In this episode of the Full Comment Podcast, we discuss anti-Semitism and the ways we can push back against it. What is it, and what does it mean, and why is it important to push back? Philip Slayton, author of Anti-Semitism: An Ancient Hatred in the Age of Identity Politics, answers these questions.
00:01:00.420The gold standard of online casinos has arrived.
00:01:03.560Golden Nugget Online Casino is live, bringing Vegas-style excitement and a world-class gaming experience right to your fingertips.
00:01:10.680Whether you're a seasoned player or just starting, signing up is fast and simple.
00:01:15.620And in just a few clicks, you can have access to our exclusive library of the best slots and top-tier table games.
00:01:21.680Make the most of your downtime with unbeatable promotions and jackpots that can turn any mundane moment into a golden opportunity at Golden Nugget Online Casino.
00:01:31.340Take a spin on the slots, challenge yourself at the tables, or join a live dealer game to feel the thrill of real-time action.
00:01:37.820All from the comfort of your own devices.
00:01:40.040Why settle for less when you can go for the gold at Golden Nugget Online Casino.
00:02:27.440And our next guest is going to discuss some of the ways that you can push back and why some of the efforts to push back against anti-Semitism are, well, just the wrong strategies, the wrong forms of fighting back.
00:02:42.140But before we get to Philip Slayton, I do want to remind you that you can and should hit the subscribe button on Full Comment.
00:02:48.240We'd love for you to subscribe, and you can do that on any platform that you're listening to us on, on Google Podcasts, on Apple, Spotify, Amazon, wherever you're listening.
00:02:57.900Hit the subscribe button, leave a review, and make sure that you share this with your friends.
00:03:06.620That's probably something we should try and define at the beginning, and it's something that Philip Slayton talks about in his book, Anti-Semitism, An Ancient Hatred in the Age of Identity Politics.
00:03:22.440Because that's something that in recent by-election here in Ontario, there was a big debate about, given the comments of one particular candidate.
00:03:33.660There was a debate about whether her comments actually rose to the level of anti-Semitism or not.
00:03:41.240Well, Brian, it won't surprise you to hear me say that there is no easy answer to that question.
00:03:46.540There's no easy answer to what is anti-Semitism.
00:03:50.200Probably these days, the most commonly mentioned or cited definition is a definition by the International Holocaust Remembrance Association, the IHRA, that was formulated a few years ago.
00:04:02.660I personally find it highly unsatisfactory, as do many people, partly because it's so vague.
00:04:09.160It's one of these definitions that whatever you're looking for, you're going to find it.
00:04:12.940And partly because one thing which is not vague, but one thing it's not vague about is the attitude towards Israel.
00:04:20.900Any kind of criticism of Israeli policies or the state of Israel can be, under this definition, construed to be anti-Semitic.
00:04:28.320But anyway, there's no easy answer, Brian, to what is anti-Semitism.
00:04:33.820People talk about hatred of Jews, but there are many ways hatred can be expressed, and there are many different kinds of hatred.
00:04:40.100So I'm afraid I cannot give you a simple, neat, pat answer to the question.
00:04:45.380One of the things that came up in the by-election I mentioned was this idea that Jews have a divided loyalty, that they are loyal to Israel rather than to Canada,
00:05:01.140but also that Jews control large parts of the world.
00:05:06.220In fact, there was one comment, the effect that Benjamin Netanyahu is controlling people around the world who are killing people in Canada.
00:05:16.180And you look at this and you say, first off, how do people believe such ridiculous things?
00:05:22.200But let's talk about those two angles, the idea of divided loyalties.
00:05:51.940I mean, I regard it as a ludicrous accusation.
00:05:55.860You can be a good, loyal, let's say, Canadian, and also Jewish and loyal to your religion and your race, and even a sympathizer with or a supporter of Israel.
00:06:09.680There's lots of room for all of those sentiments in one person.
00:06:12.420So that particular claim, I think, is ludicrous.
00:06:14.580The conspiracy aspect of all this, which is Jews control the world, they control Hollywood, they control international banking and all of that, these kinds of ideas have been kicking around for quite some time.
00:06:27.980They seem to have gathered some momentum recently, and I attribute that to the rise of populism, the general rise in the Western world, and perhaps elsewhere, of populism.
00:06:38.460Because part of populism is a belief in conspiracy theory.
00:06:42.320There's always somebody else, some other person, some other group outside that is subverting your agenda, the rightful agenda.
00:06:49.640So I think the conspiracy side of it, although it's been around, as I say, for quite some time, its recent acceleration, its recent momentum is part of the whole populist trend that we clearly see in politics these days.
00:07:03.140So that's the idea of divided loyalties, this idea of Jews being, as you mentioned, controlling banks, controlling Hollywood, controlling media.
00:07:17.600Because is that a 20th century edition that we're still living with, or is that something that has been part of anti-Semitism from the beginning?
00:07:27.860Well, I think it's been, to some extent, Brian, part of anti-Semitism from the beginning.
00:07:33.840I mean, it has modern expressions of the kind that we've just mentioned, you just described.
00:07:40.480Well, as I say, I think it comes from, first of all, from some deep human psychological traits.
00:07:46.500I mean, people are always looking for some other explanation of misfortunes that they think have fallen on them, either individually or as a group.
00:07:55.300They're always looking for somebody who may be responsible for their misfortune.
00:08:00.200And the Jews, to some extent, historically, have presented an easy target, an easy group to pick on.
00:08:07.040And then, as I say, all of this is turbocharged by populism.
00:08:11.860And also, I should add, by social media.
00:08:13.960It's now become much easier for people with silly opinions, ludicrous opinions, hateful opinions, to broadcast those opinions and even get some support for those opinions on social media.
00:08:26.000So, social media has a lot to ask for in this particular context.
00:08:29.580I want to ask you about a form of anti-Semitism that it's new to me, maybe not to you.
00:08:38.380And then once we establish all this, we'll get more into what you've written in your book and how people are pushing back.
00:08:45.800But I've seen lately this new to me description of, well, they're not the real Jews, they're Ashkenazi Jews, and those are the people that control the world.
00:09:01.360Is that a new variation on a tune, or has that been part of it from the beginning?
00:09:10.440No, I actually haven't heard that view expressed in quite that way.
00:09:15.380There are, of course, two mainstreams of Judaism.
00:09:17.760There's the Ashkenazi Jews, who essentially trace their origin to Eastern Europe.
00:09:22.760And there are the Sephardic Jews, which in recent times, certainly, trace their origins to North Africa, before that to Spain and Portugal.
00:09:30.000So, those are the two mainstreams of Judaism.
00:09:34.460Both are found represented in most Jewish communities, and certainly in Israel.
00:09:38.500And by the way, interestingly enough, historically, the Ashkenazis and the Sephardi Jews have not got along very well with each other.
00:09:46.680Certainly, that has been true in the early days.
00:09:48.860As is often the case among ethnic and religious groups, there are factions within factions.
00:09:56.260So, the Ashkenazi Jews, those from Eastern Europe, were the earliest settlers of power at the time, what is now Israel.
00:10:02.820And the Sephardi Jews came from North Africa somewhat later on.
00:10:05.860And when they came to Israel from North Africa, the Ashkenazi Jews already there looked down upon them and thought they were fit only for farm laborers and domestic servants, that sort of thing.
00:10:20.720But the idea that somehow Ashkenazi Jews are a special, powerful sect, you know, and they're the people that control the world, it's just ludicrous, as I say.
00:10:33.300There are only about 15 million Jews in the world.
00:10:35.780So, if the Jews control the world, they're doing a pretty good job against huge odds.
00:10:38.960But it has to be said that they've been, Jews have been highly successful.
00:10:44.460I mean, Israel, which is predominantly, although not exclusively, the Jewish state, has been wildly successful economically, militarily, in all kinds of ways.
00:10:53.560Not socially so much, but in many ways, wildly successful.
00:10:56.860It's a very powerful Middle Eastern country with nuclear weapons and a formidable army, and that's been proven time and time again.
00:11:06.420Jews in the diaspora, and that principally means the United States, Jews in the diaspora have likewise been highly successful.
00:11:45.400Yeah, it's, but that Ashokanazi thing.
00:11:50.280So, I wasn't wrong that it appears to be new, but that's one of the things coming out on social media is that, well, Jews aren't the problem.
00:12:09.240But this is the new form that I'm seeing on social media and sometimes being sent to me by racist readers that want me to adopt a particular viewpoint.
00:12:22.740Well, Brian, as I'm sure you know, I'm sure you would agree, the thing about social media is you can be an ignorant person and you can be a silly person and you can be a prejudiced person.
00:12:35.640But that doesn't stop you from going on social media and expressing your views.
00:12:39.320That's both the horrible thing about social media and also, in a way, it's great glory that everybody has a platform, which didn't used to be the case.
00:12:49.180But, however, things like, you know, the Ashokanazi aren't really Jews and they're the ones who are controlling the world are just plain silly.
00:12:55.920One of the points I make in my book is that when it comes to responding to anti-Semitism, when it comes to dealing with it, you have to decide what you're going to respond to, what really matters and what really doesn't.
00:13:09.320And I would say to you that the kind of claim or accusation or conspiracy theory that you've just been describing is so manifestly silly, you know, it's like that claim was made not too long ago that the cause of wildfires in California were Jewish space lasers.
00:13:42.920It's just so ludicrous that it's best just to ignore.
00:13:46.260So one of the main points, I guess, of my book on anti-Semitism that's just come out recently, I have to put a plug in for that, is to say, look, there are some things you have to deal with, some things that are very serious, expressions of anti-Semitism that are really serious, that have to be responded to in a robust way.
00:14:05.780And there are others that are not, and you can't treat them all as if they're the same, which regrettably, I think, the Jewish, international Jewish community tends to do that.
00:14:15.360So when, for example, a Jewish organization puts out a report that says anti-Semitism is on the rise, this year there were, I'm just pulling a number out of thin air here, this year there were 32,312 incidents of anti-Semitism.
00:15:02.700Was there a hateful poster put up denouncing you?
00:15:06.760That happened recently here in Toronto, an ad billboard.
00:15:10.800Did that happen or was someone making a stupid comment about space lasers on Twitter?
00:15:15.780Well, I mean, what I suggest in the book is a kind of four types of anti-Semitism, each of which suggests a particular approach to deal with it.
00:15:27.320The first kind, and I think on the whole the most common kind, is what I call degradation anti-Semitism, lack of civility.
00:15:35.260And this is somebody scrawling a swastika on a building, which, by the way, happened on the wall of the building, the condominium that I'd live in not too long ago.
00:15:46.140Or somebody, you know, making a nasty observation on the street as they see an Orthodox Jew in Orthodox Jewish costume going by.
00:16:08.720Another kind, as you just suggested, is violent anti-Semitism, when it's not just, you know, shouting dirty Jew, let's say, as somebody walks down the street, but it's punching them.
00:16:32.160Then you move from there to what I call private institutional anti-Semitism.
00:16:37.260This would be when, let's say, universities had rules against Jews enrolling, when newspapers in the editorial policy consistently took an anti-Semitic stance, and so on.
00:16:50.740That requires a different kind of response.
00:16:53.160And then finally, you come to the, what is the worst kind of anti-Semitism, hugely serious, and that's public institutional Semitism.
00:17:02.360That's when the government starts, for example, when the government starts adopting what could be reasonably regarded as anti-Semitic policies.
00:17:10.500And that requires an all-out response, no matter what the cost is.
00:17:14.960But I think it's important to say, what are we dealing with?
00:17:27.500The right response is not always the same response.
00:17:30.520It has to be an idea of proportionality.
00:17:32.780Would I be right in arguing that we don't have the last kind of anti-Semitism that you described, where the government is instituting anti-Semitic policies?
00:17:45.720We may have had that in Canada in the past.
00:19:13.680But in my view, identity politics, the modern form of it, the modern expression of it, is a breeding ground for prejudice and hatred.
00:19:23.380Exactly the things that originally it was designed, I suppose, to come back.
00:19:27.120We see the marches, though, in the streets of Toronto, in the streets of major cities across the country, where, how would you describe it?
00:19:38.860When you've got marches in support of Palestinians, which is completely understandable and acceptable, and they have more than legitimate grievances.
00:19:52.300But often they are expressed in ways that would see, well, I would argue, are anti-Semitic.
00:19:59.220Do you have to worry about people marching down Yonge Street with banners and chants of, from the river to the sea, essentially calling for the destruction of Israel?
00:20:12.140Do you have to be worried about that in Canada?
00:20:14.320Or is that one that you would say, you know what, just ignore it?
00:20:16.920Well, first of all, the Palestinians, like any other group, have the absolute right in this country to demonstrate them to march, provided they do it, in a non-violent way.
00:20:31.720Secondly, as you suggest, in my view at least, the Palestinians have legitimate grievances.
00:20:37.020They have legitimate complaints, which they should feel free to express, and they should express.
00:20:41.980Thirdly, just parenthetically, the chant, from the river to the sea, which means, I guess, it would be interpreted as a one-state solution to the Middle East problem, whereby both Israel and what is now Palestine, the Palestinian territories, form one country.
00:21:00.880That is a viable political proposal, which many Jews support, interestingly enough.
00:21:07.440Now, the difficulty is that things have become so embittered, partly because of policies of the Israeli government recently, I'm thinking primarily of settlements on the West Bank, they've become so embittered that now the discourse is not peaceful often.
00:21:25.520It's not, there's no discussion, there's no conversation, there is just the hurling of slogans.
00:21:32.440There have been attempts to do this in the past, the Oslo Accords and so on over a long period of time.
00:21:39.700So now there's no legitimate way of political differences, which are major differences and compelling differences.
00:21:47.760There's no real way for them to be expressed and addressed.
00:21:51.000So then the discourse tends to collapse into the hurling of insults on both sides.
00:21:55.340When you speak to someone like Erwin Cutler, though, you know, Erwin's argued that pushing back against things like this is important because if you don't, it leads to more.
00:22:54.160And I think in the whole Jewish community and perhaps even my old friend Erwin Cutler, don't do that.
00:23:01.020The second thing is that you suggest is a tricky point.
00:23:04.280I mean, it's the argument that, well, it's all very well for you, Philip Slayton, to say, don't get too worried about some kind of lack of civility, which may involve, you know, hurting insults at Jews.
00:23:22.420And these kinds of things lay the groundwork for much more pernicious and dangerous kind of anti-Semitism.
00:23:27.900I mean, people say, for example, that in Nazi Germany, it began with kind of taking the status of a citizen away from Jews by denigrating them.
00:23:40.160And that just then laid the groundwork for all the terrible things that we know subsequently occurred.
00:23:45.000And I can see that there is some merit, there is some seriousness to that argument.
00:23:51.360But I still think you have to look very carefully at what you're dealing with, assess its importance, some things are important, some things are not.
00:24:18.160Scotiabank. You're richer than you think.
00:24:19.860Philip, I want to talk to you in a few minutes about the different major forms of anti-Semitism and problems that have been experienced over the years between Jews and Christians that led to anti-Semitism, between Jews and Muslims.
00:24:33.900But you argue in the book that Zionism is actually something that's hurt Jews when it comes to festering anti-Semitism.
00:24:46.720I was surprised to see that, but why do you say it?
00:24:49.860Well, I think my point is slightly different from that point that you just made, Brian.
00:24:56.020I mean, what I don't like, what I think is unhelpful, retrograde, is a mixing up of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism.
00:25:07.260Is the idea that if you're anti-Zionist, by which I take to mean if you're opposed to some of the more current contemporary aggressive manifestations of Zionism, if you're opposed to that, you are therefore anti-Semitic.
00:25:23.300Because you can certainly be opposed to, not to the state of Israel, not to its existence, certain current policies of it, which might be regarded as Zionist policies, without being anti-Semitic.
00:25:35.880Maybe we should pause for a second and just let's give the definition of what you describe as Zionism versus anti-Semitism.
00:25:45.060So Zionism backing the belief or support of a Jewish homeland in Israel.
00:25:51.160Yes, I think that's a fair way to put it.
00:25:53.980That was the original Zionism, leading to the creation of Israel in 1948.
00:26:51.040But I think the point is that there's so much complicated politics on all sides going on that it confuses and clouds the issue of what is anti-Semitic at all.
00:27:01.000I mean, there's been marches in the street for weeks, months now, denouncing policies of the Netanyahu government.
00:27:13.320So I guess a better way of phrasing your argument would be that perhaps excesses of Zionism or redefining of Zionism sets back the fight against anti-Semitism.
00:27:51.560There are various degrees of religiosity.
00:27:55.640There's a very strong secular movement.
00:27:59.380And that's been manifested in these demonstrations against Netanyahu policies we've seen recently.
00:28:05.980Although I would say one thing about that.
00:28:07.460It does show that Israel is a free democracy with freedom of speech, which is a rare thing, certainly in the Middle East, to some extent, in the world as a whole.
00:28:21.560So relations between Jews and other religions, and primarily we're talking about Christians and Muslims rather than Buddhism, let's say.
00:28:32.640We don't need to go back into the ancient history of it, but there have definitely been what you might call institutional anti-Semitism within both faiths at various times.
00:29:18.960Well, without getting kind of too historical about this, the history of Christianity when it comes to the way they regard and treat Jews is not very good.
00:29:29.340And many people would say it all stems from the original deicide myth, which is the Jews killed Christ, which was the great fundamental sin.
00:29:39.520They didn't, by the way, but so it's just historically incorrect.
00:29:42.500But no one seems to let that stand in their way.
00:29:45.320Many analysts think that the systematic negative view of Jews that Christians have had throughout the ages laid the groundwork or certainly didn't stop the Holocaust.
00:29:57.960Many people think, many people think, many people look at this very carefully, think that Christian religion and the Christian church,
00:30:04.900or in its various manifestations, is fundamentally dislikes, indeed, is opposed to Jews and the Jewish religion.
00:30:15.440That is a difference, particularly in the United States.
00:30:17.840There's 100 million evangelical Christians in the United States, and they, for their own curious religious reasons, seem to be very strong supporters of Israel,
00:30:27.140but not necessarily of the Jews in Israel, which is a bit different.
00:30:31.120When it comes to the Muslims, this is particularly interesting, and people in the modern context think that the Jews and Arabs are at each other's throats,
00:30:39.220would like to kill each other, and have always been like that.
00:31:41.120Well, it's a fight about territory that's been going on for millennia.
00:31:44.240Well, in various ways it has, but it's had a very strong, powerful, modern expression in the last, what, hundred years or so?
00:31:53.740So, the anti-Semitism that you see emanating out of certain clerics within Islam, do you believe that that is generated by their religious views, or are they coming up with religious reasons to say, well, here's the problem with the Jews, but it really all goes back to the issue of land?
00:32:19.280Well, certainly in the Middle East itself, in the Palestinian Arabs themselves, I believe that to be primarily a dispute about territory, although there has subsequently been an open kind of a religious and ideological and indeed a racial overlay over that.
00:32:38.160But it's really about, if you're a Palestinian Arab, it's about you took our land and we want it back.
00:32:45.920More broadly speaking, it's hard to say.
00:32:48.900I mean, you know, Muslim religion is a huge religion with billions of adherents, and within that community you get all kinds of expressions, some extreme, some repulsive, but many not.
00:33:02.300So, it's hard to say, but you'll always find, you know, I'm sure you would agree with this, Brian, you'll always find people and groups and subgroups looking around for someone to hate and attack for their own particular reasons.
00:33:17.280Sometimes it doesn't particularly matter who the object of their hatred is.
00:33:48.580Well, I think I would repeat to them what I've just been saying to you, which is you have to have a more discerning and more discriminating and more understanding view of what is anti-Semitism, and you need to pick your battles very carefully.
00:34:29.500One has to understand that we live in an age where all kinds of identities are being formed and being refined.
00:34:38.320Identity groups are getting smaller all the time, and all of them have, or most of them, probably all of them, have a grievance.
00:34:45.080They define themselves partly by opposition to other people.
00:34:48.580They don't want other people to criticize them or even discuss them or write about them at all.
00:34:55.460And that's anti-Semitism is caught up in this much broader political and sociological trend.
00:35:02.620And you throw into the mix populism we talked about a little bit earlier on, the effects of social media, which turbocharges everything.
00:35:10.540And you have a very messy kind of volatile, explosive situation.
00:35:17.280And in that, you have to be very careful how you respond, have to respond very carefully, and you have to respond with proportionality if you want to get anywhere at all.
00:35:27.140I think there was once a hope that anti-Semitism, like other forms of hatred, would just disappear.
00:35:35.160But I think that, like poverty, it's something that will always be with us, and we can pass resolutions in legislatures.
00:35:44.300We can sign on to declarations that we will end this.