Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Jew-hatred on campus is part of a general malaise infecting the American academy

Read this article. It will make you feel uncomfortable, but you need to read it.


It is a graphic description of the sort of thing that is going on on campuses across the U.S.
I first noticed this about ten years ago. I experienced events at the University of Binghamton and at SFSU. Northern California schools are particularly bad, but it is everywhere. I don't think people realize how bad it is.
This almost incredible un-self-conscious anti-Jewish bigotry emanates from the very same people who bemoan the persistence of anti-black racism as evidenced, for example, in the police forces around the country, notably including Oakland CA. It begs a host of interesting and uncomfortable questions. The same visceral reactions that these people attack in others reside deeply within their own psyches. Only the targets are different. There are good targets and there are bad targets. It's ok to target Jews because they are beneficiaries of white privilege and use it to oppress Palestinians. It is not ok to attack blacks because they are bona fide victims.
And this closed-minded embrace of stereo-types is protected by the conviction that you should not listen to people with whom you disagree if they make you feel uncomfortable - that very fact suggesting that they are immoral. So any attempt to counter the horribly distorted impression that they have of Israel and of Jewish history is easily deflected and buried.

Seen in this light, campus anti-Semitism is not an isolated aberration. It is the very litmus test of a dangerous and disturbing closing of the American student's mind.

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