Great podcast. Best bit is I learned is that you were on Birthright. LOL.
Small correction, it's not true that Jews in the 19th opposed European nationalism. They were very pro the Risorgimento and tended to be on the nationalist side in the 1848 revolutions (except for apolitical orthodox Jews). The anti-nationalist bias of diasporic Jews is at least as much a consequence of nationalist antisemitism as vice versa. It's a reasonable critique to say that Jews are unfairly carrying over these associations to America, but I think asking Jews to take a general nationalism-for-all approach if they want to support Israel is unreasonable. No-one is obligated to support their own persecution.
I agree with regard to the history and I say as much in my recent article on unions on Jews in Italian fascism. However, the 1848 revolution contains the problem: if you look at Wagner and Marr, both revolutionaries complained that the Jews won the revolution (emancipation), and then dumped it (became conservatives, monarchists, bankers, mainstream).
That was the perception that I was referencing (whether it is true or not), which is still common today: that Jews utilize nationalism for cynical purposes and then abandon it when they get what they want. This is a very different critique from "they're just jealous that we have an ethnostate!," which was the claim I was specifically responding to.
From a universalist (Christian, Buddhist, or even Islamic) perspective, Jews actually do have a moral duty to support the rights for others people's that they themselves demand. "Do onto others," and "preach unto the nations." Nationalism for all peoples is a logical result of universalism. The fact that Jews don't recognize this moral duty creates a lot of resentment.
I don't think explanations of antisemitism are useful if they do not accurately reflect the views of antisemites. Those who aren't interested in the psychology of antisemites would be better off simply insulting them or dismissing them, rather than ascribing to them beliefs which they do not hold. That was my point, which is more sociological than it is moral.
I think that the higher forms of anti-semitism just amount to raising the bar until no group of people could be expected to clear it. Take a Hungarian haute bourgeois. He supports Hungarian nationalism because it seems like a cool idea, then he sours on it because it looks bad for business, then he warms to it again because it might be a bulwark against socialism. He might not win any prizes for virtue, but would you spend more than five minutes of your time hating him?
Most antisemites in my experience are more like AncientProblemz describe. I'll write a few thoughts about the problems and quandaries of immigration in America and they'll just LLM me with 'I bet you support Open Borders for Israel then?' as if this is a novel thing I haven't already heard 1,000 times. If smarter antisemites don't like being associated with dipshits, they should take it up with them.
I'm not making a case for the moral righteousness of the antisemitic cause. I'm not defending antisemitism -- I'm accurately describing what it is and what it isn't. I'm not even sure if you're arguing against anything I said, or if you believe that I am defending antisemitism as being "smarter than you think," which isn't my claim.
I don't think that as antisemites become less intelligent, they become more "jealous" of the Jewish ethnostate. There's a stronger case to be made that antisemites are jealous of Jewish overrepresentation in culture, academia, and finance. But I'm not arguing that, "antisemites aren't jealous, just the dumb ones! Don't paint all antisemites with a broad brush! #notallantisemites!"
Jonathan Haidt's criticism of liberals, that they cannot accurately predict conservative positions, seems to apply to common misunderstandings and distortions of the causes behind antisemitism. This is despite the fact that liberals tend to be smarter than conservatives, so it doesn't seem to be a problem of understanding complex positions, but something else.
My point was to reject the idea that "jealousy of an ethnostate" is the cause behind antisemitism. Ethnostates like Armenian, Azerbaijan, Georgia, etc do not engender global condemnation (despite the fact that they have plenty of regional enmity and their neighbors, like Turkey, have committed genocide). Antisemitism existed long before Israel.
Jewish rejection of universalism, unlike Christianity and Islam, is a much more plausible explanation. This broader hatred hatred of non-universalists is reflected in leftist narratives about white supremacy, and in the screeds of Alex Jones against eugenics. Both eventually lead to antisemitism.
The most important cause behind right-wing antisemitism is the overrepresentation of Jews in contemporary society and in Christian / Islamic mythology. If Armenians, Azerbaijanis, or Georgians were 20% of media moguls, producers, or bankers, they would be subject to much greater scrutiny. Historically, if the New Testament called Armenians the "synagogue of Satan," or Azerbaijanis the "killers of Christ," or said that Georgians are "of their father the devil," there would probably also be significant problems.
It's possible that hatred of non-universalism is at its root a form of jealousy. But that's a deeper, longer-standing, and more fundamental phenomenon than Israel's mere ethno-nationalism.
Less than 1% of conservatives / Republicans strongly support BDS, compared with 3% of Democrats. Statistically speaking, the vast majority of Israel's opponents are against the concepts of ethno-states in general. They don't want their own ethno-state, so they are not jealous.
This is reflected in the tenor of public protests, where the American flag is burned, and signs attack white supremacy, the protestors are often non-white -- within the protests themselves, there are probably more Jewish Americans who oppose Israel than white nationalists who oppose Israel (this is partially because white nationalists are afraid to join the protests out of fear of being rejected or even attacked).
Anyone who claims that "jealousy of Israel's ethno-state is the number 1 factor driving antisemitism" is implying that most of Israel's opponents support the concept of a white ethno-state. This is false, and can be demonstrated factually and statistically. An accurate assessment would differentiate between leftist and rightist antisemitism.
Viewing jealousy as the fundamental psychological drive behind rightist antisemitism might be correct, as pertains to jealousy over academic and financial domination, but not with regards to the Jewish ethnostate.
If you were truly interested in understanding the white nationalist subculture for some anthropological or psychological study (which you and AZ are not, calling them dipshits unworthy of analysis), I would inform you that the white nationalist subculture does not the Israeli ethno-state as something worth emulating. They view it as a fake cargo-cult of nationalism, propped up by America, weak, cowardly, hypocritical, deceptive, and homosexual -- not something to be emulated or coveted.
I don't share these views, but those are the actual views, if you were interested. You may protest that you are not at all interested in these low-life, scum of the earth, demon-possessed, brain-dead "people," but I didn't bring it up. Just responding.
I am not actively defending the views of white nationalists, but pushing back on an inaccurate claim (they are jealous of our ethno-state). You can respond that "well, it doesn't matter what they think or why, they are trash, who cares? Why are you defending them?" Well, I would also push back if someone said that black people hate whites because they are jealous of whites for being taller on average. Has nothing to do with defending them, I just call out wrong things.
If we are simply making comments without necessarily arguing or responding to the position of the other person, I have a thought: Israel would probably conduct a better foreign policy if it would stop sending out its ministers in public to support nuclear attacks, starving civilians, "revenge rape", etc. There seems to be some blind spot in Israeli culture over how their attitudes will be perceived by the rest of the world, and lack the tact to conceal them. These seem to be avoidable unforced errors, as far as public statements go. I am somewhat puzzled by them, and maybe when we speak again you can try to help me understand where this is coming from, or if I'm wrong and these sort of public statements are actually good PR.
I understand. I don't think envy of Israel as an ethnostate is what motivates antisemitism, but I think it's fair to say that antisemites often *exhibit* envy of Israel as an ethnostate (and that's not contradicted by them engaging in pilpul about how it's not a real ethnostate or whatever). Analogy: socialism isn't motivated by hatred of the Koch brothers, but all American socialists hate the Koch brothers. Ideologies are sort of cultures in this way, they pick up tropes and affectations.
I'm in the middle of the two- or maybe three-part series on antisemitism. The first part, published yesterday, was about debunking prevalent neurotic and nonsensical conceptions within the Jewish community.
I saw that -- I recommend Moshe Zimmerman's book on Wilhelm Marr, as he clears up some common errors (Marr wasn't the first to use the term antisemitism, but he did popularize it, for example). I should probably just stick to writing an article in response rather than nit-pick in the comments, as that would be more productive. But that would also take time and prevent me from using the comments section for procrastinating...
Great podcast. Best bit is I learned is that you were on Birthright. LOL.
Small correction, it's not true that Jews in the 19th opposed European nationalism. They were very pro the Risorgimento and tended to be on the nationalist side in the 1848 revolutions (except for apolitical orthodox Jews). The anti-nationalist bias of diasporic Jews is at least as much a consequence of nationalist antisemitism as vice versa. It's a reasonable critique to say that Jews are unfairly carrying over these associations to America, but I think asking Jews to take a general nationalism-for-all approach if they want to support Israel is unreasonable. No-one is obligated to support their own persecution.
I agree with regard to the history and I say as much in my recent article on unions on Jews in Italian fascism. However, the 1848 revolution contains the problem: if you look at Wagner and Marr, both revolutionaries complained that the Jews won the revolution (emancipation), and then dumped it (became conservatives, monarchists, bankers, mainstream).
That was the perception that I was referencing (whether it is true or not), which is still common today: that Jews utilize nationalism for cynical purposes and then abandon it when they get what they want. This is a very different critique from "they're just jealous that we have an ethnostate!," which was the claim I was specifically responding to.
From a universalist (Christian, Buddhist, or even Islamic) perspective, Jews actually do have a moral duty to support the rights for others people's that they themselves demand. "Do onto others," and "preach unto the nations." Nationalism for all peoples is a logical result of universalism. The fact that Jews don't recognize this moral duty creates a lot of resentment.
I don't think explanations of antisemitism are useful if they do not accurately reflect the views of antisemites. Those who aren't interested in the psychology of antisemites would be better off simply insulting them or dismissing them, rather than ascribing to them beliefs which they do not hold. That was my point, which is more sociological than it is moral.
I think that the higher forms of anti-semitism just amount to raising the bar until no group of people could be expected to clear it. Take a Hungarian haute bourgeois. He supports Hungarian nationalism because it seems like a cool idea, then he sours on it because it looks bad for business, then he warms to it again because it might be a bulwark against socialism. He might not win any prizes for virtue, but would you spend more than five minutes of your time hating him?
Most antisemites in my experience are more like AncientProblemz describe. I'll write a few thoughts about the problems and quandaries of immigration in America and they'll just LLM me with 'I bet you support Open Borders for Israel then?' as if this is a novel thing I haven't already heard 1,000 times. If smarter antisemites don't like being associated with dipshits, they should take it up with them.
I'm not making a case for the moral righteousness of the antisemitic cause. I'm not defending antisemitism -- I'm accurately describing what it is and what it isn't. I'm not even sure if you're arguing against anything I said, or if you believe that I am defending antisemitism as being "smarter than you think," which isn't my claim.
I don't think that as antisemites become less intelligent, they become more "jealous" of the Jewish ethnostate. There's a stronger case to be made that antisemites are jealous of Jewish overrepresentation in culture, academia, and finance. But I'm not arguing that, "antisemites aren't jealous, just the dumb ones! Don't paint all antisemites with a broad brush! #notallantisemites!"
Jonathan Haidt's criticism of liberals, that they cannot accurately predict conservative positions, seems to apply to common misunderstandings and distortions of the causes behind antisemitism. This is despite the fact that liberals tend to be smarter than conservatives, so it doesn't seem to be a problem of understanding complex positions, but something else.
My point was to reject the idea that "jealousy of an ethnostate" is the cause behind antisemitism. Ethnostates like Armenian, Azerbaijan, Georgia, etc do not engender global condemnation (despite the fact that they have plenty of regional enmity and their neighbors, like Turkey, have committed genocide). Antisemitism existed long before Israel.
Jewish rejection of universalism, unlike Christianity and Islam, is a much more plausible explanation. This broader hatred hatred of non-universalists is reflected in leftist narratives about white supremacy, and in the screeds of Alex Jones against eugenics. Both eventually lead to antisemitism.
The most important cause behind right-wing antisemitism is the overrepresentation of Jews in contemporary society and in Christian / Islamic mythology. If Armenians, Azerbaijanis, or Georgians were 20% of media moguls, producers, or bankers, they would be subject to much greater scrutiny. Historically, if the New Testament called Armenians the "synagogue of Satan," or Azerbaijanis the "killers of Christ," or said that Georgians are "of their father the devil," there would probably also be significant problems.
It's possible that hatred of non-universalism is at its root a form of jealousy. But that's a deeper, longer-standing, and more fundamental phenomenon than Israel's mere ethno-nationalism.
Most opponents of Israel are not on the right: https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2022/07/11/american-views-of-israel/
Less than 1% of conservatives / Republicans strongly support BDS, compared with 3% of Democrats. Statistically speaking, the vast majority of Israel's opponents are against the concepts of ethno-states in general. They don't want their own ethno-state, so they are not jealous.
This is reflected in the tenor of public protests, where the American flag is burned, and signs attack white supremacy, the protestors are often non-white -- within the protests themselves, there are probably more Jewish Americans who oppose Israel than white nationalists who oppose Israel (this is partially because white nationalists are afraid to join the protests out of fear of being rejected or even attacked).
Anyone who claims that "jealousy of Israel's ethno-state is the number 1 factor driving antisemitism" is implying that most of Israel's opponents support the concept of a white ethno-state. This is false, and can be demonstrated factually and statistically. An accurate assessment would differentiate between leftist and rightist antisemitism.
Viewing jealousy as the fundamental psychological drive behind rightist antisemitism might be correct, as pertains to jealousy over academic and financial domination, but not with regards to the Jewish ethnostate.
If you were truly interested in understanding the white nationalist subculture for some anthropological or psychological study (which you and AZ are not, calling them dipshits unworthy of analysis), I would inform you that the white nationalist subculture does not the Israeli ethno-state as something worth emulating. They view it as a fake cargo-cult of nationalism, propped up by America, weak, cowardly, hypocritical, deceptive, and homosexual -- not something to be emulated or coveted.
I don't share these views, but those are the actual views, if you were interested. You may protest that you are not at all interested in these low-life, scum of the earth, demon-possessed, brain-dead "people," but I didn't bring it up. Just responding.
I am not actively defending the views of white nationalists, but pushing back on an inaccurate claim (they are jealous of our ethno-state). You can respond that "well, it doesn't matter what they think or why, they are trash, who cares? Why are you defending them?" Well, I would also push back if someone said that black people hate whites because they are jealous of whites for being taller on average. Has nothing to do with defending them, I just call out wrong things.
If we are simply making comments without necessarily arguing or responding to the position of the other person, I have a thought: Israel would probably conduct a better foreign policy if it would stop sending out its ministers in public to support nuclear attacks, starving civilians, "revenge rape", etc. There seems to be some blind spot in Israeli culture over how their attitudes will be perceived by the rest of the world, and lack the tact to conceal them. These seem to be avoidable unforced errors, as far as public statements go. I am somewhat puzzled by them, and maybe when we speak again you can try to help me understand where this is coming from, or if I'm wrong and these sort of public statements are actually good PR.
I understand. I don't think envy of Israel as an ethnostate is what motivates antisemitism, but I think it's fair to say that antisemites often *exhibit* envy of Israel as an ethnostate (and that's not contradicted by them engaging in pilpul about how it's not a real ethnostate or whatever). Analogy: socialism isn't motivated by hatred of the Koch brothers, but all American socialists hate the Koch brothers. Ideologies are sort of cultures in this way, they pick up tropes and affectations.
I'm in the middle of the two- or maybe three-part series on antisemitism. The first part, published yesterday, was about debunking prevalent neurotic and nonsensical conceptions within the Jewish community.
I saw that -- I recommend Moshe Zimmerman's book on Wilhelm Marr, as he clears up some common errors (Marr wasn't the first to use the term antisemitism, but he did popularize it, for example). I should probably just stick to writing an article in response rather than nit-pick in the comments, as that would be more productive. But that would also take time and prevent me from using the comments section for procrastinating...