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raggedinflux · 3 years

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Framing Racism as a Public Health Issue

In 1978, at the International Conference on Primary Health in Alma-Ata (kazakhstan), public health reached a major milestone in solidifying the goal of “Health for All” through a slew of powerful declarations that iterated the existence of “gross inequality in the health stats of people, particularly between developed and developing countries as well as within counties, is politically socially, and economically unacceptable and is, therefore of common concern to all countries.” The declaration laid out social, economic, and political disparities that exist within healthcare and lead to poor outcomes for individuals who operate within the bounds of these limitations and constraints. A study published in 2014 in the European Review of Social Psychology laid out the issue in regards to social constraints by reporting that “around the world, members of racial/ethnic minority groups typically experience poorer health than members of racial/ethnic majority groups” (Penner, 70). For this reason, organizations and publications have openly and admittedly labeled racism and racial discrimination as a problem that public health experts and researchers can no longer ignore: racism is a public health issue due to its impact on individuals mental and physical health within large social groups.

The central axiom acting within this system of prolific and systemic carnage lay in the sphere of social psychology and can be examined through the lens of both a social and health issue since the two disciplines are so intertwined by the nature of healthcare systems and access to quality affordable care. Economic and social disparities are two elements that can be assessed and viewed when talking about the powerful aspect race can play on healthcare inequalities. Healthcare inequalities can be defined as “ systematic variations in the mental or physical well-being of members of different social groups that specifically result from inequitable economic, political, social, and psychological processes'' (Braveman, 2006). In this paper, we focus specifically on one of the dimensions that can be attributed to poor health outcomes: racism. According to Penner er al., socially disadvantaged groups generally experience poorer health care outcomes than social groups that are more advantaged. There are two reasons for which we can frame the issue at hand, the first of which is socio-economic factors, such as cost associated with access to care. Another approach is purely social: health disparities.

So how does race impact health and how can we assess health disparities? According to Penner et al., a tridimensional model can help to visualize the impacts of social stressors on physical and mental wellbeing of racial minorities specifically. The first level of this model entails the “societal level” in which social stressors such as lack of mobility, adequate resources, and lack of access to care results in health disparities. For example, a study published by the National Academies Press titled “Understanding Racial and Ethnic Differences in Health in Late Life: A Research Agenda” states that Black and Hispanic patients, compared to their white counterparts have less access to employer provided healthcare plans, and instead benefit more from Medicaid and Medicare. Additionally, the resources required to transport patients to and from health services may be disproportionately affected in low income areas where Black and Hispanic patients reside, instituting another financial barrier to healthcare services. The second level – the intrapersonal level stresses the relationship between patient and physician in terms of racial bias in the type of care provided. Hoffman et al., published a paper in 2016 titled “Racial bias in pain assessment and treatment recommendations, and false beliefs about biological differences between Blacks and whites” in which she describes the way in white physicians ascribe a higher pain tolerance to minority and specifically Black patients due to beliefs about genetic difference, which account for the false belief that Black patients have a higher pain tolerance and thus have decreased access to comfort medications such as opiate pain killers. The third level described is the intergroup level in which individuals identify with their own social groups and leads to phenomena such as in-group favouritism and outgroup derogation (Penner et al., 71). In-group favoritism is described as favoring members of one's own social group, creating differing experiences for members outside of a person's social group. For example, white physicians may form more favorable relationships with their white patients due to them being “in group” of their own social identity. This can create bias in terms of the treatment, both professionally and personally, that creates divides in how healthcare is seen from individuals “out of group” ie ethnic minorities. These rifts affect the provider patient relationship at an interpersonal level. Outgroup derogation is a phenomenon of viewing patients outside of a social group as threatening. If providers view their patients as intrinsically threatening, the provider patient relationship has become compromised and professional judgement and compassionate care cannot be attained. This drives the racial bias that ethnic minorities receive while getting medical care.

All three levels work together to create experiences that have very real physiological responses in patients, as Penner et al., addresses “feelings of being the target of discrimination may serve as a life stressor for racial minorities, increasing the physiological load on their bodies and thus their susceptibility to various diseases.” Penner describes that these experiences of discrimination and racial bias can equate out to very real health effects on the patients who experience these social phenomenon. In essence, the act of being discriminated against increases stress load which increases stress hormones, making individuals more susceptible to disease. For example, in a study published by the Jackson Heart Study, sims et al., “found in large sample of Black adults a significant association between exposure to discrimination and the prevalence of hypertension.” A connection between perceived racial discrimination and rates of hypertension had been identified.

Studies have also been conducted on the prevalence of racism related to health inequalities across and individuals life span. In 2012 Gee et al., published a literature review in the American Journal of Public Health outlining such a phenomenon by stating that throughout and individuals lifespan, interaction with racial discrimination at differing levels can create different experiences and health outcomes. This indicates that as we age, we come into contact with different forms of discrimination and racial bias that may have long lasting impacts to individuals health as opposed to specific isolated incidences of discrimination and bias. Gee et al., explains that these dynamics can change throughout time and have a relationship to healthcare: “exposure to racism can change in nature, importance, and intensity. Similarly, health and the factors that produce health can change.”

While economic status and social stressors certainly play a role in the gap of healthcare between whites and minorities and specifically Black people, there is more to the story. According to a lecture by David R Williams “every 7 minutes a Black person dies prematurely in the US.” While these statistics may seem attributed to a variety of factors, conclusive evidence has been shown that in “black teenagers, those who reported high levels of discrimination, had higher levels of stress hormones, weight and blood pressure” alluding to the fact that the causal mechanism behind these types of health indicators may be related to and directly caused by the act of discrimination and racism itself playing a role on the physiological processes of individuals in regards to stress response and activation.

The role of mental health and its effects on the physical body has been a well documented phenomena. What hasn't been addressed in literature however, is the effect of racism and discrimination on mental health. According to the The State of Minority Mental Health, “Depression is the most commonly reported condition across BIPOC (black, indigenous, and people of color” The daily traumas associated with racism cause mental turmoil on BIPOC are at the axis of mental health issues, as Mental Health America states, “racism is a mental health issue because racism causes trauma. And trauma paints a direct line to mental illnesses, which need to be taken seriously.” When looking at race-related stressors we must address the issues that BIPOC face on a daily basis such as mass incarceration, the school to prison pipeline, decreased economic opportunitiy for these groups, individual acts of discrimination and hate crimes from something as simple as being avoided out in public to being harrased and physically threatened out in public. All of these occurrences and experiences create trauma for BIPOC communities.

We must frame racism as a public health issue, when we make something a matter of public health it involves and requires resources and collective energy to address the root cause of the problem. In framing racism as a public health issue, we can allocate the resources and power needed to stop these acts of discrimination from occurring in the medical establishments and hopefully far beyond the stretches of the medical establishment to ensure a better for fulfilling life can be attained by Black Americans and other ethnic minorities.

Works Cited

Braveman, Paula. “Health disparities and health equity: concepts and measurement.” Annual review of public health vol. 27 (2006): 167-94. doi:10.1146/annurev.publhealth.27.021405.102103

Penner, Louis A et al. “Racial Healthcare Disparities: A Social Psychological Analysis.” European review of social psychology vol. 24,1 (2013): 70-122. doi:10.1080/10463283.2013.840973

Hoffman, Kelly M et al. “Racial bias in pain assessment and treatment recommendations, and false beliefs about biological differences between blacks and whites.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America vol. 113,16 (2016): 4296-301. doi:10.1073/pnas.1516047113

Williams, David. How Racism Makes Us Sick. 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzyjDR_AWzE&t=3s&ab_channel=TED. Accessed 16 Apr 2021.

Sims, Mario et al. “Perceived discrimination and hypertension among African Americans in the Jackson Heart Study.” American journal of public health vol. 102 Suppl 2,Suppl 2 (2012): S258-65. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2011.300523

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gravitascivics · 4 years

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CASE STUDY: MULTI OR CENTERED CULTURE (cont.)

This posting continues this blog’s focus on the polarization plaguing this nation. The last posting looked at one source contributing to that state of affairs: “the incubation of problems the body politic had not addressed over extended periods of time.” And the first point it made was that these problems were not the product of incompetency, per se, but came about because they do not fall within the prevailing paradigm a people hold at a given time – that is, it is a case of not knowing what is not known.

Specifically, the posting looked at the lack of fully incorporating the members of the various ethnic, national, or racial groups into the nation’s recognition of rights and disbursement of benefits it shares among those of the Anglo-Saxon base. This problem, among the dominant group, is a problem not known to exist. It was, therefore, incubating. But it is now known due to polarization.

Within the situation today, any affected party of what seems to be any existing problem, needs allies to meet what it perceives is its interests since the “other side” is so numerous. That is, there are now two grand alliances, that of the left and that of the right constituting what the nation faces, a polarized political landscape.

One side of the divide, the nationalist side, seeks to maintain what it sees as the “American way” of life it attaches to its perceived base, the Anglo-Saxon base. The other side of that divide, though, has a history of division that not so long ago generated a bit of heat. This posting continues to explain how this left side of the divide varied in its views about how one should see the challenge of a culturally varied nation.

If the reader has not read the last posting, it would help him/her to do so to appreciate the context of what follows, but the general aim here is to explain the conflict between those who have argued for assimilation or centered pluralism and those who have argued for multiculturalism, particularly critical multiculturalism that that posting describes.

In relatively simple terms, centered pluralism deals with social settings of multiple cultures by respecting each culture but insists that there be a unifying role played by the dominant culture. This is particularly true in the realm of that dominant culture’s governmental-political-legal institutions.

But in America, at least, there is a relevant attribute that characterizes the dominant culture that one should keep in mind. It has historically been an evolving attribute of this society. That dominant culture, while being central and stabilizing, is not nor has been dormant or immune from change. Instead, it is dynamic and continuously renewed by the various cultural forces within the nation.

Through active interaction among the elements of its population, the dominant culture is continuously affected as it incorporates aspects of the various immigrating cultures into its views, promoted attitudes, values, beliefs, and favored modes of behavior. Of particular note are the effects on the shared aesthetics the people as a whole adopt; that includes music, food, fashion, and language from an array of colorful immigrant groups. This adoption of a centered pluralism has led to a rich and enriching culture that defines Americanism, not for all times, but for what is “in” today.

The change is not always so dynamic or smooth. It tends to manifest itself on a generational pace. One’s grandmother’s America is a lot different culturally than what his/her grandchildren will experience through the course of their lives. But through those evolving aspects, by having a single cultural base at any given time, it has served a unifying function. And unification provides reliable expectations that are essential to a nation’s legal, economic, and even political dealings.

What, for example, would happen to legal proceedings if they did not sustain reliable rulings and assumptions? Many efficiencies would be lost as concerns would become paramount that under established modes of operations are just taken for granted.

As such, the culture provides guardrails as to acceptable behaviors that are not etched in stone but provide comfort zones that allow for levels of cooperation and collaboration not otherwise possible. Not to foist here an argument that bolsters federation theory (what this blog promotes), but that theory depends on a minimal level of a common way of being. And this view, therefore, can be called centered pluralism.

Critical multiculturalism basically rejects this image – one of a “melting pot” – as either being real or optimal. Back in the 1980s and 1990s much was written by critical multiculturalists. One such theorists was/is Henry A. Giroux. According to one of his published works,[1] he launches an attack against centered pluralism (the term he uses is “normative pluralism”).

Tracing the argument of Giroux, who focuses on how this issue affects schools, American schools do not lead or encourage immigrant and racial minority students to realize or define what their interests are. As marginalized people, they are characterized as low income, ethnic minorities. And schools, unfortunately, function to oppress these students by emphasizing management and control.

More specifically, the following general strategy is instituted as to how these students are treated or “handled.” Authorities insist on the use of language and other symbols to steer these students toward accepted behaviors. In turn, the symbols help define ways of acceptable practices that maintain existing power relationships. They, in part, do this by expressing what the base sees as ideal or as being included in the common knowledge. The effect is aimed at upholding existing curricular assumptions or values.

Those assumptions and values are noted for promoting knowledge – empirically and traditionally based – that ignore relevant issues facing these other populations. Result: with this lack of relevancy, these minority students find such lessons as being unimportant or meaningless. In sum, the legitimacy of this sort of instruction becomes suspect in those students’ eyes.

Beyond lacking relevancy for these students, centered pluralist lessons ignore the various cultural views these students represent particularly those aspects relating to their cultures’ capital in the form of their narratives, traditions, and other messaging. By ignoring these cultural elements, the message, by omission, is that their cultural elements lack value, that they are somehow lacking in worth. Other descriptive terms one might use to describe the effects these curricular choices have are deficient, deprived, deviant, underprivileged, or uncultured.

It encourages the teachers of these students, when confronted with the inevitable clashes caused by culturally-based conflicts or misunderstandings, to adopt biases that blame those students for their perceived shortcomings. In turn, it leads to potentially humiliating experiences for those students. These incidents are not just humiliating in their interactions with the teacher but serve as fodder for inter student conflicts including being instrumental in bullying.

What both sides of this “debate” agreed upon was that immigrants or people of minority culture groups were being mistreated to vary degrees. The argument was not about what was/is or even what specifically should be done, in the short term, to right the wrongs stemming from any mistreatment immigrants or racial minorities might experience. The disagreement was/is on the direction any policy should take in righting those wrongs.

One side envisions a sort of kaleidoscope of cultural flavors all equally appreciated or, at least, tolerated. The other vision is not so different, but the elements are tied together with a theme. A future posting will further develop this distinction because it serves as a very pertinent example of problems that were virulent to those affected, but beyond them, ignored. They were, in other words, incubating and have now exploded upon the tapestry of what is known as polarized politics.

[1] Henry A. Giroux, “Critical Pedagogy, Cultural Politics, and the Discourse of Experience, in Teachers as Intellectuals: Toward a Critical Pedagogy of Learning, edited by Henry Giroux (Westport, CT: Bergin and Garvey, 1988), 86-107.

#immigration #race relations #centered pluralism #multiculturalism #nationalism #Henry A. Giroux #civics education #critical multiculturalism #social studies

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friend-clarity · 4 years

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Jew-hatred by the Left

Letting Anti-Semites Be Their Guide by Karys Rhea and Keren Toledano, Commentary, April 2020

It is incumbent on both the left and right to root out the Jew-haters in their midst. But, it is Leftists who mostly hold the reigns of power and it is Leftists who deny abundant evidence that anti-Semitism is endemic to Palestinian society. Anti-Semitism has been a fundamental part of Islamic culture for more than a millennium.

A strange notion has found purchase in progressive circles. It holds that nominally marginalized and oppressed groups, most notably Muslims and African Americans, cannot themselves espouse hateful views. According to this thinking, white people maintain a monopoly on hate, and every expression of hate by someone who is nonwhite is linked to some form of white or Western influence, whether colonialist, capitalist, or Christian.

This idea is also frequently embraced by those doing the hating. Consider the strain of anti-Semitism endemic to Palestinian society, where government-run television, media, textbooks, and mosques encourage violence against Jews, praise Hitler, characterize Jews as "apes and pigs," and deny the Holocaust. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement, widely taken to be the most moderate wing of Palestinian politics and the best chance for a partner in peace with Israel, recently released a video claiming that Jews "led the project to enslave humanity" and that Jewish behavior is responsible for anti-Semitism.

To many on the hard left, this moral inversion fits comfortably with Marxist theories about class struggle and power. When a class of people is deemed to lack power, their misdeeds are recast as noble efforts to obtain that power—even when those misdeeds might include terrorist acts against innocent civilians.

Never mind that the historical record is wholly at odds with Fatah's explanation for Jew-hatred. Islamic anti-Semitism has been a fundamental part of Middle East culture for more than a millennium. Long before capitalism and Western colonialism, Jews were treated as second-class citizens, or "dhimmis," under Islamic law, and they endured frequent pogroms, humiliation, and brutal oppression. Thus, denying the historical record is a necessity if one is set on absolving the wicked.

The lengths to which some will go in their denial is exemplified by a New York–based progressive organization called Jews for Racial & Economic Justice (JFREJ). Founded in 1990 by the academic and activist Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark and the activist Donna Nevel, JFREJ claims it is inspired by Jewish tradition to dismantle racism and economic exploitation. On its website, the organization highlights its work with Black Lives Matter and its efforts to fight Islamophobia and dismantle ICE, among other things.

JFREJ cofounders Marilyn Kleinberg Neimark (left) and Donna Nevel (right) JFREJ has published a guide called "Understanding Anti-Semitism" that takes readers through the leftist looking glass into a world where oppressor and oppressed bear little resemblance to their real-life counterparts. It is worth looking at this organization's rhetoric as it helps shine a light on the current pathways of anti-racist activism and how it acts as a cover for Jew-hatred.

The authors of "Understanding Anti-Semitism" blame Christian dogma and hierarchies for the creation of Jew-hatred while writing off centuries of anti-Semitism in the Arab-Muslim world. They even reframe the dhimmi status imposed on Jews, casting it as a "protection" of the sultan. And while they acknowledge that this protection was bought through heavy taxation and that it facilitated "sporadic attacks, forced conversions and mass killings of Jews," they claim that no specific "anti-Jewish ideology" persisted in the Arab-Muslim world because, after all, other non-Muslims were also oppressed. How the presence of additional prejudices makes anti-Semitism less bigoted is unclear. What is clear, however, is that Muslim anti-Semitism culminated in nearly 1 million Jews of Araby ethnically cleansed, forcibly dispossessed, and expelled from their homes in the 20th century alone.

It is telling that the JFREJ guide discusses "Islamophobia" but omits mention of the persecution of Christians currently rampant in the Arab-Muslim world. It misleadingly blames "white Christian nationalism" for the vast majority of domestic terrorist attacks in the United States, conveniently ignoring that 2019 saw roughly an even number of casualties at the hands of white-nationalist terrorists and jihadists. JFREJ also doesn't mention that in 2017 alone, groups such as al-Shabab and the Taliban carried out nearly 11,000 Islamist attacks worldwide, resulting in 26,000 casualties.

JFREJ exonerates Muslims and racial minorities wholesale for anti-Semitism. Just as JFREJ exonerates Muslims wholesale for anti-Semitism, the group exempts racial minorities for it as well. In an interview with the Democracy Now radio show in late December, JFREJ executive director Audrey Sasson referred to New York City's recent onslaught of anti-Semitic attacks as a manifestation of white nationalism—despite the fact that the majority of incidents were perpetrated by African Americans. In the December 28th stabbing attack on five Hasidic Jews at a Hanukkah party in Monsey, New York, for example, the assailant was a 37-year-old black male who reportedly Googled topics such as "Why did Hitler hate Jews," "Zionist Temples in Staten Island," and "Prominent companies founded by Jews in America."

Some leftist Democratic politicians have dabbled in similar scapegoating. New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, for example, claimed that the rash of hate crimes in New York City was a "right-wing" problem. On Twitter, Representative Rashida Tlaib blamed "white supremacy" for the Jersey City shooting at a kosher supermarket that took the lives of three Jews and a non-Jewish police officer, even though both perpetrators were African Americans and one was affiliated with the Black Hebrew Israelites—a black supremacist and anti-Semitic hate group.

De Blasio later backtracked on his comments, and Tlaib deleted her tweet. But JFREJ has upheld the notion that there is no anti-Semitism apart from white supremacy, including retweeting an article from the socialist magazine Jacobin that claimed the best way to fight anti-Semitism "is to reject the centrist idea that anti-Semitism transcends politics," and declared it was "pernicious" to point out that Jew-haters exist on the left and the right.

Yet every week, it seems, another video appears on social media, or in the news, showing a black American verbally or physically attacking a visibly Jewish victim. The attacks range from anti-Semitic tirades to throwing objects, spitting, beating, stabbing, and shooting. Indeed, one could rightly describe these frequent and vicious assaults on Jews as a slow-motion pogrom.

JFREJ rails against "white Jews' preoccupation with black anti-Semitism." What is JFREJ's solution to this problem? Apparently, the first step is to deny that it is happening at all. The group's website claims that the real issue is "white Jews' preoccupation with black anti-Semitism," stoked by "a false narrative...that focuses on conflict between white Jews and black non-Jews." And who does the organization see as the true "architects of this conflict"? Get ready for it: "Ku Klux Klan terrorists in the South forcing African-Americans to flee to northern cities"—Ku Klux Klan terrorists, that is, who were last active a century ago.

The second part of the solution is no less confounding. In Sasson's recent interview, she said: "Our focus is to build solidarity with other groups targeted by anti-Semitism." Other groups targeted by anti-Semitism? The very formulation defies intelligibility.

But it is revealing nonetheless. Sasson's true intention is to deny that anti-Semitism—understood as a specific hatred against Jews—even exists. JFREJ subordinates the uniqueness of the Jewish plight to a larger narrative about racism—one that ironically excludes the Jews. This explains why, at New York City's January 5th "March Against Anti-Semitism," JFREJ chose to publicize the event as a generalized rally against "hate." In their promotional material, they even mentioned Islamophobia before saying a word about anti-Semitism.

JFREJ effectively denies that anti-Semitism — understood as a specific hatred against Jews — even exists. What we see here are leftist Jews leveraging their "Jewishness" to perpetuate a logical and moral perversion. In a similar fashion, the November 2019 issue of Jewish Currents featured Vermont senator and Democratic candidate for president Bernie Sanders conflating the fight against anti-Semitism with Palestinian liberation: "The forces fomenting anti-Semitism are the forces arrayed against oppressed people around the world, including Palestinians....The struggle against anti-Semitism is also the struggle for Palestinian freedom."

Once anti-Semitism is grouped with bigotry in general, it can be ignored in favor of more fashionable concerns: namely, systemic racism in the United States. In her interview, Sasson asserted that attacks on Jews, if committed by minorities, arise from "rightful anger about real problems." Since black Americans are perceived to be a marginalized group, their hate crimes must be rationalized as an understandable, if misguided, rebellion against oppression—as opposed to the manifestation of anti-Semitism that they are.

By this reasoning, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan—who famously compared Jews to "termites," called Jews "bloodsuckers," "great and master deceivers," and the "enemy of God and the enemy of the righteous"—hates Jews because of some misplaced grudge against the system. And so when Farrakhan refers to Hitler as "a very great man" and attributes gay marriage, abortion, and anal sex to the "Satanic influence of the Talmudic Jews," he is merely reacting to the evil of the white, Christian West.

In actuality, what we know about the Nation of Islam and groups such as the Black Hebrew Israelites is that their members have been actively enlisting people of color for decades, setting up shop and drumming up hatred in local communities. They preach that Jews are to blame for the plight of African Americans and draw an equivalence between black suffering in the U.S. and Palestinian suffering in the Middle East. This line of anti-Semitism gained particular strength after the assassination of Martin Luther King, a Zionist and friend of the Jews. King's tragic departure from the national conversation paved the way for his views to be overtaken by those in the tradition of Nation of Islam founder Elijah Muhammad, who wedded his ideas on black power to a sci-fi version of Islam and made anti-Semitism an enduring feature of the Nation of Islam.

JFREJ has actually aligned itself with Farrakhan supporters. On its website, the group proudly states that it lets the priorities of the marginalized groups with which it partners "guide [its] actions." Thus JFREJ has partnered with two former leaders of the Women's March: Tamika Mallory, an African American, and Linda Sarsour, a Muslim American. Both women have voiced admiration for Louis Farrakhan. And Sarsour's record of anti-Semitic statements in the name of Palestinian activism is well-known. She has said, for example, that Israel is "built on supremacy" and "on the idea that Jews are supreme to everybody else." She also tweeted: "Nothing is creepier than Zionism." Sarsour earned an approving retweet from former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan David Duke when she tweeted: "Israel should give free citizenship to US politicians. They are more loyal to Israel than they are to the American people." But, as one headline on JFREJ's website says, "JFREJ Stands with Linda Sarsour (Again, Always, with Love)." If people like Sarsour guide JFREJ's actions, it's no wonder that the group whitewashes hate crimes against Jews.

JFREJ prizes its "alliances" and readily dismisses the sins of its allies. Above all, JFREJ prizes its "alliances" and readily dismisses the sins of its allies—even when those sins run counter to the group's stated beliefs. In her interview, Sasson rightly described anti-Semitism as a "tool that punches up against Jews, in that it portrays Jews as powerful." But this is precisely the conspiracist brand of anti-Semitism espoused by anti-Israel groups such as IfNotNow and Jewish Voice for Peace, with whom JFREJ partners. These outfits rely on an anti-capitalist, anti-colonialist framework that sees the Jewish collective (i.e., Israel) as the oppressive power and that equates Zionism with Palestinian suffering.

Either Sasson is displaying willful blindness or she has been corrupted by the very suggestion she claims to condemn: that Jews are the oppressor class, and Palestinians their hapless victims. The latter stance seems more convincing given the activist left's penchant for pitting the powerful against the weak. As John-Paul Pagano has written, if Jews are perceived as the oppressor class, then overt anti-Semitism becomes "easy to disguise as a politics of emancipation," and punching up at Jews becomes "a form of speaking truth to power."

While it is true that abusers are often themselves the victims of abuse, and that a person's experience of oppression may contribute to the ways in which he oppresses other people, it is intellectually dishonest to claim that this is somehow exculpatory. And while it is laudable to condemn all forms of bigotry, there is something obscene about automatically holding up the perpetrator of a hate crime as a victim and subsequently elevating his grievances above the violence done to the actual injured party. Regarding such violence, Sasson's vigilance is wanting. On Democracy Now, she argued against greater security measures for Jews and claimed that the "answer to what is happening is not more policing."

Anti-Semitism has long been a feature of extreme left-wing and Islamist ideologies—from Soviet Communism to Hezbollah's exterminationist creed. As everyone knows, it has also been a feature of fascism and Nazism. It is incumbent on both the left and right to root out the Jew-haters in their midst. But some progressive groups have instead embraced them—as a display of progressive virtue, no less. As is often the case when bigotry is given the gloss of victimhood, it is the Jews who will bear the brunt of the abuse.

Karys Rhea is a fellow at the Counter-Islamist Grid, a project of the Middle East Forum. Keren Toledano is an artist and writer based in New York City.

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