Guest Column: Examining the historical ‘ugliness’ of racial hatred

By Letter to the Editor on November 19, 2018.

Re: The recent mass shooting at a synagogue in Pittsburgh

Just how long has this phenomena of anti-Semitism — often reaching genocidal proportions and rearing its ugly head more frequently recently again — been around and why? Why does the Hebrew race suffer so often from this seemingly senseless hatred and antagonism.

A while ago I finally decided to study that ‘weird’ — if that word is even adequate to describe that bit of extreme historical ugliness — hatred for one particular race, to see how long it had been around. It turns out to have been around since time immemorial, well into the time of the pharaohs and beyond. There have been so many attempts at excusing this now-so- ancient fear and hatred: Their love of ‘filthy lucre’ — quoting the Bible here — being only one of them. The fact that Jewish people were not allowed to join any trade guilds, to own land, etc., but were only allowed to do that then-looked-down-upon money-handling, or to become physicians, also not a very popular profession, or to study and practice law again, a very disliked profession.

So, they became very good at the only professions they were allowed to practice. What’s more, the rulers of the day, be they kings or whatever, often had their many wars financed by those ‘despised’ Jewish banking houses … these banking houses knew better than to refuse such a secret request. Britain actually expelled the long suffering Jewish people from at least England, some time ago. But that doesn’t explain that fear and hatred of Jewish folks that reaches way back into ancient times.

So, here is my theory: They were created way smarter, far more intelligent, more talented, more creative, the women folk far more attractive, all of the race much more clever, etc., etc. We all know , don’t we, that those ‘types’ must be hammered down. I learned, for example, that that kind of hatred most definitely supersedes the old myth that it all started with the the crucifixion of Christ by the Jews, a story that I have had to listen to since I first attended church, usually a Protestant Christian church. I’m sure one would also hear that in a Roman Catholic sermon. At least the Catholic Church is now making efforts at reconciling with the Jewish race and state.

One Lutheran pastor I remember literally tended to use a totally different tone and look that expressed the contempt that he must have felt whenever the crucifixion of Christ and the Jews’ purported role in it came up in some sermon. (Does a anyone know that even Martin Luther was anti-semitically inclined?) Then I also learned that Jewish people were often in the forefront of social advances, of more compassionate changes … it’s all in the history books. The folks who still feel that awful way about Jewish people should perhaps study ‘unrevisionist’ history.

I’ve also come up with an addition to the well known philosophies of democratic socialism, capitalism, Hitlerism, fascism, communism, etc. etc. That is Trumpism. That man, Trump, is making me feel ashamed to be of German birth. His grandfather was German, his father was German and that Trump, president of what is rapidly turning into a Trumpistan, home of a lying president, is half German, not Swedish as he has often claimed.

I’m just surprised that no one has seemed to pick up on that, considering how often we Germans are blamed for all kinds of ‘mischief,’ not necessarily unfounded.

Has it occurred to anyone that Mr. Trump’s words and rhetoric are very likely at least partly, if not totally, responsible for the again rising tide of nationalism, populism, extreme right wing activities and even anti-Semitism?

I’ve often wondered about the intelligence of the collection of people that one sees behind Trump at his frequent narcissistic rallies, haven’t any of you?

Ted Kohlmetz is a retired citizen of Medicine Hat

12
-11