Air America co-founder Sheldon Drobny has been posting on HuffPo (natch) and his latest entry contains a most amazing argument.
My brother warned me that the liberal blogs were becoming very anti-Israel and some were so violently critical of Israel that there was a tone of anti-Semitism in that criticism. Since I generally do not read the blogs, I was surprised that liberals and progressives would treat the Israel/Palestine issue in such a shortsighted approach. Most objective people understand that it takes two to make an argument and that an informed group would understand that the Israel/Palestine problem has historical roots where plenty of blame can be shared. And my experience with liberals and progressives is that they view the world in shades of gray as compared to the right wing black and white approach.
But, to my surprise, I got 67 comments from my last post that were mostly hostile to me and the ones that supported my analysis. Many of the other posts I had made got criticism from clearly right wing readers. The difference I observed with this subject had brought out what I thought was unlike my experiences with thoughtful progressives who could disagree rationally with different points of view.
…
I came to the conclusion that the hostile comments about Israel on these liberal blogs are not coming from true liberals. Most of the anti-Semitism comes from racism and most of the racism I have experienced has come from the far right, not the left. And history shows that the Christo-fascist policies of the right have been responsible for historical anti-Judaism.
…
So my conclusion is that the bloggers who violently hate Israel and see it in black and white terms are not really liberals. They may even be anti-Semites, but they are not representative of the liberal community that was so active in achieving racial and ethnic equality. It is a contradiction for a true liberal to be an anti-Semite. Furthermore, I would not put it past the right wing to flood the liberal blogs with hateful criticisms of Israel to advance a perception that liberals are anti-Israel or anti-Semitic. And I see Karl Rove’s fingerprints all over this.
So the argument runs thus:
1) Some liberal bloggers are exhibiting anti-Semitism.
2) Liberals are not anti-Semitic
3) Only conservatives are anti-Semitic
4) Therefore, the bloggers in premise 1 are not really liberal, they are conservative.
Gosh, that’s convenient for liberals. I can play this game too, though. You see… Drobny, despite his claims to the contrary, is actually a conservative. Wonder how? As he stated liberals “view the world in shades of gray as compared to the right wing black and white approach.” Drobny has just said, though, that liberals are by definition not anti-Semitic while conservatives are, at least inductively, anti-Semitic and racist generally. That’s a black and white distinction while allowing for anti-Semitic liberals would have been a shade of gray. Since he views this in terms of black and white, Drobny is, by his own definition, a conservative. I wonder if he realizes it?
Drobny’s argument is really quite amazing and simply runs away from the rampant anti-Jewish tenor on many lefty blogs. When faced with the evidence of this phenomenon, Drobny simply disavows the possibility of such a thing and then, even more amazingly, accuses evil genius Karl Rove of intentionally making the left look bad by planting the anti-Semitism. Bizarre conspiracy theories are always a nice way to clear up that unpleasant cognitive dissonance.
(via Moonbattery)
Your extreme blanket conclusions are based solely on your limited experience. My experience and that of many others contradict your observations. I’ve encountered an increasing degree of clear anti-Semitic comments yelled at me by those who call themselves liberals simply due to my pro-Israel stand or because I just happen to be standing at the corner. Many liberals have a strong desire to replicate the United States in the image of Europe, a continent that has witnessed an increased degree of assaults on Jews. Many liberals strongly support the UN, an organization well known for its anti-Semitic and anti-Israel views. Read the experience of a college student in the following link and you’ll see that she was assaulted equally by neo-Nazis and liberals simply because she is Jewish. The friends of the Jews and Israel are not the modern liberals, but are in fact the moderate Republicans and true Christians. These facts render all four of your arguments null and void.
Comment by Mike — 10/20/2006 @ 4:18 pm
Ummm… Mike, did you bother reading what I wrote? Do you understand sarcasm? If you take a shot at both reading and understanding sarcasm, you’ll see that I completely agree with you. I was mocking him and his bad logic.
My position is that Drobny’s argument is ridiculous and that many liberals are anti-Semitic. Simply claiming that liberals are unable to be anti-Semitic and by that premise declare that any anti-Semites are necessarily conservative, no matter how liberal they may appear to be (this is Drobny’s argument), is absurd, a poor argument, and is a sad way to alleviate one’s liberal conscience. He merely denies the theoretical possibility of liberal anti-Semites and so is able to simply dismiss any empirical evidence to the contrary. That’s wrong.
Ya dig?
Comment by Dangerous Dan — 10/21/2006 @ 8:22 am