People Love Dead Jews with Dara Horn
So today, I have Dara horn with me. Dara. How are you? Well, thanks, hon. Thanks so much for having me. Yeah, I mean, I want to have you for a lot of reasons, but I want to start with this in the realm of what I like to call identity politics right now in society, right? Or you might call them hierarchies of Oppression. Maybe you call them the oppression Olympics. Why don't use matter as much. Because I don't think they don't, and I'm a Jew. Why are we why are we somehow part of the waspy power Brokers and everybody else is marginalized? Or at least everybody else in the hierarchy, a hierarchical pyramid. Well, yeah, there's actually a simple answer to that which is that they semitism know, I'm being really serious. I take note for sure and I wanted that's what I want to unpack. Yes. Well, so fundamental feature of anti-Semitism is the If that Jews have too much power, so if you're going to set up sort of this, you know, Society where you know, minorities are people who are believed to
not have enough power. And you're coming into that, with a completely unexamined Legacy, anti-semitic belief that Jews automatically already have too much money too much power. Then you're going to go into that with that presumption and that is sort of like one of those unexamined anti-semitic beliefs that a lot of people have, you know, really not even be aware that that's part of that. That's Part of what they're thinking. It's almost an unconscious belief that a lot of people are carrying with them into these conversations, right? Yeah, I mean, and I wanted to bring that up to go into the, you know, recent kerfuffle of those. She apologizes. Whatever, the Whoopi Goldberg situation. Okay, you know where she where she talked about Jews, not being race, you know, willfully ignorant on one hand to what not what the Nazi Mantra was but also tied into the belief that the idea of racializing, something only. Can be as it relates to skin color. It can't be anything else because the debate is
literally, we're in a world. Now, I should say right where we're trying to social justice eyes, everything, right? But only the things that we think, Matt, and so, she made them, I think will be fell into the mistake though. She apologized of assuming, that somehow power is all about white people, Jews are white people, right? So, we couldn't potentially ever be considered marginalized or victimized or even racialized. I thought that. Such an interesting moment. You know, what be, who I like very much who I don't think is anti-Semitic, but she was revealing a kind of a casual anti-Semitism. Wouldn't you say, I think that her remarks reflect a general, ignorance about about who Jews are about, Jewish culture, Jewish history, Jewish civilization, and it's not her fault because think about what a I mean, this is just really a product of a very typical American Education. Think about what you Learn about Jews in like a middle school or high school history book at what point in that textbook.
Do you ever encounter Jews? And this is true for like, you know, text books that are published today and text books that were published. You know, I don't know, 40 years ago whenever or whatever Whoopi Goldberg was in school. Maybe. I don't know, 20 years ago, 40 years ago, whenever it's consistently true. There's basically two places that you're going to encounter Jews in that textbook. If it's a textbook that has ancient history in it there. Maybe a page in the beginning about what the ancient civilizations section. There might be a page about the Israelites, right? Doesn't mention that those people were Jews, right? They might as well be Phoenicians, you know? Other people from a long time ago. They're dead. Who cares? Okay, then the other time you meet Jews in this textbook, is if it's a test with the covers modern period, there's going to be a chapter toward the end about the Holocaust, which is and from this, we order that Jews are people who got murdered and their murders are there
to like teach us some Grand message about like, you know, the limits of Western Civilization. There's nothing in between and there's nothing since, right? And of course, with that tell and what's, you know, and so there's this absolute Erasure of the content of Jewish culture and civilization and I could say, like, okay. Well, Jews are this small, you know, a small minority group and like there's lots of small groups that are, don't make it into the textbook. That would be true. Except that Judaism is foundational to the history of the West. You don't have Christianity and Islam without Judaism. Mm, like also Judaism is this Counter Culture that weaves its way through the entire history of the West. Also, a lot of Western Civilization has defined itself in opposition to Judaism. There's a book by a historian University of Chicago historian. David nirenberg called anti Judaism, the Western tradition. And he traces this even from before Christianity, from other parts of the ancient world
of how many civilizations throughout the history of the West have defined themselves in opposition to Judaism and also in the modern period and, you know, sort of post religious Context as well. So all of that is kind of left out. And the result is that the Holocaust is taught as like this historical vacuum as this like moment outside of History. That's unrelated to anything about Jews interacting in a non-jewish society before or since so someone like Whoopi Goldberg can make this kind of comment that this is sort of like this like random event that's unrelated to the rest of Western history. Right? Like I don't blame her for making that mistake because she's never been taught anything different and nobody else has either. Yeah, and I was very Very good point. Also, when you say, you know, Judaism is foundational to the West. I also think that you talk about your, there's an implication of people who misunderstand, or don't understand that because there is rampant presented ISM going on
in our culture, of every etiology and every side where people think history begins with them. They think it begins today and they think all Notions of History are viewed through the lens of today. It's informed by narcissism ignorance. Educational deficiencies, but I find that interesting because she really would be was doing the thing as saying when they can't possibly be erased and we talk about race, we talk like, talk about black lives matter. Okay. Well, I support black lives matter. Why does that have to be mutually exclusive from the fact that European jewelry was exterminator attempted to be exterminated because they were racialized, as not being part of the master race, you know, and I know you don't, but it's a fascinating Nuance. That's so dangerous. Well, there's so there's two problems here that I do. An address in the book. So by book is called people of dead Jews. Yes, we're getting there were getting there, but I wanted to dive in, with yes, or no. And I mean, look, there's
in my book. I talk about basically the, to sort of lines that go through. My book are one, is that people tell stories about dead Jews that make them feel better about themselves. Right? And the other is that those stories require the Erasure of living Jews and actual Jewish culture, and civilization. So, in order to sort of do those things, you have to sort of like you dump this whole reality. That might make you feel uncomfortable and question your own beliefs. And also you have to fit juice into a box that they don't fit into. And that is something that also goes back very far in history like. So now we're living in in the United States today where we sort of tend to see because of our history often look at sort of, you know, things like, you know, identity and community. And all those kinds of things through a lens of race, and the legacy of institutional racism, that's sort of the frame that we're used to here in the United States in other. Countries. There's different frames and other
periods of History. There's different frames Jews never fit into these boxes. No. And this is sort of to me, the sort of fundamental problem. This is something I also talked about in my book is that there's this sort of problem in the way, we think about anti bigotry, education in this country where we think of anti bigotry education in this country as being something where we tell people or we tell children or whoever we're trying to sort of pod bias. We tend to tell them like, okay. This group over here that you might be prejudiced against, you shouldn't hate those people because they're just like you and me. They're just like everybody else. But of course, like what you're then doing, is creating this Erasure right? Where you're saying that like, you know, basically if they're not just like me, if they're not just like everybody else that it's okay to be prejudiced against them. Right? And that's sort of the problem that you run into because Jews never fit into these boxes. Right right
now, they're the country where we have this racial system or not system, but, you know, An identity system that's based on race. There are other plate like in Canada. Let's say maybe it's more based on language. Let's say, anythin Canada. Like they're all different places and there's always been this attempt by non-jewish societies to fit Jews into this box. This goes back to Napoleon. I mean, it goes back way before that. I can tell you example, some of the ancient world, but like Napoleon tried to do this where he's like, let's turn the Jews into just a religion because that's something that I can manage and control and he convened like a rabbinic court. Wow. Lies from all over the French Empire and he brought them all to Paris and had them sort of like, ratify this statement that was going to say that from now on, you know, judaism's just going to be a religion. It's not going to have any of these other communal or cultural or national impulses. I mean like you try to put juice into
a box that he could manage and so maybe a promise like juice just don't fit in a box, you know this idea that you know, always shouldn't hate somebody who is different from us because they're just like everybody else. I mean you spent 3,000 years not being like everybody else. That's right. Right. And I so I again the book people love dead Jews, the Triumph of the book to me and it is a triable. First of all, I love essays. As one of my favorite professors at Brown said, an essay is an act of immediacy. And I think each essay you wrote is that in the waiting gauges, not just questions of jewishness, but questions of jewishness as a relates to politics culture and the like but their Triumph of it to me is I feel like you're the first person I've read it writing in it in the contemporary. Actor, that is of the of politics and culture that explains that. You know, what Society has really done. Right? Is stripped Jews of a particularity, right? Which in essence is is a Cornerstone of the identity,
you know, meaning that kind of like you said making making them seem just like you and me but also find this weird sort of way of like sensationalizing them as you and you illustrate that through those The horrible anti-semitic attacks, not just tree of life, but the Jersey City, one in the one and outside San Diego. So what I found interesting is it and I found it very interesting. But is this in response? I know it's in response to the larger Gestalt of what it means to be Jewish and all the existential crises that come with that. But are you feel like you're waiting a little bit in reaction to some of the things that are going on in the modern political discourse, especially on the left? By the way, where it seems to be? Curiously tolerant Progressive, but also anti-semitic, not the whole left of course, but the left does have a real problem and it stinks, but I wanted to get your thoughts. Well, so to the question about on the left versus the right, and that sort of thing, you know,
the problem is extremism also, like to say like, oh, there's this curious problem on the left. It's kind of like, well, it would be curious, if it weren't over 100 years old. Right? Right. And we can talk more about that enough to want to go in that direction, right out and buy. Let me add one thing in there, you know, this happens always during the debate on Israel or the debate on anything when people say oh, you know, you know, the left can't be this way because you know anti-Semitism is a right-wing phenomenon its antisemitism is a Transcendent phenomenal. Oh, yeah, that has nothing to do with, you know people make. And again, it's like what Hitler was a Nazi right wing? That's like guys you're missing history of not just modern cultures, but of ancient civilizations, right? Which has nothing to do with right or left. I'm just pinpointing, you know again, Stripping Jew Jews and jewishness of its its particularity. Its Essence. Its meaning tying that into a search bone-deep reflexive
- against Israel as if it's you know, an oppressor. And I think pseudo Colonial anti historical analyses, your book of essays, especially when you talk about this myth starting with the Smithsonian episode and Frank episode ready for Smithsonian, you know, I think speaks to that, you know, I mean even have a chapter on Shylock and the great Merchant of Venice which I, which is I thought you had a very interesting take on. We'll talk about that in a minute. But what I want to do, let's go back. I love the book. Let's go back to the beginning. You have a doctorate in Yiddish and Hebrew studies. Well, it's actually comparative literature. But my language is in comparative literature that focus and we're getting and Hebrew. Is that a dual doctorate? Or no? It's not my doctorate and others, my doctorate doctoral degrees in comparative literature. Yeah. I think you've heard of like when you do a degree in comparative literature, you have to study multiple lengths literal icing and how did you
judge always want to write about this and you always About this. How did you what are the origins of Dara's intellectual? Trajectory? Sure. Well, so I'll start by saying I spent 20 years, not writing this book. Okay. I mean, you know, you've written five or six novel. Yes, everything. So my previous five books are all novels. They all deal really deeply with themes from Jewish history, tradition texts and culture. And so to your question about like, did I always know I wanted to do this. Well, I mean, you know, being a writer to something that, you know, it's not really like a career choice. It's more like a chronic illness, write it so that you have to sort of build your life around. When you realize that you have this problem, you know, if you're fortunate, you can make a career out of it. Otherwise, you're doing it anyway, right? Yeah, and I sort of just really felt fortunate in growing up in the Jewish community that I happen to be born into a tradition and a culture that like, where
everything was about books. I mean, this is a tradition where we literally like dance with books. We kiss books. I mean, it's like it's like a great tradition. You are a writer and a person who cares about books. So that's House of talmud Augusto, right? Yes. It's very, yes. I mean, it's very like, serious obsession with books, but I was studying Hebrew and Yiddish literature and and so when I was so to go back to what I was saying before about, you know that I spent 20 years, not writing this book. It was always very important to me and all of my work. So whether it was my scholarly, work my teaching or my writing of these novels that it was always very important to me and All of these Enterprises for me, are very focused on Jewish culture. It was always really important to me that Jewish culture be defined from the inside. The Jewish identity was not feeling as defined by like what the world didn't reduce, right. And I was always pushing back against that after Reclamation, of what belongs
to juice. Yeah. Well, I mean, for me, it was even a Reclamation because I hadn't lost this, right. I mean, this is something. I mean, I grew up. I was a total reader from the age of 12. Wow. And Shabbat every Friday night in the house. Every Saturday. I am literally had a job in my family's synagogue. In the Torah for the children's congregation every every Saturday. So that was something I grew up with, you know, so for me, it's not a Reclamation. It's a, you know, something I always had was always sort of focused on, you know, this tradition of text and and sort of creative understanding of this text and creative reinterpretation of these texts. So and so much so that I used to go to. And then when I, when I did my doctorate and I sort of realized sort of the depth of like get a civilization, get a speaking civilization Hebrew. Literature modern is from Israeli literature. Back down through all the way through biblical backwards. In time through biblical literature. You know, I used to
really push back against this idea that Jewish life was going to be defined from the outside so much. So that when I would go to speak about my novels in whatever public events I was doing, I often would ask the audience. How many people here can name? Three concentration camps and that's something a lot of readers can do. Just a side note. I was having a conversation once a debate. Is somebody about it semitism, you know what I mean? And I said there had been in the horrible, genre, the disgusting subspecies of Holocaust denial, you know, people who would claim the Jews were not gassed at Treblinka, right? And the person said, what's true blink? And this was a rather learn at person. I mean, I guess it was like you never heard of, you know, you know, I said, there wasn't one concentration camp. Anyway, go ahead. Yes. Well, so most of the thing is like, so maybe maybe this wouldn't be true anymore. And as I said, I've been doing this for 20 years, you know, how many people here can name
three concentration camps. A lot of educated readers can do that. I asked the same people, how many people here can name three artists writers? Now that's harder. Well, what's interesting is that 80% of the people who were murdered in the Holocaust where you get our speakers so famously literary culture. Yep, I ask these same leaders. Why do we care so much about how these people died if we really aren't interested in how these people lived? And you know, because I mean that is actually the culture that was destroyed in the Was get a speaking Jewish civilization in Europe. So and which, you know are there yet, uh speaking communities today. Yes. However, what was really destroyed was this sort of yiddish-speaking civilization as a broad diverse religiously diverse religious and secular with many different political parties, many different like, artistic movements, many, no a theater and arts and literature and press, and literary. Oh, and politics and all this sort of, that's what was destroyed.
And you know, one of the things I also notice is like, you know, that there's often this This tendency in those sort of again. I spoke earlier about Holocaust memorialization being something where we're trying to send this message that like, oh these people are just like you and me. They're just like everybody else. And it's like well, except like I said, eighty percent of those people are gonna speakers a huge percentage of them were religious Jews, you know, and then I'm like, you know, the Nazi project was not just about killing six million Jews. It was also about erasing Jewish civilization. Why are we participating in that by also erasing Jewish civilization? When we present this. So that's sort of, you know, so that's something that I was sort of always pushing back against and also, because I'm aware of sort of the like amazing qualities of this civilization because Judaism is a counterculture that runs through the whole history of the West, you know, and and indoors through and
not just indoors, but does so through creative reinvention. It's constant, creative reinvention, and that is sort of what to me was this astonishing sort of story of Jewish civilization. It's not about it being this Litany of horror, but it's about this Triumph of creative. Audience where you have sort of these many calamities that the community moves through not moves on from, but moves through right builds and rebuilds and reinvents. After each of these calamities going back, thousands of years. And that to me is sort of the most astonishing story. And that was what that was a story that I was telling in my novels with in many different ways. Like, my novels are contemporary stories. They have historical elements that are taking place in many different periods of time. So that was sort of like, always what I was working on. And I always was avoiding this subject. Of anti-Semitism. Like, I just did not want that. To be what I was writing about. Something happened in around 2018 when I
hit a wall and that's how this book came about. Is that tree of life. Well, it's before that actually in 2018. I was asked by Smithsonian Magazine to if they approached me and asked me if I would write a piece for them, an essay about Anne Frank, and I have gotten that request and I just felt like this overwhelming sense of dread because I thought like wow, I really really don't want to Essay for about Anne Frank and you know, I then sort of like the normal thing to do would be to turn this assignment down. But you know, I'm a writer. I'm not a normal person. So I'm just sort of like right. I mean my thought was like this is interesting. Right? Why don't I want to do this right? And I hadn't really sort of course that out for myself and I thought this why don't I want to do this? And then I remembered a news item that I had read about something. I had read about that. It happened. At the Anne, Frank Museum in Amsterdam earlier. That makes great story. I love the story. Go ahead. So again,
in 2018. This is in the Anne, Frank Museum in Amsterdam, of course, is this, if this former office building where, you know, this teenage diarist and Frank and her family, and several other people were hiding from the Nazis during World War 2. And then, you know, later her Diaries discovered these rooms where she and these other people were hiding is, and the building that they were in is now this like Blockbuster Museum in Amsterdam. He's the world. It's famous Dutch, Jew, right? Yes. Well, I mean, I mean as I put as I call her in the book the title of that chapter is of everyone's second favorite dead, Jew. So anyway, so this museum is now this like Blockbuster Museum, they get millions of visitors a year. And in 2018, this news item I had seen was about a young Jewish man who worked at this Museum and the museum would not allow him to wear his yarmulke to work, right? That's this little sort of skullcap that religious Jewish men often where the museum would not allow him to wear that.
His yarmulke to work. They made him. Hide it under a baseball hat. He then appealed this decision to the board of the museum, the board of the museum, then we deliberated for four months and then relented and let him wear his yarmulke to work. And I had just seen this new story and I thought you know for months I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall. In this form. It will deliberating about what I mean. Well silver a whole idea was like, oh our museum is all about neutrality, you know, we want to share, you know, the juice Humanity. I mean, The humanities of like the nice Jews, right? Like the dead ones, not the living ones, doing gross things. Like, I mean, I listen II don't want to be presumptuous for the Museum's mission statement, but I would argue it is precisely not about neutrality. But okay, it's so many problems with this, right. But like what I thought was hilarious was I have see this new store and I just thought, you know, four months is a really long time. Yeah.
And Frank Museum to wonder whether or not. It was a good idea to force a Jew into hiding. Oh brutal. Well, by the way, everyone should know this in the book, I love That is what I want. And what, I also love the book but I love that each piece, especially this piece was so biting in its, in its condemnation. So bracingly sarcastic, you know, well, it is because, you know, you can't make this stuff up. You can't write it. But you did, you did write it because you had to show the world the preposterousness, you know, an amine of, I mean, even as if and I'm not completely familiar with what. Dutch law is but you know, certainly in America, you know, we have a First Amendment. I mean the idea that you couldn't wear a yarmulke, what's have to do with anything. Anyway, I mean, you know what? I mean? Well, but then I realize like what was really going on here, because then I have remembered this new story and I just thought like, you know, did I dream this? Because like another and then they went
back and looked it up online, and when I looked it up, I discovered something equally ridiculous. It happened at the scene Museum in 2017. The previous year, where visitors had noticed. Something weird about the audio guides, big International Museum. They've got maybe 10 or 15 languages and A on that display where they have the, there's that display for the audio guy, word says English. And there's a little British flag and it says Francais and there's a little French flag until you get to Hebrew. No flag. Wow, no flag. And then I was like, you know, these are PR mishaps, but they are not mistakes. No. Well, I think you know, I lived in London for a bit and I'm just gonna get him speculating a little bit. But, you know, your Europe's relationship to the idea of an Israeli home. A Jewish homeland is very I still think very tortured, of course. That's where the Jews were murdered. I mean, I find I found it the idea of Israel, kind of like, well, you know, that that was, that's know, you
know, yes, we're not anti-semitic, but I mean, Israel's a mess. I mean, what's going on over there? Is, you know what I mean? So, I think there is a Dominion Wishin of I do as this is my speculation that they, you know, how hard is it to put an Israeli flag there? So Adam are going to call you on this. You're being too nice. Okay. All right, you're being too nice because as I put it in, so I did write this piece for Smithsonian and I open with these. Situation in the Anne Frank Museum. This piece is now the first chapter in the book. And as I put it in my, the very first line of that piece, people love dead Jews. Living use, not so much. That's so much, and we are going to call. And on the the point with the Israeli flag. I want to point out so that, you know, Anne Frank's sister Margo who spoiler alert was also murdered in the Holocaust was an Ardent Zionist. Yep, who's was involved in dust Zionist, youth? Organizations was studying Hebrew Was preparing to, To what was in Palestine to
be a midwife. And the Galilee that was her dream. And like, I don't care about her, right? So, I mean, that's sort of like, but like, you know, she's also dead. So, I mean, this is sort of what's interesting is that, you know, and then when you said like, oh, what was their motivation of this? Like, it really is like, we want to teach you about the Jews Humanity, like the nice Jews, meaning the dead ones, right? Not the ones doing gross things like living in Israel as more than half of the world's Jews do or practicing Judaism and this Is part of what, you know, when we were speaking earlier, you were talking about, like, this right wing versus left wing idea of, you know, of anti-Semitism. I actually have a little bit of a different distinction, which I make in my book, which I describe it but two forms of anti-santa and they don't necessarily Tractive right wing and left wing. The overlap. I try and identify these two types of anti-Semitism by the Jewish holidays. That celebrate triumphs
over them specifically Purim and Hanukkah. So Purim anti-Semitism and this is just my formulation. This is From sure, of course. Yeah, but yeah, Purim is the the poor of anti-Semitism based on the holiday of Purim, which is about the biblical Book of Esther about this Jenna Seidel. Hey Mac, who does crazy? Oh, he's basically gonna go big bad guy comes and wants to kill all the Jews, right? Nothing. Ambiguous here. Super clear. Right? Like there's no, there's no where to go with this. It's really obvious. Okay, that's what I'm form of anti-Semitism. But then there's what I call the Hanukkah form, of anti-Semitism, based on the Hanukkah story Hanukkah story. He's about this hellenized regime that takes over ancient Judea and at first the there and there's no point in that story where this regime wants says, they're going to kill all the Jews doesn't come up but their goal is still to destroy the Jewish civilization, but they do this at first, basically, not by killing people but by destroying
by editing how people are allowed to be Jewish. And so the way it's storing silly. Is that kind of Hanukkah into some of those? A nice. Well, it's more. It's about that. It's not, it's like, Yeah, we don't hate Jews. We just hate XYZ things that we have decided or not cool. Right? And so, the most obvious example of this is they the Jews of Judea this time or like. Okay, we can be a good vassal State and they build a gymnasium in Jerusalem. Ancient Greek. Athletics are like a huge. It's not like, you know, just like the NBA or something. This, it was like part of their religion religion. I mean, you know, it was a huge. It was like, the way to be put a person who matters in this culture. Was to be involved in these at Poletik. So, if you've ever been to an art museum, you know, that Greek Athletics were played in the nude. These are gue notice that actually has passed. So these Jews in Judea, then they recruited teenage Jewish boys, to be athletes. In these Greek games, these teenage Jewish
boys, then had their circumcisions reversed. So they could participate in these Greek games. I don't even want to think about how that was even possible. I actually, I know, I was hard for me to even want to think about it. What's interesting about this is that that is at an early enough stage in this story in this history. The noise making them do that. Right? No one is saying you have to do this, right? But about five years later, the regime Outlaw circumcision, right? Five years later, the regime Outlaw circumcision. They outlawed keeping kosher, they outlaw studying Torah. They are various Jewish religious practices. But again, oh, we're not, you know, you don't hate Jews. We just like, this is gross. Well, I mean II and I wanted to ask about and we're going to I mean we're To just move it on into the subject of Israel, which is on my list, talk to you by. Don't know what, we're going to circle back to things, but I completely believe, I completely believe, let me, I don't want to be
nice. I know for a fact that after the last Israel Hamas episode where social justice Warriors, decide Palace, it's all Palestine, everything else to shit in their word that attacks of people on streets of Beverly Hills who were Jewish and restaurants is no accident. Okay. It's not correlation. It's causation. Okay, and anybody who thinks differently isn't paying attention, or is just willfully naive, or anti-semitic, or both or all things. And I to your point of your example. I think what scares me so much is, right, of course, Haman in perm. King Haman was murder. The Jews. Of course, you know, you, you see, Richard Spencer, or a white supremacist or a Neo-Nazi group. Yeah. They want to murder their watches. We know that. That's what they allow. We know where they stand. And they're not hiding at their marching on Bridges and Orlando, a swastika armband. It's okay. But what we also have is people who are theoretically, enlightening, liberals and light Progressive, not necessary to be
enlightened conservative. So, you know, decide to trouble the idea, right. Just just lightly I'm using their framing, you know, of the idea of a Jewish homeland because, you know, you're turning out to be a pressers. You're turning out to be doing things that you weren't supposed to. Do. You know, I'm saying? This is all the rhetoric they use. Which is tantamount to a full-on anti-semitic screed, but it's couched in politically correct terms. But to your point over the five years, look at where we are. Now, we talked about Israel from five years ago. There's some history, there's history to the so, you know, as I just gave that example of the Hanukkah story. So, like, you know, first of all, that, this, this requires, this conical form of anti-Semitism, it requires juice to participate in their own humiliation, they all were able to use our Yeah, that's what you're sort of required to participate in this and it's like, it's a weaponized shame. So what's interesting to me about the, the
sort of the anti-israel stuff is that this is also something I read about in the book. I have a chapter in the book where I talk about. This, Soviet is a factor of this like the destruction of the Soviet Jewish intelligencia under Stalin. And what I also traced back to is that the early years of the Bolshevik regime. So in the the Evil War, the Russian Civil War and the years sort of immediately following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution between like 17 and 22. Yeah. I mean, there's like, you know, there's a whole massive scale during which by the way, if we're Lenin, for officially takes over. This is like
100,000 Jews massacred in Ukraine during that period. Nobody even remembers that. Like, oh, whatever Holocaust. Moment in history where people are being shot into Mass Graves except that you already shot. A hundred thousand people into Mass graves in Ukraine in the early 1920s. But okay, let's pretend that never happened. Okay, leaving that over side, the Bolsheviks, their goal in part of their in Waging War and consolidating their power in the former. Russian Empire is to get the Jewish masses on their side. Okay. So one of their one and one of the ways they do this is they create What's called the F sexy 0, which are the Jewish sections of the Communist Party. Whose goal is to To spread Bolshevik pulp propaganda among Yiddish the masses. So to speak. Yiddish, speaking Jews in the former Russian Empire there. What? And one of their talking points in this sort of, you know, in this propaganda spreading among the Jews, a former Russian Empire is, we are not anti-semitic. We are just wait
for it. Anti-zionist, by the way, this is like, you know, 25 years before the creation of the state of Israel or more. We're just anti-zionist. Of course what that means? Oh, and by the way, we're also anti-religious because we're communist. Well, God bless. I was its juice but you can't practice Judaism, you can't use Hebrew. So what this meant was that anybody using Hebrew was no immediate Enemy of the State. They expelled all the crime, nachman Bialik the editor of the Hebrew poet, habima theater, man. Has to escape to what was then Palestine at this time? They also I mean in the process almond, they shut down all the rabbinical schools. They shut down everything Shiva. They shut down all the synagogue's. They shut down all the the communal Jewish communal organizations. Also any Zionist activity, which is something that range from everything from political parties to sports clubs all set down. They also, I mean, in the process of not being anti-semitic and merely being anti-zionist.
They managed to persecute imprison torture and murder. Thousands of Jews, but Derek, let me, let me Let me say, you know, I appreciate where you're coming from, but come on. I mean, therefore the proletariat their communist. How could they, they're not anti-semitic. I know I'm riffing on, we hear that a leftist rhetoric now, you know, but we're really trying to say is is really that this is sort of this non-jewish Society. That's editing. That's editing and imposing its standards of how we roll. We were there, like we love Jesus. As long as you follow all these rules, about how you're allowed to be Jewish, and that's something that that's that Sonic and Anti-Semitism, which requires juice to erase and edit themselves. So that's what we saw like, that is the same process of, you know, your juice or grape, but you have to reverse your circumcision in order to play in these Greek games, right? I mean, that's the same kind of dynamic. So this was like really a, we're not anti-semitic. We're
just anti-zionist. You're awesome. If you're Jewish as long as you like jump this thing that by the way, happens to me like Central to yes. And to the point of what you do in your book because time of people, you know, love dead you As in, you know, living Jews is something. We grapple with. We minimize, we can erase my, it requires an Erasure requires an Erasure. And I always say, like, you know, when you talk about, which is obviously a big subject now, and I'm very committed. We're very committed here. I've been committed long fight for democracy fight, like, hell right. From one of the reasons is that, and this is my belief, and I think you're going to appreciate, is that any authoritarian regime, right is inherently anti-semitic. Now, what ends up happening, though, these debates right in this is what your book does. So, well is, People go. Oh, well, you know know you know, you're comparing this the Holocaust or Hitler. I said everything isn't that what's anti-Semitism that you don't
downplay or ignore or act naive or I guess indulge, however, you look at it anti-Semitism, just because it's not the Holocaust. I mean, you know what? I mean? This is how these are the building block that point is like I always find it like, what, you know, do I said, yes, if they would that person, I said, just because they're putting uyghurs in concentration camps, doesn't mean there's any love for Jew. I mean, This weird disconnect. I think your book is speaking to you know, yes. Well, I mean because the problem is I mean there's a few things first is that you know, there's this idea. So and this was an idea that was that was really promoted, you know within and by the Jewish community in the United States for the for about 30 years ago, right? Yeah. About 30 years ago, which is when you started having like things like the Holocaust museum in Washington opening you had sort of new school curricula about the Holocaust, you know, one of the ideas behind that what was the reason that the
Jewish community? At that time was so behind. That was because of this idea that like Holocaust Education would like help inoculate people the public against anti-Semitism, right? Because that was the one of the premises there. Right? Was that like people would go to these museums where they learned about this in school. They'd see where the what the world had done to the Jews. They'd see where hatred could lead and they would then stop hating Jews. I mean, you know, it wasn't a ridiculous idea. I was actually, I love the way you talk about. I was there this Summer that it opened. I was interning on Capitol Hill and, of course, it's a beautiful Museum and to your point about the Museum, the elevators are simulacra of cattle cards, right? So you get in that which is just big foreboding, you know, doomsday thing, but I will tell you, at 20 years old thinking. This is kind of performative politics. Meaning meaning to your point. Is, how does this necessarily do anything? Other than say? This
was bad. Anti-Semitism was bad. Now, go home and go out to dinner. I mean, what did right? There's a few problems one. I mean, I think that there is like the goal. I think that one, not that we should have a holocaust museum. I just
Christine, I really not something that is important and sort of the, you know, the ease with which you can have a tyrannical regime take over that kind of thing. I that I think is very valuable what, it's not very good at is inoculating people against anti-Semitism, right? Because what happens is, you know, you know, when you go to these, these museums, it's sort of like, you know, you're supposed to worry about the Holocaust that you don't repeat it. I mean, the problem is, as I mentioned earlier, people tell stories about dead Jews that make them feel better about themselves. Now, what that means is the Holocaust Education is one of those stories. Tory's because you go to a holocaust museum, hopefully you feel sad about what happened, but you feel great about yourself because you're like I would never do this. Right? Well, if you gotta go, you you probably wouldn't mass murder, six million people like pat yourself on the back but like you still might be an inveterate jew-hater though
not to clear this thing where we like every time, any random public figure says something vaguely anti semitic Museum and then they like, you know come out and like Nazis are bad and it's like the problem is it's not that hard to That Nazis are bad. It's harder. For example, when a la no more has made repeated anti-semitic comments. Repeated. So does what she did to lead to say they're in to submit it because you're not allowed to attack a woman of color who are Boo as Muslim because they could put never ever a it's islamophobic and be they could never be anti-semitic talk about it ratio. That's the debate. We that's what we were told. The real racer though. Is that There's a lot of things to unpack here. But I mean, one thing is that the problem with that sort of process is that, like that doesn't require those people to engage with living Jews in any way. It doesn't require them to engage with Jewish culture and it doesn't allow the Trope of Nazis as supervillains, which they were because
that's the bar. They used. You know what I mean? Another problem. Is that, like, and as I put it in the book, I'm like the bars kind of high. If like, you know, it's like, you know, if the if anti-Semitism consists of murdering six million Jews, what that means is that anything? Short of that is kind of no big deal. And and we're gonna have a section where I'm, like, here's a bunch of things that aren't the Holocaust, and I was everything from, like, from like Troy Jews on social media to it. Felling juice from entire countries and seizing, all their assets, which of course happened in like a dozen countries in the Islamic world. In the 20th century, you know, all those things. They will all our great compared to the Holocaust. Well, I mean, you know, that's a ridiculous standard. So this is where the, this is sort of the problem. So I think that No, and part of that problem, is that, like I said, people want to tell stories that make them feel good about themselves. And that requires this
Erasure of actual living dues. And as much as we talk about the sort of polarization of, of the Holocaust memory, it's better than what you see it. A lot of you know, I mean at least the Holocaust is remembered because like I said, you know, the pets leader of pogroms in Ukraine in the 1920s 100,000 views massacred. Did you even know that happened? Really an educated person? You probably do not have the or like, you know, Destruction of the Iraqi Jewish Community, I mean, this is like a community that predated Islam, that was, you know, thousands of years old. It was, you know, hundreds of thousands of people there, you know, all stripped of their citizenship. They're all their assets were seized like, double the Jewish community of Libya, you know, Tripoli and 1940 was 25 percent Jewish. I didn't know that yet. I mean that's like more than New York. Yeah. It was 19 in 1940 was 25%. Uh, how many Jews are in Libya today? Not even just a little Had a whole country, how many? Not just, I'm
sorry. Not just Tripoli, the whole country, how many Jews live in Libya today? I have no idea hero. And in fact, there was one Jewish man who came back on after Qaddafi was ousted, who came back to basically just try to remove trash from the ruins of the, the largest synagogue in Tripoli. He was hounded out of the country by an anti-semitic mob. That wanted his head waving signs that said, no Jews, and Libya because obviously one was too many. So, like, this is something like that doesn't come up. I mean, don't even get me started about, like, he'll be a juice. You know, the Venezuelan Jewish Community. I mean, this is like, you know, and also, I mean, in my book, I also talked about American anti-Semitism. Oh, yeah, history of American anti-Semitism and how American who's have buried that history. It speaks to the Jesus word, resilience, the enduring resilience, right of anti-Semitism. Right in America. I need in the world but in America specifically that a social justice left, and I'm
not picking I'm again. I'm not on the right, but that is social justice lens. Left could actually be an accommodationist etiology. Anti-Semitism that speaks to the pervasive power of the world's hatred in my opinion. Well, I mean it tells you about I mean, I think the don't you think that's interesting. You know what I mean? That this is B, it's called you need any other words, your passport in the world of progressive left politics is to be anti as that's because there's this, you know, when I say people of dead shoes basically, Jews are only acceptable to a non-jewish society if they are powerless and that can be either dead or Impotent. Otherwise, these are not acceptable. So that's that's sort of and those are the parameters of round which these non-jewish societies are organized. So that's why that's acceptable and especially, you know, the reason you see it more on the left is because this is a political ideology that's premised on the power, right? That sees everything through the
lens of power. And so that's why there and there's this so deep. This unexamined idea because anti-Semitism is not is one way that it differs from other prejudices. And I mean, I want to say a Purrs, you know, I'm probably wrong about this. I'm sure there's some element of this and some other group prejudice against some other group, but one way it differs from other prejudices is that it isn't like justo juicer inferior to me. It's a conspiracy theory. Oh, yeah, conspiracy. Theories, are all about power and the whole idea of a conspiracy theory is not. These people are inferior to me. It's these people have these super powers and are controlling things behind the scenes and you absolutely see that conversation happening. When you, when you look at history of anti-semitism. The United States including today. Yeah. Yeah. I want to you to talk about actually speaking of antisemitism, in America. Obviously the tree of life being so cataclysmic. But obviously the one in Pol way, California
that were was, as I was cool. And, and in Jersey City, I mean, obviously we know, anti-Semitism is pervasive. We know it's on the rise. This, it seem like there's a, I know, we know the number of attacks her up, but just, it seemed like that has increased even more than we know in the last. Five years. I'm not just going by statistics here. I mean, does it seem? Is it? No accident. Those that these attacks all happened? So close together. And then happened, you know, in what the Pittsburgh one in. Jersey City, one in California, know that synagogues are see more under a stall. Not that they haven't been, but is it just that? We're it simplified. Now you think's going on, right? Um, you know, and it is like the thing that I think, what I write about the end of the book is the attacks on the Hispanic community that happened to us before the pandemic. There are none. Sleep in many other attacks. It's then that, you know, I didn't write about in the book because I was handing it in. But, you
know, I was, I mean, unfortunately, I'm up to date. I mean, I was, you know, we just had this hostage-taking in Texas synagogue, you know, so you can, I mean that one, those people didn't die. So it's a win. Yay, right? But what I think was sort of what was really striking to me about the attacks on the Hasidic Community is that when you read the, I read all the news articles about those attacks, I couldn't find the news article. That didn't say something derogatory about the Unity being attacked in the process of putting the art. Yes, you're right about that. In Jersey City was sort of like, well, they, you know, they, there was pushback about them. And so they, they did, they haven't coming. Was that the implication? Well, yes. Well, so some of that, that, I mean, yes, that was the message. Not. Yes. That's true. By the way, every article was like, oh, these people are gentrifying a minority neighborhood. And I'm like, okay. Well number one. Like these are highly visible. Members of the
top hate crime Target according to the FBI, right? It's not like white hipsters. And number two. Is that are like, is there? Murderous rage against gentrification where people are like walking into Blue Bottle Coffee with automatic weapons because I haven't seen that happening. Why are we pretending that this is about you? Okay, shh. And then it's very similar on, you know, you mentioned some other attacks. I was one of the attacks I write about in the book is an attack in Muncie New York, which is Upstate New York Community. It's a large consider Community. This was a really horrific one more somebody right before the pandemic. Somebody walked into a crowded Hanukkah party with a 4-foot, machete, and just started slashing people. And in that attack, I mean, I read all the news articles about that attack and they're like, well, you know, just for context there was a zoning battle between the Hasidic and Noms acidic residents of this town. I'm like, you know, do we normally resolve Municipal
disputes with a machete, you know something, I will fight with my neighbor over there and I have to, I have to drop by apologize. I should have been but would know what I was going to say. These articles are sending a signal to the public the signal. They're sending us, these people deserve it. That is a signal, they're sending this is an acceptable. This is completely acceptable, way to treat this community and that is absolutely the signal they're sending. And what I have to tell you Adam is that, you know, I wrote this book as an intellectual exercise. Really, wrote this book about not about things that happen in my life, but it was like experiences. I had had that I was sort of just processing through experience. I had had like as a researcher as The writer as a traveler things. I had encountered in my scholarship. It really worth it for me. This like personal story. But since I published this book, I've gotten hundreds upon hundreds, upon hundreds of messages. I get messages from all
kinds of readers, but many, many hundreds of messages from Jewish readers. All the all say, exactly the same thing they say. And these are old people, young people. People from rural areas cities in the United States around the world. Just secular every type of person within the Jewish Community. A lot of Jewish readers and they're all saying exactly the same thing. I have what they say is I have felt uncomfortable my whole life and I've never understood why this book articulated. This for me. Thank you. And then they say, I never told anyone this but and then they told me some horrible story of some experience of their own that they've had with anti-Semitism in their own life. And then, they say thank you for writing this book. I was not here for this. I feel like, you know, when you add, then this is in response to your question about like, the last five years. Yeah, the things these people are telling me like these are not. I mean, I haven't experienced these things, but these people
have and it's like, just the variety of humiliations and these are not like, deadly attack. That's the thing. Like this isn't the stuff that doesn't end up being a new story because it didn't involve a guy with a gun, right? These are like, I mean, I'm shocked by like, yeah. I mean, these are things like, you know, I'm an actor. I spent Where's going to auditions at every audition? The director told me I work too Jewish for this part. And now I'm a voice actor. These are people who write me. They said, you know, I am an influencer. I have, you know, I saw makeup brands online, you know, and I do during the last Gaza War, I posted something that said, you know, I want to say, you know, there should be peace and I support, you know, sit at the people in Israel who are running to bomb shelters, and I lost three of my Brands and now I know I can never do that again because it will destroy my life. We could and people come to, you told me there was a student in Germany. You told me, like, oh,
I went to University and I was of my classmates and professors had never met a Jew before. They were all excited to meet me. They had me be the speaker at their Persona Memorial. Hey, then, the final exam was on a Saturday and I'm an observant Jew. It's the Sabbath. I told the professor. I can't take the exam on this day. I'm going to need to have another accommodation and the professor failed me. I cannot tell you Adam. How many people have written to me, too? Don't people are still getting pennies thrown at them in 21st century, America and 21st century America. And in this is, like, I've been and where we're almost done, but I wanted to talk to you about this, but I'm glad that you brought this up. These letters. Don't surprise me, but I'll give you my experience, you know, raising and in a secular Jewish household where grandparents always said Jews, you're never safe. Always be on alert, even though America has been good to them. Comparitively. I had to great-grandmother's one of whom
fled, the Cossacks. Actually, she was born in 1898. Eight or whatever. So she left a 19 or so. Whatever was the long bed now, and she used to talk about the precariousness of being Jewish. But what America meant and I grew up born in 1974, grew up in Miami Beach and then I lived in New York and Providence and Allah. And for the most part of very, very I would say a mix of more. I would survive, very diverse Community, but I certainly waspy in Jewish. Commingled in a private school and your book is very powerful for a lot of reasons. But the last five years and I feel like your book is again immediacy, the essays essays are so immediate. That's what I love about them. And you know, it's read me now. It's about this here. Now. I feel like some of my Illusions been punctured, you know, I don't mean that wasn't naive to it. But it seems now that I never thought we'd be talking about this, you know what I mean? It's a and he really almost spiritual feeling it's this weird wave. That's come over
me now that I'm actually thinking about that. Now again, I'm not Let's just you. I don't know. I'm not Hasidic. I don't wear yarmulkes, you know, but you wonder like would there be environments? I'd go into or have gone into where I've left and people have said something anti-semitic. I don't know, you know, and I never used to think about that, not because I was blind but because America was supposed to be the exception. Yes. Well, for this is, this is the mythology that many Americans were raised on certainly. So I'm a couple years younger than you, but we're the same generation. So yeah. People our age and older like this was never part of Lives for the most part and I feel like what's disturbing to me is it is part of my children's lives. And that's that's disturbing to me. But what I will tell you is that also, like, I mean, we have this idea in this country that like, you know, like I think it's, you know, I don't know if it's a, I think I'm going to get this wrong. I think it's a
Martin Luther King quote, where it's like, Oh, The Arc of history is long but it bends toward Justice me. Exactly. What's funny is, it's actually by Herodotus. Oh, and did. Okay. Well, so, you know, so, you know, this idea that his, there's this mineral linear progress in history, like Don't see evidence of that in Jewish history, you know, also times people say to be like, oh, how could you say that? There's any issue of anti-Semitism when we live in a country where there's Supreme Court, Justices are Jewish and you know, there's you know, and senators and whatever and I was like, you know, and cultural leaders. I was like everything you just told me. It was also true in 12th century Egypt and everything. You just told me was also true in 10th Century Spain and everything that was said was also true in 6th Century Babylonia. So it's like you're these are cyclical things, but I will tell you something that is incredibly. Urging to me, though. So, since I published this book, I did have
received this outpouring of these, like, you're really upsetting mail from Jewish readers. What I also have received is this enormous outpouring of responses from non Jewish readers and who really are looking to be good allies. Yeah. Yeah. And just don't know how I've had people write to me. I've had someone recently. Who sent me this like ten Page Letter where it was like I'm a recovering anti-semite. Wow, you know, thank you for writing this book. I felt like this was this mind Barnacle that I knew, I had to get rid of and I didn't know how I've I mean I can tell you like I've also I've done these kind of interviews like what I'm doing with you and I've spoken on, you know, sort of. So I've spoken to sort of General audiences like yours. Let's also spoken to like specifically in minority communities podcast and that kind of thing that are geared toward particular minority communities. A lot of those leaders will say to me, like, wow, what you're writing about is so familiar. Right. Like
this, this feels like we're on the same page here. Let's work together. I've also, I mean, I've been on Christian TV. Well, I was just going to say that one of the, you know, when again we're, we're we probably should have separate podcast on this. They Curious Thing use curious for a reason of, you know, the Christian Zionism, but what it means biblically. But what, but how it manifests itself in terms of politics and policy, you know, one of my closest friends is Christian Zionist. I mean, I mean religious and she will tell Tell you the Jews are blessed and nothing will ever happen. Israel, and you'll always be protected in her mind. It's so phyllo synthetic. I mean, you know, just the entire that whole kind of Conservative Christian pro-israel. I mean, my God, I follow them on Twitter. I mean, in many cases there. I mean more robust and full-throated, the many Jews. I know. Now they've, that may be because Jesus is coming back to megiddo. And if we don't all convert will be killed, but
that's their version of it. My version of Sweeney. But we need the support and you know, of Israel needs to help. So, guess what, it's a, you know, place the three religions. Well, I just really want to say though is that, you know, so there there are a lot of people of Goodwill in this country really actually want to be good allies and really don't know how and just kind of don't know anything. I mean, it's just a level of ignorance is really deep and you know, like what I see we started this conversation with like, you know would be Goldbergs comments, which you know, these aren't these are not people. Ooh, necessarily like not the level enter anything. Like they just don't. I think though that this is a moment where we do have the power to flip this narrative. That's wonderful. And what I mean by that is, you know, you've seen how that's happened for other minority groups who have been able to do this and I actually think that going back to the when I talk about the beginning of our
conversation about that High School history. Textbook. What is that high school has a history textbook. Actually did include the content of to our civilization and that was what people weren't in school. Think about how that would change. Everything about everything about the way people would approach living Jews today and I will tell I'm going to I'm going to end up with this a little more of an optimistic story. I know I'm not much of an optimist in this book. Oh, no. I wish I was actually going to say in this is good. Give us something to be hopeful for and that's not be probably Anna's but let's hopefully have an antidote to some of the wells. Don't what I want to suggest is that there's a lot that non-jews can learn from the creative resilience of Jewish civilization. Ian and that this is an enormous gift that we shouldn't keep to ourselves. And I say we shouldn't keep ourselves. Of course. I'm aware of a lot of the, The Riches of this civilization, many Jews who grew up very assimilated.
Don't know it either. But, you know, this. There's but what I want to suggest is that non-jews who even have the most passing awareness of this, The Riches of this culture. See, immediately? What it could give to them. So, I mean, basic things like the idea of Shabbat, how much could conversations? We have Shabbat Sabbath rights party conversation. We have in public in public discourse about how do we need to have time to unplug? You know, you need to have time to step back from the Mater, you know, from being tied to your phone. Just been doing that for thousands of years. Right? Right. And that's a spiritual Justice thing. The Sabbath is a social justice thing because in the ancient world, Weezer was only for wealthy people. And the Sabbath is the Commandment that says everybody has to rest. Your Scrivens have to rest your animals have to rest right now. Weezer is a human, a human animal, right? To write at least there is a right right there. Everyone has, that is a social justice initiative.
So another thing that under the give you the little hopeful story is I mentioned earlier that I'm an academic five years ago, but an academic conference for Hebrew Scholars, okay, it was at University of Washington, Seattle. And, but this conference, everybody at this conference, was basically a Jewish academic who teaches Hebrew. Okay, except except three people who sat in the back of All the sessions of this conference taking careful notes. These three people were from the Wampanoag Nation. Wow. This on there in these are on Native Americans who are from Eastern, Massachusetts. Yeah that week that were famously murdered the people whose ancestors first encountered the pilgrims, right? Well, so Conference. Because their goal was to revive Wampanoag, language hasn't been spoken. How did been smoking for 250 years? And they were at this Hebrew conference because they said to us, we want to know how you did it, because Hebrew is the only language in the history of the world that has ever
been revived. From a deadline was too now. The spoken language of the Native spoken language of like 7 million people and they're like, if you could do it we could to we want to know how you did it. Tell us. Amazing. Well, here's the language. That's a live, right? In a in this haunted present as you call it a Dara. I want to thank you for this really invigorating conversation. Darrell horn wrote. It has a as written many books, but our latest is, people love dead Jews. And you need to read it. Everybody should read it. And as Dara so eloquently, just explain Jewish culture is everybody's culture. Its belongs to us. It's the cradle of civilization and we should all find a A place a comfortable little Nook right within that cradle there. You're welcome back here, anytime. Thanks so much. Thanks so much pleasure to speak with you. Thank you.