Now that we have a #BLEXIT, maybe it’s time for a #JEXIT.
That is what came to mind when I watched the self-described liberal and progressive Jews protesting Donald and Melania Trump on POTUS and FLOTUS’ visit to express condolences for the victims at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life Synagogue.
#BLEXIT, many of us know now, is a new movement, largely initiated by Candace Owens (who may have jumped the shark a bit re: Kanye West, but that’s the subject of another discussion) imploring blacks to get off the liberal plantation that has done them no good for nigh on to fifty years. It’s #BLEXIT as in #BREXIT and the personal testimonials on their website are a revelation. (Watch them!)
Blacks and Jews were allies during the days of the Civil Rights Movement, but that went South a while ago, as we know. But despite Farrakhan et al, they aren’t that far apart ideologically, even today.
Both groups are comprised too largely of the most slavish liberal/progressive conformists [bold deliberate]. These days, Jews and blacks share a rigid conformity straight out of the theme from the 1963’s Patty Duke Show: “They laugh alike, they walk alike, at times they even talk alike. You can lose your mind … when cousins are two of a kind!”
You definitely could lose your mind with this knee-jerk conformity. You could lose your country as well.
Blacks at least have the excuse of having been an exploited underclass, although relying on such excuses does you no good and impedes progress, in fact encourages the reverse.
You would think the Jews, with their emphasis on education, might know better. But again these days, there’s no greater conformist than a Harvard professor or some Jewish columnist for the Washington Post. Their views are stupefyingly predictable.
Of course, conformity breeds group think breeds blindness. The idea that Donald Trump caused the horrific killings at the synagogue is nothing short of absurd, especially since the perpetrator was a Trump hater who thought the president was in league with the Jews.
Ironically, the demonstrators, in that sense, agree with the homicidal anti-Semite Bowers because they too loathe Trump. And yet more ironically, Bowers has a point: Trump is the most pro-Israel president of all time with the possible exception of Truman. But the demonstrators don’t care about that because their attitudes toward Israel, despite its miraculous success, are at best ambivalent and often hostile.
A litany of Trump’s pro-Jewish actions creates cognitive dissonance for them. They can’t even look at it, even though, besides moving the embassy to Jerusalem, something promised by several presidents before him who reneged, his administration is filled with more Jews at high levels than any before. To name just a few: Steve Menuchin (secretary of the Treasury) and Larry Kudlow (director of the NEC) – both of whom had their hands in the current boom – Senior Advisor Stephen Miller, Special Assistant to the president Paul Teller, Jason Greenblatt (lead negotiator for a Palestinian-Israeli settlement), Ambassador David Friedman, son-in-law Jared Kushner, daughter Ivanka and several Jewish grandchildren who, at least for now, are not involved in government. There are many more, obviously.
He also, as we know, pulled out of the Iran deal of “Death to America! Death to Israel fame!” This withdrawal is looking particularly good today.
All these victories that should normally warm the hearts of Jews enrage these Jewish demonstrators. The question arises – what’s wrong with these people? Why are they so angry?
As the song goes, “If they asked me, I could write a book…” (and I think I will) and, yes, the folks obviously could cite a list of reasons for their disdain (he didn’t speak up quickly enough for them on Charlottesville, etc., etc.), but I don’t think that’s it. It’s deeper than that and even if Charlottesville had never happened, they would be the same way.
A lot of course stems from generations of left-leaning habit and a monumental fear of change with its attendant loss of friends, family, employment. That’s where much of conformity comes from. But that doesn’t account for the anger in and of itself. Nor does the lack of serious religion, Jewish or otherwise, although that clearly contributes.
When I see these demonstrators, I see people who are very depressed, truly unhappy people whose anger could never be assuaged, folks with a cosmic emptiness of a sort. They need something to protest, always, to feel alive in their search for a utopia that could never be achieved. If it weren’t Trump, it would be someone or something else. There is a narcissistic wound as deep as the Mariana Trench.
I am going to say something now that will generate even more enemies, as if I didn’t have enough. These people make me think of Berlin in the 1930s, why things happened the way they happened. They would never fight back.
I am a Jew and proud of it and these people break my heart more than any in the world.
Roger L. Simon – co-founder and CEO Emeritus of PJ Media – is an author and screenwriter.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member