Newsflash:
Its not what you think it is.
A
few years ago, I was invited to a meeting at the Jewish Community Center of
Dallas – a meeting including a diverse group of local Jewish “leaders” to
discuss the problem of antisemitism on university campuses. I was shocked to
realize that I may have been the only one in the room who knew what was really
going on. I felt that there were new essential elements in the current situation - that we
were witnessing a deep cultural shift one that emanated
from “the left wing” rather than the "right wing" of the social
divide. This was not the usual right-wing variety of antisemitism.
In fact, over
time I have come to realize that the typical American Jewish commitment to all
cultural and social aspects of “liberalism” in America
was confusing matters and that unless the American Jewish Community at large
could be made to see past its obsolete assumptions, no effective response to this
new antisemitism would be effective.
When
its about the Jews, its not just about the Jews, its not even really about the
Jews at all.
The
“liberals” are making a big category mistake, a mistake that diverts
attention away from the most serious attack on American civil society in a
century. The category mistake involves the meaning of “liberal” – a
concept, that, in spite of its straightforward origins, has become fraught with
confusions and ambiguities. Furthermore, a radical (per)version of what passes as
liberalism has abandoned a firm commitment to tolerance, open discussion, and
the encouraging of diverse viewpoints. Bias plus intolerance is what we
have, gross intolerance of any alternative viewpoints. This is the result of a
significant radical change in the character of American “liberalism” – or, more
accurately, a change in who gets to set and dominate the “liberal” narrative.
It is what we may conveniently refer to as the ”woke revolution”. And, in a
nutshell, because of what it essentially is, the woke revolution is what is
responsible for the explosion of antisemitism on campus and everywhere else.
If
its Woke it ain’t Liberal.
Woke
is not liberal. It is the opposite of liberal – in all plausible variations of
that term. The ideology known critically as wokism originates not from any
liberal source, but, from its antithesis, from a variant of Marxism, known as
Critical Theory. Wokism denies the validity of every important aspect of
liberalism, most significantly the value of freedom of expression and open
inquiry. Modern American “liberals” who have jettisoned the firm commitment to
protection of individual property rights, at least still agree on the
importance of tolerance of individual viewpoints and the encouragement of civil
discussion of alternative viewpoints. As such, they should not seek to make
common ground with the Progressives who have embraced the tenets of wokism. Understanding
that wokism is illiberal is also the key to understanding why it is responsible
for the rise in (this new variant) of antisemitism.
Jews
Don’t Count
Wokism,
“social justice revolution”, Critical Race Theory, “Anti-racism”, equity,
diversity, inclusion, … .and other various components of this new ideology, all
seek to articulate an alternate worldview that is antithetical to liberalism
and liberal democracy, and to the very foundations of western science. In this
worldview, the ideas and perceptions of all individuals are indelibly shaped by
their identity, in the original Marxist concept by their social class, but, in
this modern variant, by their race. Truth is not objective in the sense we
usually understand it. For example, the truth of the “black experience” cannot be
understood, therefore should not be described or researched, by anyone who is
not black. One has to have access the “lived experience” of the minority group
members themselves for this. Hence there can be no legitimate discussion between whites and blacks who disagree about this.
In this narrative, whites, who live privileged lives, should just shut up about this, unless it is
to seek to understand the role that they have played historically, and continue
to play, in the ongoing oppression. These are not claims made as an invitation
to a discussion, they are dogmas, to be acted upon. Identity (race) determines
character. This principle is completely and insidiously destructive of the idea
of the uniqueness of the individual. The individual is completely eclipsed by
the contours of the group to which she belongs. There is no transcending the
nature of one’s group - one’s racial identity. It is of a type with Marxist class determinism, where class is
replaced by race.
According to this, Martin
Luther King’s hope for a colorblind society is naïve at best and complicit at
worst. The woke agenda, by contrast, seeks to emphasize race, to dethrone and
shame whites for benefitting from white supremacy, and remake the entire social
system (by massive government intrusions, educational indoctrination
challenging all and every “white” shibboleth imaginable). I have yet to find an
account of what the new world achieved by this revolution is supposed to look
like.
I
just read two recently published books, one about the UK (Jews Don’t Count by David
Baddiel) and the other about the US (Woke
Antisemitism by David Bernstein). I highly recommend them both. Perhaps the
most notable thing about them, is that they are both written by avowedly
“liberal” authors, self-described as “leftist”. But, both, in spite of this, have
become completely disillusioned and alarmed by the woke (Progressive) agenda,
not least because of its inevitable anti-semitic element.
Baddiel
is a well-known British-Jewish comedian/public intellectual. Bernstein is an
eminent American-Jewish communal leader. Both became disillusioned over time,
especially Bernstein, as they began to realize that the woke folk were not the
traditional friends to the Jews that “liberals” had always been. Further, they
came to the realization that following the well-worn path of Jewish-liberal
alliances would no longer work with the latest brand of “liberalism”. In fact,
and this is key, the vigorous attempt by Jewish organizations to curry favor
with the organizations adopting one woke principle after another, was not only
undermining traditional Jewish values of tolerance and open-mindedness, it was
not even working to maintain the alliances regarded as valuable. Instead, these
efforts were rebuffed and treated with contempt (for chapter and verse read
Bernstein).
In the
woke worldview Jews cannot be victims, notwithstanding the evidence to the
contrary. The Holocaust was terrible, but it is not relevant to the current
environment of “systemic racism” in which Jews are “white adjacent” – part of
the privileged white class. (Whiteness has been mystified to go beyond skin
color to include a state of being). In fact, Jews, because of their relative
success as a group, are an obvious and easy target when it comes to attacking
white privilege. They have used their “whiteness” to garner disproportionate numbers
in the institutions of power. As Baddiel points out when it comes to
anti-semitism, “Jews don’t count” as victims, because they are way down on the
hierarchy of racisms. And, by the way, Asians are, likewise, white adjacents,
who have benefitted by their token whiteness. They are not included in the club
of the oppressed. Indeed, the world is divided into oppressed and oppressor and
if you are not part of one you are part of the other.
An
important aspect of this anti-Jewish animus is the uncompromising
anti-Israel rage that characterizes the woke folk. Criticism of Israeli
government policy absolutely need not be anti-semitic, but, upon close
examination, most of it in social media turns out to be grossly anti-semitic. To
wit, the distortions that characterize the reporting, the historical
misinformation, the singling out of Israel for human rights violations far less
egregious than those of its neighbors or, indeed, numerous countries around the
world, the insidious allusions to the Jewish character of the Israeli nation and
so on. The association of Jews with the demon Israel has done much to make
left-wing anti-semitism respectable.
You
need not take my word for it. In a short essay I cannot provide the kind of
evidence necessary to document the character of wokism and the implications of
it for Jews and for Jewish organizations. For that you should read especially
Bernstein. Anyone in any position of Jewish leadership should read that book. But,
if this is right, if Bernstein is right, then Jews in America and everywhere
that wokism is a factor, should understand the fundamentals of wokism and why
it is necessary for Jewish organizations to distance themselves from it, and to
combat its blatantly illiberal precepts. Those precepts are essentially anti-liberal
and anti-Jewish in nature.
Conclusion
Recently,
the problem has gotten worse. Jewish students on many campuses are at pains to
hide their Jewishness. Jewish organizations have to have security at their
events. University administrations have caved to the demand of woke student
organizations to adopt their agendas and strike anti-Israel poses. None of this
comes from the right-wing.
As I
write, as evidenced by the two books referenced here, awareness is growing, but
slowly. An effective policy to combat this new anti-semitism, on campus and
elsewhere, will depend on a fundamental change in the typical American Jewish
mindset. It is a big change, but, one that I actually feel is possible, even
likely, given the growing impossibility of denying the obvious.
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