are communists necessarily anti-semitic?

[Skeptic]

Cindy Sheehan, who's son was killed in Iraq said her son "died for Israel".

At least she has the excuse of having gone round the bend because of a terrible trauma. What's the excuse of those who do it voluntarily?

 

[Taarkin]

Whole lotta posts not defending the notion that communism is intrinsically antisemitic ITT.

 

[WildCat]

Whole lotta posts not defending the notion that communism is intrinsically antisemitic ITT.

Can you link to any communist criticisms of the blatant and rampant anti-semitism regularly found on PA or Hamas controlled media outlets? If not, why do you think these self-proclaimed enemies of racism ignore some of the most blatant examples in the world today, and indeed champion the cause of those engaged in it?

 

[Kaylee]

Capitalist kibbutz? Isn't that an oxymoron? If the Wiki article is accurate I would say that at least 72% of the kibbutzim no longer fit the communist model.

Let me say, as an Israeli: True, they don't. They are now no longer communist. But the idea is that it tries to keep the "spirit" of the place alive: e.g., small rural communities, more communal involvement between the members than in regular villages / towns, a communal dining room, etc., etc.

Skeptic, thanks for your input as an Israeli. I like the idea of more community involvement but I imagine it can be difficult at times. I suppose it all depends upon whether most of the adults act maturely or like a bunch of cliquish high school students.

I worked on a kibbutz for about 6 weeks in the early 1980s which helped make a 12 week vacation (well 6 weeks of it was a vacation) much more affordable. The kibbutzers were friendly but reserved. Understandable as there had been many temporary people before us ( I traveled with a group of people) and there would be many temporary people after us. Never got a real insider's sense of the place, but most of the members seemed happy to be living there, as far as I could tell.

I have worked on several committees and know several people who own coops which are run by committees. I realize that is not anywhere the same thing as a kibbutz, for one thing the scope of of power is narrower than most kibbutz's -- but its probably the closest hands on experience I have to what a kibbutz member's experience would be. IMHO, a well run committee is a marvelous thing, a committee that gets absorbed in petty bickering is a form of hell on earth.

==

To make my post more pertinent to the OP, AFAICT, most communists governments don't have a system of checks and balances*. Like the saying says, "power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. "

A small group of people given absolute power often demonstrates how monstrous people can get when given the opportunity.

I would say that the USSR was not only anti-semitic but anti-people. How many people did Stalin kill? How many ended up in the Siberian concentration camps?

When one group is discriminated against with so much prejudice, usually some other groups are being discriminated against also. I think one can compare a discriminated against group like a canary in a coal mine. If the canary is in trouble, its just a matter of time till some or even all people in the mine also start getting into trouble.

AFAIK, there weren't any Jews in China or Viet Nam during the 20th Century, but the the communists party in those countries also had unchecked power and many people were unjustly imprisoned in indoctrination camps.

To sum up, IMHO, a communist govt set up without checks and balances is basically going to be "anti-people", with the focus on the local minorities -- whoever the minorities happen to be in that country.

In the USSR I agree ancient cultural habits held fast and Jews were among the people that the Soviets discriminated against even after they had changed their form of govt from a monarchy to communism.


* ETA: Is anyone aware of a communist government that does have a good system of checks and balances?

 

[WildCat]

* ETA: Is anyone aware of a communist government that does have a good system of checks and balances?

They all do, just ask any communist. Of course, they will also tell you that there has never been a True Communist^TM government ever.

Of course, I would argue that while small communes can work it is impossible to scale them up to encompass an entire country without reverting to the typical totalitarian communist state of which we are all familiar, complete with gulags and re-education camps and severe restrictions of freedom of speech and the press and religion.

 

[Skeptic]

Skeptic, thanks for your input as an Israeli. I like the idea of more community involvement but I imagine it can be difficult at times. I suppose it all depends upon whether most of the adults act maturely or like a bunch of cliquish high school students.

Tell me about it. For the record, there have been kibbutzim which have split in two due to massive in-fighting between groups of "fans" of various socialist leaders of the Kibbutz movement. Indeed the kibbutz movement as a whole split into three (or four) competing "streams", each one collecting those kibbutzim which fit exactly with its ideological views.

Cliquish high school students' got nothing on those guys.

I worked on a kibbutz for about 6 weeks in the early 1980s which helped make a 12 week vacation (well 6 weeks of it was a vacation) much more affordable. The kibbutzers were friendly but reserved. Understandable as there had been many temporary people before us ( I traveled with a group of people) and there would be many temporary people after us. Never got a real insider's sense of the place, but most of the members seemed happy to be living there, as far as I could tell.

On the whole humans like living in such relatively small connected groups, for all their faults -- we are built to live in tribes, not atomistically, by evolution. Their reserve might have had, by the way, to do also with their fear of the reputation kibbutz members have, or had, abroad -- as some sort of superhuman commando fighters and/or crpto-anarchists. The relation to reality is about the same as the relation of an actual New Yorker to the people in the movie "Taxi Driver", or of actual US soldiers to Rambo.

Your other points require a serious answer, I will try to get to it tomorrow.

 

[Praktik]

AFAIK, there weren't any Jews in China or Viet Nam during the 20th Century, but the the communists party in those countries also had unchecked power and many people were unjustly imprisoned in indoctrination camps.

To sum up, IMHO, a communist govt set up without checks and balances is basically going to be "anti-people", with the focus on the local minorities -- whoever the minorities happen to be in that country.

In the USSR I agree ancient cultural habits held fast and Jews were among the people that the Soviets discriminated against even after they had changed their form of govt from a monarchy to communism.

Excellent points. The fear in Stalin's mind was of any particular national identity that could compete with the communist ideology of state. Stalin was paranoid that these nationalist/tribalistic/ethnic kind of feelings could subsume one's loyalty to the state and its directives. Even Stalin's own Georgia was problematic for Moscow in this respect...

You can also see the same dynamic at play in China with the different ethnic identities in the periphery, the Uzgurs and the Tibetan people come to mind.

 

[Mycroft]

Whole lotta posts not defending the notion that communism is intrinsically antisemitic ITT.

Would you agree there is a strong positive correlation?

 

[WildCat]

You can also see the same dynamic at play in China with the different ethnic identities in the periphery, the Uzgurs and the Tibetan people come to mind.

Although that can be an advantage in certain circumstances. For example, the troops China used to massacre protestors in Tiananmen Square were from the hinterlands, far away from Beijing. They spoke a Chinese dialect those in Beijing couldn't even understand. Much easier to kill protestors who you don't identify with.

 

[HansMustermann]

Would you agree there is a strong positive correlation?

Really? Probably there were more communists in Asia (starting with China) than in the USSR and all Eastern Europe combined. Exactly how much antisemitism do you find in China? Vietnam? Kambodia?

 

[Mycroft]

Really? Probably there were more communists in Asia (starting with China) than in the USSR and all Eastern Europe combined. Exactly how much antisemitism do you find in China? Vietnam? Kambodia?

That sounds almost like a concession that there is a strong positive correlation among European communists. Is it?



Edited to add:

And honestly I have no idea the levels of antisemitism in China and other Asian countries, but a quick Google search suggests it's greater than zero:

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/02/china-anti-semitic-conspiracy-theories-and-wall-street/

About a year and half ago, a book titled “The Currency War” came out in China. It was written by a Chinese graduate student who returned from the United States. The book was anti-Semitic and probably the most fantastic “conspiracy theory” about Wall Street. The basic claim was that the Rothschilds and other Jews wanted to control the world by manipulating the international financial system. The book read more like a script for a James Bond movie than a serious dissertation on Wall Street.

 

[Praktik]

Although that can be an advantage in certain circumstances. For example, the troops China used to massacre protestors in Tiananmen Square were from the hinterlands, far away from Beijing. They spoke a Chinese dialect those in Beijing couldn't even understand. Much easier to kill protestors who you don't identify with.

Thats an interesting fact I was not aware of!

 

[Praktik]

Edited to add:

And honestly I have no idea the levels of antisemitism in China and other Asian countries, but a quick Google search suggests it's greater than zero:

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/02/china-anti-semitic-conspiracy-theories-and-wall-street/

Certainly, though I think if we're going to get into this seriously we need to start differentiating between forms of antisemitism. For instance, my sister, her husband, a close friend and others I know subscribe to the above ideas - usually just mentioning "Rothschild" without specific reference to the jewishness of that name. For them, to accuse them of antisemitism is merely to employ a tool of state to silence dissent, and they'll assure you they are not anti-semitic.

And the one guy most deep into this is marrying a Jew actually... family still practices and he's all good with it. This I term "anti-semitism light", almost like the way with disease there are people who are carriers and don't become sick themselves... but can unintentionally spread disease when these ideas find the right (or wrong) host.

All of this to point out of course, that evidence of anti-semitic ideas in China is no evidence of their correlation - let alone causational relationship - with communist political ideology.

None of these people I know have been exposed to much genuine communism.

 

[Kaylee]

They all do, just ask any communist. Of course, they will also tell you that there has never been a True Communist^TM government ever.

Of course, I would argue that while small communes can work it is impossible to scale them up to encompass an entire country without reverting to the typical totalitarian communist state of which we are all familiar, complete with gulags and re-education camps and severe restrictions of freedom of speech and the press and religion.

I agree.

Interestingly enough, there are examples of socialist small organizations in the USA also. (Because they are small businesses that are cooperatively owned, I don't think they are large enough in scope to be considered communist. But I cheerfully admit that I'm not an expert on the subject.)

New York City, for some reason, has a handful of food coops. One of the better known ones is in Park Slope, Brooklyn.

Basically, this is a grocery store run for and by members only. Per their FAQ, each members must contribute $100.00 (one time only) to the Coop and work about 3 hours a month. They estimate savings of about 20 - 40% off a typical grocery store bill.

I think sometimes small organizations like this make sense and I'd like to see some people try to create a medical coop organization for routine medical care. Cutting out the health insurance companies and advertising for routine medical care would be more efficient and save a great deal of money IMHO. I also think that eliminating employers from most health care transactions would even out the cost of routine health care for most people. I'd prefer universal health care, but it would be interesting to see how successful this approach could be. /off topic

 

[Kaylee]

<snip>
You can also see the same dynamic at play in China with the different ethnic identities in the periphery, the Uzgurs and the Tibetan people come to mind.

Great examples!

 

[Kaylee]

Really? Probably there were more communists in Asia (starting with China) than in the USSR and all Eastern Europe combined. Exactly how much antisemitism do you find in China? Vietnam? Kambodia?

That sounds almost like a concession that there is a strong positive correlation among European communists. Is it?



Edited to add:

And honestly I have no idea the levels of antisemitism in China and other Asian countries, but a quick Google search suggests it's greater than zero:

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/02/china-anti-semitic-conspiracy-theories-and-wall-street/

AFAIK, many Asian countries don't have that many Jews. Hans, you mentioned China, Vietnam and Cambodia. AFAIK, most of the few Jews in Vietnam and Cambodia are ex-pats from other countries. Usually, if a majority is going to be prejudiced against a minority, I think a prerequisite is that you need at least enough around to make it worthwhile.


FWIW, I thought this wiki article was interesting -- I read it very quickly but it seems that to whatever extent Jewish ex-pats encountered anti-semitic problems in Viet Nam, it was from other ex-pats and not native Vietnamese.

And in the 1970s, Israel took in hundreds of non-Jewish Vietnameses refugees after the end of the Viet Nam war.

==

As far as China goes, historically it seems that Chinese Jews had no problems and that may be why they almost completely assimilated.

A wiki article about the history of the Jews in Kaifeng, a Jewish community that probably got started around 960 CE. Per the article, by the 20th Century while there remained several hundred Jews who were still aware of their Jewish heritage -- their awareness has been assimilated down to not eating pork and remembering a holiday or two such as Chanukah.

More recently, there were Jews in Shanghai. Thousands of Eastern European Jews fled to Shanghai from Nazi Germany found despite the fact that at the time the city was under the control of the Japanese, allies of the Germans. Proof that the Japenese didn't share this particular prejudice with the Nazis. One reason is probably that while their were Jews in Japan, they were not a large enough minority to attract prejudice.

==

I believe that prejudice is usually all about dirty politics. It distracts people from the real problems and intimidates them into toeing the line set by the powerful people in their society least they share the fate of those unfairly discriminated against. For a minority to be suitable for that role, they do need to be a minority -- but they must be numerous enough to be noticeable.

As I posted upthread, Communist governments usually don't have checks and balances and as a result the people in power will often act in monstrous ways including playing politics with extreme prejudice. In Eastern Europe Jews hit the sweet spot in overall population percentages to be a target group -- in Asia they did not. IMHO, that's why some communist governments in Europe will engage in anti-semitism but Asian governments usually won't.

 

[HansMustermann]

That sounds almost like a concession that there is a strong positive correlation among European communists. Is it?

I could get into how that's a not what was claimed in the first place in the thread anyway, but the more relevant objection is: Do you even understand what a correlation is? At all? Because I have a feeling that nobody still harping on that silly idea has the foggiest idea of statistics.

To claim such a correlation, you'd have to basically not just show that you found a couple of high profile examples which were both, but basically that percentage of antisemite communists is higher than by chance alone, i.e., higher than the product of the probability to be a communist multiplied by the probability to be an anti-semite in the general population. Or in simpler terms that the communists are more anti-semitic than the average for the general population in the same countries.

Do you think you can make such a case? Were, say, Soviet Russia more antisemitic than Tsarist Russia? The anti-commies in that revolution actually did do a few pogroms, you know?

Really, go ahead. If you want to claim a correlation, fine, let's see an actual correlation. I don't see anyone who was harping on that silliness doing anything even remotely like a real correlation, because essentially I see no comparison to the baseline. Which is kinda essential.

Edited to add:

And honestly I have no idea the levels of antisemitism in China and other Asian countries, but a quick Google search suggests it's greater than zero:

http://economix.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/10/02/china-anti-semitic-conspiracy-theories-and-wall-street/

Oh yes, ONE guy from China wrote an anti-semitic book, and you don't know if he's even a communist, so that's obvious correlation Not.

Try again.

 

[HansMustermann]

AFAIK, many Asian countries don't have that many Jews. Hans, you mentioned China, Vietnam and Cambodia. AFAIK, most of the few Jews in Vietnam and Cambodia are ex-pats from other countries. Usually, if a majority is going to be prejudiced against a minority, I think a prerequisite is that you need at least enough around to make it worthwhile.

BUT, read the thread title. If it actually were necessary to be antisemitic to be a communist, it would mean just that: communists everywhere, including in China, Vietnam, Cambodia and North Korea would be antisemitic. Heck, even those 16% Jews among the Communist Party delegates in 1917 would necessarily be anti-semitic.

What I'm saying is that the whole thing is BS.

 

[Mycroft]

I could get into how that's a not what was claimed in the first place in the thread anyway, but the more relevant objection is: Do you even understand what a correlation is? At all? Because I have a feeling that nobody still harping on that silly idea has the foggiest idea of statistics.

Yes, I understand what correlation is and yes, I understand statistics. You're the one who presented the existence of Asian communism as evidence that overall communists would be less anti-Semitic, presumably because their levels of anti-Semitism would be watered down by the non-anti-Semitic Asians. If that's not what you meant, then please clarify.

To claim such a correlation, you'd have to basically not just show that you found a couple of high profile examples which were both, but basically that percentage of antisemite communists is higher than by chance alone, i.e., higher than the product of the probability to be a communist multiplied by the probability to be an anti-semite in the general population. Or in simpler terms that the communists are more anti-semitic than the average for the general population in the same countries.

Do you think you can make such a case? Were, say, Soviet Russia more antisemitic than Tsarist Russia? The anti-commies in that revolution actually did do a few pogroms, you know?

Really, go ahead. If you want to claim a correlation, fine, let's see an actual correlation. I don't see anyone who was harping on that silliness doing anything even remotely like a real correlation, because essentially I see no comparison to the baseline. Which is kinda essential.

So in your opinion communist anti-Semitism would be comparable to baseline anti-Semitism?

Oh yes, ONE guy from China wrote an anti-semitic book, and you don't know if he's even a communist, so that's obvious correlation Not.

Try again.

Right. Which is why my claim that Asian (not communist) anti-Semitism was greater than zero. Exactly appropriate to the evidence presented.

 

[bikerdruid]

Why is it that you only care to support Palestinians? Aren't there other peoples out there in the world that are in urgent need?

There's a Syrian refugee crisis looming for instance.

Isn't it that supporting the deadlock Palestinian cause gives you a free pass to bash Jews?

dude...the israel/palestinian thread is that a way>>>>>
this topic is based on a wild, and as yet unsubstantiated, claim by skeptic that communists are jew haters.