Is Steve Bannon really anti-semitic?

SixOfWands

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 3:11 pm

Here's some more fun Breitbart headlines:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/.....f1bdb

http://mediamatters.org/blog/2.....12467

And according to Breitbart (post Breitbart himself, FTR), the alt.right isn't really racist, just really smart. And they want to shock their elders. You know, some crazy kids listen to death metal; others post offensive anti-semitic images

Crazy kids; they're just looking for some laughs!

Quote:

From digging up the most embarrassing parts of his family’s internet history to ordering unwanted pizzas to his house and bombarding his feed with anime and Nazi propaganda, the alt-right’s meme team, in typically juvenile but undeniably hysterical fashion, revealed their true motivations: not racism, the restoration of monarchy or traditional gender roles, but lulz.

I personally find the memes about putting Jews into ovens a real hoot, don't you?

http://www.breitbart.com/tech/.....ight/

Miri7

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 4:24 pm

MagentaYenta wrote:

The unintended consequences of the end of PC.

I don't understand your comment - would you please explain?

I was confused because I think that there is a lot of room between being "very PC" and being out-and-out racist or bigoted and voicing those positions.

I think that most people I know aren't "PC" but also I don't have any personal friends who feel comfortable sharing any bigoted feelings they have. So it appears to me that most of us occupy a middle ground, where people are basically good and decent to one another. So I don't get why the "end of PC" would cause a big pendulum swing so far into the other direction - so far that they're saying really awful things directly to people. If PC is over, then can we just stay in the realm of "basically good and decent"? I think that's a reasonable space to occupy.

MagentaYenta

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 4:33 pm

Miri7 wrote:

Just because you don't have people who are dropping the gloves on PC in your RW doesn't mean they don't exist. Pandora's box has been opened, not just for Jews but for Muslims and other minorities.

I agree that good and decent is a reasonable space to occupy, not everyone feels that way.

Last edited by MagentaYenta on Mon, Nov 14 2016, 5:19 pm; edited 1 time in total

Fox

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 5:20 pm

Miri7 wrote:

I was confused because I think that there is a lot of room between being "very PC" and being out-and-out racist or bigoted and voicing those positions.

I think that most people I know aren't "PC" but also I don't have any personal friends who feel comfortable sharing any bigoted feelings they have. So it appears to me that most of us occupy a middle ground, where people are basically good and decent to one another.

You are 100 percent correct, but here's the problem:

All of us think we're average and reasonable. What's "bigoted" to you might not be to me, and vice versa.

For example, we have a thread going on right now about remarks made to a Chassidish woman, and we've had plenty of threads here on Imamother where incredible bigotry was displayed. Of course, to the people who were displaying it, it wasn't bigotry at all -- they were just expressing their reasonable opinions.

To add to the mix, we've developed an "offense culture" in which behavior is monitored for "microaggressions" and "cultural appropriation" and being deemed "offensive" is a grave sin.

Not to mention the fact that the charges of racism, sexism, etc., have been cheapened through overuse.

The theory of people who once epitomized the alt-Right (everyone is scurrying away from it now because leftists have made it synonymous with white nationalism) mostly felt that the best way to deal with the true 1488ers was to simply ignore them.

You may argue that this is not an adequate response; I would make that argument, too. But you have to actually read what they've written -- not just post links -- before denouncing them too stridently. Disagreement over the best way to treat anti-Semitism among conservatives doesn't make you an anti-Semite simply for participating in the discussion.

Ben Shapiro is brilliant. In fact, I'm planning to hear him speak along with Christina Hoff Sommers tomorrow night (barring a riot). However, he's a bit of a diva (divo?) and this isn't the first time he's had conflicts with an employer.

My personal analysis, and I follow his writing pretty closely, is that he really didn't believe Trump would win, and he didn't want to be too closely associated with the losing side. He was opposed to Breitbart's becoming so wildly pro-Trump in the primaries, which seemed reasonable until Trump got the nomination. Breitbart would have ended up supporting him anyway, so it turned out to be a moot point.

Whatever you think of Steve Bannon, you'll forget about him completely if Milo is made press secretary. Obviously a long shot, except that Trump would love nothing more than the spectacle of Milo lording over the MSM. Of course, Bannon knows that Milo isn't housebroken, so he'll probably counsel against such an appointment, thus ruining the fun but preserving some shred of dignity for all concerned.

Quote:

“I would have everybody show up in my house, throw The New York Times and The Washington Post in the back room, have E!Entertainment Television and TMZ at the front and on Tuesdays only answer questions about fashion."

Miri7

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 5:48 pm

Fox wrote:

Thanks for your explanation!

But I think that we agree that racial epithets, telling individuals to go home/get deported because of their skin color, painting swasticas, are objectively bigoted. I'm concerned that people I know have reported such happening to them, their children and their fellow shul members in just the past couple of days. (These are all incidents I know of firsthand from the individuals affected, not from the media.)

I could get why people may say "I am so glad I don't have to be so PC anymore!" But it seems that a number of people are then going all the way to the other end of the spectrum and engaging in outright bigotry.

We are visiting family in a red state next week and DH told me that he's uncomfortable being visibly Jewish when we go to museums, etc. He told me to be sure all the boys pack baseball hats. He will be trying to pass as a hipster with a "cool" hat or baseball cap.

ETA - I'm not sure why Fox's quote didn't appear correctly.

Fox

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 6:24 pm

Miri7 wrote:

But I think that we agree that racial epithets, telling individuals to go home/get deported because of their skin color, painting swasticas, are objectively bigoted. I'm concerned that people I know have reported such happening to them, their children and their fellow shul members in just the past couple of days. (These are all incidents I know of firsthand from the individuals affected, not from the media.)

I could get why people may say "I am so glad I don't have to be so PC anymore!" But it seems that a number of people are then going all the way to the other end of the spectrum and engaging in outright bigotry.

We are visiting family in a red state next week and DH told me that he's uncomfortable being visibly Jewish when we go to museums, etc. He told me to be sure all the boys pack baseball hats. He will be trying to pass as a hipster with a "cool" hat or baseball cap.

What is ironic is that anti-Semitic speech, language, and signage has increased significantly -- on college campuses, doubling in 2015. Anti-Semitism has become acceptable, usually masquerading as anti-Israel sentiment, at some of the country's most elite universities, but only when there's a hotly-contested election does anyone get worried.

Members of UCLA's student government were taped discussing whether a Jewish-identified student should be allowed to serve. Students manning Birthright booths at activity fairs have been assaulted on a number of campuses. Students at various universities have been pressured not to take trips to Israel. SJP chapters regularly blur the lines in their demonstrations and events between protesting the Israeli government and pure anti-Semitism. My son was advised "off the record" not to wear a yarmulke on campus.

Benjamin Gladstone, an SJW-type if ever there was one, wrote in the NYT:

Quote:

My fellow activists tend to dismiss the anti-Semitism that students like me experience regularly on campus. They don’t acknowledge the swastikas that I see carved into bathroom stalls, scrawled across walls or left on chalkboards. They don’t hear students accusing me of killing Yoshke. They don’t notice professors glorifying anti-Semitic figures such as Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt or the leadership of Hezbollah, as mine have.

A generation or more of college students is being taught and/or desensitized to anti-Semitism, yet we're worried about the alt-Right and blowback from PC culture?

I can't guarantee that red state yahoos won't say something offensive, though the type of people who engage in that kind of behavior aren't much found in museums. On the other hand, you are unlikely to have to run a gauntlet of people screaming, "From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free," at you, either.

Miri7

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 6:41 pm

Fox wrote:

I'm well aware of the sharp uptick in campus ant-semitism as I live near a large university and have answered the call to support Jewish students on campus, particularly when SJP and similar groups are protesting or counter-protesting Jewish events. I have seen it - and it is horrible and ugly. I don't take my young children into those situations. Rather, I'm there to help protect others' children who are college students.

My concern is that with the election of Trump and his inclusion of Bannon, such anti-Semitism will appear to some groups to have the imprimatur of the White House.

ETA: And, if my earlier post wasn't clear - I'm not concerned about the "blowback of anti-PC" - I'm concerned about people feeling more free say and do outright bigoted things.

Fox

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 7:35 pm

Miri7 wrote:

My concern is that with the election of Trump and his inclusion of Bannon, such anti-Semitism will appear to some groups to have the imprimatur of the White House.

The 1488ers don't care, but fortunately, they also don't have much influence on public opinion.

For example, a Salon reporter got a Gab account (the new alternative to Twitter) to document the virulent anti-Semitism that was certain to emerge in a free-speech environment. She spent a week or so on Gab and didn't find any. So then she started searching for hashtags associated with anti-Semitism and white nationalism. Guess what? She found some!

I've even followed a couple of these guys on Twitter and Gab, and it's just as awful as anyone here can imagine. But they don't have a lot of followers, and their messages/tweets are rarely shared. We shouldn't dismiss them as harmless, but they're not persuading a lot of people, either. As the Salon reporter discovered, you won't run across them accidentally.

Alas, we always seem to have yahoos in America, a product of the sheep-herding culture of the Scottish Highlands, which has now taken root among people who wouldn't know from kilts and haggis.

After President Obama's election in 2008, we had plenty of AA yahoos here in Chicago who were certain that they'd be living on easy street with a black president. They boasted and trash-talked for a week or so and then got back to work, realizing that the new president wasn't going to pay their rent or mortgage and they'd goofed around too much already.

So my prediction is that the yahoo element will settle down shortly.

I actually have higher hopes for college campuses because of Trump's unequivocal support of Israel. I'm obviously not in favor of stifling criticism of Israel's government or even its customer service. But SJP has repeatedly crossed the line between legitimate disagreement and outright hatred of Jews. It wouldn't bother me in the least if they felt it was in their best interests to tone things down a bit.

rfeig613

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 8:32 pm

Zionist Organization of America (ZOA) President Morton A. Klein released the following statement:
It is painful to see Anti-Defamation League (ADL) president Jonathan Greenblatt engaging in character assassination against President-elect Trump’s appointee Stephen Bannon and Mr. Bannon’s company, Breitbart media. ADL/Greenblatt essentially accused Mr. Bannon and his media company of “anti-Semitism” and Israel hatred, when Jonathan Greenblatt/ADL tweeted that Bannon “presided over the premier website of the ‘alt right’ – a loose-knit group of white nationalists and anti-Semites.”
In fact, as pro-Israel writer (and orthodox Jew) Joel B. Pollak wrote, Mr. Bannon is “an American patriot who defends Israel & has deep empathy for the Jewish people.”
ZOA’s own experience and analysis of Breitbart articles confirms Mr. Bannon’s and Breitbart’s friendship and fair-mindedness towards Israel and the Jewish people. To accuse Mr. Bannon and Breitbart of anti-Semitism is Orwellian. In fact, Breitbart bravely fights against anti-Semitism. Here are a few of the many examples:
Stephen Bannon joined ZOA in fighting the anti-Semitic rallies at CUNY by requiring his Breitbart reporters to call CUNY officials and Gov. Cuomo aides urging them to do something about it.
Breitbart courageously publishes articles reporting that the Palestinian Authority defames Israel with blatant falsehoods. On November 13, 2016, Breitbart reported that:
Stephen Bannon joined ZOA in fighting the anti-Semitic rallies at CUNY by requiring his Breitbart reporters to call CUNY officials and Gov. Cuomo aides urging them to do something about it.
“The Palestinian Authority’s official TV network has been airing a video several times a day baselessly accusing Israel of poisoning former PA President Yasser Arafat and further claiming that Israel is targeting current President Mahmoud Abbas next. Arafat died at the age of 75 on November 11, 2004, just outside of Paris. A French forensic team examined his remains and concluded that there were no traces of poison in his body. Nevertheless, every year around the anniversary of his death, the PA disseminates the libel that Israel murdered him.” (Emphasis in original.)
On November 14, 2016 Breitbart reported the human cost and pain to a Jewish student at the New School of finding a swastika scrawled on her dorm room door.
Breitbart bravely publicizes Iran’s violations of the Iran deal – which pose an existential threat to Israel. On November 13, 2016, Breitbart reported that “Despite a finding published by the UN’s atomic energy agency this week that Iran has — for the second time — stockpiled more heavy water than permitted under the terms of the nuclear agreement it reached with six world powers last year, the US State Department is declining to acknowledge this as a violation of the deal.”
Breitbart also sympathetically reports on the scourge of anti-Semitic anti-Israel boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS). On November 2, 2016, Breitbart reported that: “Reports of anti-Semitic incidents on US college campuses have increased, much of it attributed to the rise of the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement, a new report has found.”
ZOA President Morton Klein stated: “The ZOA welcomes the appointment of Stephen Bannon as chief strategist to the incoming Trump/Pence administration. We wish Mr. Bannon every success in his new position. We urge Jonathan Greenblatt/ADL to withdraw and apologize for their inappropriate character assassination of Mr. Bannon and Breitbart Media.”
Would Trump’s extraordinary pro-Israel advisors such as Newt Gingrich, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Pence, Sheldon Adelson, and Orthodox Jews Jared Kushner, David Friedman, and Jason Greenblatt ever allow an anti-Semite/Israel-hater to work with them? Would Trump’s Orthodox Jewish daughter Ivanka, whose children go to an Orthodox day school, ever allow an anti-Semite to work with her father? And, remember Donald Trump’s platform on Israel was the strongest pro-Israel platform ever. I’m also forced to ask – why didn’t ADL and other Bannon bashers complain that Hilary’s advisers included some very anti-Israel people starting with major donor to Hillary, the Israel-hating, George Soros? Where were ADL’s complaints then?

Read more: http://zoa.org/2016/11/1034235.....qj8wY

Mevater

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 9:13 pm

"Bannon is accused of having given a great deal of website space to the alt-right, not necessarily because he’s a white nationalist or an anti-Semite, but rather, because the movement was an effective organizing weapon against the Left. But it’s a very problematic association.

It would be like claiming President Obama is an anti-Semite, just because he was a member of Reverend Jeremiah White’s congregation for 20 years and used one of Wright’s sermons as the source for a speech of his own.

However, there are also those who, in addition to Priebus and the president-elect, defend Bannon and say that he’s no anti-Semite. One is Joel Pollak, a writer who has personally worked with him.

Another is Jewish writer David Horowitz, who wrote in an article on the Breitbart News site on Monday, in response to all the outrage: “I have known Steve Bannon for many years. This is a good man. He does not have an anti-Semitic bone in his body.

“In his new position as Chief Strategist in the Trump White House, Bannon is the strongest assurance that people who love this country can have in America’s future, the strongest assurance that America is in the hands of people who will give this country a chance to restore itself and defend itself against its enemies at home and abroad.”"

http://www.jewishpress.com/new.....1/15/

Is this supposed to make us view Bannon differently? Only time will tell, by Bannon's behavior and actions.

Fox

Mon, Nov 14 2016, 9:33 pm

JoyInTheMorning wrote:

Fox, why in the world are you saying that Trump is unequivocal in his support of Israel?

Look, he hasn't been elected president of Israel, so let's not pretend that he values Israel above the U.S. Nor should we assume that support of Israel means support of Jews. However, Trump's rhetoric has certainly been more supportive than what we've heard from the Democrats for quite a while.

JoyInTheMorning wrote:

I agree with Six Wands that the line between the alt-right, white supremacists, and NeoNazis is a very thin one indeed.

I find it both funny and odd that the alt-Right and Breitbart have become such big issues here lately. I don't remember them coming up before unless I or one of a handful of other Imamothers mentioned them.

Imamothers who are interested in this stuff tend to discuss it in PMs, not in threads. I'd like to brag that our conversations revolve around deep, meaningful topics, but I'm embarrassed to admit that a lot of it is just celebrity gossip (Did you hear what Blaire White was asked by a nurse yesterday? Have you seen that video with CHS and Camille Paglia? Milo needs to stop PDAing with Ariana Rowlands or The Advocate is gonna Peter Thiel him. Are you sick of Kassy Dillon's dog, too? Do you follow @Yeyo? Who's watching Shkreli's cat today?). If small minds discuss people and great minds discuss ideas, we split the difference and discuss people who have ideas.

So I'm forced to wonder just where everyone is getting her information all of a sudden? Is everyone literally reading years worth of Breitbart articles? Is everyone spending time on 4chan and Reddit? Are you hanging out on Gab?

If you're reading about the alt-Right, then don't waste your time. Whoever is writing the article probably can't distinguish the jokes from the serious points. Anyway, the party's over. The people who could have been categorized as alt-Right six months ago jumped overboard as soon as the press began equating it with white nationalism. If you ask, nobody will admit to being part of the alt-Right now, including the white nationalists. Oh, and the neo-Nazis are mad at the mythical alt-Right because they're not anti-Semitic enough and have too many Jews involved.

Now, back to Steve Bannon:

It's perfectly reasonable to be concerned about Steve Bannon's appointment, but not because of anti-Semitism. In fact, Marina's comment is a lot closer to the point. By everyone's account, Bannon is wound very, very tight.

IMHO, the biggest potential problem is that Bannon is a scorched-earth kind of guy, and that's very dangerous in Washington. Politics makes strange bedfellows, and today's enemy may need to be tomorrow's BFF. My biggest concern is that Bannon may permanently alienate people whom Trump needs to compensate for his lack of political capital.

I can only guess that Trump and Priebus think they can keep Bannon on a leash, letting him out intermittently. I hope they're right.