I’m not going to be afraid to say it. And while I am going to put this one to rest, I won’t do so quite yet. It used to be that, on the left at large and on the Jewish right, the term Nazi got thrown around any which way to tag someone or something one didn’t happen to like. Today, with actual Nazis now front and center, it’s no longer an analogy. That means what? If you intentionally drummed up that part of the Trump base with racist, anti-Semitic, and misogynist red meat, if you bring into your campaign for leadership a person who was proud to give the Nazi alt-right a “platform,” if you then install that person into the Administration, then that makes you a Nazi collaborator. The Trump team is going to walk back all the hate they unleashed as campaign rhetoric, but let’s not beat around the bush. When Trump “condemns” these people, he can’t even name them; and as the rightwinger like to say about “Islamic extremism,” you can’t fight the phenomenon if you refuse to even name it. They are the ones who let this loose on the world. They gave it the platform. Hypocrites, if you are Jewish and you voted for Trump or worked to get him elected, it doesn’t matter that you are Jewish. You have aided and abetted. You have made common political cause with Nazis. You have worked to create an end together with them. One can say this with no special animus, as a technical designation. Technically, this collaboration makes you a Jewish Nazi collaborator.
- Zachary Braiterman is Professor of Religion in the Department of Religion at Syracuse University. His specialization is modern Jewish thought and philosophical aesthetics. Facebook | Twitter | Academia.edu.
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Niwdog’s Law —
As the percentage of Nazis in a population increases, the
probability that someone will mention it approaches 1.00.