Antisemitism: medieval and modern. Steven Katz

In the 2009 Freilich Foundation Annual Lecture in Bigotry and Tolerance, Steven Katz describes the features of medieval Christian antisemitism and the very different features of modern racial antisemitism, culminating in Nazi antisemitism. He concludes with an assessment on the connection between historical antisemitism and the antisemitism of today.

Steven T. Katz is Director of the Elie Wiesel Center for Judaic Studies at Boston University, Boston, Ma., where he holds the Alvin J. and Shirley Slater Chair in Jewish and Holocaust Studies. Professor Katz was Chair of the Academic Committee of the United States Holocaust Museum for five years and still serves on the committee.

ANU, Canberra, March 2009

Could be, yes, but generally aren’t, which is partly what fuels their ressentiment.

And, if you can leave out the religious aspects and assuming the literal interpretation, isn’t “tikkum olam” surely a compliment? Does “Troll” have a clue?

In this case, leaving out the religious aspect means leaving out the Jewish aspect, an impossibility as The Anti-Semite’s world revolves around The Jew, and derives its meaning from it. Thus I am Jewish by mere virtue of the fact that I appear to defend The Jew from The Anti-Semite.

Them’s crazy!

And, if you can leave out the religious aspects and assuming the literal interpretation, isn’t “tikkum olam” surely a compliment? Does “Troll” have a clue?

What are they all so scared of? A false enemy and shadows?

Stoopid alright. Geez.

As for the commentary: yes and no. My blog tends to attract all kindsa anti-Semites, bigots and racists (I mean, you should see some of the comments I DON’T publish!). They usually come from Australia, the US or the UK, but it varies.

The first comment (“you tikkum olamin?”) was posted by someone in the Netherlands; ‘Another Ranting Anti-Semitic Troll’ is someone from the US (which is apparently where Mike Delaney is also from). Peter Watson is a teenage racist from regional Queensland (and a member of the ‘Australia First Party’); Darrin Hodges is from Sydney, a former member of AF who now belongs to the rival ‘Australian Protectionist Party’. ‘Tony the Troll. Again!’ is a serial troll I’ve now more-or-less banned from my blog, but who’s posted 100s of comments under dozens of names, and is I think the stupidest person ever to have done so. ‘Whitelaw’ is another AF member named Jim Perren; like Peter, he’s a neo-Nazi from rural QLD (but old enough to know better). ‘KinkyBoy’ is another, formerly frequent troll, who is a monomaniac and now frequent commenter on Jim’s blog. Finally, ‘anarchore’ is a Canadian-based (?) anti-Semite, while the last few comments concern an internecine dispute among a number of different anti-Semitic groups and individuals, in which O’Connell assumes various roles, generally either as courageous champion of The Troof or dastardly agent of The Jew.

So…

Yeah, the planet is screwed, and yeah, one racist, bigoted, narrow minded, self-serving, one-eyed, insane, oxygen-waster is one too many, but I allow some of their commentary on my blog because others have expressed the view that these moarons don’t exist, so therefore I’m wrong to oppose their stoopid. Beyond that, Theantibogan blog documents the mountains of racist stoopid on Facebook — of which, sadly, there’s an absolutely endless supply.

Holy sh*t! Are there really so many racist, bigoted, narrow minded, self-serving, one-eyed, insane, oxygen-wasters in this world?

This planet is truly screwed.