donquixote99
06-26-2015, 10:40 AM
The thread title is to say this is a comment against a bit of web 'journalism' that is against antisemitism. To be clear at the beginning, I'm four-square against antisemitism, I'm just against junky articles like this on the web, as well.
The title may be the worst part. It's called "Why Literally Everyone in the World Hates the Jews, and What To Do About It."* This is a terrible title because, first of all, the article says practically nothing about why anti-Semitism exists. It's just cites a few examples, and claims they are universal, without showing much evidence. Second, if we take "What To Do About It" as denoting a goal of countering or diminishing antisemitism, the article again is actually devoid of ideas. So the article is basically trolling for readers by completely misrepresenting itself.
It's also a terrible title, of course, because it strokes the principle audience's emotions by asserting 'literally everyone in the world hates the Jews.' The article says polls show it, but it only gives figures from a poll that reports that "over 89 percent of the citizens of Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan have a “very unfavorable” opinion of Jews." First of all, everyone in the world doesn't live in Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan, and secondly, even this presumably-ripest of picked-cherries reports a number that is actually less than 'literally everyone.'
Likewise typical of this sort of thing is this assertion, cast in the form of a quote: "...former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer has remarked, 'Anti-Zionism inevitably leads to anti-Semitism.'" Quote marks and the name of an authority figure do not make a claim true. They don't make it false either, of course, but the point is no supporting argument is provided. Just the assertion, resting only on an appeal to authority, is considered sufficient.
Previously in the article, the writer characterized antisemitism thusly: Anti-Semitism is an inert object of a kind not usually met with in the social sciences. While historians try to see everything in its context to show how our human environment alters our beliefs, anti-Semitism resists context; it is a rock-hard conviction so persistent and monomaniacal that, for all we can tell, it will never go away.
Well, why should one think all this is so? Some of the claims are reasonable enough: convictions of bigotry in persons lacking self-insight are frequently 'rock-hard...persistent, and monomanical.' Read what white supremacists, or commentators on the Islamic Global Menace, typically have to say. And we know that ethnic and racial and religious hate often persists across generations; even reasonable people in the main, such as the English, widely persist in thinking 'the Vatican' is still the covert menace it was during the time of it's conflicts with Henry VIII. Once cultures identify 'hereditary' enemies, they stick with them.
So how is antisemitism different? Why should a thing that exists, after all, only in people's heads be called an 'inert object?' Why am I wrong if I suspect antisemitism is not truly unique and that it can indeed be understood in proper contexts? Alas, this article doesn't tell me. Again, one is left thinking the writer is simply stroking the emotional sense of special victimhood of his audience.
The article goes on into it's main subject, which is commentary on a couple of books on antisemitism. Creditably, it gives more favor to the more academic, objective one. But this after it has shown, in my opinion, much too great a willingness to depart from such standards in its own commentary.
* I'm not giving a link; Tablet Magazine doesn't deserve any idle-curiosity clicks for this sort of thing. You can look it up if you really want to. It's by David Mikics.
The title may be the worst part. It's called "Why Literally Everyone in the World Hates the Jews, and What To Do About It."* This is a terrible title because, first of all, the article says practically nothing about why anti-Semitism exists. It's just cites a few examples, and claims they are universal, without showing much evidence. Second, if we take "What To Do About It" as denoting a goal of countering or diminishing antisemitism, the article again is actually devoid of ideas. So the article is basically trolling for readers by completely misrepresenting itself.
It's also a terrible title, of course, because it strokes the principle audience's emotions by asserting 'literally everyone in the world hates the Jews.' The article says polls show it, but it only gives figures from a poll that reports that "over 89 percent of the citizens of Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan have a “very unfavorable” opinion of Jews." First of all, everyone in the world doesn't live in Egypt, Lebanon, and Jordan, and secondly, even this presumably-ripest of picked-cherries reports a number that is actually less than 'literally everyone.'
Likewise typical of this sort of thing is this assertion, cast in the form of a quote: "...former German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer has remarked, 'Anti-Zionism inevitably leads to anti-Semitism.'" Quote marks and the name of an authority figure do not make a claim true. They don't make it false either, of course, but the point is no supporting argument is provided. Just the assertion, resting only on an appeal to authority, is considered sufficient.
Previously in the article, the writer characterized antisemitism thusly: Anti-Semitism is an inert object of a kind not usually met with in the social sciences. While historians try to see everything in its context to show how our human environment alters our beliefs, anti-Semitism resists context; it is a rock-hard conviction so persistent and monomaniacal that, for all we can tell, it will never go away.
Well, why should one think all this is so? Some of the claims are reasonable enough: convictions of bigotry in persons lacking self-insight are frequently 'rock-hard...persistent, and monomanical.' Read what white supremacists, or commentators on the Islamic Global Menace, typically have to say. And we know that ethnic and racial and religious hate often persists across generations; even reasonable people in the main, such as the English, widely persist in thinking 'the Vatican' is still the covert menace it was during the time of it's conflicts with Henry VIII. Once cultures identify 'hereditary' enemies, they stick with them.
So how is antisemitism different? Why should a thing that exists, after all, only in people's heads be called an 'inert object?' Why am I wrong if I suspect antisemitism is not truly unique and that it can indeed be understood in proper contexts? Alas, this article doesn't tell me. Again, one is left thinking the writer is simply stroking the emotional sense of special victimhood of his audience.
The article goes on into it's main subject, which is commentary on a couple of books on antisemitism. Creditably, it gives more favor to the more academic, objective one. But this after it has shown, in my opinion, much too great a willingness to depart from such standards in its own commentary.
* I'm not giving a link; Tablet Magazine doesn't deserve any idle-curiosity clicks for this sort of thing. You can look it up if you really want to. It's by David Mikics.