No one is antisemitic if you ask them. Not at all!
Certainly not John Galliano, even though you can hear him admiring Hitler in this video. Not Charlie Sheen and not Mel Gibson. These guys were just drunk or stoned and plus, some of their best friends are Jews.
Here is my feeling: Anyone who separates people into Jews and Everyone Else is antisemitic. It is frustrating to argue this point. I tried in another post, when a film reviewer praised an actress for not “trying to mask her Jewishness.” Everyone claimed to be bewildered by the premise that this is clearly antisemitic.
If you tell me about your Jewish friends, you are antisemitic, to my ears. The fact that you distinguish some people as Jews – unless they are orthodox Jews whose lifestyle is defined by religion – then you have a problem.
Me, I’m an atheist but I’m a Jew because my parents and their parents were Jews. The world will always define me as different because the world is nuts. Why the world is nuts about Jews, I don’t know. I’ve been reading about it but I’m not a historian. I don’t need to be a historian to know that most of the world hates Jews.
That’s their problem, though, I’m not going to boycott Galliano because he’s antisemitic. I love his designs and I don’t care about his personal problems. Hating Jews is like hating blacks but more insidious: It’s just ignorance and the need to feel superior. It’s stupid, but evidently we can’t cure stupidity.
Last night I watched a great movie called “The Believer” which caused such an uproar when it was previewed to Jewish leaders that it was released under the radar and disappeared quickly. It’s the true story of a self-hating Jewish student in New York who becomes a neo-Nazi.
Ryan Gosling is the anti-hero. His speech to a group of would-be fascists is so maniacal that it has stayed with me over the years. Each time I see the movie and hear the speech, I laugh out loud at its audacity and absurdity – and because its true. Here it is, copied from the script:
DANNY
How many of you think of yourselves
as anti-Semites?
(All the hands go up.)
Good. Actually, the term is a bit
imprecise since technically Jews are
only one of the Semitic peoples....
In fact, Arabs are Semites, as are
the Eritreans, the Ethiopians, and so
on.... But for our purposes an anti-
Semite is someone who hates or is
against Jews.... Now, why do we hate
them?
He looks around. The room is silent.
DANNY
Let me put it another way. Do we hate
them because they push their way in
where they don't belong? Or because
they're clannish and keep to themselves?
Murmurs of "Yeah. Both." But some are confused by this.
DANNY
...Because they're tight with money,
or because they flash it around?
Because they're Bolsheviks or because
they're capitalists? Because they
have the highest IQs, or because they
have the most active sex lives?
The audience, confused...
DANNY
Do you want to know the real reason
we hate them?...
DANNY
...Because we hate them.
(as people exchange
puzzled looks)
Because they exist. Because it is an
axiom of civilization that just as
man longs for woman, loves his
children and fears death, he hates
the Jews.
(smiles)
There is no reason. If there were,
some smart-ass kike would give us an
argument, try to prove we were wrong.
And of course that would only make us
hate them more. In fact we have all
the reasons we need in three simple
letters: J-E-W. Jew. Say it a million
times. It is the only word that never
loses its meaning: Jew Jew Jew Jew
Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew Jew....
Dru – Thank you! We don’t want Penis Enlargement to sully this discussion!
Long time reader, first time commenter. 🙂
I realize I am a few days late to the conversation but I still want to participate. As an “ethnically” Jewish person (not a “religious” one) I first really want to thank Homma for all your thoughtful comments especially this paragraph (which actually made me cry a little):
“Jews have been hounded from country to country, pushed out and have lived in fear of pogroms for centuries. Deep within the Jewish psyche is the feeling that there is nowhere a Jew can truly call or feel at home — even Israel — without fear of being pushed out or murdered one day even if one is not religious at all or really identifies with being Jewish. This is centuries and centuries of fear that is passed down unconsciously through the generations and for good reason. Where can Jewish people really feel safe? Where? LA? Melbourne? New York? Mexico? Yes, there are communities of Jewish people where you can feel safe and tolerated but for how long and where to go when the welcome is outstayed? Because history shows us that apparently the Jews always outstay their welcome.”
I pretty much can’t say it any better than that. I recently realized that I have lived my entire life feeling shame for being Jewish. This is partially because I have a made up last name, changed by my grandfather and his siblings to something that sounds ‘white’ to avoid the stigma of our real last name and how ‘Jewy’ it sounds.
No matter what ignorant people say about anti-semitism being a thing of the past, it isn’t. I’ve personally experienced it quite a lot of it and I live in Canada. I’ve also come across this attitude that the commenter “February” displays, that since it’s 2011 and not 1936, these attitudes are gone. No, they aren’t. I had a former friend who revealed himself as an anti-semite once he learned of my ethnicity, who also veiled his hatred behind anti-Israel “political” sentiments while being completely ignorant of the situation. This was someone raised Catholic, who left the church to be an atheist but was taught by his family to be anti-semitic and so didn’t even realize he was because it was his ‘normal.’
Just my thoughts. Thanks for encouraging a dialogue about this topic that is so often discouraged.
Another thing I wanted to bring up is that
whoops ignore that last sentance 🙂
err… last half a sentence
Vancouverista – Thank you for commenting! You can bring up that Other Thing any time you like.
I still don’t understand what draws the line between “criticism of Israel” and being an anti-semite. Because it seems to me as if the lines are quite blurred. And that is wrong.
Holy shit Sister, I LOVE The Believer. One of my all-time favorites.