1/ In the wake of the horrific anti-Jewish terror attack in Pittsburgh & the insistence by many of us that the "anti-globalist" rhetoric of the Trumpist right wing might be stoking this anti-Semitism, some have asked 'why the left doesn't condemn Louis Farrakhan?' as strongly...
2/ It's a predictable pivot and one the right has deployed consistently for over 30 years, ever since Farrakhan became their all purpose bogeyman. It's also marinated in false equivalence, historically contextual ignorance, and supreme bad faith…
3/ Not to mention how truly absurd it is to expect "the left" to call out Farrakhan as if his philosophy were some prototypical example of leftism. As if he were "one of ours," the way Trump is one of theirs, or Alex Jones, etc. Seriously?…
4/ Have u studied NOI theology? Or LF's thinking on gender or sexuality? Or economics? I mean, he's a major proponent of black capitalism & I don't know many leftists who R fans of capitalism, in any color. Plus many left have critiqued (Angela Davis, Kimberle Crenshaw, etc)...
5/ But I digress...I want to go through this bit by bit, as fully as possible, because this critique comes up literally all the time, so it needs to be addressed. This will be long, but please stick with it…
6/ B4 I get into my critique of the critique of Farrakhan, I want to say something clearly however. And it's something I've said to members of the Nation of Islam b4 including @sischarlene who writes for the Final Call, has interviewed me often, and 4 whom I have much respect…
7/ Namely, that some remarks the minister has made about Jews are, in my opinion offensive and hurtful. Tho I do think the context of some of those remarks has been deliberately distorted others are hard 2 understand in any context as legitimate...
8/ As 4 his most recent comments (where he supposedly called Jews termites), I actually don't think that's what he did. Indeed in the paragraph (where he DID analogize himself 2 a donkey), he was drawing a DISTINCTION between anti-Semitism (Jew hatred) & being 'anti-termite'...
9/ which suggests he does not view Jews as termites as a group, but rather he is referring to certain people (some jewish, others not) whom he views as destructive of the foundations of the house, so to speak, understood in metaphorical terms. It was a clumsy metaphor...
10/ But I didn't hear it as the outrageous remark some took it 2b. On the other hand, I thought his "synagogue of satan" remarks from Saviour's Day earlier in the year were worse, as I noted to @sischarlene...and about which she and I had a good, reasonable convo, like adults...
11/ So yes, much of what LF has said is offensive. AND if u think that's all that needs 2b said (that it's enuf 2 condemn him &move on, w/o exploring why so many black folk continue 2respect him) yr part of the problem that created him & the beliefs u now find objectionable...
11/ I'll explain this last point down thread, but 1st let me make clear the false equivalence some are trying 2 draw between Farrakhan (whom we on the left supposedly don't criticize) & the far-right neo-Nazis whom we do…There are 3 ways in which the equialence is false...
12/ First, is quantitative. For the neo-Nazis and white nationalist movement, anti-Jewish bigotry is literally the fuel of their movement, the glue that binds them. It isn't a secondary issue & anti-Jewish comments aren't just things that pop up from time to time among them…
13/ To those folks Jew hatred is THE thing, bigger than racism against folks of color, bc they believe Jews are evil manipulators who USE POC to destroy white people. Their racism against POC is of a pitying/inferiorizing type (bad enuf) Their hatred of Jews is quite different…
14/ It's rooted in a belief that Jews are all-powerful and intent on "genociding" Aryans. Thus, Jews "fund the caravan," support "open borders," and push diversity as a way to divide whites, allowing Jews as Jews (a small minority) to remain poweful as a unified group...
15/ So hating Jews is not the B-side of a Nazi record, or an occasional errant note in their orchestra. It is the overture, and the primary cacophony of each movement, so to speak. On the other hand, for Farrakhan and the NOI, it simply isn't…not even close...
16/ The Nation's theology is not steeped in anti-Jewishness (it has some odd things 2 say about the origins of white people, 2b sure, though all religions' origin stories seem bizarre to me) & most of LFs speeches, of which there are 1000s, make no mention of Jews at all…
17/ ...which is 1 of the reasons that when he DOES go back to that well, we end up hearing about it. Because when it happens it shocks us, in a way it doesn't when a Nazi says something like that. Nazis literally always say that shit, so it never makes news when they do…
18/ Unless that nazi goes into a synagogue and massacres people during a service, or marches with others on a college campus shouting "jews will not replace us." Which then brings me to the second level of false equivalence…namely, qualitative…
19/ The anti-Jewish rhetoric of neo-Nazis like the shooter, or the Atomwaffen Division terrorist cell, or the Charlottesville organizers, or the Daily Stormer, is eliminationist in tone. They call openly for extermination of Jews or forced removal from America…
20/ NOTHING that LF has said about Jews could b viewed as eliminationist in tone or likely 2 result in violence against Jews. It's offensive and wrong, but not remotely comparable to "get in the oven" memes or the death threats right wingers send to Jews on social media daily…
21/ I personally get these regularly, never from any1 affiliated w/the NOI, always from right wing neo-Nazis. So yes, The NOI has put out some arguments about Jews (and Jewish involvement in the slave trade 4 instance) w/which I take issue as a matter of historical accuracy...
22/ ...and the purpose of which I question too, but however troubling I find it, it is not central to NOI beliefs or activity, or eliminationist in intent or effect, the way neo-Nazi & right wing anti-Semitism is...
23/ (Apparently Twitter is telling me this post is the limit for this thread, which I don't understand bc I've seen longer threads, but I guess I'll start another one, so please follow my next thread which I will mark as a continuation of this one)
