A New Challenger Approaches!: Evaluating the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism

Yet another antisemitism framework has emerged, with the release of the Jerusalem Declaration on Antisemitism (JDA) signed by around two hundred Jewish Studies scholars. This, of course, comes rapidly on the heels of the Nexus document on antisemitism (of which I was one of the drafters), meaning we now have two new antisemitism frameworks standing as potential complements (or alternatives) to the venerable IHRA definition.

The other day I made a handy table summarizing the similarities and differences between the three definitions. That was designed to be a pretty straightforward, "just the facts" presentation. But I also want to give my evaluative judgment on the Jerusalem Declaration in comparison to IHRA and Nexus (I wrote more on the Nexus document, specifically, in this post). Obviously, the fact that I was a Nexus author means I have a dog in this hunt, though I don't view these definitions as in competition with one another. And likewise, I don't have direct knowledge of the background and genesis of the Jerusalem Declaration in the same way I do for the Nexus document -- some of my comments will be based on inference and speculation. So take them with however much salt you think is appropriate.

This is a somewhat long post, divided roughly into three parts. First, I address differences in the orientation of the JDA compared to the other frameworks -- who wrote it and who their audience is. Second, I examine the JDA's relationship to IHRA -- particularly IHRA as a symbol of (depending on who you ask) rallying against antisemitism or creating toxic policing of discourse on Israel -- and how that is mediating the reception (both positive and negative) of the JDA. Finally, I address where the JDA is substantively different from the other frameworks and where it isn't. Likewise, I identify a few important areas that neither the JDA nor IHRA address that are included in the Nexus document: the inclusion of conditions (alongside attitudes and behaviors) as a potential form of antisemitism, recognizing and objecting to the practice of routine and reflexive dismissal of antisemitism claims, and addressing how Jews who take the "wrong" (however defined) position on Israel see their Jewish identity denigrated or denied -- a form of harassment that especially targets Jews of Color.

I. The JDA's Orientation

At the outset, there are a few core differences in the orientation of the JDA in comparison to the Nexus document -- who wrote it and what it is targeting. The JDA has more of a European center of gravity, whereas the Nexus is more American; the JDA is primarily endorsed by academics, whereas the Nexus document was geared more towards "community leader" sorts. Obviously, these are generalizations -- the JDA has American signatories, the Nexus document had academics involved (such as myself). But I think these broad-stroke differences exert a noticeable impact in terms of what is and isn't prioritized, and who was and wasn't sought to be "included" in the definition.

In particular, the JDA seems to have been very invested in coming up with a definition that could get non- or anti-Zionists onboard alongside at least liberal Zionists (getting a document signed by Susannah Heschel and Richard Falk is no mean feat!). In doing so, the JDA gives the non-Zionist contingent a few very big wins: it expressly declares BDS not antisemitic, and it more or less declares calls for the dissolution of Israel to be not antisemitic (the constraint is that any alternative polity that is envisioned must be one that protects "the right of Jews in the State of Israel [or, I imagine, its hypothetical successor] to exist and flourish, collectively and individually, as Jews"). The Nexus document, by contrast, had as its target audience (more or less) the median American Jew -- envisioned as a Biden-style Democrat who identifies as broadly Zionist and pro-Israel but has his or her fair share of criticism. Accordingly, the Nexus doesn't speak directly on BDS, implicitly judging it by the other standards in the document, and contains a more robust defense of the right of Jewish self-determination than is present in the JDA (it is notable that challenging Israel's "right to exist" is viewed as antisemitic by an extremely wide consensus of American Jews -- more so than almost any other issue). 

The JDA's audience is thus simultaneously broader and narrower than the Nexus': it reaches non-Zionist activists for whom it is exceedingly important that challenging Israel's existence as a Jewish state not be labeled antisemitic, but in doing so it may have language that's a veritable poison pill for rank-and-file Jews (at least in the US). The Nexus document was meant to be a viable set of guidelines for a Democratic administration that would let them handle antisemitism controversies while avoiding obvious shoals and pitfalls. The JDA (and I think this is true even if one agrees with it on its merits) would be more likely to provoke controversy simply because of its explicit language on BDS and its position that denying Jewish self-determination in Israel is not necessarily antisemitic. The JDA is I think more valuable as a tool of public discourse than something that could be "adopted" by a particular organization, especially (say) the Democratic Party (and the JDA is quite explicit that it is not meant to be adopted or codified as any explicit legal tool).

II. The Symbolism of IHRA

Speaking of provoking controversy, another defining feature of the JDA is its explicitly antagonistic posture towards IHRA. The Nexus document sought to position itself as primarily an interpretive resource -- a complement where IHRA was vague or incomplete (as Jonathan Jacoby put it, IHRA is the Mishnah and Nexus is the Gemara). The JDA, by contrast, is very much taking aim at the king. As I mentioned in my post on the Nexus document, IHRA has taken on such symbolic weight that one can generate almost reflexive support and opposition for a given initiative simply by presenting as a challenge to IHRA, and that's definitely occurring here. People who hate IHRA are cheering the JDA simply because it's the "anti-IHRA", even when their own conduct would seemingly be obviously indicted under the JDA's definition. As noted above, Richard Falk is a signatory even though he's endorsed materials which seem to cleanly fall under categories the JDA deems antisemitic. Jackie Walker praised the JDA too even though her antisemitism likewise would be covered by the JDA. It's doubtful that such persons are backing the JDA as a mea culpa for their past misconduct; rather, they see the JDA as a counter to IHRA's putative "weaponization" of antisemitism and endorse it on that basis. If or when the JDA does get cited to label them as antisemitic, I suspect they will be just as dismissive as they've been in the past. 

Arguably, then, just like IHRA there is a risk that the JDA will be "applied" in a purely symbolic manner divorced from its actual textual mandates. Just as IHRA's language insisting that context matters has been roundly ignored, one can easily imagine persons accused of antisemitism "citing" the JDA for the blithe retort that "criticism of Israel is not antisemitic" while disregarding language in the JDA which arguably encompasses their particular "critique". As always, one suspects the most important interpretive canon in accepting or applying any definition of antisemitism will be the overriding principle "me and my friends are not antisemitic."

The hegemony of IHRA's symbolism doesn't just afflict the JDA's defenders. IHRA's advocates also have gotten so invested in the importance of IHRA as a marker for "taking antisemitism seriously" that they are often unwilling to recognize IHRA has quite a few serious gaps and ambiguities. The core definition itself is nearly useless ("A certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews" -- what does that mean?), and the illustrative examples, while helpful as far as they go (and IHRA itself says they only go so far as to be cases which "could, taking into account the overall context," be antisemitic), are significantly underinclusive even leaving aside IHRA's relative lack of guidance on what "context" can be used to assess whether any given speech or behavior that abuts one of the examples actually is antisemitic. As a symbolic gesture where a given organization says "we care about antisemitism", IHRA can stand alone (in large part because for that function it doesn't matter what IHRA says). As an actual substantive tool for identifying antisemitism, IHRA needs to be expounded upon, and that is a task that (in different ways) both the Nexus document and the JDA attempt to tackle.

Unsurprisingly, I prefer the Nexus' approach of not directly trying to overthrow IHRA but rather fine-tune, calibrate, and direct it. I have no desire to undermine the symbolic importance of IHRA, but I very much have an interest in alleviating the very real gaps and shortfalls present under any honest reckoning with IHRA's text. Even still, if I'm being honest I suspect that the JDA will prove more influential than Nexus simply as a function of polarization. The people who blame IHRA for creating a toxic atmosphere around antisemitism want something that directly challenges it. The people who are basically content with the way antisemitism discourse has proceeded around IHRA will stick with it, without seeing the need for modification. Even if substantively the Nexus does the best job of filling the pitfalls and potholes in IHRA while representing a vision of fighting antisemitism that aligns with the median American Jew, the seemingly inexorable pull of polarization will drive people into the arms of either IHRA or anti-IHRA (which is to say, JDA).

III. Substantive Similarities and Differences Across the Frameworks

You might have noticed that the above analysis actually doesn't concentrate that much on the actual substantive differences between the three antisemitism frameworks. One reason for that is that, as my table illustrates, there are fewer differences between them than one might guess from the heated nature of the JDA and IHRA's reception. Certainly, it is fair to focus on the areas where the definitions depart -- that's what should determine whether one prefers one over another -- but that focus can overshadow the significant agreement in a large set of cases regarding what is antisemitic amongst all three frameworks. All agree that criticism of Israel can be antisemitic insofar as Israel is a Jewish institution (and thus none indulge in the tritely true but banal point that "Judaism and Israel are not the same thing"), all agree that criticism of Israel is not always antisemitic, all agree that "tropes" (variously worded) are an important feature of antisemitism, and all agree that notions of Jewish collective responsibility for alleged Israeli misdeeds are antisemitic.

What are the key differences? I've mentioned two already: IHRA and Nexus both consider denial of Jewish self-determination rights to be antisemitic, while the JDA seemingly does not; and IHRA and Nexus don't speak specifically on BDS, while the JDA expressly says it is not antisemitic. These are both significant. BDS is a well-known third rail in Jewish politics, and Nexus' "strategic ambiguity" (to put it uncharitably) on the question is an attempt to traverse a cliff the JDA eagerly dives off. Likewise, as noted above the "Israel has no right to exist" position is one on which there is almost unrivaled Jewish consensus regarding its antisemitic character, so the JDA's dissident position here is risky indeed.

Beyond those two issues (and putting aside any nitpicking one can do about phrasing or word choices), the other big departure I see in the JDA is that it explicitly says that "double standards" are not antisemitic, whereas IHRA says they are. The Nexus tries to take a middle position here, agreeing that double standards are antisemitic but refusing the simplistic argument that any time Israel is concentrated on or even "singled out" in a discrete case that is evidence of a double-standard (as I've argued, AIPAC "singles out" Israel -- is that antisemitic? Of course not). The JDA's rejection of including "double standards" likely stems from the view that this language has been particularly abused by right-wing zealots who argue that essentially any Israel-critical activity that does not simultaneously tackle the entire world is per se antisemitic. That notwithstanding, the JDA's dismissal of double standards as even a potential form of antisemitism seems clearly incorrect. Disparate treatment -- treating likes unalike -- is perhaps the closest thing there is to the paradigm case of discrimination and it'd be simply weird for antisemitism to stand alone in not including this very intuitive case. If one can subject Jews or Jewish institutions to different standards than other comparable actors in global affairs without it being labeled "antisemitic", you've created a loophole you can drive a truck through.

It is also important to flag a group of important components of antisemitism that are found only in the Nexus definition and are not present or discussed in either IHRA or the JDA. The first is that the Nexus definition is the only one which considers certain social conditions (on top of behaviors or attitudes) to be cases of antisemitism: specifically, those conditions "that discriminate against Jews and significantly impede their ability to participate as equals in political, religious, cultural, economic, or social life." I lobbied very hard to include this language, and in some ways I think it is the single most important point in Nexus' favor compared to other frameworks. Ironically enough (given that the Nexus document is nominally limited to the Israel case), the inclusion of this language is why the Nexus document is probably the only framework of the three which could explain why a proposed ban on Kosher slaughter would be antisemitic -- it does not fall within any of either IHRA or JDA's examples, but it would represent a social condition which "significantly impede[s] [Jews'] ability to participate as equals" in European society. Understanding antisemitism as not just a set of attitudes or behaviors but as a state of social affairs better aligns antisemitism with emerging understandings of racism and other forms of oppression, all of which have dedicated considerable attention to understanding inequality at least partially in those terms.

The second inclusion in Nexus not seen in the other frameworks is an acknowledgment of the epistemic antisemitism that occurs when Jewish claims regarding antisemitism are reflexively or cavalierly dismissed. The so-called Livingstone Formulation, where claims of antisemitism can be immediately brushed off by claiming they're actually attempts to "silence criticism of Israel," is one of the primary mechanisms through which Jews are impeded in their ability to be treated as valid and viable claim-makers in public discourse. Here, too, recognition of this practice as a form of antisemitism aligns antisemitism with other forms of oppression where it has been well-acknowledged that these sorts of reflexive dismissals are themselves manifestations of racism, sexism, or what have you (as in the infamous and ubiquitous "race card" retort). The opening entry of the Nexus definition is decisive on this point: "All claims of antisemitism made by Jews, like all claims of discrimination and oppression in general, should be given serious attention" -- which is not to say automatic acceptance, but not immediate eye-rolling dismissal either. Neither IHRA nor the JDA address this issue -- IHRA probably wasn't thinking about it at all, and the JDA it's fair to assume includes a good number of stakeholders who are at least sympathetic to the notion that antisemitism claims are regularly abused and so need tighter policing.

The final major feature of Nexus not found in its compatriots is an acknowledgment of a particular type of antisemitism that targets Jews for having the "wrong" view on Israel, at which point their status as Jews is called into question. Rudy Giuliani claiming that he's "more of a Jew" than George Soros is a high-profile case here. But the importance of including this as a form of antisemitism stemmed from the way in which this sort of marginalizing rhetoric is especially likely to be deployed against Jews of Color, who regularly are assailed as being "fake" or "lesser" Jews (even by non-Jews!) if they deviate from an imagined proper or correct Jewish standpoint on Israel. The Nexus document accordingly recognizes that "denigrating or denying the Jewish identity of certain Jews because they are perceived as holding the 'wrong' position (whether too critical or too favorable) on Israel" is a form of antisemitism, and I can say that language was included in specific recognition of dynamics one increasingly sees on social media where JOCs have been subject to brutal and persistent harassment along this exact dimension. It is a recurrent failing of Jewish efforts on antisemitism that we often are not thinking intersectionally -- and so the discrete experiences or problems faced by, e.g., Jewish women, or Mizrahi Jews, or Jews of Color, as Jews are overlooked or not incorporated. I'm sure the Nexus document can still improve on this front, but I am proud that it made at least a step in the right direction.

DC Statehood Is Not Going To "Backfire"

Noah Feldman has a truly idiotic -- and I don't say that lightly, but it's bad -- column arguing against DC statehood because it might "backfire" against Democrats by increasing partisan polarization. Others have done the requisite line-by-line refutation. I'll just reiterate my earlier observation that one of the virtues of DC statehood is that, in comparison to other forms of political "hardball" by congressional Democrats, it is relatively immune from partisan retaliation. What are Republicans going to do -- add Wyoming as a state? It's already a state! As it happens, for oh-so-mysterious-reasons there aren't a bunch of non-voting disenfranchised American territories overwhelmingly populated by White folk lying around that Republicans could give statehood too the next time they win back control of Congress. 

What Can Be Done About a Problem Like Peter?

The other day, the Washington Post published a story about a kerfuffle at Richmond's Virginia Commonwealth University, where the Jewish Studies program invited Peter Beinart to give a talk, prompting backlash from Jewish community organizations who contend VCU's Israel-related programming is one-sided. Beinart, of course, has very publicly evolved from hawkish New Republic editor to dovish two-state solution supporter to his current position rejecting two-states and backing a single-state solution "from the river to the sea" with equal rights for all inhabitants.

My first thought on reading the article was to stake out my general position of absolutist academic freedom: if the relevant officials at VCU want to invite Beinart to speak, there should be no attempt at forcing cancellation of that speech, regardless of whatever opinion I might have about Peter Beinart or his politics.

My second thought, which I viewed as consistent with the first, is that so long as it doesn't take the form of seeking cancellation of the talk, the local Jewish community is entitled to express its discontent that Beinart was invited to speak -- again, regardless of whether I do or don't share their opinion that Beinart is objectionable.

Putting those two thoughts together, though, made me wonder: what is and isn't in-bounds for how the local Jewish community can object to Beinart being invited to speak? I've written before my view about how academic freedom is a constraint on remedies, which raises the question of what "remedies" remain in play and unconstrained? (I was particularly curious about this because I think the WaPo article was somewhat ambiguous on exactly what the local Jewish leaders were and weren't trying to do here).

This question is not, to reiterate, about whether it is proper "on the merits" for the Jewish community to object to Beinart being invited to give a talk. For the most part, the analysis I'll be running through would, I think, be applicable to any speaker who is controversial amongst a particular section of the broader community. So if Peter Beinart doesn't resonate as a valid example, feel free to substitute a different hypothetical speaker that might.

The one wrinkle here is that the VCU's Jewish Studies program appears to be integrated into and a part of the Richmond Jewish community in a way that most university programs are not vis-a-vis any particular segment of the local community -- it is not "just" an academic program, it is also part of the "fabric" of Jewish life in the area both for Jewish students at VCU and for Jews in the Richmond area (for example, front and center on the program website is a series of links to "other Jewish resources" available in the Richmond area; and it appears historically local Jewish community organizations have helped sponsor and support departmental programming). This I think is somewhat common for Jewish Studies programs in cities and towns with a real but not massive Jewish population -- often, the university is the place where speakers and programs on Jewish life occur not just for students and faculty but for the whole community, and there is greater interaction between non-academic communal organizations and departmental leadership than probably is present in, say, the Physics Department. Consequently, it's fair to say that the community has at least somewhat more specific of an interest in the content of the department's programming, albeit not an interest that would override general academic freedom protections.

Let's start with some obvious (to me, anyway) cases. It would clearly not be okay to try and get VCU administrators (or, even more clearly, state officials) to cancel the talk. That's a straight up-and-down academic freedom violation -- a definite no-no. On the other hand, local Jewish organizations clearly are entitled, if they wish, to pull their sponsorship of the event -- if they don't want their names attached to this speech, that's their prerogative. Likewise, if the local JCC or synagogues wanted to offer their own programming featuring speakers with different ideological commitments than Beinart's, that would be clearly be okay.

Okay, those are the easy cases. What else?

One thing the article mentioned is a request that Beinart not speak solo but be situated as part of a panel or with another speaker to "balance" his viewpoint. As several academics quoted in the article observe, the idea that every academic speaker needs to be "balanced" with someone representing the "other side" is not a standard that is observed anywhere else in academia -- the vast majority of talks are "solo" affairs; to the extent "balance" is desired it occurs via the aggregation of all the events and discourses available to students and not measured atomistically in each event. (It's also notable here that this standard -- if taken seriously, which I'm not convinced it's meant to be -- suggests that anytime a university department invites a Zionist speaker to campus, it should be forced to pair them up with an anti-Zionist activist for "balance"). The right to invite a speaker also includes the right to decide the context in which the speaker presents, whether as a standalone lecture, as part of a panel, in a debate, or something else. I would say, then, that any effort to get VCU administrators to alter the design of the event in a manner not desired by the inviting program (e.g., forcing them to add another speaker) also would be an academic freedom violation and is out-of-bounds.

My "impermissibles" thus far have involved seeking to have university administrators (or other high-ranking officials) alter or cancel Beinart's speech. But suppose the effort was not to force a cancellation from on high, but rather to convince the person responsible for the invitation in the first place (here David Weinfeld, the chair of the program on Jewish Studies) to change his mind and retract the invitation. Is that different? My instinct is that so long as the effort solely is comprised of moral suasion (and doesn't carry any tangible or intangible threats of professional retaliation, for instance), that's in-bounds. Who to invite for a speech is an exercise of discretion; it is entirely appropriate for community members to assert that the decision-maker made the wrong call, and there is no sin in the decision-maker ultimately being persuaded that he or she did make the wrong call. 

The issue in this case is that such an effort would almost certainly be unsuccessful -- Weinfeld knew what he was doing when he invited Beinart, he certainly was not unaware of the arguments for and against him as a speaker and so the fact of communal opposition probably won't represent new information likely to change his mind. But we can imagine a different case where a bright-eyed but somewhat clueless university actor wanted to invite a prominent Jewish speaker to campus, saw Peter Beinart was one, and invited him wholly unaware of the negative reaction it would prompt from the community they thought they were serving. In such a circumstance, it's possible that a communal backlash could prompt a reassessment by the appropriate decision-maker; in such a case I'm not sure that these efforts or the result would be inappropriate. One could say this still is a case where outside pressure results in an academic talk being cancelled, but academic freedom recognizes a very strong distinction between the university dean forcing John Doe to cancel his event because of external pressure, and John Doe coming to his own conclusion that he made a mistake when scheduling a given event and changing his mind.

Another possibility involves Jewish communal organizations going to the administrators, not to cancel or even modify the event, but to encourage the university to host additional Jewish programming that takes a different view from that adopted by Beinart -- circumventing, if necessary, the Jewish Studies program which (we'll stipulate for sake of argument) is only inviting speakers from one "side". My instinct is to say this is in-bounds as well, insofar as it represents a remedy of "more speech, not enforced silence", though it's possible once I become a full-time academic I'll develop stronger feelings about university administrators stepping onto the turf of particular programs or departments in order to implement their own judgment on what is a "good" or "balanced" program on matters they don't have any especial expertise in. And of course, this proposal is very much adjacent to the "force the program to offer a balance" remedy which I said is not okay. There is a difference between a dean creating his or her own program which brings in certain speakers who would not be invited by a given professor in the relevant department and the dean forcing a department to alter its own program to match the dean's desires, and while I think that difference is an important one, I also recognize it is a thin one.

This illustrates a more fundamental problem: the lines between the permissible and impermissible, while perhaps clear enough in theory, can become very blurry in practice. If the local JCC meets up with the university president on the subject of Beinart's talk, it's probably difficult to know whether they're trying to get the talk altered (not okay) or get the university to commit to additional programming to supplement the talk (probably okay). Statements of communal discontent that do not contain explicit threats of substantive retaliation nonetheless can be read that way and may be intended to be read that way; but also can be alleged to represent such a threat even if the objectors do everything in their power to scrupulously disavow such an intent.

The fact that there are remedies available to disaffected Jewish communal organizations that do not violate academic freedom, it turns out, may be more true in concept than in reality. On the theoretical level, I feel relatively comfortable in saying it is appropriate and permissible for Jewish communal organizations to try and convince the university to host additional programming or to persuade Weinfeld he "got this one wrong" and retract his invitation, while it would be impermissible for them to try and have the university administration to outright cancel or modify Beinart's event over the objection of the man authorized to invite him. But once one leaves the level of austere theory, the permissible and impermissible often are going to look very much alike. It is, of course, easy for such groups to make demands which are clearly in no way compatible with the university as a place of academic freedom. But it is also possible for them to seek other remedies which, while nominally permissible, may well look like (by sincere and opportunistic interpreters alike) efforts to suppress academic freedom. How to navigate these complex shoals is a question I'm not sure I have an answer to.

The Nexus in the Shadow of IHRA

For over a year now, I've been part of a task force (known as "Nexus") seeking to provide greater guidance on the intersection of antisemitism and discourse about Israel. Our first major document went public this week, offering a definition of antisemitism and principles guiding when discourse about Israel is, and is not, antisemitic. It's already getting some coverage.

I'm very proud of what we in the task force put together. It was very much a long labor, but the document we produced is one that I think could be of great service in providing badly-needed guidance and support to those concerned about antisemitism and invested in the fight against it. One thing the work especially underscored for me was the challenge of a document "written by committee", which always will entail compromises and elisions that differ from what I would have written as a solo author; this means there will inevitably be particular word choices or phrasings that can be subjected to potshots as unideally put. But I've realized that's baked into the cake of writing a document that's designed to represent a group consensus; it's not going to be avoidable. It certainly gave me considerable more empathy for other contentious documents written by collectivities (such as, say, the California Ethnic Studies model curriculum).

Perhaps unsurprisingly, but to my mind unfortunately, much of the early commentary on the Nexus document places it in competition with the venerable IHRA antisemitism definition. Those who dislike IHRA were quick to cheer the Nexus document as a challenger, those who like IHRA were immediately suspicious that our goal was to kneecap IHRA. Yet I can honestly say that IHRA was not at the forefront of our minds when we began this project. To the extent the Nexus document has a relation to IHRA, I agree with Jonathan Jacoby (chair of the task force) when he described IHRA as the mishnah and Nexus as the gemara. We're providing commentary and clarity; a complement, not a replacement.

IHRA, of course, began as a working tool to aid data collectors in documenting instances of antisemitic activity in European countries. It has since been pressed into far more contentious service, not because it was designed to shoulder that burden, but because it was the only tool available. In doing so, IHRA began to take on significant symbolic weight, as support and opposition began to reflect a broader orientation towards antisemitism and its relationship with Israel. To support IHRA was to affirm that antisemitism was a serious problem and that criticism of Israel often veered into antisemitic territory. To oppose IHRA was to hold that legitimate criticism of Israel was often falsely squelched by being labeled antisemitic and that much of the discourse about antisemitism was overblown. Support for and opposition to IHRA rapidly coalesced around the symbolic dimension, with little investigation into whether IHRA-qua-IHRA actually was contributing to resolving and/or exacerbating the underlying problems.

One upshot of this symbolization of IHRA is that, despite our best efforts, it's really hard to make a contribution to the space of "defining antisemitism" without it being assessed in the shadow of IHRA. I think this is very unfortunate, because IHRA was never intended to be the last word on the subject and very much should not be viewed as the last word on the subject -- an assessment which in no way requires one to think that IHRA is some monstrous force or even is a net negative. Compare the "core" antisemitism definition in IHRA with the opening of the Nexus document. Here's IHRA:

Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.

I am not the first person to observe that this tells us virtually nothing. "A certain perception of Jews" -- well, which perception? This is almost useless as a means of declaring what is and is not antisemitism. Contrast the Nexus definition:

Antisemitism consists of anti-Jewish beliefs, attitudes, actions or systemic conditions. It includes negative beliefs and feelings about Jews, hostile behavior directed against Jews (because they are Jews), and conditions that discriminate against Jews and significantly impede their ability to participate as equals in political, religious, cultural, economic, or social life.

This is far more detailed and precise than the IHRA definition. It's not that there's no room for argument about whether a given activity, e.g., constitutes an "anti-Jewish belief". But it certainly provides more guidance than IHRA's "a certain perception". And one might notice that in important respects the Nexus definition is more expansive than IHRA's, in that we do not look only to "perceptions" of Jews but also tangible conditions that might be implemented regardless of whether the instigating actor holds any particular "perception" of the Jewish people.

For example, consider the recent decision in the EU judiciary permitting bans on Kosher slaughter. This was roundly condemned by Jewish organizations worldwide, but one would struggle mightily to label it "antisemitic" under the IHRA definition -- it doesn't fall under any of the illustrative examples, and it doesn't seem to stem from any particular "perception" of Jews. By contrast, even though the Nexus document is intentionally focused primarily on the Israel case, our definition explains why such bans could be validly labeled antisemitic -- they would "significantly impede [our] ability to participate as equals in political, religious, cultural, economic, or social life." I don't think we're betraying IHRA's spirit to make this extension, but it is a good thing for Jews that this additional gloss now exists.

The other major frame we've seen applied to the Nexus document is that it is more permissive of "anti-Israel" criticism than IHRA is. I don't know if that's necessarily the case -- I think again one could view the Nexus document as providing commentary and exposition upon IHRA's own declarations that "criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic" and that even its illustrative examples are merely cases which "could, taking into account the overall context" be antisemitic. But it certainly is the case that we are more explicit than IHRA is in labeling certain forms of anti-Israel activity (including some activity that might be objectionable on other bases) not antisemitic.

One of our guiding principles here, albeit not expressly stated, is that we didn't want Israel-only "one offs" in the understanding of antisemitism.  A given activity, practice, trope, etc., neither becomes nor ceases to be antisemitic just because it is applied against Israel. Instead, "Whether speech or conduct about Zionism and Israel is antisemitic should be based on the standards for speech or conduct that apply to antisemitic behavior in general." IHRA, for instance, has as one of its examples comparing Israel or Israeli policy to Nazism. If this is antisemitic, under the Nexus framework it should only be because comparing Jews or Jewish entities to Nazism generally is antisemitic -- including, for example, calling liberal Jews "kapos" or "Nazi collaborators". For my part, I'm okay with that extension; I think it generally (and not just in the Israel case) raises a pretty glaring antisemitic red flag to call a Jewish actor a Nazi. But ensuring that the rule is even-handed prevents opportunistic usage, and that's a good thing -- people who want to continue calling liberal Jews kapos should as a consequence be forced to sacrifice their ability to condemn Israel-Nazi comparisons as antisemitic.

A similar motivation explains our gloss on the issue of "double-standards". We agree that treating Israel differently than other nations, "using standards different than those applied to other countries," is a form of antisemitism. But we also say that the mere fact that a given group focuses more on Israel than on other countries does not suffice to prove a "double-standard." Again, this is because the latter requirement would be impossible to apply even-handedly. AIPAC, ZOA, NGO Monitor, APN, Adalah, the American Task Force on Palestine -- all of these focus on Israel more than other countries, and that's their prerogative. It is neither weird nor sinister for a Jewish or Palestinian organization to devote more attention to human rights issues in Israel compared to China or the Crimea or Zimbabwe, and nobody actually thinks otherwise. One can, I think, fairly contrast the case of AIPAC or Adalah with, say, the UNHRC -- a body which would struggle to articulate a neutral reason for focusing overwhelmingly on Israel but does so anyway. There the antisemitism objection carries significantly more force. Again, the Nexus document provides additional gloss and detail that can help fairly instantiate the IHRA rule, avoiding opportunistic deployments where the mere fact that a Palestinian organization is talking predominantly about Palestinian issues is held out as an antisemitic "double-standard".

Finally, while the nexus between Israel and antisemitism often focuses predominantly on "left" critiques, it was important for us to articulate practices on the right with relation to Israel which have subjected many Jews to antisemitic abuse or harassment. It is antisemitic, we said, to "Denigrat[e] or deny[] the Jewish identity of certain Jews because they are perceived as holding the 'wrong' position (whether too critical or too favorable) on Israel." This is something that many liberal Jews (and in particular many Jews of color) have experienced, sometimes from other Jews, often from non-Jews, and it absolutely should be viewed as a form of antisemitism. Again, this is a principle that can and should be applied even-handedly and not as an Israel-only one-off. There certainly are cases where Jews have seen their identities challenged or deemed "fake" because they're allegedly too pro-Israel, and that should be viewed as antisemitism (and/or racist) as well; likewise, there are instances where Jews are alleged to be "fake" Jews because of their "wrong" political opinions on issues that have nothing to do with Israel -- I'm fine with the extension to that context too. Non-Jews, in particular, have no business policing the identities of Jews based on their (usually wrong and inevitably blinkered) opinion about what ideology Jews "should" have. Being clear on this point helps remedy a recurrent problem in too much antisemitism discourse -- rules which have only a left-wing application. If it's wrong to subject Jews to purity tests to demonstrate their "left" enough, it's wrong to subject Jews to such tests to ensure they're not too far left.

All of this, hopefully, shows how the Nexus document can be useful in the fight against antisemitism. We did not intercede in order to kneecap IHRA, but neither do we think IHRA is so comprehensive to be the last word. We set out to provide greater detail and context in assisting persons of good faith in navigating the intersection of Israel discourse and antisemitism, and I think we've made a valuable contribution. Of course, our document shouldn't be the last word either -- but it does, I think, move the conversational ball forward.

The Knife's Edge of Radicalization

Something I've noticed recently in the Jewish social media space particularly -- though I suspect it's present elsewhere too -- is the arbitrariness of a form of radicalization-by-rejection. Here's what I mean (and I'll use the Jewish case as my example):

Often times, one sees people who start off with relatively reasonable, mainline positions, who become increasingly strident and radicalized as a result of writing something that sets off the terrible, toxic, troll-ish wing of our community. It's a feedback loop: they are attacked relentlessly, which makes them view the side that's attacking them with greater hostility, which encourages them to relate to that side even more pugnaciously, which encourages still more attacks, until we end up in a state of full-on hostility.

One place you often see this is persons who criticize racism in the Jewish community. If their post gets any attention at all, they will invariably experience a vicious, terrible pile-on by the nastiest elements of the Jewish right, who will attack them as fake Jews, as Farrakhan-esque, as anti-Zionists (this will occur even if their critique doesn't mention Israel at all). Another place one sees it is with collegiate Jewish students who attack Jewish exclusion in progressive spaces; these persons will often find themselves savagely assailed by the trolly elements of the Jewish left, accusing them of being fascists, colonizers, and Israeli stooges (again, this will be true regardless of whether the criticism says anything significant about supporting any particular Israeli policy).

In either case, once the controversy becomes recognized as the latest front in the forever-war between the terribles on the Jewish right and the terribles on the Jewish left, everyone will quickly assume their assigned places -- attacking the new "enemy" or defending the new "comrade". And since people naturally dislike being attacked and like being supported, the result is that a person who started in a perfectly normal and mainline position will often quickly find themselves radicalized in whichever direction has not been loudly comparing them to pond scum for weeks on end. This is why one ends up seeing folks go very quickly from, say, somewhat ambivalent liberal Zionist to "FROM THE RIVER TO THE SEA" in the space of maybe just a few weeks; or on the other side go from "still with her"-style Democrat to "Critical Race Theory is an existential threat to Western Civilization!" in a similar time frame. It's a function of recoiling from who hates you, and liking the people who like you. Nothing especially complicated about it.

The thing is, though, that for persons who start in relatively reasonable, mainline positions, there's a sort of arbitrariness as to which direction they go. Many of the people I have in mind here, at the proverbial T1, probably could have written a post or essay or tweet that tweaked off either side. They would be critical of racism in the Jewish community and they'd be sensitive of Jewish exclusion in campus spaces; they'd call Netanyahu a bigot and they'd say SJP had made their campus a hostile environment. Which comment sets off the landslide is, more or less, a coin flip. Any one of them could have easily gone either way, just depending on for whom they become the symbol of 20 minutes hours days of hate. But perched on the knife's edge, it takes a lot of discipline to avoid falling in one direction or the other.

All That's Old Is New Again in Jewish Politics: The Neo-Neoconservatives

Sometimes, when I feel especially glum about the state of campus politics or political debates on Israel or "antisemitism on the left", I remind myself of history. If one is familiar with the state of Jewish affairs in the 1970s and 1980s, one quickly will realize that none of what we're going through now represents new terrain. Many of the issues, aggressions, insecurities, and controversies that afflict us today were also present then. It's one of the reason why so much of the work from that era -- pieces like Evelyn Torton Beck's "The Politics of Jewish Invisibility" or Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz's "The Issue is Power" -- is so resonant today. That recurrence could be depressing, but I've always found hope in it. None of the more dire predictions of that time came to pass. Jews were not expelled en masse from the left. There was no widespread public repudiation of Israel's existence outright. There were issues, and tensions, and very real problems -- problems which are very reminiscent to the controversies facing Jews today. And as difficult as they were, these problems were worked through, and we made it through -- if not unscathed, then at least intact. As it was then, so too might it be now.

Today, I found myself wondering if we're seeing another replication of a moment in Jewish history: the (re-)rise of the Jewish neoconservative. Tell me if this sounds familiar: The "first wave" of neoconservatives -- folks like Irving Kristol, Nathan Glazer, and Norman Podhoretz -- tended to be disaffected liberals or even leftists who starting in the 1960s felt as if the culture currents of the left had grown too extreme. Their particular hobby horse issues were typically (a) foreign policy and (b) "identity" issues (often including campus radicalism). These were persons who might agree that America had done wrong, but were emphatic that the Soviet Union was an evil empire doing worse and that the US must be willing to take any and all steps to rollback communism; they wouldn't defend (at least by the 70s) segregation outright, but presented affirmative action and identity politics as equally wrong as violations of a "colorblind" principle; they'd accept Martin Luther King Jr. (now that he was dead), but saw the current generation of civil rights leaders as too radical. Among Jews, in particular, this often intersected with significant anxiety over how the left was turning against Israel and lumped Jews in with White European oppressors (a move which they linked up to the rise of Third Worldism and identity politics more generally). Some of their concerns were legitimate; some were prototypical examples of fragility or contrarianism. And there was also a feedback loop -- as they grew more strident in critiquing the left, the left grew more hostile to them, which fed into their feelings of alienation (a feeling itself strengthened by the fact that they had viewed themselves as "of the left"), which prompted even more strident critiques. Ever onward.

At the end of the day, some neoconservatives remained Democrats, others became leading Republicans. In general, they still styled themselves as social moderates (they weren't going to be found marching against abortion clinics, for example), but they were happy to ally with more "paleo-" elements in the conservative coalition insofar as they would stand against the terrors of out-of-control leftism. And today, many (though not all) of the surviving members of the older wave of Jewish neoconservatives have drifted just a bit back towards the left. They've been markedly overrepresented in the "Never Trump" clique, for instance (Bill Kristol is an obvious example here) -- part of a broader recoiling from the recoiling. Some of the old and long-dormant "liberal" views re-emerged as the growing extremism of contemporary conservativism, and in particular the utter impossibility of reconciling it with anything approaching a defense of classically liberal and democratic values, became impossible to deny.

And yet even as the original cohort of Jewish neoconservatives is becoming more liberal, I feel like I'm seeing the rise of a parallel version of neoconservatism among (some) younger Jews. Once again, it comes from people that would characterize their roots as basically liberal but who are recoiling from bad experiences they've had precisely as liberals in predominantly progressive spaces (campuses, political activism, and so on). Once again, the particular issues that seem to most motivate them are what they see as extremism tied to issues of identity and campus politics (now typically styled as "wokeness" or "Critical Race Theory"). Once again, this anxiety is significantly bound up in claims about how Israel and Zionism are treated in these spaces. Once again, their "personal" politics typically do not seem to be swinging all the way over to the right, but they are increasingly willing to ally and align with more explicitly right-wing actors in the face of a perceived common enemy and they will do so claiming it is an extension of a fight for "traditional" liberal values (around free speech, individualism, or what have you), even when their putative allies make no bones about running roughshod over all of these. Meanwhile, their increasingly loud criticisms of left excesses (some fair and some not) prompt increasingly vocal pushback by the left, furthering the feeling of rejection, setting up its own vicious cycle. If they do end up leaving the Democratic Party, they will be very emphatic in asserting that "the Democratic Party left me."

The young neo-neoconservatives tend to be vocal, and they tend to capture attention. After all, they make for a nice man bites dog story, and they really are tapping into some genuine and reasonable Jewish anxieties -- this was true of the original wave and it's true today. It's also the case that their public salience is far in excess of their numbers -- the vast majority of Jews in the 1970s and 80s did not become conservatives (neo- or otherwise), and the vast majority of Jews today likewise are not publicly or privately wrestling with their political affiliation. It's entirely possible -- maybe likely -- that they will retain a position of prominence even as (because?) they more explicitly align with the right; it's also likely that they will not carry the majority of the Jewish community with them.

So even as there is a part of me that worries -- is this the future of our community -- another part of me looks to history and is reassured. The neo-neoconservatives will be loud, and they'll be influential, but if history is any guide they will not be the vanguard of the new Jewish politics in the 21st century. They are simply what is old, made new again.

Congress Passes COVID Relief Bill Without Any GOP Support

We should be clear -- this was a bipartisan bill, in the sense that Americans of both parties backed its content. It passed on a party line vote because the GOP is relentlessly partisan and will never back any significant Democratic Party initiative no matter how it is framed or how much effort is put into negotiation. Yes, that includes Moderate Republican (tm) Susan Collins. And it's a very, very good thing that Democrats learned this lesson from the Obama years, and didn't waste time in a futile effort to gain meaningless Republican support. If Republicans had actual good ideas for the relief bill (as opposed to the "idea" of giving less help to fewer people), they were welcome to say so. In the meantime, Democrats should own all the tremendously popular provisions of this law straight through the midterms.

The other thing I want to say is that while yes, the random bites Joe Manchin decided to take out of the final bill were frustrating, stupid, and gratuitous, they also don't change the fact that the final bill is one of the most strikingly progressive pieces of stimulus legislation ever to pass through Congress. That's testament to a serious shift in the Democratic Party coalition which is worth celebrating, and it's also a good illustration that at the end of the day, the difference between Biden vs. Harris vs. Warren vs. Sanders as President pales in comparison to the difference between Ossoff and Warnock vs. Perdue and Loeffler as Georgia's Senators.

Haley's "Courageous" Break With Trump Ends After Less Than One Month

When it came out that Nikki Haley was "breaking" with Trump, publicly saying "we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again," I observed that this seeming profile in courage was anything but for a host of reasons. Chief among them: Haley could and would always come groveling back to Trump if it seemed like he was holding onto his position as a GOP power broker. 

Still, even I thought she'd take more than a month to complete the journey:

Former United States Ambassador the the United Nations Nikki Haley on Monday praised former President Trump over his speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) the day before, after sharply criticizing him last month for his rhetoric and actions ahead of the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol.

“Strong speech by President Trump about the winning policies of his administration and what the party needs to unite behind moving forward. The liberal media wants a GOP civil war. Not gonna happen,” Haley wrote on Twitter.

What an utter sleazeball. 

The Ring Announcer's Dilemma

The below feels like one of those math puzzles, though I don't actually know enough about math puzzles to know if it really is one. It is something I've genuinely noticed and wondered about when watching boxing.

In boxing, there are functionally six types of decisions: A unanimous decision, a split decision, a majority decision, as well as a unanimous draw, a split draw, and a majority draw.

• In a unanimous decision, all three judges agree in scoring the bout in favor of one fighter.
• In a split decision, two judges score the bout in favor of one fighter, while the third scores it favor of the other.
• In a majority decision, two judges score the bout in favor of one fighter, while the third scores it draw.
• In a unanimous draw, all three judges score the bout a draw.
• In a split draw, one judge votes for fighter A, one for fighter B, and the third scores it a draw.
• In a majority draw, one judge votes for one fighter, but the other two judges score it a draw.

When a ring announcer gets set to tell the audience the judges' decision, there are several pieces of information he needs to communicate. By the end of his announcement, the audience should know how each judge scored the fight, and for whom, and of course they need to know the actual result of the fight (who won, or that it was a draw). In general, however, he can announce the three judges' decision in any order he likes. Being a good performer, the announcer would like there to be as much suspense as possible. In practice that means he wants to the last piece of information he reveals to be the result.

The dilemma is as follows: how, if it all, can an announcer accomplish that goal in the case of a majority draw?

Start with a unanimous decision. A bad announcer might deliver the decision this way:

"Judge A had the bout 77-75 for Doe, Judge B had the bout 78-75 for Doe, and Judge C had the bout 78-74 for the winner, John Doe!"

Notice how once the crowd knows both A and B voted for Doe, they know the result even before it is announced. John Doe has at least a majority of the judges, so he won. In order to achieve the result of not tipping off the audience until the very end, a better announcement might go as follows:

"Judge A had the bout 77-75, Judge B had the bout 78-75, and Judge C had the bout 78-74, all for the winner, by unanimous decision, John Doe!"

Notice how by the end everyone knows how each judge voted, and for whom, but the last piece of information they got was the result. Until "John Doe" was said, the crowd didn't know the result of the match.

One can do this for most types of decision. A split decision can be announced like this:

Judge A had the bout 77-75 for Doe. Judge B had the bout 77-75 for Smith. And Judge C had the fight 77-75 for the winner, by split decision, John Doe!"

This works so long as the announcer is permitted to choose what order he delivers the judges' verdicts (i.e., he can make sure the one card for Smith is announced either first or second).

Here's a split draw:

Judge A had the bout 77-75 for Doe. Judge B had the bout 77-75 for Smith. And Judge C had the fight 76-76 -- this fight is a draw!

Here's a unanimous draw: 

All three judges scored the fight the same, 76-76 -- this bout is a draw!

And here's a majority decision:

Judge A scored the bout 76-76. Overruled by Judge B, who scored the bout 77-75, and Judge C, who scored the bout 78-74, for the winner, by majority decision, John Doe!

The majority decision is the toughest one so far -- the alert listener knows once the announcer says the word "overruled" that a majority decision is coming*, but still doesn't know who won.

But what of a majority draw? Consider the following:

Judge A scores the fight 77-75 for Doe. Overruled by judges B and C, who each score the bout even -- this fight is a majority draw!

Here one knows the result of the fight -- that it's a majority draw -- the moment the announcer says "overruled". Why? Well, there are only two ways that A's score for Doe could be overruled -- either B and C voted for Doe's opponent, or they voted for a draw. If it was the former, though, this would be a terrible way to announce it, as the audience would know who won as soon as just one of Judge B or C's card was announced for the other fighter. There'd be no suspense. Given that, we all know that the card was overruled by two judges voting for a draw even before we actually hear it.

What happens if you announce the cards in a different order?

Judge B and C score the fight 76-76, a draw, overruling Judge A, who scored the fight 77-75 Doe.

Nope -- that gives away the result before we ever hear Judge A's card. Similar problems emerge if you try to do something like going B (draw), A (Doe), C (draw) -- once you've revealed that B voted draw and A voted for Doe, then you know that if anyone won it has to be Doe (by majority decision), which means that if Doe did win you'd know as soon as the announcer gave a non-draw score even before they told you who the judge voted for -- and knowing that the announcer wouldn't do that, you know that C's score is going to be a draw and that the fight will be a majority draw. 

*Deep breath*

So ... is there a resolution to this? Is there a way for a ring announcer to announce a majority draw without sapping it of all the drama? I don't know. And I don't know if this "dilemma" reveals anything interesting. But I have noticed it, and haven't been able to solve it (if it can be solved).

* How does he know? Because Judge A's decision to score the fight a draw could only be "overruled" if the two other judges did not have it a draw and did vote for the same person to win. If one or both scored it a draw, then the fight would be either a majority or unanimous draw. And if they didn't score the fight even but voted for different fighters to win, then the result would be a split draw.

The Novice Dissident Minority

One of my recent areas of scholarship is the case of the "dissident minority", a member of a minority group who dissents from some important consensus position of the larger group (I use Jewish anti-Zionists and Black conservatives as my keynote examples). In the cases I had in mind, the dissidents are, for lack of a better word, "used" to being dissenters. It's their longstanding position within their larger group. They may be upset by that, they may have found ways to accommodate that, but it's normal for them.

Recently, though, I've been thinking about people for whom this is not true -- that is, people who are not typically in a dissident posture vis-a-vis the larger group, but unexpectedly find themselves there on a particular issue. The debate over the current draft of the California Ethnic Studies curriculum gives a decent example. The consensus of the Jewish community in California is favorable towards the current draft (which was the product of a lot of hard work to undo severely problematic elements in the first draft) -- while there always is room for improvement, and no work written by committee will be perfect, in general the sense is that the third draft is a substantial "win" for the Jewish community. But as on any issue, of course, this is not a unanimous view. There are dissenters who oppose even the current draft and are mobilizing in opposition to it.

For whatever reason, though, on this issue in particular I've seen several actors who are used to thinking of themselves as very much representative, mainstream voices within the Jewish community who have taken up this dissident stance. Such persons occupy an interesting posture. I can imagine it is quite disorienting and even alienating to find oneself "out of sync" with a community that one typically feels relatively well-aligned with. Unfortunately, sometimes that means the persons in that position just fall into one of denial, and try to obscure the obvious fact that they are in a dissident posture. Although they would deride "not all Jews" type language when it comes from groups like JVP or ZOA, once they're in the minority position they may find that formulation increasingly attractive. Perhaps, they think, it is qualitatively different that there are dissenting views not just on the fringes but among (erstwhile) "mainstream" voices. Maybe that does mark out some sort of difference. I'd have to think more on that. But my instinct is that this is primarily a cover to avoid the anxious feeling of alienation where one is lined up against one's usual allies in one's own community.

For now, though, my bottom line in this case is the same as it is in the "Dissident Minorities" case generally. The dissident minorities are entitled to take their dissident position -- this is true regardless of whether they are old dissenting hands or complete novices at the practice. What they cannot do is offer themselves out as a substitute for engagement with the larger group. Opponents of the current draft of the California Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum are entitled to make their case as best they can, with all the vigor they can muster. But what they cannot do is suggest they represent an alternative to engaging with the bulk of the California Jewish community which has adopted a more favorable stance.

N(R)IMBY

There's a common debate that pops up every time a celebrity or some other figure runs into a scandal, one that's serious enough to threaten their career, but not serious enough to put them in prison. A lot of #MeToo cases fall into this category, though this isn't the only case, but it works as one to keep in mind (think Louis C.K.). At some point, after apologizing (whether sincerely or opportunistically) and laying low for awhile, they'll try to restart their profession. Once this happens, the pattern is almost rote:

1. Some group of people will condemn the person for trying to restart his career ("You won't believe who's attempting a comeback!"), and/or condemn the venue for hosting him.
2. A different group of people will defend the celebrity, asking whether or not his "whole life should be ruined" and whether he should be prevented from making a living in perpetuity.
3. The first group of people will retort that not having access to some celebrity spaces is hardly the same as having one's life ruined nor is it a complete bar on any money-making endeavor. Lots of people, I'm told, live perfectly comfortable and money-earning lives without getting standup comedy specials or starring movie roles. Meanwhile, the person's re-entry into the professional space also will have the effect of rendering it unsafe and/or uncomfortable for members of the group the celebrity had previously victimized.

I think there's reasonable purchase in that third move. However, it does carry with it an implicit promise -- that there is some space where the erstwhile celebrity could enter into which would be legitimate (as a means of making money, continuing with their life, etc.). When one says "'not here' is not the same thing as 'life-ruining'", there is tacit "try over there." And that raises the question: where is the "there" that is okay?

Let's take Louis C.K.. Suppose in the wake of his scandal he takes a random, normal-person job -- I don't know, he's working at a call center. Being a former celebrity, he's quickly recognized. And some of the employees are uncomfortable with him around, knowing what he had done to people like them. What happens if they complain, and say "we don't want Louis C.K. in our office?"

The implicit promise in position #3 requires that, for at least some non-theoretical set of cases, that complaint has to be turned aside; notwithstanding that part of the force of position #3 is precisely that Louis C.K.'s presence in a given space exacts costs upon the women already occupying it (and that applies with similar, if not identical, force, if he's working at a call center compared to a club). Given that, do we have confidence that the advocates of position #3 will be able to find circumstances where they say "no, we do not support hounding this person out of this space -- they may not be allowed to redeem themselves in the celebrity sphere, but this place is okay."

It seems we have a classic NIMBY problem, or perhaps a N(R)IMBY problem (No Redemption in My Back Yard). Most of us probably are fine in concept that there exist some space where Louis C.K. goes off to live his life, perhaps not as a celebrity, but not in a state of utter banishment either. But none of us want it to be in our backyard. Redemption is a social good, we agree, but it shouldn't occur here but ... elsewhere -- an objection that will attach to virtually all "heres" with nary a suggestion of viable "elsewheres". Ironically, the most likely "elsewhere" that will be stuck with him over their own objection is an elsewhere populated by people who largely lack social power and influence. Indeed, to some extent, this is a feature of the "he can live his life, but not as a celebrity" account -- it's fine for him to seek redemption, but it should occur among the normies.

This is a problem I've puzzled over, and I don't have a really good solution to it. It's no answer to say that the person should do the work of repentance and redemption before they can make a claim to "live their life" in any space -- the work of repentance and redemption occurs in occupied space; it is impossible to do it from a place of social banishment. And if you're accusing me of a strawman -- nobody is arguing for outright "social banishment" -- then my goal here is to call the bluff a little bit and ask "okay, so where is good?" Is it low-level performances in their field? Interviews with journalists about their misconduct? Working at charities? Can we honestly say that in any of these cases, that we haven't seen at least some pushback -- "they shouldn't be here"? And again, it's not that I lack sympathy for what's motivating that pushback. But I am not sure how far it should go, and how far it can limit itself in going.

Trump's "Liberal"* Eighth Circuit Appointees

As many of you know, I did my clerkship on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, for the late Judge Diana E. Murphy. It was a fantastic experience. It was also an eye-opening experience, not least because the Eighth Circuit is by far the most conservative court in the country. How conservative is it? I think there's a plausible case to be made that Donald Trump's appointees to the court were to the left of the median active judge on the circuit at the start of his administration.

The active judges at the start of Trump's administration, ordered from most liberal to most conservative (this is my somewhat arbitrary ranking), were:

Kelly, Smith, Shepherd, Wollman, Benton, Loken, Riley, Colloton, Gruender

The ideologically median judge would be Duane Benton. I've italicized the two judges that went senior during Trump's term; he also got two more appointments from judges (Bye and Murphy) who went senior at the tail end of the Obama administration but whose seats were still empty at the start of Trump's term.

Now let's order the current judges (italicizing Trump's appointees):

Kelly, Smith, Grasz, Shepherd, Kobes, Erickson, Benton, Loken, Straus, Colloton, Gruender

Three of four appointees are to Benton's left; the new median is Judge Ralph Erickson. Now, again, there's some amount of arbitrariness to this; I wouldn't read too much into the precise order (e.g., if one flipped Kobes and Erickson I'd hardly have any basis for objecting). Moreover, judges of course can be "liberal" on some dimensions but not on others (Smith, for example, is exceptionally conservative on issues like abortion but is more liberal on issues of discrimination and qualified immunity). And to be clear -- none of these judges (excepting Kelly, the sole Democratic appointee) are liberal under any objective standard. 

But even with all those caveats, there's a decent case to be made that the Eighth Circuit was so outrageously rightward slanted that Trump actually managed to slightly shift the court to the left. That's amazing.

What Happens When There is No Contraception

The New York Times has a harrowing story about women in Venezuela who cannot access contraception. A raging economic recession has made condoms, IUDs, and other birth control products prohibitively expensive for many poorer women; at the same time, the cost of raising a family has also spiraled out of control. Many women have resorted to shady back alley abortion attempts (it is still illegal in the country), but unsurprisingly these are exceptionally dangerous.

If you're a conservative, maybe the fact that it's Venezuela and you can nyah-nyah about it since Chavez is of course AOC's role model for Americana will make the story resonate more. But let's be clear -- America is not as far off from this as we'd imagine ourselves to be. The legality of abortion is on the very brink, and cases like Hobby Lobby threaten contraceptive access as well -- again, especially for poorer women. It may be that in a few years, the main difference between America and Venezuela is that we have proportionally fewer women in the sort of abject poverty that is comparable to that found in the South American country -- but for those who do find themselves in that situation, this story could easily become a U.S. story as well.

Where Am "I"?

This post has no political content whatsoever. It is a random, rather inane question I was pondering last night.

When I think of where "I", am, spatially speaking, the answer is "my brain". That is the seat of my consciousness, it is the physical location I identify as being occupied by the core of my being. When I think, the spot where I feel like the thoughts come from is my head. Which makes sense, since my brain is where I do all my thinking.

But it also so happens that my brain is right behind my eyes. If we imagine our eyes as the holes in our body that we peer through to see the world, it makes sense that we'd conceptualize ourselves as existing right behind them. So maybe that's why that particular spot is the one we associate as being where "we" are.

So here's the question: If our eyes were in our chest, would we still view ourselves as centered around our brain? Or would it move to our chest? Or flip it: if our eyes were still in our head, but our brain was in our chest, would we still identify our thoughts as coming from our head or from our chest? (Or perhaps there'd be a more fundamental divergence between where we feel our thoughts "exist" -- our chest -- versus where the broader core of the "I" is -- our head).

Again, no big moral to this question. Just a random thought that grabbed my attention last night in lieu of sleeping.

What To Make of Haley's "Break" With Trump?

The JTA's headline says it all: "Nikki Haley broke with Trump. It could make her a Jewish GOP favorite in 2024."

Well, perhaps not all. "Broke" is a very friendly way of putting it; I might go with "lickspittle stops licking." But that's editorializing.

In any event, what do we make of this decision by Haley?

Let's start with the Jewish angle, since that's how JTA frames it. I do think that Haley is well-positioned to be the Jewish GOP favorite in 2024, since she's followed a similar trajectory as most GOP Jews with regard to Trump. Start by loudly disavowing him, shift to "well, but look at what he does for Israel," crest at treating him like their God. Now that we're falling off that peak, I suspect they'll settle back into the groove of "sure he wasn't perfect, but Israel!", and Haley, viewed as the human instantiation of Trump's Israel advocacy, is well positioned to take advantage of that. The incongruity of going from genuflecting at Trump's magnificence to "breaking" with him will be easily overlooked, since much of the Jewish GOP will be doing the same contortion.

But what about Haley's 2024 prospects more generally? Certainly, there's risk -- as the last few weeks have shown, the GOP is still very much Trump's party. Nonetheless, I think this is a savvy move. Simply put: Haley wants to be President in 2024. That won't happen if Trump is strong enough in the GOP to win the Republican nomination. So Haley might as well act as if he won't be -- if he is strong, her support for him will be moot, and if he's weak, she has the advantage of presenting a clean ("clean") break.

Moreover, Haley doesn't currently hold elected office, so she doesn't have to worry about a primary backlash or other ways of the Trumpist base directly humiliating her. And even if Trump does hold his position, he's perhaps surprisingly tolerant of welcoming former adversaries back into his orbit if they grovel hard enough (see Graham, Lindsey). Haley may be saying that "we shouldn’t have followed him, and we shouldn’t have listened to him. And we can’t let that ever happen again," but I guarantee that if Trump remains the prime 2024 GOP power figure, Nikki Haley will absolutely be eager to do it all over again. And fortunately for her, that puts her in the same position as 95% of the GOP.

Well played, Haley. Well played.

How To Meet With the Jewish Community

Contrast two JTA stories of Republican congresspersons who had recently antagonized, or at least raised the eyebrows of, the Jewish community.

The first is Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R-NC), whose lowlights include a slightly-too-excited trip to see Hitler's bunker, appropriation of a poem about the Holocaust, a stated desire to convert Jews to Christianity, and, of course, inciting an insurrection against American democracy. The story is titled "Following a string of controversies, Madison Cawthorn meets with his Jewish constituents", and details the variety of Jewish community members whom he met with, including a local synagogue director,  an area pulpit rabbi, a Jewish educator, the executive director of a Jewish community center and a Jewish conservative activist. A diverse and seemingly plausibly representative bunch. I'm not saying that I think the meeting was or wasn't productive, or that it makes Cawthorn an ally of the Jews. But if you're going to reach out to the Jewish community after a controversy or scandal, this seems roughly like the way to do it.

Compare that with our second contestant, Rep. Mary Miller (R-IL), who gained notoriety for saying "Hitler was right on one thing" just before the Capitol insurrection. The title of this story is "Congresswoman who said ‘Hitler was right on one thing’ meets with rabbis", and my assumption on reading that headline was that she was meeting with local rabbis from synagogues in her district. But I was mistaken: the meeting was actually with representatives from the "Coalition for Jewish Values", a fringe right-wing group that has long carried water for the GOP. They had no particular connection to her district or the Jews who lived within it; the pull quote they offered as an apologetic for Rep. Miller came from a Rabbi residing in Florida.

This is most certainly not how one "meets with the Jewish community." It is the right-wing equivalent of a Democratic politico addressing concerns of antisemitism via a meeting with JVP. In either case, the clear ambition is not to actually hear the perspective of the Jews one represents, but rather to find some Jews who already agree with you and will offer themselves as shields against the communal majority. I have written at length as to why this sort of tokenizing move is an ethical no-no -- for both the tokenizer and the tokenized -- and I reiterate it here. Nobody should be fooled by what Rep. Miller is trying to pull here (and I wish the JTA would update their headline so that it doesn't have the potential to mislead).

(And, by the same token, kudos to Rep. Cawthorn for doing it right. The tokenization move is too easy and one sees it too often, and so while I don't want to give too much praise for doing the bare minimum, I do feel compelled to give at least a tip of the cap to him for avoiding the easiest dodge available).

What are the GOP's COVID Relief Ideas?

We keep on hearing complaints from Republicans about how the COVID relief bill needs to be "bipartisan". For my part, I'm all in favor of bipartisanship. I welcome any and all Republicans to vote for the COVID relief bill that Democrats bring to the floor.

But in all seriousness, I have no intrinsic objection to incorporating Republican ideas into the COVID relief bill. The problem is I don't know what ideas Republicans have. So far, their main ask has been to request that the bill do less to help fewer people. That's not an idea, that's a contraction of the Democrats' idea. Does the GOP have any positive suggestions for things that could improve the bill?

The one actual policy idea I recall Republicans proposing in the past is tort immunity for businesses that reopen during the pandemic. That's an idea. It's a profoundly terrible idea, and Democrats absolutely should not take them up on it, but it is at least an idea -- it is not just the negation of a Democratic idea.

Do they have any others? Preferably, ones better than "businesses should be allowed to murder their employees with impunity"? Or is the "party of ideas" stuck at preferring more misery over less?

Watching the Mainstream Jewish Community Stand Up to Lies About Ethnic Studies

When I saw Tablet Magazine had published a rapidly-going-viral article on the California Ethnic Studies curriculum, I felt a despairing sense of deja vu. I had already seen some other hit jobs on the curriculum floating around the Jewish media, and I knew that many of the claims undergirding the attacks were misleading if not false. Yet I assumed we were in for another scenario where the bad faith right-wing outrage machine, capitalizing on legitimate Jewish fears but also stretching way beyond them, would entirely drive the conversation about the curriculum and lead to unnecessary and damaging friction that would entirely blow up the hard work so many in the Jewish community had put in to ensure that Ethnic Studies fairly represented Jews.

You see, in the past when I'd found myself in predicting one of these trainwrecks from afar, I'd contact someone in the establishment Jewish community and plead with them to fire back. Don't let the bad faith actors occupy the field, don't let them control the narrative, don't let them poison the discourse without challenge. And over and over again, the response I got from the folks I talked to was "we don't want to give them any oxygen." The standard tactic in the face of these conservative narratives was to adopt an above-it-all posture of silence. It purported to be a stance of dignity -- not deigning to respond to such obvious falsehoods. In reality, it was an ostrich defense -- hoping that if they buried their heads in the sand, the problem would go away on its own.

And so when I sent out my now ritual missives on this issue; pleading with a leader of one of the organizations to push back against the Tablet narrative racing around the internet, I didn't expect much. And I wasn't surprised when the first response I got back was an instinct to just let it lie. The person I spoke with was worried that more attention might spark still greater backlash, threatening the incredible advances they had already made. 

I argued that silence was more likely to see those advances disappear -- to the extent they were added in deference to the Jewish community, if the perception is that the Jewish community is still unhappy, that doesn't exactly assist the credibility of those Jewish organizations who had been their advocates. More broadly, the folks in the California education system who had made these changes needed to know that the reward for working with concerned Jewish organizations wouldn't be to be left high and dry as soon as there was pushback. The last lesson we want someone to draw is that it's useless to try and assuage Jewish communal concerns because even if you do work with prominent community members you'll still come in for attacks and your erstwhile partners won't have your back.

And wouldn't you know it -- she listened. And others in the Jewish community seemed to have listened to.

It has been striking to see over the past week just how decisively the mainstream Jewish community has rallied against attacks from the communal right on the Ethnic Studies curriculum. Tye Gregory of the San Francisco JCRC had an early editorial out defending the latest draft. It was swiftly followed by columns by Sarah Levin of JIMENA, Hen Mazzig, and JPAC, all blasting the "misinformation" and "misrepresentations" being promulgated about the curriculum. A huge coalition of Jewish establishment heavyweights -- the ADL, AJC, Holocaust Museum, even StandWithUs -- released a united statement urging support for the Ethnic Studies curriculum and condemning bad faith attacks.

I haven't seen anything like it. And it's made a huge difference. The Tablet article's author has been thrown on the defensive, with a weak authors' note appended to the piece that does less to address the substantive criticisms than it does make evident just how effective the pushback has been. In the space of a few days, the article has gone from "the story" in the Jewish press (per Bari Weiss) to almost uniformly discredited. It seems obvious to me that the folks who had been pressing the histrionics about the Ethnic Studies have been taken a bit aback. And why shouldn't they? They're use to peddling this sort of nonsense without any resistance. This was new for them.

I hope it is the start of a trend. I hope it is the start of a more muscular Jewish center, one that knows that it cannot make the problem of right-wing zealots go away just by wishing it so. We'll see if the lesson takes. But boy, has it been nice to see our side throw some elbows of our own for a change.

Why Is Tablet Digging In?

The post I wrote the other day, debunking some claims in a widely-shared Tablet Magazine article about the latest draft of California's Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum, went pretty viral. Several readers were surprised that Tablet and the author have completely dug in their heels. They haven't admitted any wrongdoing, are defending the piece to the hilt, and have not even retracted the most obvious falsehood: the allegation that there is an antisemitic quote contained in the curriculum that is not, in fact, present. Their efforts at defense have gotten increasingly ludicrous, turning off even some readers who were broadly skeptical of Ethnic Studies in general but didn't support flatly lying about the curricular content. Why wouldn't they just confess error on that issue and move forward?

I admit I was a bit surprised too, and when someone asked me why Tablet was digging in I leveled two hypotheses. The first was professional vanity. It's hard for anybody to admit a mistake, and it's easier to go into denial mode and kick up a lot of dust. The second was that the article was so thin with respect to problems with the current curricular draft that if they conceded error on this quote, they really were left with virtually nothing. The entire edifice collapses without it, so they were forced to defend it lest they abandon the article entirely.

Both of those hypotheses I think remain plausible. But on reflection, I think there's a third possibility, and it relates to "cancel culture". In quotes, because I'm not referring to any actual cancellation, but rather the idea of "cancel culture", political correctness, and other such concepts that provoke so much ire in segments of the right-leaning media (Jewish media very much included). Persons who have drank of these waters believe we are overwhelmed with attempts at censorship, sugar-coating, and kowtowing to online gangs. For such persons, then, there is no greater betrayal, no greater cowardice, than acceding to the demand for a retraction. It doesn't really even matter if the claim under attack was justified or not; it ceases to be about defending the claim on its merits. The "principle", such as it is, is to stand up to the mob. Anyone who fails to do that is weak.

I started thinking about this when I called on Bari Weiss -- surely one of the doyens of this approach -- to retract the allegations she had made regarding the Ethnic Studies course that, it turns out, were objectively false. Weiss had just written a column where she said that "Being popular is not essential ... Telling the truth is essential." The truest test of character, she continued, is whether someone is "willing to tell the truth even if it hurts their own side." This would be a good place, I thought, for Weiss to practice what she preaches. To tell her readers that the claims about the Ethnic Studies curriculum she had amplified were false would not be popular with the readership she cultivated. But popularity isn't essential. Truth is. Or so she said.

Alas, Weiss has not seen fit to tell her readers the truth. But the issue about it being "unpopular", I think, is one that goes beyond an uncomfortable truth. If Tablet retracted the article, or even if they publicly admitted that there were flaws in it that shouldn't have been published, they would face a different sort of backlash from readers who thought they had prostrated themselves before the politically correct mob. It wouldn't matter that the claims in question fail basic journalistic standards. The fact that there was so much outrage (even justified outrage) on its own makes it imperative that Tablet stand its ground.

We cannot disconnect this from the sense of grievance which inspired some, albeit not all, of the popularity of the initial article. There is a segment of the Jewish community (and other communities) which views Ethnic Studies as so much PC claptrap, a sop to loud and angry minorities who want to silence anything and everything that doesn't present America as a bigoted hell-hole. They read the Tablet article and understood this curriculum as reflecting the ambitions of this cohort, they view the critiques of the article as Tablet being besieged by this cohort, and if the article was retracted they'd view Tablet as having been captured by this cohort. Ironically, Tablet's credibility with its readership (or at least large chunks of it), depends on them not correcting even obvious mistakes. Many of the folks who couldn't care less about the realities of the California Ethnic Studies Model Curriculum (the author of the article now forthrightly admits that it doesn't matter what's in the curriculum; she thinks it's a poisonous idea no matter what it teaches) would never forgive Tablet if seemed to be giving in to "the left" (whatever that means).

Telling the truth does indeed, take courage. But telling this particular kind of truth -- that you made a mistake, that you have to retract -- perhaps takes even more courage than normal. And that's especially so when you're part of a social current which values above all else standing firm in the face of challenge.

It takes real backbone, and real commitment to the internal norms of journalistic integrity, to tell the truth in that case. I hope that Tablet can one day find those virtues in itself.

Republican Rep. Wants Us To Know She'll "Never Back Down" from her Antisemitic Conspiracy Theories

Republican House Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene responds to Jews calling her out for antisemitism in the classic Republican fashion: telling us to get bent.

“I will never back down,” Greene said in a defiant statement Friday afternoon, one day after revelations of one of her conspiracy theory-filled Facebook posts from 2018 thrust the term “Jewish space lasers” into public discourse.

In the post, the freshman congresswoman from Georgia theorized that the Rothschild family was involved in starting California wildfires using lasers from space. Invoking conspiratorial control by the Rothschild baking family over world events is a centuries-old anti-Semitic stereotype, and it is also a theme in the pro-Trump QAnon conspiracy theory that Greene has promoted.

[...]

On Friday afternoon, Greene signaled — in a statement titled “A Message to the Mob” — that she felt emboldened by the criticism.

“Every attack, every lie, every smear strengthens my base of support at home and across the country because people know the truth and are fed up with the lies,” the statement said. “For me, it’s people over politicians. It’s people over Big Money PACs. It’s people over powerful elite corporations and the Silicon Valley cartel who are trying to cancel all of us.”

She added, “I will never back down. I will never give up. Because I am one of you. And I will always represent you.”

But don't worry: accountability is coming!

Republican leaders this week appointed her to the House’s education committee.

Joy.