Creighton University Virtue-Signalling
Creighton University Virtue-Signalling
ADL Support for Retaliation Will Backfire
UPDATE: Ben Shapiro enters the fray. https://the4pm.com/houston-astros-75-million/
David Cole has now written his interesting take on the topic at:
https://www.takimag.com/article/kanyes-kancellation-the-devils-in-the-details/
Creighton University, for some reason or other, decided to take time to ban songs written by Kanye West, now known as Ye. The songs are not anti-Semitic but because West made anti-Semitic statements in a recent rant, somehow the songs became evil and are unacceptable for public events. Suggestion for the University: perhaps you should be more focused on students in abusive relationships, or campus crime instead of the latest news from your Twitter account. All you have done with your action is encouraged people to buy West’s albums and songs. Antisemitism is a problem in Omaha as well as Nebraska as shown on the Anti-Defamation League website below. Ye is hardly the problem here.
Yes, West’s anti-Semitic rant is disgusting and is rightly condemned. Some say free speech must have consequences, but what consequences are acceptable, and what consequences are not acceptable?
Unfortunately, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) appears to be going the way of the Southern Poverty Law Center in trying to raise money over every little scandal if not creating a scandal out of nothing while at the same time fostering division and extremism. These organizations rightly focused on defamation, and violent extremism but because they wanted to grow, they broadened their choice of targets going after any signs of hate and lost sight of the anti-Semites. When Trump first got off the escalator in running for President, their partisanship kicked in and suddenly words changed and the focus went to “white nationalists”, a vague term creating a vast array of targets including, Afghani refugees, Iranian-Americans, India-Americans, and Jews. Ignoring the antisemitism growing on the left (as shown on the map in liberal Omaha above) and labeling the Alt-Right as “white nationalists” instead of anti-Semites resulted in a whole bunch of poor assumptions and bad decisions. Other individuals have followed the lead to further extremes in attacking white people (https://nypost.com/2021/11/24/darrell-brooks-called-for-violence-against-white-people/).
The hypocrisy is thick from attacking “historic revisionism” to “hate”. The end result sounds like “I hate neo-Nazis and the KKK” without anyone picking up on the contradiction. Let me break it down for you: “I hate hate-filled groups”. Bathing in a thick soup of hypocrisy is what it is. How can the Anti-Defamation League ignore the fact that hate is part of the human condition and is not necessarily the source of the problem? There is a time for hate (https://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/16464/jewish/Chapter-3.htm). The focus must be on the extremism, the violence, and the defamation, not necessarily mere words or stupid ideas.
Today, whenever the US flag is brought to the center of civic events, some Colin Kaepernick-wannabes will probably take a knee, ignoring all the Black soldiers in the Union Army who fought under the US flag (https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/united-states-history-primary-source-timeline/civil-war-and-reconstruction-1861-1877/african-american-soldiers-during-the-civil-war/) while accusing critics of being “white nationalists” and “haters”.
So back to West, or Ye as he now calls himself. The attack on Ye appears partisan as Ye has been known to be a Trump supporter. The response to him should have a sense of proportionality and mercy, and not be retaliatory. Unfortunately, Adidas cut ties with Ye because the ADL requested it (https://www.adl.org/resources/letter/adl-letter-adidas-executives-regarding-kanye-west). In other words, ADL supports disproportional, punitive, partisan retaliation. There is no sense of mercy, forgiveness, reconciliation, a call for reform, or avenue to appeal. Their action is reactionary and done in haste as it looks like a high-tech lynching. Ye, being a billionaire, will merely take his money somewhere else while gaining support from anti-Semites.
Jonathan Greenblatt, the CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, is a Democrat and served in the Democrat Presidential administrations of Clinton and Obama and has made the organization more partisan. He plays his tea-leaf reading game for partisan hate (https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2022/10/17/adls_greenblatt_when_trump_says_before_its_too_late_it_sounds_like_a_threat_to_jews_already_threatened.html) yet he has fallen for the same sort of trap he sets for others when he compared Elon Musk to anti-Semite Henry Ford (https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/article-719178). Greenblatt fails to address his own partisanship which stems from Trump's criticism of partisan American Jews. Did he forget he and Trump backed President Clinton? As Trump is on Gab, here is how an anti-Semite on Gab (one of many) responded to the Trump posting Greenblatt takes issue with.
Greenblatt really should rethink what he is doing with the ADL. The broad attacks on West remind me of what was done to Roseanne Barr (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roseanne_Barr), Alex Jones (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones), and Mel Gibson (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alex_Jones). These are examples of puritanical extremism where if a person is not perfect in every way, they must be shunned and exiled. Such extremism is wrong and needs to be condemned as much as defamation, and violence against people.