The Free Press
Honestly with Bari Weiss
The State of the Black-Jewish Relationship in America: A Roundtable
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The State of the Black-Jewish Relationship in America: A Roundtable
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For the last month, Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, has been all over the internet with his conspiratorial, antisemitic tirades. Most recently, he went on Alex Jones’ InfoWars show with White Nationalist Nick Fuentes and said things like, “I love Nazis” and “I see good things about Hitler.” 

Last month, there was also Kyrie Irving sharing a link to a video that claimed that blacks are the real Hebrews and the Holocaust didn’t happen. There was also the Black Hebrew Israelite march outside of Barclays Center that got almost no media coverage. All of this, took place in a country where Jews still suffer the largest total number of hate crimes, year after year. 

What’s happened over the last month isn’t about one celebrity or basketball player. As Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and I talked about recently, the antisemitic ideas we’ve seen in the news lately are not new in America. Especially not in black America. 

Black-Jewish relations in America have a long and dynamic history, from the shared struggle during the Civil Rights movement to the horror of the Crown Heights Riots in 1991. Throughout all of it, it’s hard not to think about the outsized influence of Louis Farrakahn, often dubbed the most popular antisemite in America. 

So today, an honest conversation with guests Chloe Valdary, Bret Stephens, Eli Lake and Kmele Foster about the history of these two communities in America, and how, as a society, we should respond to public figures who spew antisemitism.

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What a great convo. I especially loved that they found points to debate. I personally don't agree with Bret Stephens that Trump and Tucker Carlson opened the gates to antisemitism. Great Replacement theory, and "Demographics is Destiny" nonsense was openly promoted by the left for decades. The right merely took notice and called these people out. Eli Lake makes a much stronger case that the leftist gatekeepers ruined their own credibility by calling everything, including all opposition to rampant illegal immigration "white supremacy". One of these preceded the other. Trump was a symptom of rampant anti-institutionalism. The left robs terms of their potency with nonstop boys crying wolf. Kmele brings up the proliferation of leftist hate hoaxes. The hysterical leftist desire for hate crimes was fulfilled by an army of Jussie Smollets. Many conspiracy theories converge around antisemitism but we can't place all the blame on the right. The left has mastered calling everything a conspiracy, until we have proof, like the Twitter Files and Shadowbanning. We are supposed to reject the appeal of Illuminati nonsense but the general structure of an elite cabal controlling the world looks alot like the Woke Tech Cartels colluding to control what is seen on the internet.

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A few years ago, The NYT featured the most prominent people in corporations and institutions, with photos, to demonstrate how white people dominate elite positions. Instead, someone on the internet went and put the star of David on all the pictures of photos with Jewish sounding surnames to demonstrate how actually it’s Jewish people dominating these positions. I had a bad feeling about what was to come after seeing that.

It reminded me of something I learned when my kids started school. They had a program where teachers rewarded students for good behavior, especially students with challenging behaviors. Some parents were complaining about the message it sent to kids then a parent explained the program isn’t for the kids. It’s for the adults. It keeps the adult engaging positively with challenging children and this is what helps to stop bullying, that kids will feel they have permission to bully a child that adults don’t like and ultimately this gives the child permission to bully anyone they don’t like.

I think our social justice/CRT movement has done just that. Now it’s ok to group white people, men together and make assumptions, and denigrate them based on this grouping. The gatekeeper adults have given permission for one type of prejudice which is giving permission for all types of prejudice.

This was an excellent conversation-thought provoking and riveting. I never knew what each person was going to say and found myself surprised by a lot of it. Everyone was great but my heart is with Kmele. Once you grasp what he’s saying it’s hard not to be deeply frustrated by what is and what it could be.

Thanks for the great podcast!

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