Tag Archives: jews

The dark side of community organizing

I’ve had a long simmering suspicion towards “community organizers”.  Might have been since college.  While I preferred to listen to people, I watched career minded organizers come in with their own agenda, rally people around it, and kick out anyone who disagreed.

Then came the Iraq War.  I was opposed to it – even though I’m not a pacifist, I didn’t like being lied and manipulated into a war.  I organized MoveOn movie nights because it was a great way to find like-minded people and try to amplify our opposition that way.  But MoveOn quickly became an organizing agent for the Democratic party, and when our discussions were replaced with “Bush as an Idiot” slogans, I backed off and dropped out.

Now, it seems, such “community organizing” has taken a toxic turn.  In the past few years I’ve seen first J-Street appear, and then Jewish Voice for Peace.  These groups have no organic connection with the Jewish community.  Their only real connection is with the Democratic apparatus, their only unifying factor a desire for Democrat coattails.

I’ll leave J-Street alone for another day, I’d like to focus on JVP for now.  The articles about them are damning, and yet I wonder how long they’re going to last.  Their own website looks like they’re a bunch of slick internet hacks.  First of all, it’s only available in HTTPS, which means you can’t track or verify any of their traffic.  But it looks like they’re disputing their Wikipedia page, which points out that their only claim to fame is giving the anti-Israel lobby some cover against the charge of anti-Semitism.

Of course, that doesn’t stop other groups from revealing who they are.  The ADL has a whole page devoted to their tactics.  Forward magazine also has a great article about them.

And if they were recognized as such, that would be one thing.  But Democrats like Karen Bass are starting to give them an air of legitimacy.  And that’s what concerns me.  Note:  she originally posted this on her Facebook page, but once I commented with the ADL link, she took it down.  Luckily, the internet loves to archive pages.  And so do I.

Overall, my IT pro analysis is that they’re great at overinflating their numbers and influence, claiming to not only speak for Jews, but questioning whether established groups like AIPAC, ADL, etc. actually represent them.  This is what makes them valuable for the Democratic party, and why the Obama campaign has been really pushing them to the forefront as an alternative to those pesky established Jewish organizations with their pesky demand that Israel remain a safe haven for Jews.

And see, here’s the ultimate difference between a “community organizing” group like JVP and an established community group like ADL.  It’s the daily advocacy and work that groups like ADL, AIPAC, Hillel, Chabad, do on a daily basis for Jews.  Charity work, research work, going out of your way for other Jews, taking complaints about slurs and hate crimes against Jews, taking them seriously, advocating on different governmental levels.  The political programs are only an extension of this daily work.  And that’s why all these Jewish groups are tireless advocates for Israel.  They know how desperately Jews need a safe haven in this world that so quickly aligns against them.

I can tell you without any more than a peek at JVP that they do NONE of this.  That’s what makes them a fraud.  That’s what makes them toxic to this country, and why they need to be outed.

We don’t even need to make this about Jews, either.  I’m sure other races and people have similar issues.  Whereas the organic community has their own organizations and culture, ruling class representatives go in with foundation money, not to advocate for that community, but to push their own agenda on them.  The community is just a stepping stone to a political or intellectual career.

Economist toys with Blood Libel

The blood libels keep pouring in.  I wrote this letter to The Economist based on their recent article on the Cracking down on Settlers:

——

DEAR SIR,

“Jew kills baby” is a tagline that should be raising red flags at any respected journal, as it provokes the medieval Blood Libel slur.  And yet, the number of times the press rallied around dead Arab children they hoped to pin on Jews in the past year is staggering.

Which is why I was quite disappointed to see you running the story “Cracking down on the settlers”.  It remains to be seen whether a Jewish settler even committed the arson – forensic evidence actually points to the contrary.  http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/198961#.VckfBSZVhBd

But to take a crime still under investigation, rush to pin it on Jews, and run with it to a criticism of Israeli policies in general, well it only delegitimizes any authority you have on the issue.

Some points I’d like to make:

Settlements aren’t “illegal”.  People like to claim it is so, but the area was never a country, and continues to be under dispute.

Gaza 2014 drove the point, at least materially, that evacuating disputed terriroties to Arab rule only exacerbates this situation.  Old dogmas die hard, but the fact is the best hope for peace isn’t a Judenrein West Bank – it’s making Arabs and Jews live among each other.

Despite your massaging your wording to even out the casualties, one dead Arab baby makes world headlines, while Jews are quite unceremoniously under constant Arab attack.  And it doesn’t matter whether Jews live in disputed territories or well within the confines of Israel.  If an Arab is killed, it’s soldiers stopping them from a murderous terrorist rampage, not any sort of Jew vigilante murder.

Finally, suppose the attack were actually caused by Jews.  A more rational mindset would understand that, under such a tense situation, blowback is inevitable.  Some certainly use it to justify the World Trade Center attacks.

It will be because of the left, not the right

Thinking of sending this letter to the Economist, figured I’d post it here first.  It’s in response to two contradictory articles they posted; claiming the PEGIDA march is Neo-Nazi (“Gone Boy on the Right“), and saying Jews don’t have to fear Muslim attacks (“Be Not Afraid“). The irony was a bit much not to write about.

SIR – I have this game I like to play with PEGIDA march pictures, called “Spot the Nazi.” I pore through the dozens of pictures of thousands of people, trying to find a single person, a single sign, with some neo-Nazi sign or signal. So far, I’ve found nothing.  So I was rather amused when a tabloid picked up some obscure picture of one of the organizers in a Hitler pose and threw it all over the place like a political football. It wound up all the way on your journal (“Gone Boy on the Right”), so kudos for that.

I say this in contrast to the “Free Palestine” marches, where a child couldn’t throw a stone without hitting a neo-Nazi reference.  Really, these marches were so glutted with stark raving mad anti-Semitism that it doesn’t bear repeating. It just reminds me of what Marx said, that things happen a second time as farce.

So it is rather cute that while you take such great pains to characterize the far right parties as neo-Nazi (implying some threat to Jews), you take equal lengths (“Be Not Afraid”) to be cavalier about the plight of Jews in Europe. Indeed your tone (the Jews deserve it because of Israel, and they’re so weird looking aren’t they?) does more to reaffirm fears than assuage them.

Fear tends to anticipate the final act rather than patiently wait for it: perhaps today Jews aren’t in clear and present danger in England. But they are in France, they are leaving in droves, and already Netanyahu has plans on his desk to absorb all 120,000 French Jews into Israeli society.  England is undergoing the same demographic shift as France, and if France falls to Islamism and a flight of the Jews, England is not far behind.

And ironically, it will be because of the left, not the right.

Is PETA anti-Semitic?

So I’ve been hearing this more and more lately – Kosher animal slaughter causes much more suffering to the animal than conventional slaughter. As a Jew, I take this accusation seriously, since the entire law of Kosher slaughter is based on the animal not suffering at the moment of death. So I did some Google searches on the subject, and I have to say the results weren’t satisfactory.
On the one side you have PETA, who has a definite agenda to go vegan, and they bring this all up to support their argument. Their one source of actual evidence was this NY Times article from 2004 detailing abuses at a kosher slaughterhouse in Iowa.
One article about one place ten years ago does not constitute a pattern, less a policy that contradicts the theory. And only a cultist would run with it straight to the conclusion that vegetarianism is the only solution.
On the other side, you have the rabbis, who insist up and down that according to Jewish slaughtering rules, the animal must not suffer. This guy gives a good explanation. I have to acknowledge what he says about this accusation being another form of anti-Semitism. Frankly this whole “Kosher animals suffer more” has about the same amount of evidence as the old “Jewish bankers run the world” canard.
And I’ve known people who’ve learned the trade of Kosher slaughter, so I know the proper practice exists at least in some places. But, as another article puts it, factory style slaughterhouses may have a completely different practice. And that’s where I see there may be a point.
So it seems like the issue is transparency at kosher slaughterhouses. Are they living up to the spirit of the law and making sure that animals are not suffering? Or are they just giving a tip and a nod to the law and, in the name of efficiency, maintain practices that result in a lot more suffering than conventional slaughter? And if that is the case, are Jews aware of this and doing anything about it?
If people really wanted to address this question, this is how they would approach it. So far I’m not seeing that. All I’m seeing are the kind of abstract debates and finger-pointing that the internet excels at. Like I said, this is a serious accusation, and if it is true, and Jews remain unaware of this, then Judaism is in need of some serious reforms. But if it is false, then the accusers can be branded as anti-Semites.