I blame our incompetent media for perpetuating crap. The flotilla incident brought out the worst of the anti-Semites. But I don't see any follow-up with what happened afterward. Did you know that the supplies from the boarded ship were put on trucks and driven to Gaza? Did you know that Hamas refused to accept it, saying the supplies were not needed?
Tell me this whole incident isn't a set-up?
sharonsj has left a new comment on your post "AntiSemitism":
ReplyDeleteJudaism is a religion, not a race. So you have people of every color; the idea that Jews are only Europeans who aren't really Jews is nonsense. Even if it were true, that my white Russian great-great-grandfather was not originally Jewish, so what? Your ancestors were Pagan; at some point they converted to Christianity. How would you feel if bigoted morons told you that you weren't really Christian?
I blame our incompetent media for perpetuating crap. The flotilla incident brought out the worst of the anti-Semites. But I don't see any follow-up with what happened afterward. Did you know that the supplies from the boarded ship were put on trucks and driven to Gaza? Did you know that Hamas refused to accept it, saying the supplies were not needed?
Tell me this whole incident isn't a set-up?
At some point all our ancestors were pagan. The problem is that the mythology of return does have an ethnic spin that no longer stands up if it ever did. All this remains central to the conflict.
ReplyDeleteDrop the mythology and it becomes another unpleasant land grab that is difficult to rationalize.
No one ever said that someone is not a real jew since that is matter of personal consent. However the mythology is one of purported neo ethnic continuity and that has certainly been integral to the emergence of Israel itself.
It is really easy to understand why competing ethnic groups can develop their own counter narrative. The remaining question is how to end it all in a way that brings peace and also accepts facts on the ground.
No one has had a good answer and too many have ample selfish reasons to promote hatred.
We cannot pretend that the mythology however ill founded is not important because it is central to creation and existence of the Israeli state.
It is not anti-Semitism - the anger is not against Jewish people. It is anti-Zionism. It is anger against Zionism's occupation and destruction of Palestine. It is anger against Israel's attack on the Gaza flotilla and the killing of at least 9 people (some people are still missing). It is world anger and outrage at the Acts perpetrated by Israel's government and Zionists. Claiming the anger is against Jewish religion is a dodge of the horrific acts of Israel that has all the world appalled.
ReplyDeleteEverything is anti-Semitic these days. You cannot have a dialog with a extreme idiot who wants to call you names. I taught my children if everybody is against you, you are probably doing something wrong.
ReplyDeletePlease ... just go one killing each other over there and leave me out of it!
Oh ... give me back the Canadian passports you've stolen from the 3 Canucks on those ships .... before you misuse them like you have done n the past.