Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

huh?

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

I believe Young Adder is trying to impress all the cute chick lurkers who are looking for a boyishly-handsome yet woke professional by (1) asserting that the accusations of anti-Semitism hurled at Rep. Ilhan Omar for saying “I want to talk about the political influence in this country that says it’s ok to push for allegiance to a foreign country” are stronger than they would be for, oh, Mitt Romney or someone like him because she’s a Muslim, while (2) not wanting to turn off lurker Gal Gadot by hedging with his “hey, but I’m just a WASP, so maybe it is anti-Semetic because of the ‘Jews are Globalists, Not Really Citizens of Our Country’ trope.”

Query - would Jonathan Pollard be prosecuted today? Magic 8 Ball say “Very Doubtful.”

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

Adder and I agree on little, but he's right about Omar being targeted. First, her comment was not anti-Semitic. Or at least not on its face, as the right wing media is claiming. You have to read into what she said with a jaundiced eye to assert it was clear anti-Semitism.

But that's no matter, because everything is a purity test these days. The broader your definition of what constitutes an offense against a group, the more credibility you have. Any common person can label a man saying "Jew it down" as an anti-Semite. The truly enlightened man is the one who can read between the lines of a statement like Omar's and see that it stems from anti-Semitic sentiment. Or that even if it doesn't, even if she only means no US citizen should hold allegiance to any other nation, because it could be technically viewed as criticizing a historically targeted group of people, it's nevertheless bigoted.

A famous philosopher whose name escapes me once noted that, among the faithful, the more unbelievable a thing is, the more attractive it is. To believe in the most extremely improbable thing is to demonstrate the greatest faith. This process is working itself out in various ways in all of the purity tests taking place in our politics, and all of the accusations taking place in our culture. To assert the most extreme zero tolerance position, to recognize the most granular of alleged offenses, is a badge. You are enlightened above others, the most faithful of the adherents.

The polarization at work in our society has the whiff of religion to it. The right has its purity tests, the left has its. As the people engaged on both sides dig in deeper, there emerges a competition. Who is the most committed to MAGA? Who sees the greatest number of social injustices?

I'm not paving any new roads here to suggest these things are new secular religions. Alain de Botton's done that, among numerous others, I believe. But when you wonder why a person would accuse Omar of anti-Semitism on such thin grounds, it might be worthwhile to evaluate the statement as a signalling act... a public devotion in one of our new competing secular religions.

Re: I bet She's Colorblind
 

Dude, I agree with you about how most white people act. You complained that I was overgeneralizing. So were you, because that's the sort of conversation we were having.

Right. And I haven't answered about why white audiences react the way they do.

It's massive denial that prejudice and racism permeate how people act. You don't disagree. Trump is President because his racism is a feature to so many people, not a bug. WTF?

I never got the sense that she felt attacked, and I don't get how a successful partner at one of the largest law firms in the world can feel neglected. I think it's a cultural resentment, but the ability of people who are wildly successful to nonetheless feel a sense of resentment is baffling. In individual cases, maybe not. My father, now retired, went to an Ivy League school and had a fine career as a doctor. Nonetheless, he has always felt like an outsider, for reasons that IMO have to do with his family history and then going to an Ivy League school as a non-affluent public-school kid from the rural West at a time when that was more unusual. But he's always been a Democrat.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

What she said used an anti-Semitic trope, which is troubling, even if you agree with her about Israel policy. As I am inclined to. There is no doubt that many people are seeking to use the reaction to the anti-Semitic overtones to what she said to squelch disagreement about US-Israel policy. That fact that so many people are looking to rebuke her but have said nothing about repeated use of anti-Semitic tropes by Republicans, including Trump's campaign, is telling.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

This thread contains some history I did not know and I think is useful for trying to understand where Jewish critics are coming from.

You are rightly distinguishing the right wing media from that group of people.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

My Catholic grandmother is rolling over in her grave...

(The Methodist one probably isn't.)

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

"It's all about the Benjamins, baby!" in regard to Israel and AIPAC is not a bigoted trope. Unless one thinks reference to Israel's use of money to further its interests is automatically anti-Semitic because it alludes to The Merchant of Venice. How else does one effect lobbying goals? And should we also rethink use of "pound of flesh" as an expression?

This is where the "enlightenment" of being hyper-sensitive to all potential slights turns into bad comedy. If one is woke to every tenuous potential grievance, half of everything he is exposed to becomes an offense of some sort. That's the problem with the zealotry we're seeing on these issues. Omar has said nothing anti-Semitic so far as I can see, but to the uber-woke, she's not only a bigot, but a bigot with the temerity to double down and defend herself.

Ms. Omar, this is not up for debate. The enlightened have judged you unenlightened. You do not get a reply.

Accusing Jews generally of having dual loyalties is a trope. Accusing AIPAC and other pro-Israel lobbies of having dual loyalties is not a trope. That's a fact. Those groups openly lobby our govt on behalf of Israel and openly acknowledge their dual loyalties.

Omar is wrongly "in the barrel" here. But right or wrong doesn't matter much in social or moral panics. What matters is that the most enlightened, most sensitive, most pure, are allowed to judge her, to get their pound of-- Oh, my. Sorry about that near offensive comment. Well, you get the point.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

The fact that a group has been subjected to so many horrors over so many years does not require that all comments regarding the group should be hyper-critiqued with an assumption that they are bigoted toward that group.

My initial interpretation of Omar's comment was that it was related to US aid to Israel, which is substantial. Given the context and wording, it's a stretch to assume she was referring to a stereotype regarding Jews and money. I think that's a purist's reading, one seeking to "call out" Ms. Omar.

"Call out culture" is an excellent name for it, by the way. It captures the essential irrational and emotional component of a lot of what happened to Omar, and has happened to so many others in recent years. The first reaction isn't to apply a circumspect view to Ms. Omar's comment. The First reaction is to assume the worst, so she can be judged, and thrown in the barrel for a bit. Yay! I called her a bigot on Twitter, and signaled my moral superiority and purity on these matters!

I can't abide much of organized religion because I think moral judgment is the currency of people who haven't any others. It's cheap, and any man can print as much of it for himself as he likes. By judging and calling out his judgment to others, he can elevate himself at no cost or effort. In reality, however, he's just a yawp in the peanut gallery, a faceless wine drunk screaming for blood at the Coliseum circus games.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

"Jews have all the money and use it to control things" is an anti semitic trope.

Also, I thought I read that AIPAC doesn't give directly to candidates (but can nonetheless get supporters to).

One of the things that was weird about that particular line is that AIPAC and stridently pro-Israel groups' outsized influence is as much about evangelical end times beliefs as money. It very much is not only about the benjamins.

I don't think that's even remotely an accurate summary of what's happened. She said a thing that is within the realm of anti semitic trope. The Israel lobby, some proportion of American Jewish people and the right wing outrage machine went after her, pretty much for entirely different reasons.

She listened to the middle group and then apologized and then, arguably, did it again, causing the same groups to push it for the same reason. One wants to discredit/silence criticism of Israel, one has legitimate concerns about growing, sometimes violent, antisemitism and one sees a away to score political points and demonize a back, muslim woman.

The uber-woke seem to me to be mostly on the sidelines.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

I'm not sure I agree, but that's not what I was talking about.

This is what I was talking about:

But I hadn't focused on the details, and now that I have read Paul Waldman's column, from which the above is taken, I am going to change my tune and agree with you when you say that Omar is wrongly in the barrel. Waldman says it better than I could, so read him.

I think people are attacking her because they disagree with her on Israel policy, not to signal moral superiority. Waldman:

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

Again, that is not a fair summary of the point. The point is the Jewish people have been targeted for a lot of nasty stuff explicitly because they are alleged to have allegiance to a foreign power. Given that, the argument goes, let's avoid alluding to split allegiances when we're talking about policy toward Israel.

I see a distinction between "I don't owe allegiance" and "all Jews owe allegiance" but I get how concerned Jewish people think it's thin.

And to be clear, I don't have any sympathy at all of the other two groups griping on this.

Interpret all you want, but she tweeted "AIPAC," as clarification, so you're interpreting it wrong.

Re: I bet She's Colorblind
 

This may be the right answer. I tend to think that white people of all kinds deny their racism no matter the level. And I think many white people have been in a position where they were accused or looked at sideways and felt a compulsion to explain that they are in fact not racist, so when they hear another white person desperately try to explain the same thing, there's some kind of knee-jerk empathy.

Once you read the book, you'll read about how DiAngelo breaks down when someone is accused of racism (even minor shit) and all the white people around that person rally to his/her rescue. "She's a good person, she's not racist," "He didn't mean it like that," etc. Hell, there's a whole chapter on the power of white women's tears.

This is not the main point.

Yes. This is the whole point, right? When it comes to this topic, it is impossible for someone accused of racism to step back and think about it. There is no introspection. There is only defensiveness, accusations, explanations, excuses, avoidance.

That is very little of what bugs me.

That's a good question. I'm not going to have him act out of some sense of loyalty to me. The guy was a regular and my friend's superficial, business relationship with him shouldn't be put in jeopardy because I'm done with the guy.

TM

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

I'm as pro-Israel as any one here and I have never heard the "allegiance elsewhere" as a thing. I give a pass on something she might not have realized. I do think there are some real haters in the new crop of congress, just not this one statement.

Re: Doesn’t Matter Who Wins the K Race; We’re All the Same
 

I mean, I'm not well placed to be especially sensitive to anti-jewish stuff, but the first thing that "dual allegiance" conjures to my are mind anti-Catholic tropes used against Kennedy, referring to the Vatican.