Before the pandemic, I used to crisscross the country and speak to people interested in understanding and combating anti-Jewish prejudice. But it always felt like fighting a losing battle.
I could only be in so many places at once, and couldn’t possibly address all the communities that sought guidance on this subject. So starting nine months ago, I embarked on an ambitious project to change that. I began scripting and designing a web series about antisemitism.
Today, I’m proud to share the result with you.
The series consists of six videos, each providing straightforward answers to difficult questions about antisemitism that many people have, but are afraid to ask.
It’s both a crash course for a general audience, and a serious attempt to reground our broken antisemitism conversation in principle rather than partisanship. I hope it will serve as a resource for both Jews and non-Jews seeking to untangle and rebut this vexing bigotry.
Here's the series:
1. Did antisemitism go away after the Holocaust? (Today) 2. Whose fault is antisemitism? (8/11) 3. Is criticizing Israel antisemitic? (8/18) 4. Do Jews cause antisemitism? (8/25) 5. Can Jews be antisemitic? (9/1) 6. Why should I care about antisemitism? (9/8)
Obviously, these are big questions, and they won’t be resolved in a YouTube clip. But my goal with these videos is not to end the conversation, but rather to provoke more productive conversations.
If this series inspires folks to dig deeper into the subject of antisemitism, have better arguments about it, and come up with better approaches than I did, then it will have been a great success.
OK, now for the good stuff. The first video from the antisemitism explainer series is now live! You can watch and share it here:
Can't wait through September to see the rest of the videos? You can learn how to get advance access to the entire series here: yair.substack.com/p/watch-my-new…
Incidentally, now you can all understand this tweet from February:
1. "This info is brought to you by Tiktok" was your first clue that this was a viral falsehood. 2. Despite this tweet being repeatedly debunked by actual crop scientists, the person hasn't taken it down, because Twitter incentivizes people to prioritize virality over accuracy.
Takeaways: 1. Assume massively viral tweets that don't cite their sources to be false until proven otherwise. 2. This is especially true if the viral tweet is clearly playing on people's political biases to get shares, like dumping on a buzzword like "socialism" or "capitalism."
The key here is that no one would've cared about this tweet if it just made a claim about trees. But once it (falsely) tied its point to a political buzzword (in this case, "capitalism"), it was able to short-circuit people's brains and get them to retweet without verifying.
The fun thing about doing an antisemitism video series on YouTube is that literally every kind of antisemite helpfully shows up in the comments to prove your points:
NEWS! Over the last 9 months, I've been working on a video explainer series tackling big questions about antisemitism that many people have, but are afraid to ask. We now have a release date! August 4. Can't wait to share it all with you. Here's a taste:
Here is a still from my forthcoming antisemitism explainer series, along with a misleading caption from my newsletter: yair.substack.com/p/does-america…
Sign up here to be notified when the series comes out, and to get links to the other resources and articles that will be launching with it: yair.substack.com
Israeli prime minister Bennett gave a primetime address last night about the Delta variant and what the country is doing about it. It's worth watching it here with English subtitles, simply because what they're facing now is what we'll be facing soon.
"Dear citizens, those who refuse vaccines are endangering their health, those around them and the freedom of every Israeli citizen. They are endangering our freedom to work, the freedom of our children to learn and the freedom to hold celebrations with the family."
"I respect different views but there is a time and a place in which this discussion needs to stop – and it is our very lives. The science is unequivocal: The vaccines work."
Antisemites deface school bus of anti-Zionist Jewish sect with "Free Palestine." Making Jews feel assailed and threatened where they live is how you create more Zionists, just FYI!
If you are triggered by Jewish people, Jewish ritual objects, or the ancient language of the Jewish people, and feel the need to attack those things, you aren't anti-Israel, you're just antisemitic, and you should probably look into that.
Saying "Free Palestine" isn't an attack on Jews. Defacing Jewish institutions, ritual objects, and other property around the world with "Free Palestine," as above, is an attack on Jews. Random Jews in Brooklyn are not Israel any more than random Muslim there are Saudi Arabia.