Burn, Baby, Burn

I actually don’t mean that literally, as anyone who knows me would know. Of course people could quote it out of context, but screw them. You have to be outrageous to get any attention these days. It’s kind of my rhetorical methodology. Where it came from is a long story. For the time being, you can blame Mad Magazine.

So the campuses are blowing up, and the merry month of May is upon us, the traditional season for campuses blowing up. There will be a lot more of it. The Israeli blitzkrieg visited upon Gaza is well-timed to launch a whole new left movement. The students agitating today are acquiring experiences that will stay with them the rest of their lives, shaping careers or (as in my case) lack thereof.

A few pointers germane to the times:

Do not conflate Judaism with Zionism. Judaism preceded Zionism by thousands of years. Lo, according to legend, it preceded Israel itself. (“We were slaves in the land of Egypt” and all that.) In fact, I’d say it’s a mistake to call Israel a religious state, or a Jewish state. The U.S. is not a Christian state. India is not a Hindu state. Christians and Hindus can be Nazis. Neither are equivalent to Nazis as a group. States and religions are different things.

Israel and its nutty friends in the U.S. would like you to believe Israel is the center of world Jewry. Its cultural heart, so to speak. Says who? The people who want you to think any criticism of Israel is a criticism of all Jews, hence anti-semitic. The people who hold that Israel is the only safe place for Jews. The Jews who will not actually go and settle in Israel themselves.

The news to all such deluded persons is that Jews have thrived outside of Israel, in the Diaspora. In fact, Israelis who’ve made it big leave Israel. What does that tell you?

A friend proposed the useful notion of “Anti-Zionistism.” Properly speaking, Lefts oppose perverse ideology, not individuals holding such an ideology. In fact, the real enemy is a state wielding mass lethal force in service to such ideology. The enemy is not random individuals maintaining an ideology we do not like, even when it is a rotten ideology. “Only a pawn in their game,” as the bard said. Demonization of individuals feeds the anti-semitism canards and loses the relevant political thread.

Without doubt, some outrageous anti-semitic episodes on campuses are the work of Zionist agent-provocateurs, but it would be naive to think that all of them are. It is common for people to confuse Judaism with Zionism, especially for Jews.

Students need to get their shit together.