A Dialog about Anti-Semitism
By Sam Vaknin
Author of "Malignant Self Love - Narcissism Revisited"

Rabid anti-Semitism, coupled with inane and outlandish conspiracy
theories of world dominion, is easy to counter and dispel. It is the
more "reasoned", subtle, and stealthy variety that it
pernicious. "No smoke without fire," - say people - "there must be
something to it!".

In this dialog I try to deconstruct a "mild" anti-Semitic text. I
myself wrote the text - not an easy task considering my ancestry (a
Jew) and my citizenship (an Israeli). But to penetrate the pertinent
layers - historical, psychological, semantic, and semiotic - I had
to "enter the skin" of "rational", classic anti-Semites, to grasp
what makes them click and tick, and to think and reason like them.

I dedicated the last few months to ploughing through reams of anti-
Semitic tracts and texts. Steeped in more or less nauseating verbal
insanity and sheer paranoia, I emerged to compose the following.

The Anti-Semite:

The rising tide of anti-Semitism the world over is universally
decried. The proponents of ant-Semitism are cast as ignorant,
prejudiced, lawless, and atavistic. Their arguments are dismissed
off-handedly.

But it takes one Jew to really know another. Conditioned by
millennia of persecution, Jews are paranoid, defensive, and
obsessively secretive. It is impossible for a gentile - whom they
hold to be inferior and reflexively hostile - to penetrate their
counsels.

Let us examine anti-Semitic arguments more closely and in an
unbiased manner:

Argument number one - Being Jewish is a racial distinction - not
only a religious one

If race is defined in terms of genetic purity, then Jews are as much
a race as the remotest and most isolated of the tribes of the
Amazon. Genetic studies revealed that Jews throughout the world -
largely due to centuries of in-breeding - share the same genetic
makeup. Hereditary diseases which afflict only the Jews attest to
the veracity of this discovery.

Judaism is founded on shared biology as much as shared history and
customs. As a religion, it proscribes a conjugal union with non-
Jews. Jews are not even allowed to partake the food and wine of
gentiles and have kept their distance from the communities which
they inhabited - maintaining tenaciously, through countless
generations, their language, habits, creed, dress, and national
ethos. Only Jews become automatic citizens of Israel (the infamous
Law of Return).

The Jewish Response:

Race has been invariably used as an argument against the Jews. It is
ironic that racial purists have always been the most fervent anti-
Semites. Jews are not so much a race as a community, united in age-
old traditions and beliefs, lore and myths, history and language.
Anyone can become a Jew by following a set of clear (though,
admittedly, demanding) rules. There is absolutely no biological test
or restriction on joining the collective that is known as the Jewish
people or the religion that is Judaism.

It is true that some Jews are differentiated from their gentile
environments. But this distinction has largely been imposed on us by
countless generations of hostile hosts and neighbors. The yellow
Star of David was only the latest in a series of measures to isolate
the Jews, clearly mark them, restrict their economic and
intellectual activities, and limit their social interactions. The
only way to survive was to stick together. Can you blame us for
responding to what you yourselves have so enthusiastically
instigated?

The Anti-Semite:

Argument number two - The Jews regard themselves as Chosen,
Superior, or Pure

Vehement protestations to the contrary notwithstanding - this is
largely true. Orthodox Jews and secular Jews differ, of course, in
their perception of this supremacy. The religious attribute it to
divine will, intellectuals to the outstanding achievements of Jewish
scientists and scholars, the modern Israeli is proud of his
invincible army and thriving economy. But they all share a sense of
privilege and commensurate obligation to civilize their inferiors
and to spread progress and enlightenment wherever they are. This is
a pernicious rendition of the colonial White Man's Burden and it is
coupled with disdain and contempt for the lowly and the great
unwashed (namely, the gentiles).

The Jewish Response:

There were precious few Jews among the great colonizers and
ideologues of imperialism (Disraeli being the exception). Moreover,
to compare the dissemination of knowledge and enlightenment to
colonialism is, indeed, a travesty.

We, the Jews, are proud of our achievements. Show me one group of
people (including the anti-Semites) who isn't? But there is an abyss
between being justly proud of one's true accomplishments and feeling
superior as a result. Granted, there are narcissists and
megalomaniacs everywhere and among the members of any human
collective. Hitler and his Aryan superiority is a good example.

The Anti-Semite:

Argument number three - Jews have divided loyalties

It is false to say that Jews are first and foremost Jews and only
then are they the loyal citizens of their respective countries. Jews
have unreservedly fought and sacrificed in the service of their
homelands, often killing their coreligionists in the process. But it
is true that Jews believe that what is good for the Jews is good for
the country they reside in. By aligning the interests of their
adopted habitat with their narrower and selfish agenda, Jews feel
justified to promote their own interests to the exclusion of all
else and all others.

Moreover, the rebirth of the Jewish State presented the Jews with
countless ethical dilemmas which they typically resolved by adhering
uncritically to Tel-Aviv's official line. This often brought them
into direct conflict with their governments and non-Jewish
compatriots and enhanced their reputation as untrustworthy and
treacherous.

Hence the Jewish propensity to infiltrate decision-making centers,
such as politics and the media. Their aim is to minimize conflicts
of interests by transforming their peculiar concerns and preferences
into official, if not always consensual, policy. This viral
hijacking of the host country's agenda is particularly evident in
the United States where the interest of Jewry and of the only
superpower have become inextricable.

It is a fact - not a rant - that Jews are over-represented in
certain, influential, professions (in banking, finance, the media,
politics, the film industry, publishing, science, the humanities,
etc.). This is partly the result of their emphases on education and
social upward mobility. But it is also due to the tendency of well-
placed Jews to promote their brethren and provide them with
privileged access to opportunities, funding, and jobs.

The Jewish Response:

Most modern polities are multi-ethnic and multi-cultural (an
anathema to anti-Semites, I know). Every ethnic, religious,
cultural, political, intellectual, and economic or business group
tries to influence policy-making by various means. This is both
legitimate and desirable. Lobbying has been an integral and
essential part of democracy since it was invented in Athens 2500
years ago. The Jews and Israelis are no exception.

Jews are, indeed, over-represented in certain professions in the
United States. But they are under-represented in other, equally
important, vocations (for instance, among company CEOs, politicians,
diplomats, managers of higher education institutions, and senior
bankers). Globally, Jews are severely under-represented or not-
existent in virtually all professions due to their demography (aging
population, low birth-rates, unnatural deaths in wars and
slaughters).

The Anti-Semite:

Argument number four - Jews act as a cabal or mafia

There is no organized, hierarchical, and centralized worldwide
Jewish conspiracy. Rather the Jews act in a manner similar to al-
Qaida: they freelance and self-assemble ad hoc in cross-border
networks to tackle specific issues. Jewish organizations - many in
cahoots with the Israeli government - serve as administrative
backup, same as some Islamic charities do for militant Islam. The
Jews' ability and readiness to mobilize and act to further their
plans is a matter of record and the source of the inordinate
influence of their lobby organizations in Washington, for instance.

When two Jews meet, even randomly, and regardless of the disparities
in their background, they immediately endeavor to see how they can
further each other's interests, even and often at the expense of
everyone else's.

Still, the Jewish diaspora, now two millennia old, is the first
truly global phenomenon in world affairs. Bound by a common history,
a common set of languages, a common ethos, a common religion, common
defenses and ubiquitous enemies - Jews learned to closely cooperate
in order to survive.

No wonder that all modern global networks - from Rothschild to
Reuters - were established by Jews. Jews also featured prominently
in all the revolutionary movements of the past three centuries.
Individual Jews - though rarely the Jewish community as a whole -
seem to benefit no matter what.

When Czarist Russia collapsed, Jews occupied 7 out of 10 prominent
positions in both the Kerensky (a Jew himself) government and in the
Lenin and early Stalin administrations. When the Soviet Union
crumbled, Jews again benefited mightily. Three quarters of the
famous "oligarchs" (robber barons) that absconded with the bulk of
the defunct empire's assets were - you guessed it - Jews.

The Jewish Response:

Ignoring the purposefully inflammatory language for a minute, what
group does not behave this way? Harvard alumni, the British
Commonwealth, the European Union, the Irish or the Italians in the
United States, political parties the world over ... As long as
people co-operate legally and for legal ends, without breaching
ethics and without discriminating against deserving non-members -
what is wrong with that?

The Anti-Semite:

Argument number five - The Jews are planning to take over the world
and establish a world government

This is the kind of nonsense that discredits a serious study of the
Jews and their role in history, past and present. Endless lists of
prominent people of Jewish descent are produced in support of the
above contention. Yet, governments are not the mere sum of their
constituent individuals. The dynamics of power subsist on more than
the religious affiliation of office-holders, kingmakers, and string-
pullers.

Granted, Jews are well introduced in the echelons of power almost
everywhere. But this is still a very far cry from a world
government. Neither were Jews prominent in any of the recent moves -
mostly by the Europeans - to strengthen the role of international
law and attendant supranational organizations.

The Jewish Response:

What can I say? I agree with you. I would only like to set the
record straight by pointing out the fact that Jews are actually
under-represented in the echelons of power everywhere (including in
the United States). Only in Israel - where they constitute an
overwhelming majority - do Jews run things.

The Anti-Semite:

Argument number six - Jews are selfish, narcissistic, haughty,
double-faced, dissemblers. Zionism is an extension of this
pathological narcissism as a colonial movement

Judaism is not missionary. It is elitist. But Zionism has always
regarded itself as both a (19th century) national movement and a
(colonial) civilizing force. Nationalist narcissism transformed
Zionism into a mission of acculturation ("White Man's Burden").

In "Altneuland" (translated to Hebrew as "Tel Aviv"), the feverish
tome composed by Theodore Herzl, Judaism's improbable visionary -
Herzl refers to the Arabs as pliant and compliant butlers, replete
with gloves and tarbushes. In the book, a German Jewish family
prophetically lands at Jaffa, the only port in erstwhile Palestine.
They are welcomed and escorted by "Briticized" Arab gentlemen's
gentlemen who are only too happy to assist their future masters and
colonizers to disembark.

This age-old narcissistic defence - the Jewish superiority complex -
was only exacerbated by the Holocaust.

Nazism posed as a rebellion against the "old ways" - against the
hegemonic culture, the upper classes, the established religions, the
superpowers, the European order. The Nazis borrowed the Leninist
vocabulary and assimilated it effectively. Hitler and the Nazis were
an adolescent movement, a reaction to narcissistic injuries
inflicted upon a narcissistic (and rather psychopathic) toddler
nation-state. Hitler himself was a malignant narcissist, as Fromm
correctly noted.

The Jews constituted a perfect, easily identifiable, embodiment of
all that was "wrong" with Europe. They were an old nation, they were
eerily disembodied (without a territory), they were cosmopolitan,
they were part of the establishment, they were "decadent", they were
hated on religious and socio-economic grounds (see
Goldhagen's "Hitler's Willing Executioners"), they were different,
they were narcissistic (felt and acted as morally superior), they
were everywhere, they were defenseless, they were credulous, they
were adaptable (and thus could be co-opted to collaborate in their
own destruction). They were the perfect hated father figure and
parricide was in fashion.

The Holocaust was a massive trauma not because of its dimensions -
but because Germans, the epitome of Western civilization, have
turned on the Jews, the self-proclaimed missionaries of Western
civilization in the Levant and Arabia. It was the betrayal that
mattered. Rejected by East (as colonial stooges) and West (as agents
of racial contamination) alike - the Jews resorted to a series of
narcissistic responses reified by the State of Israel.

The long term occupation of territories (metaphorical or physical)
is a classic narcissistic behavior (of "annexation" of the other).
The Six Days War was a war of self defence - but the swift victory
only exacerbated the grandiose fantasies of the Jews. Mastery over
the Palestinians became an important component in the psychological
makeup of the nation (especially the more rightwing and religious
elements) because it constitutes "Narcissistic Supply".

The Jewish Response:

Happily, sooner or later most anti-Semitic arguments descend into
incoherent diatribe. This dialog is no exception.

Zionism was not conceived out of time. It was born in an age of
colonialism, Kipling's "white man's burden", and Western narcissism.
Regrettably, Herzl did not transcend the political discourse of his
period. But Zionism is far more than Altneuland. Herzl died in 1904,
having actually been deposed by Zionists from Russia who espoused
ideals of equality for all, Jews and non-Jews alike.

The Holocaust was an enormous trauma and a clarion call. It taught
the Jews that they cannot continue with their historically abnormal
existence and that all the formulas for accommodation and co-
existence failed. There remained only one viable solution: a Jewish
state as a member of the international community of nations.

The Six Days War was, indeed, a classic example of preemptive self-
defense. Its outcomes, however, deeply divide Jewish communities
everywhere, especially in Israel. Many of us believe that occupation
corrupts and reject the Messianic and millennial delusions of some
Jews as dangerous and nefarious.

Perhaps this is the most important thing to remember:

Like every other group of humans, though molded by common
experience, Jews are not a monolith. There are liberal Jews and
orthodox Jews, narcissists and altruists, unscrupulous and moral,
educated and ignorant, criminals and law-abiding citizens. Jews, in
other words, are like everyone else. Can we say the same about anti-
Semites? I wonder.



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AUTHOR BIO (must be included with the article)



Sam Vaknin ( http://samvak.tripod.com ) is the author of Malignant
Self Love - Narcissism Revisited and After the Rain - How the West
Lost the East. He served as a columnist for Central Europe Review,
PopMatters, Bellaonline, and eBookWeb, a United Press International
(UPI) Senior Business Correspondent, and the editor of mental health
and Central East Europe categories in The Open Directory and
Suite101.

Until recently, he served as the Economic Advisor to the Government
of Macedonia.

Visit Sam's Web site at http://samvak.tripod.com