RETIRE ANTISEMITISM

Today's topic has been long percolating, and not very pleasantly. I mean, it doesn't exactly smell like a good cuppa coffee. But it's been rattling around my head for a while, and this past week, the furor around a few choice comments from folks like Nick Cannon and DeSean Jackson make me want to examine the word antisemitism.

This is not a popular topic. At least not amongst my peeps. If anything, it's a hot button issue, rightly so, but I think this virulence is mislabeled. I am not talking about the act, I am talking about the word: antisemitism.

Let's look at the word SEMITE as a stand alone:

1. a member of any of various ancient and modern peoples originating in southwestern Asia, including the Akkadians, Canaanites, Phoenicians, Hebrews, and Arabs.
2. a Jew.
3. a member of any of the peoples descended from Shem, the eldest son of Noah.

The Levant

No surprises there. Or are there? Lots people don't realize Arabs are Semites, Other people like to refer to themselves as the "real" Semites, excluding Jews because Ashkenazi Jews look pretty much European. They conveniently forget most Jews outside the US are not Ashkenazi, but are a whole raft of other types, with a sizable percentage being Mizrachi from guess where? The Levant....the Middle East... and North Africa. Hello? They look more like their Arab cousins than they look like white Ashkenazi.  

So maybe antisemitism is the wrong word to use to describe what is happening in the Western World. 

Michael Berenbaum writing for ENCYCLOPÆDIA BRITANNICA  notes:

The term anti-Semitism was coined in 1879 by the German agitator Wilhelm Marr to designate the anti-Jewish campaigns under way in central Europe at that time. Although the term now has wide currency, it is a misnomer, since it implies a discrimination against all Semites. Arabs and other peoples are also Semites, and yet they are not the targets of anti-Semitism as it is usually understood. The term is especially inappropriate as a label for the anti-Jewish prejudices, statements, or actions of Arabs or other Semites. Nazi anti-Semitism, which culminated in the Holocaust, had a racist dimension in that it targeted Jews because of their supposed biological characteristics—even those who had themselves converted to other religions or whose parents were converts. This variety of anti-Jewish racism dates only to the emergence of so-called “scientific racism” in the 19th century and is different in nature from earlier anti-Jewish prejudices.

He may be on to something important here. 

Antisemitism is sometimes called the longest hatred. Its roots go back at least 4 centuries before the appearance of Christianity. Historian Josephus attributes the following to Hecateus of Abdera's writing around the 4th century B.C.E:

[Jews] have often been treated injuriously by the kings and governors of Persia, yet can they not be dissuaded from acting what they think best; but that when they are stripped on this account, and have torments inflicted upon them, and they are brought to the most terrible kinds of death, they meet them after an extraordinary manner, beyond all other people, and will not renounce the religion of their forefathers

We were a stubborn, stiff-necked group, y'know. Still are. 

Once Christianity comes on the scene, well, the history is well-established that Jews are the scapegoat minority in most places. Back then, it's not called antisemitism. It's anti-Jewish. And that's what it should be called now.

The term antisemitism does not even appear until the 1879, thanks  to that fineh mensch Wilhelm Marr who coined the phrase antisemite and founded the Antisemites League. The word took off. At least two more Antisemite parties were founded at around the same time: The German Social Antisemitic Party and the Antisemitic People's Party. Hitler did not have to go far to find an audience. 

But there's that word. I guess German's simplistic structure did not allow for the creation new a word to encompass Jew-hatred. They need more important words to describe art forms like Gesamtkunstwerk or Bezirksschornsteinfegermeister...the head chimney-sweep. One might think that antijüdisch would do the trick, but apparently not. For whatever reasons they had, the Germans chose to mask their intent with a word that was not exactly matching in translation: Antisemitismus

The word stuck. Every time I hear it I cringe...and not just because of context. I hear the sociable lie beneath the surface. The facade hides nothing; the intent remains the same. And people use lots of other phrases to hide their Jewish hatred in socially acceptable ways: Anti-Zionist. Anti-Israel. Anti-Progressive. Why not code it even more deeply and call it Aunty D'vera or Aunty Golde? It's the same bullshit. You remember...lipstick on a  pig?

In the end, it doesn't matter what you call Jew-hating or how you try to push it into socially acceptable terms. No one is fooled. The increase in Jew-hatred is palpable these days. Whether it's in France, the UK, or here, hating Jews seems to be growing as a new participation sport. In some ways, it's like whack-a-mole...as soon as you whack one down, a new one pops up. Here in the US, it's open season on crawling out from under this particular rock, encouraged by the Asshole-In-Chief who seems  to thinks no one knows what he's doing. 3,000 years of Jew-hatred and he thinks we don't recognize it? (Wink, wink.)

Women of the IDF

Jews are a strange amalgam of the human condition. We come in all sizes, colors, and shapes. We are our own rainbow. We are a group of human beings. What we are not is homogeneous. Even in the United States, there are Ashkenzai Jews, Sephardi Jews, Mizrachi Jews, Black Jews, Persian Jews, Ethiopian Jews, Bene Israel Jews, Syrian Jews, Asian Jews, orthodox Jews, marsorti Jews, reform Jews, and secular Jews. Line us up, and you don't see one face, one nose, one intellect, one bank account. You only see a diverse group of people. We tend to be very polite about that. We let the haters apologize...or pretend to apologize...and we all smile and say, "that's okay," but it's really not.  

Once upon a time, someone tried to line us up and send us all to the ovens. That is not ancient history. There are people, precious few and dwindling daily, who stood on those lines. They know what hate looks like....and it's not antisemitism. It's Jew-hatred and it's alive and well in the US.

If you want to hate Jews, you get to hate all of us regardless of size, color, or shape. You have to pretty much admit you hate all people unlike your own little microcosm. And if you hate Jews, you are not antisemitic, you are a Jew-Hater. That's a much more precise  label. Maybe people should start getting used to it. 

We need to stop making excuses and being polite. Call Jew-haters what they are. No other community would tolerate the slander and the slurs the way we have. We don't need Nick Cannon or DeSean Jackson to apologize. It's not really gonna change what they think, only what they say in public. We need to be calling it out, saying the words, and stop being so goddamn nice about it. 

Retire antisemitism. There are better ways to call it what it is: Jew-hatred. And if you really need an "anti" word, use anti-Jewish. Much clearer.

There. I said it. Let the firestorm commence. 

The Wifely Person's Tip o'the Week

A note to my gentle...and some not-so-gentle readers: 

Ten years ago, on July 19, 2010, I published the first episode of 

The Wifely Person Speaks, 

not knowing where this would go, what I would write about, or if anyone would care. 

I still cannot answer where or what from week to week, but I can tell you that empirical evidence leads me to believe people seem to care. 

I will not pretend to understand that, but I will tell you I am eternally grateful for the reader response...especially the emails. Keep 'em coming. Please. 

Therefore, you should know I am not stopping anytime soon.

From the bottom of my heart, I thank you.