Yes, some who are “just asking questions” are working an agenda. And some not. And we have no way of telling who is who with certainty. So how best to respond to someone asking questions, whatever your personal assessment of his/her motives might be, recognizing that the audience for the response is not only the questioner but also the others who may be listening, few of whom have reason to have the same relative pitch that you have?
spoke,
I’ll ask you a similar question: Given what you now know about the context, how do you think we should respond, both to this particular charge, and the related charge that Jews are in charge of X, Y, or Z despised political philosophy? Recognize that political philosophies are in the space of new ideas and so it really is often true that Jews are highly involved in whatever political POV you despise. Communists? Yup, beginning with Marx and Trotsky. Capitalist Pigs? Uh huh. Some of the piggiest. Labour Rights organizers? Oh yeah. Free market economies? Yup. Both Chicago and Austrian schools. Neocons? You betcha. So much so that “neocon” became code for saying “Jewish” in some parts. Pacifists and anti-war activists? Of course. Libertarians? Uh huh. Civil Rights advocates? Yup. Bigots? We got em too. Jews control the media to promote their agenda and the nature of that agenda is often any and all of the above depending on the anti-Semite’s target audience. Okay, probably few in the Tea Party but even the Religious Right has some prominent Orthodox voices. When someone is just asking, but is asking questions that sound as if they could come from that playbook, what, in your opinion, is the most effective response?
Certainly if it’s a first-time questioner who’s raising a classic offensive stereotype, he/she may be unaware of how it’s been misused throughout history and how it will be viewed, here or elsewhere*. Education can be helpful in such instances.
When bigoted attitudes (against one or more groups) are promoted in a hostile manner, using a lack of evidence (or easily refuted misinformation, such as that found on sleazy websites devoted to bigotry), and the person promoting bigotry does so over and over again despite attempts at education - then yes, I feel such a person can be characterized with certainty. Once their agenda is common knowledge their claims can be viewed with appropriate skepticism and dispatched (with evidence of course, but not requiring the level of repetitive effort one might expend to convince someone who is not a lost cause).
For instance, I find DSeid to be a decent and knowledgeable poster with whom I disagree at times, but whose evidence is generally of a high quality without requiring a bunch of fact-checking. Conversely there have been numerous posters here whose biases are so evident that far more rigorous standards must be applied before any of their claims can be accepted.
*Even if one is unaware of the baggage attached to certain topics, it doesn’t mean that common sense can’t be applied to avoid blurting out one’s curiosity without doing a little research first. This board is famous (in certain forums in particular) for threads about bodily functions and inane inquiries of all kinds. Most everyone here is reasonably intelligent. Before you post questions/opinions about the alleged predilections of a particular ethnicity/religion/sexual orientation/whatever, it makes sense to do a bit of Googling to get a basic level
of understanding about the subject before posting to avoid unnecessary conflict and bad feelings.
Jackmannii, thank you for the kind assessment of my contributions here. And likewise. We will have to disagree about much certainty we can have in our assessments. And of course if someone is openly hostile and sleazy then making their agenda clear may be all that is needed to respond appropriately. But we are talking about those just asking questions and even if you personally are certain as to their intent others may not be. Even Herman Wouk’s character has his doubters; I would fear coming off more like another character referenced further upstream: Woody Allen’s “D’Jew?” one. The conversation is not a private one with the questioner. How does attempting to “out” someone as having an agenda, even when you are sure that is the case (which I personally rarely am) play to others who aren’t attuned to the same pitches you are? What approach is going to help diminish potential anti-Semitic beliefs the most? I honestly don’t know and honestly fear that the answer is often “none of the above”; as I said upthread some, that in every direction the potential for madness lies.
Well spoke I regret that you have left before seeing fit to respond to the question I asked.
Nevertheless I thought this small update was of note: upthread I had mentioned the tactic of blaming Jews for X, Y, or Z despised political philosophy (the exact one changing with the audience) since you will find Jews as major forces in almost all of them, but had made a possible exception of the Tea Party - well, the major funders of the Tea Party, the billionaire New Yorker Koch brothers, are not Jewish - Catholic of Dutch heritage - but apparently living in New York and having a name that might possibly sound Jewish is enough that the tactic can be used:
Well, I don’t think Jews are going to blamed for the Nazis or the skinheads anyway. (Cece’s take notwithstanding.)
What’s kind of depressing is that the Jewish stereotypes of today have gotten progressively more boring.
Where are the colorful if disreputable figures of the past gone? For instance, the Jewish gangsters (i.e. members of Murder Inc.) and the swashbuckling spies and foreign adventurers (like Two-Gun Cohen, Moe Berg and Sidney Reilly). Reilly was quite the guy - as a pre-WWI British spy he got a job in a Krupp armaments plant to spy on the Germans, and when he had trouble getting weapons specifications his solution was to overpower and kill a security guard, break into the safe and escape with the Kaiser’s goons hot on his trail.
Who’s going to make a thrill-packed movie about Jewish Hollywood executives? I miss the good old days.
The same answer I would give for all controversial topics: I think you should discuss the issue openly and honestly (–as I think you have in this thread).
What I don’t think you should do is try to squelch debate with accusations of bigotry. (Which thankfully you have not done.) The problem with responding that way is that it tends to prevent the issue from being discussed at all. (Dopers who might otherwise participate in the discussion sit it out because they don’t want to be smeared.) And leaving such controversial topics undiscussed doesn’t eliminate bigotry; it just forces it underground. (In fact I think the stridency of the boards’ self-appointed Grand Inquisitors of anti-Semitism probably only serves to create further resentment-- as I think you have correctly surmised.)
I have no anti-Semitic sentiments at all, but I enter a thread like this with dread, because I know there are a couple of posters who, like Jerry Seinfeld’s Uncle Leo, are hyper-sensitive to the issue (I’m sure they would say “attuned”).
I can read an article like the one you linked above and understand why some might be quick to arms to respond to perceived anti-Semitism. But I don’t think such bristling responses are really productive.
I gave this some more thought and realized that this is why it’s valuable to have spoke posting in this and similar threads. Apart from his opinions on a given topic he can illustrate some interesting ramifications we might not have otherwise considered.
spoke is worried about forcing bigotry underground. Isn’t that what we’ve been increasingly doing in recent decades, both in the U.S. and abroad? Legislation has cracked down on discrimination in employment, housing and other public spheres. Both legal remedies and broad public disapproval have severely limited the activities of groups that openly promote bigotry. There are no more giant Klan marches and rallies (at most of what has passed for Klan events in recent years, the protestors far outnumbered the Klansmen, who required police protection). We don’t have budding fascists filling Madison Square Garden to promote their ideology. And say what you will about talk radio, there’s no one like Father Coughlin openly preaching hatred. Bigots feel vastly more inhibited about promoting their agendas. So should we feel bad about that?
Nah, I don’t think so. I’m pleased by the fact that most hate groups these days could hold their meetings in a broom closet instead of hoping to fill an auditorium. Bigots largely confined to emoting anonymously on the Internet? A big improvement on the old days. And if, even on the Internet, it is made increasingly clear to bigots that they face scorn and ridicule for spreading poisonous nonsense and they start to dread expressing their bigotry, is that a bad thing? Not in my opinion.
There is a very wide latitude given to free speech in this country and it’s a large part of what makes us great. It does not mean that saying ignorant and hateful things should come without a price, even if the price is merely the disapproval of your peers.
The argument will be made that the progress we’ve made in counteracting bigotry has gone too far and led to the rise of violent hate groups that operate in secrecy. This is debatable (perhaps in a separate thread in this forum). We have supposedly had an upsurge in activity by bigots due to the election of Obama. Should we have refrained from voting for him so as not to provoke such people? Where do you draw the line in protecting society from the negative impact of bigotry, for fear that another splinter group will dress up in camouflage gear in the Idaho woods and start plotting violence?
I hope spoke or some other supporter of the idea that “we musn’t drive them underground” will start a discussion that aims to clarify if, and just where we need to draw the line in assuring human rights and combatting bigotry.
Yes, Jackmannii, you have divined my meaning precisely. Thanks for “clarifying.” :rolleyes:
I suppose you are right. Silence is best. If anyone dares notice the facts presented in the OP, they must be driven from our midst. Much better that approach than to have a rational discussion.
The difference between open discussion and bigoted ranting should be obvious. Are you intentionally conflating the 2? Or is it that you think any bias against Jews must by definition be bigotry? If the latter, the mere fact that the supposed bigot is willing to have a frank discussion of the merits (or lack of same) of his or her position should be enough to encourage your participation - participation with an open mind rather than a single minded agenda.
The fact that you are either unable or unwilling to make such distinctions means that no discussion which falls even marginally within your view of what constitutes anti-semitism will be possible. Earlier in this thread I laid out some broad principles for discussion - principles which on their face applied generally to any subgroup of people - not just Jews. You repeatedly demonstrated no interest in discussing the substance of my argument. You chose instead to focus on what you saw as the anti-semitic undertones - which in fact were not present. After a few such exchanges, I chose to withdraw since my participation clearly was not required.
Everyone has biases - even you. The point is to feel free enough to be able to discuss them openly without becoming a target. Why is that so difficult to understand?
I think it is more complicated than how either of you present it.
I highly doubt that most (or perhaps even “any”) who hold bigoted or anti-Semitic beliefs perceive themselves to be bigots or anti-Semites. They think that what they honestly think is just truth as they see it: “I’m not prejudiced against Gypsies, it’s just that they’re lazy and dishonest.” Fill in your favorites. It is only from the perspective of those who do not share the belief that one is bigoted or anti-Semitic.
Thus, at the risk of being mealy-mouthed, I can agree with both of you. It is a good thing that explicit bigotry is forced underground. And it is necessary to have rational discussions that honestly discuss what the tropes are, what overlap they may or may not have with reality, and hopefully thereby diminish their power.
It is the audience of those who have no specific belief set firmly held that I am concerned about, those whose main conscious experience with, name the minority but in this specific instance Jews, is limited to occasional real life contacts with those who so explicitly self-identify, and to the many images and tropes that they see and hear in the media and from others. For these folk jackmannii it isn’t really underground, it is just not when you or I are in earshot … which is most of the time. They hear these tropes no matter what. Wouldn’t you prefer that they hear them in a forum in which some rules of politeness must apply, “above ground” where the worst explicit bigotry is verboten, and by enough light to disabuse them some?
Sure, some of those who are “just asking questions” are actually firmly set in their belief set, a belief set that you and I would perceive as bigoted or anti-Semitic, working an agenda (and no dzero, to some of us that difference is not always so obvious); but even then the audience consists of a greater number of those who really are, in the non-pejorative sense of the word, just ignorant - not stupid, just uninformed. Should their only exposure to the tropes be in hushed but unchallenged tones?
You smiley face but it is true. And as noted before, being paranoid doesn’t mean they are not out to get you. And in the case of Jews it is true: we are paranoid and the world has, time after time, proven itself to be out to get us. We ignore that history at our potential peril.
And back to the article referenced in the op - it is that paranoia that the article mocks, which I think is a dangerously naive position to take. Anti-Semitism is dismissed by many nowadays because, afterall, Jews are so over-represented in the ranks of the achieved. How can prejudice against them be held as significant compared to bigotry against other groups for whom bigotry has kept from as much success? Yet historically the combination of being perceived as “other” coupled with “success” has set up Jew-hating - add in hard economic times and a few Jews visibly doing well despite it, or worse yet, a few profiting during it - and you can easily see some Jew-hating getting traction, and called “just asking questions”. Paranoia? Maybe. But still a realistic paranoia. I would be very surprised if a large fraction of those who self-identify as Tea Party did not endorse many beliefs that I would consider very anti-Semitic.
And yes, I understand the history, and I understand the reason for concern when such tropes arise. But I think that causes some to err on the side of paranoia, even fanatical paranoia. And it only takes a few encounters with actual anti-Semites, I would imagine, to reinforce that paranoia.
I can only tell you that your way of dealing with the situation is better than the smear-and-shout-down approach. That can only breed resentment.
spoke, well “better” is a matter of outcome. Did you end up no longer believing that there is good reason to believe that Jews “overwhelm” Hollywood and functionally discriminate against non-Jews in that industry? If in the future someone tells you that Jews “control” Hollywood, how will you respond?
As I said up front, “Jews” as a group don’t do anything. Nor do “Jews” as a group control anything. There is of course no grand conspiracy.
Whether there is a (non-sinister) good-old-boy network operating in Hollywood, which results in Jews predominating in the industry is, I think, an open question. I trust you see (as I do) the distinction between a conspiracy and a social network.
