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Go Home Special Attention New Yorkers! Bernard Henri-levy Speaks On...

THE SPINE APRIL 4, 2008

Special Attention New Yorkers! Bernard Henri-levy Speaks On Sunday Night

BY MARTIN PERETZ

There are many observances of the 60th anniversary of the independence of Israel that have already taken place and there is a long list of others to come. Especially in New York. But I've been involved in the planning of one that I believe will be intellectually cutting-edge and politically significant. Bernard Henri-Levy, the brilliant and highly controversial French intellectual, whose writings appear frequently in TNR and TNR on-line, will be the speaker. His topic is "The Strange Experience of Jewish Sovereignty." Why does an independent Israel rile so many states and countries? Why does it threaten so many "humanistic" intellectuals and especially Jewish intellectuals? I've discussed this matter with Bernard, who is an old friend, and his is a very provocative take.

The talk will be held on Sunday, April 6, at 7 p.m. at YIVO-Institute for Jewish Research, 15 West 16th Street (between Fifth and Sixth Avenues), New York City. Tickets are available at the door. Remember the date and time: this coming Sunday, April 6, at 7 p.m.

The meeting with be chaired by another frequent contributor to TNR, Paul Berman, the author of Terror and Liberalism, and a learned commentator on the Middle East.

I do hope to see you there.

By the way, there will be a showing of Otto Preminger's momentous film EXODUS (starring Paul Newman, Eva Marie Saint, Ralph Richardson, Sal Mineo, David Opatashu) at 1 P.M. with a panel discussion including Nathan Lee and Noah Harlan.

I hope to see you there.

 

 

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142 comments

Marty will be there in person? Wow..  Might be worth a trip in from the burbs to meet the man himself

Out of curosity, why are these things always in NYC, and not in Torrington CT?  The latter would be much more convient for Tembrach

NYC intellecutals might enjoy a trip to post industrial America, seeing the empty factories and the unemployed proles who wander the streets.

- tembrach

April 4, 2008 at 1:06pm

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Will the talk be webcasted, Marty?

- jacksondyer

April 4, 2008 at 1:31pm

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The description of the talk at the YIVO Institute goes:

"Levy brings his formidable intellect to the questions : Why does the new Jewish sovereignty rattle many Gentiles? Why does it rattle many Jews?"

Both questions are predicated on malicious falsehoods -- which Bernard Henri-Levy would understand if he really had a "formidable intellect."  In fact, the title bears a strong resemblance to some dufous debate title at the Oxford Union designed merely to garner public attention and not to be taken seriousl. Furthermore, the talk is introduced by Paul "I was always against the Iraqi war I just didn't tell anyone" Berman so I don't know how much of his introduction I would trust.

www.yivo.org/.../index.php

- ndmackenzie

April 4, 2008 at 2:31pm

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Thanks Marty - I may take you up on this, I get alot out of both of these writers.  DOES Jewish sovereignty rattle Gentiles?  If so, why?  Good God, why?

I wonder if anyone will discuss the Atlantic cover this month. I reached in to my mailbox and was startled when I brought out the magazine screaming at me "IS ISRAEL FINISHED?" by Jeffrey Goldberg. It seems like a harrowing read, destined to make me anxious.  I'm sure all Spinesters know more about this wrter and topic than I ever will, but:

I think I'll wait until next week, Fridays are for reading that calms me.

Thank you again Marty!

- Wandreycer1

April 4, 2008 at 2:51pm

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Neil Nazi mackenzie is showing his Jew-envy again.

Hey bigot Yivo is not a place for the likes of you. It's not for people whose sympathies are with those who helped destroy the Jewish people in Europe.

So take you trashy hatefilled posts, elsewhere, asshole.

- jacksondyer

April 4, 2008 at 3:37pm

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"Furthermore, the talk is introduced by Paul "I was always against the Iraqi war I just didn't tell anyone" Berman so I don't know how much of his introduction I would trust."

As if Nazi Mackenzie would trust any Jew unless he was a pretentious self hating asshole like Yiglesias.

- jacksondyer

April 4, 2008 at 3:41pm

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"I wonder if anyone will discuss the Atlantic cover this month. I reached in to my mailbox and was startled when I brought out the magazine screaming at me "IS ISRAEL FINISHED?" by Jeffrey Goldberg."

Not only is Israel not finished, it'll still be aroung long after the Jew hater Mackenzie and all other Jews haters are  dead.  

The title is probably an allusion to Olmert's comment that Israel needs to implement the two State solution or it is finished.  A two State solution is the right way to go, but within without it Israel is not finished.

To paraphrase Shakespeare:  If you can still say  “This is the end t,” then it's not the end  yet."

- jacksondyer

April 4, 2008 at 3:49pm

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Jacksondyer,  as my father one said to me when I was being especially polemical

"you'll find that you attract more bees with honey than vingar.."

- tembrach

April 4, 2008 at 5:12pm

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I wish I was in New York for this.

- CRS9TNR

April 4, 2008 at 8:40pm

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tembrach, true if you want to attract bees.

But if you want to repel them?

Neil (I didn't support bin laden or Saddam but didn't tell anyone) Mackenzie isn't anyone I wish to attract. A two by four between his narowly focused eyes  should keep him a comforbale distance from me.

- jacksondyer

April 4, 2008 at 9:12pm

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jackson - I think by now all of us are sufficiently aware of your animus for ndmackenzie that it does not require ad nauseam repetition.  And most of us are probably smart enough to discount obvious biases and ignore the authors, so you are not unmasking a secret villain.  Beyond your polemical habits, I regard you as a well informed and cogent commenter.  I appreciate most of the content of your posts. But for me the insults and ad hominems are an unwanted distraction, which I would urge you to curtail.

- JackR

April 5, 2008 at 10:22am

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Marty--next time would you please give us notice?  I have free miles, and would have loved to use this as an opportunity to visit New York and see some very dear friends.  And hopefully get to give you a hello.  What can I say, I'm a fan.  

- MOLLYSIMON

April 5, 2008 at 12:16pm

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In that case, JackR, you'd be interested in this:

z-word.com/podcasts.html

Terry Glavin on anti-Zionism and the Canadian Left

posted april 2008 | 0:18 min. | 20.99 MB

"On the Z Word podcast: Terry Glavin discusses the politics of the Canadian anti-war movement with Z Word editor Ben Cohen."

It complements Paul Berman and Henri Levy's talk.

- jacksondyer

April 5, 2008 at 12:25pm

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Molly, if you were there I would surely cross the Atlantic to see you, leaving my wife and child behind me and falling in your arms.

We would have a "night on the town" (similar to the one in "The Purple Rose of Cairo") and forget about Henry-Levy (which I don't like very much, I confess: his book on America having been pretentiously written "on the footsteps of Tocqueville" only reveals that he is a pretentious dwarf before Tocqueville...)  

- luispc

April 5, 2008 at 1:05pm

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jacksondyer writes:

-- A two by four between his narowly focused eyes  should keep him a comforbale distance from me.

I am so deep inside jacksondyer's brain that he would have to hit himself on the head to get anywhere near me.

- ndmackenzie

April 5, 2008 at 2:35pm

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"...forget about Henry-Levy (which I don't like very much, I confess: his book on America having been pretentiously written "on the footsteps of Tocqueville" only reveals that he is a pretentious dwarf before Tocqueville...) "

I haven't read Levy's book about "America" since most Europeans even the ones who have spent some time here tend to misunderstand this country.  de Tocqueville was an exception, but then he was writing at a time when Western culture was less fragmented, more coherent, especially the United States.

However, Levy views about European culture especially its antisemitism are keenly perceptive.

This is what drives antisemites like Neil (some of my best friends are Jews) Mackenzie crazy.

- jacksondyer

April 5, 2008 at 3:58pm

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Oh, my, Luis, how you do go on (said in a Southern accent).  Nevertheless, New York never sleeps.  We would have a limo waiting for us outside the YIVO institute to spirit us off into the night.  Adventure, romance, and a five star meal--which I'd charge on my husband's Visa.  Ah, the conversation:  Plato, Socrates, and all  the lesser philosophers you favor.  And then you could try to convert me to Christianity.    

- MOLLYSIMON

April 5, 2008 at 4:03pm

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Neil Mackenzie is of no account. He is a nuissance who ones in a while comes here to take a crap  and stink up the place. That's what all his posts amount to. He is a walking talking cesspool.

- jacksondyer

April 5, 2008 at 4:03pm

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"I am so deep inside jacksondyer's brain that he would have to hit himself on the head to get anywhere near me."

:)

- The Ignorant Populist

April 5, 2008 at 4:26pm

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There would not be philosophy or religion. I would only say things such as the ones said in "The Purple Rose of Cairo". Something like "the moon will be out, the stars will be bright and we'll wonder all night". And you would answer "I've got just the dress to wear".

It's only a piety it is Sunday night (a lousy night to go out everywhere).

Hey, I've got one idea: perhaps one should make it a romantic Thursday night in Buenos Aires. Oh, how I love Buenos Aires. That's a place where some romantic atmosphere can still be lived.

PS: Hey Jack is there an open bar at that place where B H-L is going to make his conference? If there is, you should take not one, but five or six. Yes, you do need a drink in order to get ndmackenzie out of your mind. You talk like a couple out of a really bitter, disputed to the last dime, divorce.

- luispc

April 5, 2008 at 4:51pm

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Good thinking--Argentina is the only place left with a strong dollar.

- MOLLYSIMON

April 5, 2008 at 6:10pm

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Hey Lou, does your  mulher know that you are off the reservation  looking to ride a different filly?

- jacksondyer

April 5, 2008 at 8:12pm

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If not, you can tell her. Hey Mr. What if I was a jewish and "mulher" was a hebrew word? Anti-what?

- luispc

April 6, 2008 at 4:26am

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Lui is desperate for a retort.

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 9:33am

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My dear old Jackson, how you make me laugh and how I missed a fight with you (this one pales in comparison to others, but I'm a big boy now and must control myself)

Now, calm down and prepare yourself to watch Henri-Levy. And don't forget to use (and abuse) the open bar, if there is one. After a generous dose of alcohol and a nice hangover, come back to discuss with your friends.

But there are a few rules you must follow:

1) Not refer to ndmackenzie and actually follow your many times made promise of ignoring him/her;

2) Restrict the use of the word anti-semitism to cases of unquestionable evidence (something like a "presumption of inocence");

3) Refrain from feellings of anger and revenge. They are not good for your heart.

See? Today, I've already made a Sunday job that your Rabi was supposed to do. And just who will thank me?

- luispc

April 6, 2008 at 12:33pm

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Luis is still desperate for a retort.

When Luis is hard up for words he starts preaching. Since he preaches all the time...well draw your won conclusion.

Here is a rule for Luis to follow, refrain from giving advice to people who haven't asked for it. You could also benefit from learning to differentiate between the books you read about the world and the world itself. This isn’t advice, it’s merely an observation.  

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 1:41pm

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Getting back on topic:

Here is a talk Bernard Heny Levi on European antisemitism:

youtube.com/watch

"The Resurgence of Anti-Semitism in Europe"

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 1:50pm

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"You could also benefit from learning to differentiate between the books you read about the world and the world itself."

We could have such an interesting discussion about what precisely is "the world" for us human beings, if only you could accompany it...

Such a discussion would be very useful to find out exactly if the world of anti-semites that Jackson and Bernard Henri-Levy write about in their books and posts is the actual world (or is just the world that Jackson and Bernard Henri-Levy envision from their perspective...).

My dear friend, by this I do not mean to take any credibility from what you say. I just mean to say that one always sees, writes and reads about the world from a perspective. From another angle, without such a perspective there isn't really "a world". And that's precisely why, as Heidegger said, "only humans have world".

Oh, and am I "hard up for words"? No one had ever told me that,  Until now, I always thought that words were not really a problem.

- luispc

April 6, 2008 at 2:14pm

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Luis you are indulging yourself again in double talk.  Your reading of Heidegger leads you to believe in the obfuscations you peddle.

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 2:24pm

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Enough though about me or you:

What exactly did BH Levy say in his talk which is false?

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 2:25pm

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Didn't hear BH Levy talk. Have no patience.

- luispc

April 6, 2008 at 2:43pm

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Oh, and on those "obfuscations I peddle", I am glad to discuss any you're able to identify. Anyway, you could never really argument against any of such "obfuscations". Everytime you run out of arguments (which is everytime I discusse with you), either  you suggest that the forum is improper for such a discussion or you start insulting. So, keep believing in what you want to believe...

- luispc

April 6, 2008 at 2:47pm

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Obfuscation number one:

"We could have such an interesting discussion about what precisely is "the world" for us human beings, if only you could accompany it... "

Luis: "Oh, and on those "obfuscations I peddle", I am glad to discuss any you're able to identify."

This is typical Heideggerian double talk: 'let's talk about "the world" never about the world. Then there is the so called "human world" as if it were distinct from the world (sans quotes).

Give us a break your Heideggerianism is second rate and tiresome. Want to talk about Heidegger, fine. Start with telling us why he embraced the swastika and not about his "world." His "world" is not my world, it is the man made world ("the human world") of Nazi rallies and the "being towards death."

"Such a discussion would be very useful to find out exactly if the world of anti-semites that Jackson and Bernard Henri-Levy write about in their books and posts is the actual world (or is just the world that Jackson and Bernard Henri-Levy envision from their perspective...). "

I ask you again, what did BH Levy say in his talk that is not factually true?

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 3:01pm

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jacksondyer asks "what did BH Levy say in his talk that is not factually true?"

As I pointed earlier, even the YIVO Institute description of Levy's talk contains deliberate and malicious falsehoods:

"Levy brings his formidable intellect to the questions : Why does the new Jewish sovereignty rattle many Gentiles? Why does it rattle many Jews?"

If Levy really had a formidable intellect he would know full well that the same answer applies to both his questions and that answer is "It doesn't."  In predicating his talk on such mendacity Bernard Henri-levy can not be other than mendacious in the talk.

I am reminded of the quote from Brecht's Gelileo when the old man, paraphrrasing someone who would live much later, says "A man who doesn't know the truth is a fool but a man who knows the truth and tells a lie is a criminal." Perhaps his talk should have been subtitled:

Bernard Henri-levy - Fool or Criminal?

- ndmackenzie

April 6, 2008 at 3:13pm

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birdwalk...

I am [sincerely] interested in hearing what peretz  - and jackson and all the Spine herd - has to say about Jeff Goldberg's Atlantic article. (I think I can guess mack's response but if he or she wants to respond, fine...)

I found that a very challenging and layered article. And, as a testament to just how twisted I have become, when I read it yesterday, I have to admit that my first thought was "I wonder what peretz and jackson think about this piece?" I quake at the implications of this confession but that is the truth...

- thejauntyboulevardier

April 6, 2008 at 3:17pm

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Two articles on Israel you might be interested in, JB:

'"Atlantic' magazine: Is Israel finished?"

www.jpost.com/.../Satellite

and the more interesting one by a French official:

"Fadela Amara on Israel, Anti-Semitism, and Islamist Politics"

wisconsinyankeeinkingdavidscourt.blogspot.com/.../fadela-amara-on-israel-anti-semitism.html

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 3:27pm

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Neil (Nazi) Mackenzie is back with another lying opion:

Has he heard Levy's talk? NO! Yet he is ready to assert that Levy said an untruth.

With friends like these you crediilty among most Jewish posters isn't going to be very high, Luis.

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 3:31pm

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Here is are some pieces of the interview with Fadela Amara to which I linked above:

Saturday, April 5, 2008

"Fadela Amara on Israel, Anti-Semitism, and Islamist Politics"

From the blog:  "A Wisconsin Yankee in King David's Court"

"First, I was impressed by her comments about Israel. She acknowledged that racism exists in Israel, as it does everywhere. But in contrast to Israel's most vituperative European detractors, many of whom now routinely and absurdly denounce Israel as an "apartheid state," Amara noted that Israel's ethnic and racial diversity made her feel more at home here, in certain respects, than in Europe. Her comments also challenged the tendency, also common among Israel's detractors, to class Israeli Jews as "white" and "European" in contrast to the Arab population. (In fact, roughly half of Israel's Jewish population is constituted of Jewish refugees from Arab countries and their descendants.)

Amara says that when she was in Israel, she actually felt quite at home. She was invited here in June 2004 as part of a delegation of leftist women that met with Israeli and Palestinian women...."

"I felt very comfortable [in Israel]. I wasn't the object of special stares, as often happens toward foreigners. I didn't feel any racism, though I'm certain it exists. You have all the colors there so it's become almost natural to see white, yellow, brown."

By your appearance, you could certainly pass for Israeli. Maybe that's the reason?

"Maybe, but I'm not used to that. Here in France, I get looks. To the French, I'm not very 'French.' We're living here under a dominant culture. When your name is Francois and you're white with blue eyes, it's one thing. But when your name is Fatima and you've got a little color, the look you get is different. In Israel - because of the variety of people, I didn't feel that. In fact, I met a lot of young people there and it happened more than once that I was talking with a Palestinian and thinking he was an Israeli or vice-versa. Luckily, some of them were wearing a Star of David, otherwise I would have been confused all the time."

Second, I was impressed by Amara's comments about the resurgence of anti-semitism in Western Europe. Anti-semitic acts in France have mainly been perpetrated by Muslim youths from the country's impoverished quartiers de banlieue ("suburbs"), which were swept by riots in 2005. Ironically, the Muslim youths who commit such acts are themselves frequently the victims of prejudice and xenophobia. Given Amara's background and her social activism on behalf of this marginalized Muslim population, one might expect her to deny the presence of anti-semitism, dismiss it as unimportant or insignificant, or make excuses for it ("an inevitable response to Israeli policies"). Instead, Amara criticized it squarely and forthrightly.

Did your visit [to Israel] change your views in any way?

"The point of view of the residents of the suburbs in France regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is very narrow: The young Palestinians whom I met asked me to explain to the youths of the suburbs that their anti-Semitic acts are not helping them. That it creates a boomerang that hurts them in world public opinion. I was very impressed by this talk from the Palestinians I met, which was so different than that of the youths of the suburbs - some of whom, by the way, were put up to what they did by Islamic activists."

Is France anti-Semitic? Is it Islamophobic?

"No on both counts. We're good students. We've managed to reduce the number of anti-Semitic acts, but it's not enough, we have to continually keep at it. As for Islamophobia - there's no such thing. It's an invention of the Islamists that shouldn't be taken up."

But racism against Muslims - doesn't that exist in France?

"You have to be careful with the terminology. Anti-Semitism is a fact and we know exactly what it has led to in our history. It can't be compared to anything else. I'm not prepared to accept moral preachings from some Muslim intellectuals who use the term 'Islamophobia' as a parallel to anti-Semitism. When it comes to acts against Muslims, their religion doesn't play any part. These are racists acts, period. You can't liken the Holocaust and the memory of it to my personal-family memory, which is of the colonization in Algeria. It's true that my father, who was born in the colonial period, was deprived of his rights. He was not allowed to attend school, and I can only regret these 'sad intervals' of French history. But that has nothing whatsoever in common with the Final Solution. The terrible Holocaust was the most barbaric act the world ever came up with. It's not like anything else at all. Not even the genocide in Rwanda."

In Rwanda, it was an organized genocide, though.

"But it wasn't set out or carried out in the same mechanical and sick fashion. In my opinion, the trap that some intellectuals try to use by putting everything on an equal footing in the name of some sort of competition among memories is the ultimate anti-Semitic act. A deluxe act of anti-Semitism.

"Unfortunately, the problem of anti-Semitism isn't fully resolved in my country. It's returning in a new formula in the suburbs, where the Islamists have rotted our children's brains. If we had properly fulfilled our roles and if we had radically reduced anti-Semitism in France, including in administration, we wouldn't be witnessing its renewal today in the suburbs, in its Islamic form, together with its discourse, which has fascist overtones. It's all because of our cowardice and because we didn't want to admit and we didn't want to know.

"I have Jewish friends who tell me - Fadela, we don't want to talk about memory. That's a choice that I respect, but if these things aren't said, then no one will be protected."

...

"People talk about so many memories - colonization, slavery, etc. - but the emphasis has to be on the Holocaust, because we haven't sufficiently internalized the memory of it: Just two years ago, a young man from one of the suburbs was tortured for a month. And why? Because his name was Ilan [Halimi - A.P.] and he was a Jew. For a whole month. Can you imagine? A whole month. Thirty days. Do you understand what that means? Everyone knew about it. Or a lot of people, at least. And afterward they threw him out like a dog, and all because of his Jewish origin. It's intolerable. Just intolerable."

Read the whole post:

wisconsinyankeeinkingdavidscourt.blogspot.com/.../fadela-amara-on-israel-anti-semitism.html

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 3:36pm

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"Bernard Henri-levy - Fool or Criminal?"

Yes, all Jews who condemn antisemitism are "fools or criminals" in the eyes of antisemites like Mackenzie. Nothing new there.

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 3:43pm

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"People talk about so many memories - colonization, slavery, etc. - but the emphasis has to be on the Holocaust, because we haven't sufficiently internalized the memory of it"

This is not accurate at all. Other experiences -- such as colonization -- are not as internalized as the holocaust.

If the Holocaust must be singled out - and I don't question it - it is not because it hasn't been "internalized". It is because it is a direct consequence of the perversions of Modernity, most importantly a direct consequence of the very wrong self-representation of modern man, that led him to be extremely vulnerable morally. There are many good books about this. Recently there was a brilliant one: Bauman's "Modernity and the Holocaust".

If M. Henri-Levy was really a great thinker he would think about the origins of the holocaust in the modern European experience and in (still by many unchallenged) modern european philosophy. That would give him a much more accurate perspective on the real origins of anti-semitism. But is he really interested in doing that? Perhaps not. Since he is not interested in challenging Modernity and in really understanding the tragedy that happened from everyone's perspective. He is interested in profiting from some of it's parts and playing with ghosts at the same time. Which is, from my point of view, a very ugly job.

- luispc

April 6, 2008 at 4:35pm

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Luis, who are these modern philosophers?  Are you speaking mainly about Nietzsche?  A professor friend once said that Heidegger also helped shape Nazi ideals (I'm not talking here about his involvement in the party).  Curious to know your thoughts.

Luis:  What is your definition of "internalize."  I take it to mean Never Again.  In other words, we've learned our lesson.  But we haven't.  Otherwise Darfur wouldn't be happening right now.  

Jackson:  Very interesting link to that interview.  The problem I have here is that her emphasis on the  Holocaust to some degree negates other people's suffering.  Why do we have a museum of the Holocaust and not a museum of slavery?  Or what about a museum dedicated to the Native American genocide.  These actually happened in our own country.  I was in Boston this summer, taking a Duck Tour with my kids (yeah, that's what happens when you have children) when the driver pointed out Boston's new Holocaust memorial.  Jesus Christ, when is enough enough?  All this emphasis on our own suffering is a turn-off.  I'm not saying we shouldn't be aware, but don't you think that when they start erecting Holocaust museums in Palm Springs--and yes, Boston--it's gone too far?  There's also a prurience to it.  I swear, half the people who go to D.C.'s museum are there to indulge some sick and ghoulish fascination.  It's like going to a slash film--even better because it's really happened.  So it's more like a snuff film.

As far as educating our  youth, don't you think they could get the visceral impact it should have if they watched that Holocaust documentary QB7?  Or even Schindler's list, if you want a watered-down version for more impressionable kids (the kind who might throw up, like my older brother did, at watching QB7).

Speaking of these Holocaust museums, an orthodox ex-boyfriend of mine (it wasn't ever going to work--I need my pork and lobster!) once said that all that money should be going into good works for less unfortunate Jews.  I agree.

- MOLLYSIMON

April 6, 2008 at 6:07pm

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 "People talk about so many memories - colonization, slavery, etc. - but the emphasis has to be on the Holocaust, because we haven't sufficiently internalized the memory of it"

It's very difficult to answer you comments about modernity and the Holocaust because it is so general. Also because you being by offering a quote which you seem to misidentify as being by Levy.  The above quote was by Fadela Amara a French government official of Arab extraction who just visited Israel.

Hence your comment that:

"If M. Henri-Levy was really a great thinker he would think about the origins of the holocaust in the modern European experience and in (still by many unchallenged) modern european philosophy,” is out of place here.

Levy has written voluminously (I haven't read most of it) so I don't know if he addresses the Holocaust in relation to modernity or not.

In any case, I read  Bauman's "Modernity and the Holocaust" when it first came out (I won a copy) and it certainly not the best or even the best analysis of those events.

That the Holocaust was not merely a consequence of the "perversion of modernity" whatever that might be, Luis, is demonstrated that it occurred in a country (Germany) which came later to modernity and it didn't touch the country whose very foundation was a product of modernity: The good old USA.

Assuming that we could come to a clear definition of modernity it still would not prove that because the Nazis used modern techniques of organization in their killing installation that “modernity” was at the origin of the Holocaust.

One of the most egregious and ignorant comments made about the Holocaust came from the pen of Heidegger who because he hated modern technology believed that it was responsible for everything evil in the modern world. I would argue that the belief that “modernity” or technology was the root cause of the Holocaust is one way of not confronting it. The Holocaust was a particular European response to the disease of Jew hatred.

I am still waiting to hear what Mr. Levy said in his talk (the talk) I linked to above that was factually incorrect.

Did you listen to the talk?

Here, again is a link to it:

youtube.com/watch

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 6:34pm

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"Jackson:  Very interesting link to that interview.  The problem I have here is that her emphasis on the  Holocaust to some degree negates other people's suffering.  Why do we have a museum of the Holocaust and not a museum of slavery? "

Molly, you are not serious, are you?

How does a Museum about the Holocaust "negate" other people's suffering?

Did you listen to Levy's talk I just linked to? He addresses that issue, specifically.

This is one of the canards used by the antisemitic left in order to deny or minimize the importance of the Holocaust.

These are very different phenomena and need to be treated as unique and not lumped into one grand gesture, which too many on the left love to do, as "human suffering."

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 6:40pm

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"Speaking of these Holocaust museums, an orthodox ex-boyfriend of mine (it wasn't ever going to work--I need my pork and lobster!) once said that all that money should be going into good works for less unfortunate Jews.  I agree."

if these Museums are overated as a teaching tool, and I agree that they are, then the non existence of other Museums of the same kind hardly matter, don't you think?

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 6:43pm

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Jaunty Boulevardier -

I thought the Atlantic article  interesting enough but in the end somewhat bland. It reads a little bit like a mashup of two stories - one on Olmert and one on Grossman - with the Grossman story being more interesting but one that alone would probably not be sufficient for an Atlantic cover story. Indeed the novel Grossman is writing reminded me of the Heinrich Boll novella, The Train was on Time, and I will be interested in reading it when it comes out. I thought Goldberg's use of the term "leftist" to describe Grossman was unfortunate given that the term is mostly used as a right-wing smear.

I thought Goldberg demonstrated cowardice in his lack of response to blatantly offensive comments by Rabbi David Samson and Rabbi Heim Steiner of the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva. Goldberg writes:

-- [Rabbi David Samson says] "Democracy is not a value for us. Justice is a value, and fairness, but not democracy. In the Book of Exocus, it says that the Jews shall be a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. It does not talk about democracy." The Arabs who live in biblical Israel, he said can either choose "to get along with us, to live peacefully, or to leave." He said the Arabs would have the status of "protected foreigners" in Israel; they would have local autonomy, but have no say in the governance of Israel

The Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva was recently attacked by a Palestinian gunman who killed eight students. Goldberg writes without comment:

-- The Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva announced shortly after the fatal attack that Olmert would not be welcome to pay a condolence call. "We cannot receive a prime minister who advocates agaisnt the spirit of the Torah and accept that Israel withdraws from a part of the Land of Israel," a yeshiva official, Rabbi Haim Steiner, said.

Goldberg appears unwilling to criticize comments which are explicitly irridentist and implicitly racist. Hopefully, the next time The Atlantic puts out a cover story on this issue the magazine will use a writer with more courage.

The Economist this week has an editorial and special report on "Israel at 60." The editorial is more direct than Golderg in identifying the problem with Israeli politics. Goldberg merely states political problems but, unlike The Economist, never suggests ways to alleviate them. The Economist writes:

-- Meanwhile, Israel's settlers in the West Bank have woven such tight alliances with various parties that they have made themselves effectively untouchable, even though they are only a tiny proportion of Israeli society. As a result, the government is incapable even of enforcing Israel's own laws in the West Bank. It has not made good on a promise to remove even a few of the hundred-odd settlement "outposts" built without permission. Nor has it done anything about revelations that much of the building in even the officially approved settlements has been on illegally expropriated private Palestinian land, not state land as originally claimed.

The Economist ends it editorial with the following political prescription:

-- Israel has achieved some remarkable things during its 60 years. But for the sake of its security and domestic well-being, it now needs a system that makes politicians answerable to voters, not to other politicians. What shape it should take - whether a mixture of proportional representation with electoral districts, higher thresholds to keep small parties out of the parliament, or just rules to make it harder to topple governments - is up to Israelis. Unfortunately, since their politicians will design and vote on it, it is unlikely to be optimal; but almost anything would be better than what there is now.

www.economist.com/.../displaystory.cfm

- ndmackenzie

April 6, 2008 at 7:13pm

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So now you know Neil Mackernzie's predictable anti-Jewish thoughts:

"I thought Goldberg demonstrated cowardice"

In other words, the author didn't use Nazi like language to condemn Israel as Mackenzie would have done.

As if anyone here were interested in this bigot's predictable point of view.

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 7:44pm

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Whatever problems Israel has right now, btw, pale in comparison to the problems it had in the pre State days and in 1948 when no one expected the country to survive or in the mid 50's when it's economic problems were staggering, or in 1973 when it lost so many citizens in the Yom Kippur war.

What Israel has going for it and what the Arabs lack is need for self criticism. Unless you criticize yourself how can you change? Moreover, being on the defensive tends to bring out the best in the Jewish people.   This is why just as Israel has managed to survive its previous crises it will survive this one as well.

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 7:51pm

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Actually, yes, I suppose you're right.  Though I do think slavery and the Indian genocide should be getting far more attention in education than they do.  And this, I think, is due in part to prurience about the Holocaust, as I mentioned above.  

I'm sort of surprised you agree with me on this topic.

- MOLLYSIMON

April 6, 2008 at 8:11pm

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Don't want to shock you, but I didn't exaclty agree with you, Molly.

I said that museums are not the best way to educate young people about the Holocaust.

There is a strong case to be made that the Holocaust is a qualitatively different event than either slavery or the conquests of the Americas.  Briefly, this is true for two reasons:

First, slavery till recently was a constant in human affairs. I believe that it was in our lifetimes that slavery was officially abolished in the Arab world and in some African societies. This is also true of conquests; this too was a constant in human events from the ancient world till very recently. The list is way to long to mention but there hardly a country untouched by conquest and dispossession. Conquered peoples were treated with varying degrees of brutality that ranged from actual extermination to enslavement.

The Holocaust was something unique and while I don’t believe that it’s the product of “modernism” it did occur in modern times and the means of extermination used ranged form the more primitive form of mass shootings to the uses of modern assembly line of methods of exterminations in the death camps.

This is a fact that hasn’t really penetrated our skulls, yet as the French speaker said in the article above. Perhaps it is too frightening to think about.

The museums were supposed to highlight this fact. I don’t believe they are doing it very well.

In any case reducing the Holocaust to another instance of human suffering doesn’t explain anything and merely falsifies the events. Hell if human suffering is what we want to highlight why not a museum of airplane crashes or of car accidents surely hundreds of thousands of people (perhaps millions) have already died all over the world in automobile accidents.

btw: where do you see "prurience" in all of this.

On an another note, I suggest you listen to Mr. Levy’s lecture he has insightful things to say about issue in relation to contemporary (post Holocaust antisemitism.).

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 8:37pm

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The Holocaust, like the situation in Darfur, was a genocide based on race, which is entirely different from a plane crash.  The Native Americans were also victims of genocide when we gave them blankets infected with small pox, to name just one instance of our brutality.  Furthermore, the numbers of deaths in just getting Africans to America are in the millions.   I'm not denying that the Holocaust be studied on its own terms.  It deserves a singular status. But not such a central one in the annals of human suffering.  And furthermore, the Jewish community's constant insistence that it be shoved in others' faces--as when Boston erected its Holocaust towers (I believe that's what it is)--doesn't do us Jews any favors.  It's called pushing it too far.  

- MOLLYSIMON

April 6, 2008 at 9:10pm

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mollysimon you are wrong, wrong, wrong,......

You don't seem to be aware that it is people's consciousness of the Holocaust that makes the events at Darfur so central to people's thoughts.  The Armenian genocide did not have the same impact not did the many genocides in the 19th century or even the wholesale slaughter of Greeks by the Ottomans in the early part of this century of the 1945 killings in Indians that took the life of millions. The Holocaust in modern life is not "just another genocide."

The Holocaust has restructured the way we think post WW2. It has also created a great many international institutions like the UN that were supposed to deal with them. Looked at it in the right way it’s these institutions that is the lasting memorial to the Holocaust and not the Museums

“And furthermore, the Jewish community's constant insistence that it be shoved in others' faces--as when Boston erected its Holocaust towers (I believe that's what it is)--doesn't do us Jews any favors.  It's called pushing it too far.”

This is too crass for words, Molly. I live in Boston and the only people whom I ever heard complaining about the memorial, and they are not “towers,” are self-declared antisemites. They are in an out of the way place and you have to make a special trip to get to seem them.

This is the extreme left line which unfortunately you seem to have swallowed, hook line and sinker. Amazing, too, that a west coast Jew should complain about a memorial in Boston!

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 9:44pm

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As for Darfur it’s precisely the people who complain about the Holocaust being “rubbed” in people’s faces who resist stopping it. This includes Iran and much of the Muslim world as well as the extreme left.

You don’t seem to be able to listen to pod casts, Molly, which is a pity, but for people like who can I suggest this:

 z-word.com/podcasts.html

The pod cast deals with Canadian antisemitism on the left but it has a lot to say about the same people’s resistance to helps stop the genocide in Darfur.

With friends like these, Molly….

- jacksondyer

April 6, 2008 at 10:01pm

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nazimackenzie, the far-left student activist from Leeds, doesn't  like YIVO, a Jewish inistitute dealing mostly with Holocaust archives.

Look at Nazi ndmackenzie carefully, here is that strain of British anti-semite who supports any type of murderer, as long as it's about murdering Jews.

The same Britain that gave us suicide bombers on London and Tel Aviv sends this truly demented ndmackenzie here at TNR. Look at him! Behold him closely. He thinks of nothing of murdering Jews. The only exception in his shitty mind is fellatio, which ndmackenzie talked about at quite some length on TNR.

- sleepyavl

April 7, 2008 at 3:42am

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"Luis, who are these modern philosophers?  Are you speaking mainly about Nietzsche?  A professor friend once said that Heidegger also helped shape Nazi ideals (I'm not talking here about his involvement in the party).  Curious to know your thoughts."

No, Molly, I'm not just thinking about Nietzsche. The history of Modern philosophy is in a great deal a supposed history of "emancipation". From Descartes on, modern man thought of himself as methodically able to build his own moral universe within an unassisted reason. Which meant in a great deal an attempt of release from God.

The problem is that this is very much an illusion. In the words of Kafka, "modern man found the archimedian point but used it on himself; this was the only way he could find it".

This illusion can be very much seen in Kant. When building his moral system, he undertook a postulate according to which the moral dictates he would follow could be reached within an autonomous process of thinking. So within that process (that can be gisted in the categorical imperative) one would be able to act well, determining oneself autonomously. This was nothing but an illusion, since through that categorical imperative alone one could never reach the moral imperatives that we recognize as such (do not kill, do not steal, etc.). We reach these dictates because there is a substantive principle informing our reason outside which moral dictates are not meaningfull for us.

As Macintyre says try to emancipate kantian morality from a "theological scheme of God" and you'll have no morality or you'll have a radically transformed morality".

A "radically transformed morality" in this sense was the one that Eichman confessed to share in Jerusalem. He explicitly confessed to be performing his duty (even against his will) within what he called "the categorical imperative of the Third Reich" and explicitly quoted Kant. And what's most scarry is that his quote of Kant was exact. One could reason within the Grundlegung and still be Eichman...

Anyway, what I wish to say is that the elements of radical secularization followed by massive bureaucratization left modern man in an extreme state of moral vulnerability. At a certain point he was able to use impressive technology unbound my any real morality (or bound by a morality radically transformed in it's character).

Nietzsche only culminates a process. The main point of his thought can be stated as the ability of the man to create and shape his own moral universe (that's what the "will to power" means, it is a "principle of new evaluation" that I proudly create and in which I move myself totally freely from the moral imperatives of the judeo.christian tradition, taken by Nietzsche to be enslaving and degrading).

It was very much this last narrative that moved the nazis and this narrative hadn't been possible if modern man had not had the illusion of being completely free and emancipated from his moral-theological ties.

One other thing: one can only truly understand the Holocaust, and as hard as this exercise may be, if one faces it through the perspective of the evil doers. One must understand that they were themselves the victims of an atmosphere of moral erosion and cultural desperation. An atmosphere that left them completely vulnerable to accept being those awfull evil doers.

This is the perspective that is expressed in Hannah Arendt and that's why her books are the most revealing ones on the subject. And she only was able to wrote them because in her firm moral convictions, she felt, like Socrates, that "it is better to suffer the injustice than to practice it".

«Luis:  What is your definition of "internalize."  I take it to mean Never Again.  In other words, we've learned our lesson.  But we haven't.  Otherwise Darfur wouldn't be happening right now.»  

I'm talking about the internalization of the Holocaust experience (and of other grim experiences, such as colonization and communism) as the moral basis that allowed for the building of the political Europe that we know today. In a way, as it is expressed in the Bonn Constitution, Europeans undertook a "responsibility before God and before men" for their past and commited themselves with human dignity as the basis of their polities (as the basis, also, of the EU, which hadn't been possible if the nationalist narratives of Europe had not been simply rejected...).

From my point of view, there isn't a greater demonstration of someone having learned a lesson than the following conduct of that person. And European post-war democracies (and the EU) are, most importantly, monuments to the past showing a will building a completely different future in which something like the Holocaust cannot be possible.

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 9:30am

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"Luis, who are these modern philosophers?  Are you speaking mainly about Nietzsche?  A professor friend once said that Heidegger also helped shape Nazi ideals (I'm not talking here about his involvement in the party).  Curious to know your thoughts."

No, Molly, I'm not just thinking about Nietzsche. The history of Modern philosophy is in a great deal a supposed history of "emancipation". From Descartes on, modern man thought of himself as methodically able to build his own moral universe within an unassisted reason. Which meant in a great deal an attempt of release from God.

The problem is that this is very much an illusion. In the words of Kafka, "modern man found the archimedian point but used it on himself; this was the only way he could find it".

This illusion can be very much seen in Kant. When building his moral system, he undertook a postulate according to which the moral dictates he would follow could be reached within an autonomous process of thinking. So within that process (that can be gisted in the categorical imperative) one would be able to act well, determining oneself autonomously. This was nothing but an illusion, since through that categorical imperative alone one could never reach the moral imperatives that we recognize as such (do not kill, do not steal, etc.). We reach these dictates because there is a substantive principle informing our reason outside which moral dictates are not meaningfull for us.

As Macintyre says try to emancipate kantian morality from a "theological scheme of God" and you'll have no morality or you'll have a radically transformed morality".

A "radically transformed morality" in this sense was the one that Eichman confessed to share in Jerusalem. He explicitly confessed to be performing his duty (even against his will) within what he called "the categorical imperative of the Third Reich" and explicitly quoted Kant. And what's most scarry is that his quote of Kant was exact. One could reason within the Grundlegung and still be Eichman...

Anyway, what I wish to say is that the elements of radical secularization followed by massive bureaucratization left modern man in an extreme state of moral vulnerability. At a certain point he was able to use impressive technology unbound my any real morality (or bound by a morality radically transformed in it's character).

Nietzsche only culminates a process. The main point of his thought can be stated as the ability of the man to create and shape his own moral universe (that's what the "will to power" means, it is a "principle of new evaluation" that I proudly create and in which I move myself totally freely from the moral imperatives of the judeo.christian tradition, taken by Nietzsche to be enslaving and degrading).

It was very much this last narrative that moved the nazis and this narrative hadn't been possible if modern man had not had the illusion of being completely free and emancipated from his moral-theological ties.

One other thing: one can only truly understand the Holocaust, and as hard as this exercise may be, if one faces it through the perspective of the evil doers. One must understand that they were themselves the victims of an atmosphere of moral erosion and cultural desperation. An atmosphere that left them completely vulnerable to accept being those awfull evil doers.

This is the perspective that is expressed in Hannah Arendt and that's why her books are the most revealing ones on the subject. And she only was able to wrote them because in her firm moral convictions, she felt, like Socrates, that "it is better to suffer the injustice than to practice it".

«Luis:  What is your definition of "internalize."  I take it to mean Never Again.  In other words, we've learned our lesson.  But we haven't.  Otherwise Darfur wouldn't be happening right now.»  

I'm talking about the internalization of the Holocaust experience (and of other grim experiences, such as colonization and communism) as the moral basis that allowed for the building of the political Europe that we know today. In a way, as it is expressed in the Bonn Constitution, Europeans undertook a "responsibility before God and before men" for their past and commited themselves with human dignity as the basis of their polities (as the basis, also, of the EU, which hadn't been possible if the nationalist narratives of Europe had not been simply rejected...).

From my point of view, there isn't a greater demonstration of someone having learned a lesson than the following conduct of that person. And European post-war democracies (and the EU) are, most importantly, monuments to the past showing a will building a completely different future in which something like the Holocaust cannot be possible.

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 9:30am

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Jackson, I think my post to Molly also addresses your question (as possibly as it can be addressed in a post). Anyway, I'm glad to develop any point that you wish clarified.

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 9:32am

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Luis has said all of this before and it wasn't convincing then and it isn't convincing now:

"Anyway, what I wish to say is that the elements of radical secularization followed by massive bureaucratization left modern man in an extreme state of moral vulnerability. At a certain point he was able to use impressive technology unbound my any real morality (or bound by a morality radically transformed in it's character). "

This doesn't explain why the Holocaust occurred in a country like Germany which wasn't radically secular (Catholic Bavaria was one of the most religious areas in Europe) and not in the US which was and  is and which was technologically as advanced as Germany and some would say even more advanced.

Luis also contradicts himself:

"From my point of view, there isn't a greater demonstration of someone having learned a lesson than the following conduct of that person. And European post-war democracies (and the EU) are, most importantly, monuments to the past showing a will building a completely different future in which something like the Holocaust cannot be possible."

And yet, Europe is as advanced technologically today as it was then and is even more secular. If the determining factors were modern technology as well as radical secularism then the political arrangements shouldn't matter, yet as Luis himself says they do.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 10:01am

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Jackson, you clearly are not interested in discussing anything seriously. You are interested in debunking by insults and in keeping your superficial notions, according to their use to advance your causes.

There is a most important point that you don't understand. That that secularization (and by this I mean a certain sort of rationality) took over all cultural institutions. The Catholic world being also vulnerable, since in a way they were confirming their thesis on this-wordly fallen man. It is no accident that Schmitt, the nazi, was a also a commited Catholic. So mix Augustinianism and Nietzshce as this worldly "master builder" and you get nazism. Which is something that you probably can't understand but whatever.

And this hasn't really got to do with technological advance by itself. Since technology is ideologically neutral. It can be used in every way. What you should ask is why, in America, the cultural aberration that nazism is was not possible. But this is an effort that you are simply unable or unwilling to do.

And if I'm not "convincing", you should specifically address arguments. For instance, you should specifically address the question if an autonomous reason is able to reach moral dictates outside a "theological scheme of God" or if, on the contrary, is is a vulnerable reason...

Anyway, you are a tyresome and dishonest discusser. If you knew all about my unconvincing arguments why did you suggest that I was making "general" statements? You could have integrated them with my "unconvincing" arguments.

I'm only interested in continuing to keep discussing with you if you answer one simple basic question: is enlightened autonomous reason able to reach moral dictates (such as not killing, not stealing, etc.) outside a substantive principle that informs it? Can you address this question SPECIFICALLY? If you can't you're just insulting and dishonestly speaking...

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 10:44am

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man is this whole forum about deciding who is an anti-semite?

oh geez, does that observation make me an anti-semite?

if i am already black-listed, let me say:

i didn't even know BHL had any opinions on anti-semitism or israel, or was jewish (is he?), but i still think he is a joker, and that because he is one of those french "intellectuals" who pestered your sister for 30 minutes with bad red wine breath and stupid generalities about this and that people when you were late to meet her at that bar in paris a few years ago, even though she said repeatedly she wanted to enjoy her drink in peace and was waiting for someone.

"but can it be zat you do not know who ay am? ay am a famoos philosophair, come, let me show you zee eiffel tower and zen afterwards zee flyboat on zee seine."

- chrisnatale

April 7, 2008 at 11:05am

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luispc said:   "Jackson, you clearly are not interested in discussing anything seriously. You are interested in debunking by insults and in keeping your superficial notions, according to their use to advance your causes."

You are right about one thing, Luis, I don't take your fanciful ramblings about culture and the Holocaust seriously.

Here is but one example of why that is:

"There is a most important point that you don't understand. That that secularization (and by this I mean a certain sort of rationality) took over all cultural institutions. The Catholic world being also vulnerable, since in a way they were confirming their thesis on this-wordly fallen man. It is no accident that Schmitt, the nazi, was a also a commited Catholic. So mix Augustinianism and Nietzshce as this worldly "master builder" and you get nazism. Which is something that you probably can't understand but whatever."

I understand everything you say just fine, this is why I don't accept it.

Above for example, you say that "the Catholic world" I suppose you also include the Catholic Church in this pronouncement has also been it too being an institution has also been touched by the 'secularization process,' but this is using language the way humpty-dumpty does.

You speak of the jurist Schmitt being a Catholic and a Nazi and draw certain conclusions from it as if one could not draw radically different conclusion from such a phenomenon: namely that rather than Catholic institutions becoming "secularized," many political institutions came under the sway of the spirit of religiosity or at least the fantastic. This was true not just for Nazism whose many goals and principles exhibited a deep appeal to beliefs which even then were considered quasi religious. The same can be said about Communism whose dialectical formulas were but a pretense to rationality.

In any case, I am tired of arguing with someone who proposes a rigid thesis. Save it for you dissertation committee, Luis. This isn’t the place to defend you thesis.

And do try to address real issues being discussed on the thread such as Bernard Henry-Levy lecture. I did link to a recent lecture of his about a similar topic. If you want to post on it fine; otherwise stop wasting my time.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 11:10am

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You haven't answered my question, Jackson. You went on insulting and insulting...

By the way, you should study very deeply the "jurist Schmitt". His intellectual process is most revealling on what led to nazism. But are you interested? Clearly not. So this is just a waste of time.

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 11:28am

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"Above for example, you say that "the Catholic world" I suppose you also include the Catholic Church in this pronouncement has also been it too being an institution has also been touched by the 'secularization process,' but this is using language the way humpty-dumpty does."

If you're really interested in this and not in keeping some superficial notions you should study how Catholic theologians (beginning with Suarez) were very attracted to Descartes. The thing is that method and instrumental rationality took over everything culturally. This is the point you did not understand and that confirm what I thought that you haven't got any idea of what I'm talking about.

Anyway, if you were interested in any kind of profound thought about anything I would advise to study the Aristotelian notion of "phronesis" (carefully and not superficially) and the thomist notion of "prudentia". That would lead you to understand that this sort of rationality (as originally was, which is something completely forgotten in the modern world) was completely erradicated from the modern world. What prevailled in all worlds (Non-Catholic and Catholic alike) was a completely different sort of rationality  (very vulnerable)...

And on Henri-Levy as I already told you I have no patience to listen to him. And you have no patience to read my posts you're welcome. No one forces you to read them, question about them or anything else. But it seems you feel somewhat threatened by them. I wonder why...

And on that simple basic question, you remain, of course silent. I wonder why...

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 11:36am

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luispc, you study Schmitt. I am not working on your dissertation.

You also haven't answered my question about Levy said about European contemporary antisemitism in his talk that was factually incorrect.  

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 11:39am

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Mr. Dyer, I was answering Molly which asked me specific questions that I tried to answer. Something that you're clearly unable to do (and I do not need your assistance working on any "dissertation" or I would only say very old banalities...).

On Henri-Levy, I state again. Have no patience to listen. If you can gist his idea on European anti-semitism, I'll read and, if interested, will look up and answer. But this is something you can't do. You can't say anything positively that actually makes one think. You have only been able to insult and attack out of futile simplifications (that only reveal your ignorance about the subjects that you're supposedly discussing). And, at the same time, grimly usefull simplifications (which is something that many intellectually dishonest people are doing around). They do not offer anything. They only destroy...

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 11:58am

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Speaking of Henry-Levi:

According to Drudge, Hillary is going to endorse Pelosi's call to boycott the opening ceremony of the Olympics.  Obama was noncomittal.

So Marty, if genocide is your issue...

- Lymon1

April 7, 2008 at 12:00pm

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luispc -

You write of jacksondyer:

-- But it seems you feel somewhat threatened by them. I wonder why...

I think it should be obvious by now that jacksondyer is threatened by anything that disrupts his worldview in even the slightest way.

- ndmackenzie

April 7, 2008 at 12:13pm

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Luis you are not a very convincing liar:

You said earlier:

"luispc said: Jackson, I think my post to Molly also addresses your question (as possibly as it can be addressed in a post). Anyway, I'm glad to develop any point that you wish clarified."

Now you say:

"luispc said:  "Mr. Dyer, I was answering Molly which asked me specific questions that I tried to answer."

You also say in the same post:

"On Henri-Levy, I state again. Have no patience to listen.."

Fair enough, but this a thread about Henry-Levi not about you.  Go start your blog if you want to discuss your work.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 12:38pm

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See  the antisemitic neil mackenzie

is on your side.  nuf said.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 12:39pm

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"So Marty, if genocide is your issue..."

Lymon, his issue is defeating Hillary. Everything else is secondary.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 12:40pm

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chrisnatale said:    "oh geez, does that observation make me an anti-semite?"

If you have to ask than the answer is YES.

Also if you are a European like mackenzie at al here than the answer is also probably YES.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 12:42pm

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Any thoughts about my SPECIFIC question? (that from my point of view is decisive to understand the cultural history that led to the holocaust)? No. Of course not. Babbling about imaginary anti-semitism here and there? Jacks, you sound like a witch-hunter!

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 12:57pm

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chrisnatale -

As you can tell from his response jacksondyer uses the word "antisemite" to describe anyone he disagrees with. In doing so he pisses and pukes on the memory of those Jews throughout history who have suffered actual antisemitism.

- ndmackenzie

April 7, 2008 at 1:17pm

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luispc, any thoughts about Levy? Oh I forgot he is just a witch hunter since he dares to talk about contemporary European antisemitism.

You are becoming a real pest, Luis.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 1:26pm

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"In doing so he pisses and pukes on the memory of those Jews throughout history who have suffered actual antisemitism."

This is a comment that shows up on a lot of leftist antisemitic websites.  It is posted by people like mackenzie who defend Islamicist organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah who preach Jew hatred and the murder of Jews.

The  Jews (who are referred to by mackenzie and other Jew haters as "Zio-Nazis) are being targeted by these organization are still suffering from actual antisemitism.

Hamas and Hezbollah gave garnered a lot of support among the left in Europe home of the Holocaust. It’s also no accident that Europeans like mackenzie who post here are died I the wool Jew haters.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 1:37pm

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And Luis address your comments to mackenzie, he is more in agreement with you than almost anyone else here.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 1:38pm

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There is very little daylight between the leftist so called anti war movement and antisemitism.  The following story only confirms Henry-Levy's views about contemporary Jew hatred:

The Cairo Clique: Anti-Zionism and the Canadian Left, by terry glavin  

“It is hard not to notice these cultural codes emerging in Canada's "anti-war" ideational package, perhaps especially during and after the 2006 Second Lebanon War. Its anti-Zionism is often barely distinguishable from antisemitism, and having lost its grounding in a solid progressive politics, it hasn't taken much of a leap to get from conventional Canadian nationalism to a reactionary anti-Americanism that regards Israel as an objectionable surrogate for the United States, and Jews as objectionable surrogates for Israel.

It is in this same context, Volkov writes, that Jews become legitimate targets: "Thus, the position on the Jewish question, even if not in itself of paramount importance, came to indicate a belonging to a larger camp, a political stand and an overall cultural choice." “

Read the whole article:

www.z-word.com/.../the-cairo-clique%253A-anti-zionism-and-the-canadian-left.html

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 2:00pm

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Just who is supposed to "read the whole article"? Me the "pest" with "rigid views" or ndmackenzie, "the nazi"?

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 2:11pm

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luispc -

If the paragraph quoted from the Glavin article is the best there is I will leave the reading of the article to you because the paragraph didn't contain a single honest word.

- ndmackenzie

April 7, 2008 at 2:22pm

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Jack, you're attacking and being obnoxious to Louis, you're friend Louis, remember?

You've completely lost it, at this point. Why don't you take your own advice and start your own blog? Who knows The Spine might become more civil and interesting.

- The Ignorant Populist

April 7, 2008 at 2:32pm

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Ndmackenzie, I had no idea that we were in such agreement. Is it that we think alike about "modernity and the holocaust"? Do we share views on Henri-Levy? What the hell does the man say anyway? What exactly do we agree on?

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 2:33pm

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Dear John. thanks for the cover, but I can defend myself. Me and Jacks go a long way back. You have no idea.

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 2:55pm

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A few months ago, I watched the c-span broadcast of a debate between Bernard Henri-Levy and Bill Kristol (or rather, a talk by BHL and a substantial commentary following on by BK).

BHL thought that there would always be, no matter how vital a democracy we had, a natural tendency for intellectuals to be crtical and to place themselves a little on the outside, even if that irritated the mainstream.  It keeps the society from getting too smug.

Kristol commented that he thought that American intellectuals didn't have any reason to be critical, and that it was totally legitimate to ride comfortably inside the system, just smiling and mouthing "it's all good."

I rather liked Henri-Levy after that.

- ironyroad

April 7, 2008 at 3:16pm

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I understand that Louis but I'm starting to feel sorry for Marty at this point. Every single Spine thread turns into a witch hunt for anti-semites and just descends into name calling childishness. It's pathetic and f*cking boring.

I disagree vehemently with a lot of what Mr Peretz posts but he does deserve better than this sh*te.

- The Ignorant Populist

April 7, 2008 at 3:27pm

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The main reason The Spine is f*cking boring is that there are 83 comments in this thread and one person has made 38 of them - a not atypical occurence. I'm with the Ignorant Populist in suggesting that jacksondyer gets his own blog.

- ndmackenzie

April 7, 2008 at 4:03pm

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Good I am glad you found your soul mates in mackenzie and ignoble, Luis.

They are what you have been looking for. These antisemites will confirm your theses about big bad modernity and about the evil and decadent US of A.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 4:24pm

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nazi ndmackenzie farted out:

"The main reason The Spine is f*cking boring is that..."

If this place is so boring go post on The Atlantic where you can bore people ad naseam as you do here. You are the reason this place is so boring. You and your fellow bigot Ignoble.

Now get the fuck out of here.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 4:29pm

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Yes, agree or didagree with him Henry-Levy always has interesting things to say, ironyroad.

Bill Crystal is out of his depth debating Henry-Levy.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 4:31pm

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It would be surprising if you found anyone that is not persistenly babbling about anti-semites all around him as having something interesting to say. You need resonance chambers for your ridiculous notions. If you can't find them, you are completely unable to communicate or understand: all you can say is fuck you, fuck you, fuck you. As some retarded toy.

- luispc

April 7, 2008 at 4:36pm

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"Just who is supposed to "read the whole article"?"

Anyone who kows how to read. That cuts out mackenzie and ignoble bigot.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 4:44pm

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"WARSAW, Poland, April 7 (UPI) -- Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, scheduled to visit Israel Tuesday, says he didn't know his grandfather had ties to the Nazis."

www.upi.com/.../print_view

what about mackenzie's grandfather’s ties? Wasn’t he too a proud Nazi fellow traveler.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 4:55pm

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Did luis, the troll,  say something?

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 4:56pm

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Jackson, I grew up in Boston, so yes, I'm interested in the Holocaust memorial.  But I'm also interested, and quite dismayed by, the fact that Berlin's Holocaust memorial was placed in front of the Brandenburg Gates.  Should we erect a monument to those Africans who died during the trans-Atlantic crossing?  Do you think that the individual Africans suffered less than the Jews who were put on freight trains?  There is such a thing as too much, and putting up a memorial on the Commons is but one example.  The Shoah didn't even happen here.  We're certainly guilty of turning away Jews who could have escaped their fate, but that could be said of the Iraqis who've worked for the US and who lives are no in danger.  God knows what will happen to them once we leave, and leave we must.    

Furthermore, you've heard only anti-Semites decry the memorial in Boston.  But you can't listen to what's said behind closed doors.  And listen, I grew up in Boston, and know quite a bit about Jew-hating in that terrain.  My brother was chased by a bunch of Irish townies and called a "dirty kike."  So if this is what comes out in public, you can bet there's plenty not being said because thank God we've attained a certain level of political correctness.  What politician in his right mind would have objected to that memorial?  He would immediately have been tarred an anti-Semite.  I can't imagine I'm the only Jew in Massachusetts who feels this way.  And I'm no self-loather.  I'm bringing my children up as Jews and teaching them about their history because I want them to be proud of what they are.  It's a mean world out there, and even on their playground they've heard the epithet "dirty Jew."    

I made it very clear that the Holocaust should be studied on its own terms, and that it was a singular event.  It wasn't the first genocide, but it was and remains the largest, and it was--unlike anything that came before or since--mechanized.  But we don't have a monopoly on suffering, hence my disapproval of many of these museums and memorials.

As for the new consciousness Holocaust awareness has brought about, sure, when the word Darfur comes up, people shake their heads and sigh.  And then what?  Nothing.  No rescue missions.  No NATO forces hitting the ground.  As you yourself have said, the UN is a joke.  

As for prurience about the Holocaust, why are people so fixated on it?  Atrocities abound.  And yet, how many block-buster movies have been made about Rwanda?  It's box-office poison.  But there's something about the Shoah, and frankly, I think the fixation rests on some kind of perversion.  For God's sake, there are actual fetishists out there who love to dress up in Nazi uniforms, leather boots and all.  I think Nazism was based on some weird psycho-sexual fantasies, and the continued fascination bears this out.  

Jackson, I'd like to add that I enjoy reading your opinions.  We don't always agree, so please don't read my differing opinions here as part of the pile-on that seems to be taking place.    This conversation is entirely separate, as far as I'm concerned.

- MOLLYSIMON

April 7, 2008 at 5:35pm

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Luis, as I understand it, you're saying that the Holocaust came about because we began to see ourselves as not constrained by traditional Judeo-Christian morality.  But how would you measure such a thing.  No matter how much a believer you would be in Kant or Nietzsche  Not sure I agree, though.   How would you test for something like this?  You'd have to raise someone in a complete vacuum, with no moral or religious instruction, and then let him or her loose in the world.  Would he or she kill?  Would he or she feel obliged not to sleep with his neighbor's wife?  And hasn't there been recent research that morality may be hard-wired into our brains?  I think this is really the age-old question of nature versus nurture, which they still haven't figured out.    

Also, I'm sure you would agree that modernity alone does not explain the Holocaust.   I'm having a hard time believing that the Orthodox Christians of Eastern Europe were much touched by Kantian belief.  Furthermore, Christian anti-Semitism was deeply rooted in Germany and the rest of Europe.  The Nazis just used this to their advantage.--and hatred of the Jews was not their only motivation.  Hardly.   Add 1000 percent inflation, a humiliating military defeat, and even then you've got only some of components.  The Holocaust can't be simply explained.  I'm not sure I believe in the concept of evil, but I do believe that if there is such a thing, the Holocaust was it.  And from what I understand, evil is not so easily understood.  

Finally, as far as the European Union goes, what's to say nothing like the Holocaust could happen again, despite all their laws?  There were laws in Germany, and the Nazis essentially dismembered them.  Hey, I watched Judgment at Nuremburg.  

You seem busy elsewhere right now, but I just wanted to relay back some of my thoughts.  No need to answer.  

- MOLLYSIMON

April 7, 2008 at 6:09pm

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...is enlightened autonomous reason able to reach moral dictates (such as not killing, not stealing, etc.) outside a substantive principle that informs it...

What about  an analysis of the autonomous, rationally willed moral actions that conform to universalized laws. It is universalization--not a substantive principle, but a formal one--that leads to morally permissible behaviour.

Which is to say, of necessity, from an analysis of such universalizing, moral action will consist of acting in such a way that we treat Humanity, whether in ourselves or in others, as a means only but always as an end in itself. (the “Humanity formula”).

The Humanity formula rules out engaging in the pervasive use of Humanity such that we treat it as a mere means to our ends. The difference between a horse and a taxi driver is not that we may use one but not the other as a means of transportation. Unlike a horse, the taxi driver's Humanity must at the same time be treated as an end in itself.

It applies to the ‘Humanity’ in human beings that we must treat as an end in itself—that collection of features that make us distinctively human, and these include capacities for self-directed rational behavior, to adopt and pursue our own ends, and capacities necessarily connected with these. If the taxi driver is freely pursuing his line of work, we universalize his willed acts when we act in a way that he could, when exercising his rational capacities, consent to — say, by paying the agreed  price.

Humanity is a rational end, because it is an end that every rational being must have insofar as s/he is rational.

My (unoriginal) argument is that, as opposed to what I think you are saying, autonomous rationaility is a/the ground for moral action and that moral action is necessarily inferrable from a proper analysis of autonomous, willed, rational action: which is to say, in one formulation, willed, autonomous, rational, moral action to be such must conform to the Humanity formula.

- basman

April 7, 2008 at 6:51pm

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MollySimon writes:

-- Finally, as far as the European Union goes, what's to say nothing like the Holocaust could happen again, despite all their laws?  There were laws in Germany, and the Nazis essentially dismembered them.  Hey, I watched Judgment at Nuremburg.  

It is, of course, impossible to guarantee something will not happen regardless of how tightly laws and constitutions are written. For all the power of the US Constitution, it offered precious little support to the African-American community for much of the history of this Nation.

One of the benefits of the European Union is that it provides a supra-national watchdog function that limits the ability of a single nation to go off the reservation. A few years ago Austria was "discouraged" from electing a hard-line right wing government by its fellow EU governments. Recently, members of the Polish government mouthed off that the EU should ban abortion and allow the death penalty - neither of which is going to happen.

Finally, another EU benefit that also serves to limit the ability of a single nation to repeat the Holocaust is that the EU provides its citizens with the freedom and right to work anywhere. Facilitating that is that the EU has pretty much abolished all internal border and custom controls. Last summer, for example, I drove from Italy into Austria without seing any indication that I was crossing an international border. A Paris-Rome flight is treated as a domestic flight.

- ndmackenzie

April 7, 2008 at 7:13pm

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Last things first,

mollysimon said: “Jackson, I'd like to add that I enjoy reading your opinions.  We don't always agree, so please don't read my differing opinions here as part of the pile-on that seems to be taking place.    This conversation is entirely separate, as far as I'm concerned.”

No danger of reading your comments as part of a “pile on as you call it.” I treat most interlocutors (not all, but most) as distinct correspondents.

In any case, I am going to do something I don’t like much like doing:  I will respond to your post piecemeal. This is because it is so long and I would have to write a long essay to cover all your points and la vida es muy breve.

“Jackson, I grew up in Boston, so yes, I'm interested in the Holocaust memorial.  But I'm also interested, and quite dismayed by, the fact that Berlin's Holocaust memorial was placed in front of the Brandenburg Gates.”

What does one memorial have to do with the other? And why should I care were it was placed, Molly. This is a German issue not an American one.

“Should we erect a monument to those Africans who died during the trans-Atlantic crossing?”

No one is preventing Black Americans from erecting whatever memorial they wish. It is no an issue related to Jews erecting Holocaust memorials.

“Do you think that the individual Africans suffered less than the Jews who were put on freight trains?”

I believe I have already answered that point above in great detail, Molly. Please reread my response above.  

“There is such a thing as too much, and putting up a memorial on the Commons is but one example.”

The memorial is not near the Commons:

http://www.nehm.org/

And who are you (or me) to decide how many memorials are too much?

“The Shoah didn't even happen here.  We're certainly guilty of turning away Jews who could have escaped their fate, but that could be said of the Iraqis who've worked for the US and who lives are no in danger.  God knows what will happen to them once we leave, and leave we must.”

Excuse me but this is a little hysterical, Molly. You are again mixing up issues. You seem to have a problem with facing the reality of the Shoah and don’t like to be reminded of it. I suggest you stop thinking about memorials and either forget completely about the Shoah or do some more reading about it.

A family history is not enough.

As to your comment the Shoah that the Shoah didn’t happen here, well that’s ironic because Henry Ford was instrumental in stalking the fires of antisemitism here and in Europe with his publication of antisemitic literature which was read by Hitler. Then we had our own homegrown antisemitic Father Charles Coughlin whose antisemitic tirades also spread Jew hatred and made it more difficult for Roosevelt to take the side of Great Britain in the early years of WW2, etc. Then there is Charles Lindbergh…. I could go on. The Shoah didn’t happen here but the same kind of antisemitism was present here too.

The Holocaust memorials don’t just commemorate what happened once upon a time they above all are meant to show what hatred can lead to. No, there is no such thing as too many reminders of that.

“Furthermore, you've heard only anti-Semites decry the memorial in Boston.  But you can't listen to what's said behind closed doors.”

I don’t care what people say “behind closed doors,” Molly. My neighbors mostly non Jews were the ones who told me about the memorial and asked to go see it. So our experiences are quite different.

“And listen, I grew up in Boston, and know quite a bit about Jew-hating in that terrain. My brother was chased by a bunch of Irish townies and called a "dirty kike."  So if this is what comes out in public, you can bet there's plenty not being said because thank God we've attained a certain level of political correctness.”

What you say is one more reason to have such a memorial here, then. And btw, I hate political correctness, but that’s another discussion.

“What politician in his right mind would have objected to that memorial?  He would immediately have been tarred an anti-Semite.  I can't imagine I'm the only Jew in Massachusetts who feels this way.  And I'm no self-loather.  I'm bringing my children up as Jews and teaching them about their history because I want them to be proud of what they are.  It's a mean world out there, and even on their playground they've heard the epithet "dirty Jew." “

You are writing not as a self hating Jew, Molly. You are writing as a frightened Jew.

We have a beautiful new bridge that goes to Charlestown called the  “Leonard P. Zakim Bunker Hill Bridge.” The bridge was named after a former Jewish civil rights organizer:

www.leonardpzakimbunkerhillbridge.org

Many people in Charlestwon complained because he wasn’t “one of us.” Others did not and the bridge was so named and guess what people adjusted and it’s now called the Zakem Bunker Hill bridge and I never heard anyone refuse to call it that.

You can’t let your fears dictate how to live, Molly.

“I made it very clear that the Holocaust should be studied on its own terms, and that it was a singular event.  It wasn't the first genocide, but it was and remains the largest, and it was--unlike anything that came before or since--mechanized.  But we don't have a monopoly on suffering, hence my disapproval of many of these museums and memorials.”

I have already treated that issue above and don’t want to repeat myself.

“As for the new consciousness Holocaust awareness has brought about, sure, when the word Darfur comes up, people shake their heads and sigh.  And then what?  Nothing.  No rescue missions.  No NATO forces hitting the ground.  As you yourself have said, the UN is a joke.”

Yes, it’s a joke, but at least most people in the West can’t pretend that they are unaware of what is going on there. And as I said above it’s the people who hate Shoah memorials who don’t want us to do anything about Darfur.

“As for prurience about the Holocaust, why are people so fixated on it?”

Why are people fixated on WW2 or on Hiroshima? It’s because they don’t want it to happen again. Some people like you want to deny or minimize the events. They say let’s not talk about it, there were other wars and other genocides. This is because they are afraid that by talking about it they might actually make it happen again.

There are others who ask themselves what is the best way to educate people about what happened? Some of these believe that building Museums is the answer. I don’t think it’s the only answer but I am not against them per se. I also don’t want people’s fears to dictate my views about the Holocaust.

“Atrocities abound.  And yet, how many block-buster movies have been made about Rwanda?  It's box-office poison.  But there's something about the Shoah, and frankly, I think the fixation rests on some kind of perversion.  For God's sake, there are actual fetishists out there who love to dress up in Nazi uniforms, leather boots and all.  I think Nazism was based on some weird psycho-sexual fantasies, and the continued fascination bears this out.”

I am sorry, but this is just so much Freudian rubbish.

There was one film made about Rwanda. However, the reason more films are being made about other genocides has more to do with the fact that there is no agreement about who is responsible for the genocides.

Take Cambodia, do you think the left wants to make a film about Communists slaughtering man women and children? The same is true about Communists atrocities in the Soviet Union.   What about the Armenian genocide? Will the Turkish government not complain about it? (There was one excellent film dealing with the Ottoman mistreatment of Greeks at the time of the massacres: “America, America” directed by Elia Kazan. I recommend it highly.) See who much trouble filmmakers are having making movies about 911. (You are not supposed to blame the Muslims, etc., etc.); the same with Darfur.

In fact the Holocaust is the only historical atrocity most people agree that it was an evil and it has become an easy tool for teaching about genocide. (Of course, now you have the Islamicists and their leftist friends complaining about that too.)

I know one thing, Molly; I am not in favor of not bringing the Holocaust because it will offend genocidal Islamicists and their leftist allies.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 7:31pm

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nazi mackenzie is back replying to  a post not addressed to him.

No one gives a shit what you think, mackenzie, so get thr fuck out of here.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 7:33pm

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"Humanity is a rational end, because it is an end that every rational being must have insofar as s/he is rational."

This formulation a tautological, Itzik, and doesn't address the problematic of reason as a moral force.

I know this wasn’t addressed to me and I don’t want to get into a debate about reason here, but I just wanted to point this out, Itzik.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 7:37pm

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Jack I welcome a comment from you anytime, anywhere and am happy to stand corrected or just engaged.

..."Humanity is a rational end, because it is an end that every rational being must have insofar as s/he is rational."...

If the analysis of what it means for people perforce to act volitonally and rationally as such leads to the conclusion that that they must act in accordance with the Humanity formula, then I see this statement as summary and conclusionary rather than tautological. It is how one gets from the premises to the conclusion that (may) justify the statement.

- basman

April 7, 2008 at 8:00pm

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"Finally, as far as the European Union goes, what's to say nothing like the Holocaust could happen again, despite all their laws?  There were laws in Germany, and the Nazis essentially dismembered them..."

There isn’t going to be another Holocaust in Europe, Molly, because most Jews were already murdered. If there were there even one or two millions Jews in Europe then might certainly be a revival of murderous antisemitism.

There is btw a steep rise in antisemitism in Germany over the last few years. This is due in part because of the number of Jews from the Soviet Union who settled there. Their numbers are still quite small but not small enough for German bigots.  No Jew with a kippa can walk down a street without being insullted or even physically assaulted.

The EU can't stop such hatreds and I expect with the rise of Islamicism in Europe that it will spread and become more virulent.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 8:01pm

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"If the analysis of what it means for people perforce to act volitonally and rationally as such leads to the conclusion that that they must act in accordance with the Humanity formula, then I see this statement as summary and conclusionary rather than tautological. It is how one gets from the premises to the conclusion that (may) justify the statement."

Yes, but if you postulate a rational being who “must act in accordance with the Humanity formula," I.e. rationally, then how is that moral (or even a rational) act.

Morality implies a degree of choice. If I am compelled to be rational then I am rational in the same way that a computer is functional if it acts according to how it was programmed. We don't call computers rational or irrational. They merely function well. Similarly a perosn who acts in accordacne with his "humanity formula" is also neither rational nor irrational. He is moreover certainly not moral.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 8:29pm

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…Yes, but if you postulate a rational being who “must act in accordance with the Humanity formula," I.e. rationally, then how is that moral (or even a rational) act….

A rational person is a person whose will follows reason and is answerable to the dictates of reason. A rational person acts autonomously and morally through reason and its dictates by universalizing his actions by: 1. enshrining a maxim—a volitional principle—that states the reason for his action; 2. recasts his reason as a universal principle governing all rational agents acting as proposed; 3. asks himself if the maxim is conceivable in a world governed by the recast universal law; and 4. and if so, asks himself whether he will or can rationally will  himself to act on the maxim in such a world. If so then his action is morally permissible.

Your choice is whetehr to so scrutinize your actions in moral terms and then make decisions. But, the argument is, it is inconceivable to act morally in contravention of the Humanity formula, which is where, and by what, reason will lead your will to act.

- basman

April 7, 2008 at 9:10pm

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An excellent restatement of the Kantian formula, Itzik.

I wish I had the time to  engage in a full fledged discussion about this topic right now. Perhaps at some future date I will.

- jacksondyer

April 7, 2008 at 9:43pm

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Thanks Jack, anytime.

- basman

April 7, 2008 at 9:49pm

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According to the categorical imperative one must act as within a maxim one is able to universalize.

But there is no violation of the categorical imperative if a racist is so fanatic that he thinks (as Eichman thought) that a maxim that dictates the elimination of a race also applies to him if, by chance, he belongs to such a race.

There is also no violation of the categorical imperative if a nepotist believes that their own must be protected by their own in every circumstance.

As Hegel saw (and more recently Kelsen) within the categorical imperative anything (absolutely anything) can turn into a moral law, even if morally repugnant from a substantive point of view, if formally universable.

The question implicit in every ethics (which relates to the substantive principle that is "there" in the moment one universalizes) is not answered by enlightened reason. Which means, this way, a dangerous of emancipation...

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 3:29am

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"Luis, as I understand it, you're saying that the Holocaust came about because we began to see ourselves as not constrained by traditional Judeo-Christian morality.  But how would you measure such a thing.  No matter how much a believer you would be in Kant or Nietzsche  Not sure I agree, though.   How would you test for something like this?  You'd have to raise someone in a complete vacuum, with no moral or religious instruction, and then let him or her loose in the world.  Would he or she kill?  Would he or she feel obliged not to sleep with his neighbor's wife?  And hasn't there been recent research that morality may be hard-wired into our brains?  I think this is really the age-old question of nature versus nurture, which they still haven't figured out. "

These are very intelligent questions Molly. And, first of all, one must be aware that a "vacuum" did not exactly succeed to the erosion of ancient morality. A persisting vacuum is not humanly possible. What happened is that the vacuum was filled by other narratives, many different ones, that became the western ideologies of these last two centuries:

- by a liberal world of atomistic individuals that pursue rational self-interest through an invisible hand;

- by a conception of history in which one reaches the end of it through the violent destruction of the bourgeois world;    

- by darwinistic laws of self-affirmation of race, such as the ones that presided over national-socialism.

Eric Hobsbawn said that the 20th century was a century of "religious wars" in which the religions at war were not traditional religions, but new ideologies with an incredible attractive power for those that were captured by them within an atmosphere of moral erosion and cultural desperation.

And on Kant and Nietzsche, one doesn't "believe" in them. If any they expressed the paradigmatic illusions of modern man, the illusions that left him so vulnerable. They mostly articulated exemplary the self-image of emancipation that modern european man increasingly had, creating the vacuum that was to be later filled by those narratives (a self-image that the American man had not of himself until the recent recovery of Enlightenment myths in an utilitarian atmosphere by men such as Rawls, thus creating the "vacuum" that is beginning to be felt in the American polity).

In a great way, contemporary Europe understood, at the collective unconscious level, that a moral vacuum is always filled in the most grim way. That's why you have Europeans undertaking politically a fundamental responsibility and an inviolable creed in human dignity as basis of the polities (and of the general polity that is the EU).

Hope I was clear. Best, Luís

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 3:46am

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"Eric Hobsbawn said that the 20th century was a century of "religious wars" in which the religions at war were not traditional religions, but new ideologies with an incredible attractive power for those that were captured by them within an atmosphere of moral erosion and cultural desperation."

He should know the Stalinist. He supported the Soviets during their invasion and put down of the Hungarian revolt in 1956.  He never recanted his support of the Soviet State.  Like most intellectual thugs he merely devised a theory to explain it away.

The same is true with much of the contemporary extreme left and their support of Islamicist regimes like Iran (and terrorist groups like Hamas and Hezbollah) against the liberal West on the grounds that the West is more evil because it practices a commercial type of “imperialism.”

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 9:02am

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Why don't you address the idea of Hobsbawn instead of attacking him? There are others that defended the same, even before Hobsbawn, that are not Stalinists, from Eric Voegelin to Karl Loewenstein, from Carl Jung to... (some of them, like in the case of Loewenstein, very respectable exiled people in the US).

"Unable to attack the philosophy, one attacks the philosopher"? Such a sad move...

And of course, from all I said you chose a reference to an Author that you could accuse of something, instead of discussing the substance of any thing said, simulateously pretending that your notions are to be taken seriously...

Anyway keep babbling. Just don't pretend that you know anything at all about politics and ethics. Since you don't know anything at all and you are absolutely unwilling to learn.

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 9:48am

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...The question implicit in every ethics (which relates to the substantive principle that is "there" in the moment one universalizes) is not answered by enlightened reason. Which means, this way, a dangerous of emancipation.....

What nonsense and what analytical malaise even in an informal forum such as this.

"Enlightened reason" could never, by its own, terms, assert your counter-examples. If it did it would not be enlightened. You are conflating a chain of reasoning that starts from any arbitrary premise you choose and goes logically to a conclusion with enlightened reason which perforce rejects absurd premises.

A premise of the Humanity formula is the commonality of those traits in all of us that distinguish us as human. Your counter-examples don't even begin to sustain/pass the smell test--they stink-- themselves let alone be subject to the reasoning of the demands of universalization.

- basman

April 8, 2008 at 11:50am

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Luispc -

-- "Unable to attack the philosophy, one attacks the philosopher"

A truly apt description of jacksondyer's rhetorical style. He reminds me of the soccer hooligan who, lacking the intellectual ability to comprehend the world, is compelled to lash out with his fists and his feet. There is no intellectual process behind his thuggery.

- ndmackenzie

April 8, 2008 at 12:00pm

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Mr. Basman. Your tone is surely not proper of anyone interested in questioning seriously the subject at hand.

Anyway, Mr. Basman, and making an effort to instruct you, yet again I suggest you to think about the fact that the "enligthened reason" (a general expression to refer to a reason pretentiously without substantive commitments or presuppositions that inform it) is nothing but an illusion. Since it is merely a process of thinking, a mere "how". And it is completely impossible to derive a substantive "what" from a strictly procedural (substantively uninformed) "how".

And on your "humanity formula" Mr. Basman, I'd suggest you did consider seriously the fact that "humanity" is concept charged with presuppositions, a framing value that you take for granted when you reason (only supposedly without substantive presuppositions, only supposedly without reference to any religious "truths"...).

The concept of humanity of a nazi --  the framing value that shapes his moral universe --  excludes the jews. These are not "human" for a nazi, but anyway a nazi can still resort to your "humanity formula" within his concept of humanity... As can a marxist-leninist within his concept of humanity referred to the proletariat...

And you cannot reason against a nazi or a marxist-leninist strictly based on your "hows". You must take notice that the substantive presuppositions of the nazi and of the marxist-leninist are different from yours, but that they got to have morally framing power ("capturing" power)

And, at this point -- in which you've already acknowledged that the "humanity formula" doesn't worth a dime by itself --, and if you're honest enough, you'll be able to understand that your framing concept of "humanity" was not produced by your "reason". It was produced by your internalization of a moral frame that is characteristically Judeo-Christian.

And perhaps at this moment you'll feel some recognition and loose some of your arrogance.

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 12:21pm

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Just one more very simple thing Mr. Basman. The fact that "humanity" IS doesn´t necessarilly mean that "humanity" OUGHT or must be respected.

Applying the humanity formula the way you apply it, means to fall into a falacy very much condemned both by Hume and by Kant with very good reasons. An "ought" cannot be derived from a simple "is"... In order not to fall in the fallacy, when "humanity" is at stake, the "is" (humanity) must have some "worth" attached to it, an inherent worth (so we are back to a pre-rational framing value only understandable within the judeo-christian tradition)

And I'm not going to resort to formulas such as "stinking". Really, I do try to be above them, in informal or less informal forums....

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 12:32pm

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Luis:

Don’t worry about my tone and I won’t worry about your presumption or your sanctimony.

The reference to “enlightened reason” is yours not mine. And I took it to stand for the privileging of reason in the Enlightenment, one of the axioms of which is a notion of a common humanity, a beneficent legacy of an otherwise intellectually bankrupt theology.

Kant throughout his work struggled mightily to bring his notion of the Categorical Imperative in line with intuition. I wouldn’t spend too much time worrying about whether humanity in Kant’s or the Enlightenment’s conception of it is charged with presuppositions. It is for Kant and the Enlightenment axiomatic; and it is your inability to confront this either intellectually or intuitively which has you posing your inane counter examples ,which rest --as a matter of your argument--on a puerile relativism.

I have no problem  either intellectually or intuitively rejecting the Nazi or Marxist or other de-humanist “framing of their moral universes”'--which sounds oxymoronic to me.

Do you?

Considering that Kant, in one of his formulations, starts his Categorical Imperative from the pre-logical irreducible truth of his Humanity axiom, your objections are either incoherent or trivial as manifest in your ridiculous counter-examples.

The fact is that you have no argument to make that can dislodge the efficacy of the Humanity formula and the intuitive  and rational truth it proceeds from except by saying that I cannot reason against Nazis or Nepotists or whomever. If you want to call the basis of the Humanity formula God, feel free. I call it an irreducible truth arrived at by both intuition and reason and I say God is dead.

- basman

April 8, 2008 at 3:32pm

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Have it your way if it conforts you. If you're interested in going back to my posts and actually understand what's in them, be my guest.

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 4:16pm

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luispc said:  "Why don't you address the idea of Hobsbawn (sic) instead of attacking him?"

I already did.  Eric Hobsbawm is wrong. At best one can postulate Nazism, Bolshevism, and the kindred ideologies subscribed to by people like mackenzie as quasi religious. (I believe I mentioned this myself in an earlier post.) They are heresies if you like, but surely not religions in the sense that they believe in a transcendent creator, have a developed theology and a set of moral principles which aspire to the universal.

The other people you mentioned “from Eric Voegelin to Karl Loewenstein, from Carl Jung to... (some of them, like in the case of Loewenstein, very respectable exiled people in the US),” had more to say about it than that.

Your “some of them, like in the case of Loewenstein, very respectable exiled people in the US),” made me laugh. At least you are aware how utterly absurd it is to quote Jung in this context.

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 4:21pm

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luispc “Have it your way if it conforts you. If you're interested in going back to my posts and actually understand what's in them, be my guest.”

Yes, itzik, if you are interested in becoming his disciple than Luis will be your friend for life. If not, not.

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 4:23pm

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jacksondyer said:

luispc “Have it your way if it conforts you. If you're interested in going back to my posts and actually understand what's in them, be my guest.”

Yes, itzik, if you are interested in becoming his disciple, then Luis will be your friend for life. If not, not.

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 4:52pm

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Another effort Basman, and by analogy: you say your car runs. I admit your car runs!

I'm saying that your car runs on fuel. You're saying that you don't care that your car runs on fuel and that "fuel is dead"!

I'm also saying that one must understand what fuel is (explosive material) in order to be defended against some fuel imitations that are sold around and that explode cars even if sounding very attractive.

And I'm saying that it was the fact that many decided to run on fuel unaware of it, imagining that they were the ones that pushed their cars (as Kant) or imagining that they could create an alternative fuel for their cars by declaring "fuel is dead" (as Nietzsche) that allowed many to sell around some very strange kinds of fuel ("that have no transcendent God or systematic theology on them", conceded) but that still had a great power of attraction and of self-explanation (thus fulfilling the role of a "religion", considered the notion in a wide sense), selling pseudo-fuel to millions of people that had their millions of cars exploded and killed millions of people in the process.

Anyway, you can keep saying that your car runs on fuel or that "fuel is dead"

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 4:59pm

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Correction: anyway, you can keep saying that you don't care if your car runs on fuel or that "fuel is dead". But your car will still be running on fuel and fuel will keep to fill your car's deposit, until someone sells you pseudo-fuel and you are uncapable of distinguishing, thus ending with an exploded car and killing someone in the process.

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 5:02pm

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This is a joke, right?

"I'm saying that your car runs on fuel. You're saying that you don't care that your car runs on fuel and that "fuel is dead"!"

When was fuel ever "alive?"

Luis must have "fuel" in his veins.

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 5:29pm

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Correction:

This is a sophmoric joke, right?

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 5:30pm

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"This is a sophmoric joke, right?"

If it is, it's  good. I wonder if you'll get some sleep and give everyone some peace from your babbling and yelling. And if it were everlasting peace, it would be even better.

- luispc

April 8, 2008 at 6:00pm

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luispc said: " I wonder if you'll get some sleep and give everyone some peace from your babbling and yelling. And if it were everlasting peace, it would be even better."

Is this real everlasting peace, or metaphoric everlasting peace you want?

You are too much fun, Luis.

- jacksondyer

April 8, 2008 at 6:45pm

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Luis:

So now we come to the essence of your conceptual, logical and thus philosophical problem as revealed in this little exchange. I’m happy to say my car runs on fuel and to investigate fuel to any extent possible. And when I have thought about and investigated fuel sufficiently I may be able to come to some irreducible understanding of it which I propose, but of which, because I am a great, great, great, grandchild of the Enlightenment who privileges reason (and science for that matter as a reasoned way to understand the material world) I am always open to a better argument. For you God is fuel; for you a Judeo Christian conception of God is on faith the core, the irreducible source of your/the moral universe. But where I reject as mindless superstition your most precious starting point, proceeding by reason, skeptical but open, willing to make the best arguments I can for a proposition which my reason concludes is irreducibly true, I am told your faith in fuel disposes of my reasoning to the conclusion I argue for as manifest on the Humanity formula. For all your “elevated discourse” is this the best you can do? No wonder you pathetically have me trying to argue Nazis and Nepotists out of their “moral universes” in answer to my argument. And God is not really dead of course; just to let you in on it, he never existed; he is the construct of our own imaginative projection; we set the guy up; and we are tearing down our own work. You can pray to yourself and call it God. Me, I am much more modest. I pray and bow to no thing, real or reified, never, never ever!

- basman

April 9, 2008 at 11:29am

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Oy, Itzik, I hope your yiddishe mama isn't alive to hear such things!  

I myself am not so certain on the God question, though I admire your certitude.  Your argument makes the most sense, intuitively and otherwise.  Isn't "holds these truths to be self-evident" (which I THINK is the crux of your argument) an enlightenment idea?  Just asking, my friend from the North.  All this philosophizing has me reaching for my smelling salts.

- MOLLYSIMON

April 9, 2008 at 12:02pm

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...All this philosophizing has me reaching for my smelling salts...

Malke, s'vet dir zein gut.

- basman

April 9, 2008 at 12:24pm

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Luis:

Also, I read you to have said to Jack, "drop dead"--"everlasting peace/sleep." If so, if my reading of you is right, my self-considered morally superior interlocutor, so full of sanctimony and presumption, you are quite the living, walking embodiment of the the precise antithesis of what you profess and of what you profess your very own self to be.

And what's that you are going to instruct me/anybody in?

- basman

April 9, 2008 at 1:00pm

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Basman, you are taking Luis way too seriously. He is writing a dissertation, for crying out loud, and everything he says revolves around his thesis. It so happens that I have read many of the books he mentions and I can tell you that he doesn’t read the books critically. He quotes Arendt and he quotes Heidegger and he quotes Charles Taylor but there is no critical distance between what he says bout these books and what they say.

This is fine for a dissertation writer. Eventually he will learn to establish some distance between himself and the writers he currently worships. In the meantime, I don’t want to become the sole audience for his regurgitated readings.

This btw, is true of most dissertation writers. While they are at work they need to isolate themselves from humanity and just give themselves over to their books.

Moreover, for an atheist you shouldn’t take Luis’ death wishes seriously. Really, one would think that you were superstitious after all. Superstition is not Kosher for an atheist.

As for the atheism issue, it’s more complicated than you make it out.

From a nonbeliever’s and rationalist point of view the problem is that it’s just as problematic to assert belief as it is to assert disbelief.  Kierkegaard had it right here.

Also there is a difference on many levels between religion and belief. Religion can exist without belief. Religion has a cultural history as well as a doctrine.  In addition there political movements are the only quasi religious phenomenon in modern times. People have turned all kinds of organized activities into religions: from psychotherapy to diet groups, and sports events.

- jacksondyer

April 9, 2008 at 3:25pm

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Mr. Basman,

I surely do not want to interfere with your widely shared dogmas (on "faith vs. reason", on that strange creature called reason "alone", that you take for inquestionable within your argumentation and that require, each of them, lenghty and hard discussions). And I'm not going to reply to your least polite remarks and terms about me personally or about what I said. I only question myself about the reason for such anger.

My fault surely for adapting a self-convinced tone that must be irritating to others. And, most of all, my fault surely for not having been able to explain. And my fault for trying to explain this (which requires previous and lenghty explanations) within an atmosphere of explicit agressiveness, through a medium that is as limitated as this with people that I don't know from anywhere (and that I'm not going to accuse of anything else, since this medium is surely not apt to make complete profiles).

The only profile I make right now is one of myself. How stupid of me. It surely must reveal some pride, some presumption and an incredible childishness (included the childish behaviour that means to disrespect some subjects that cannot be discussed here in a serious way, even if my original purpose was to answer specific questions made by Molly Simon in a brief and understandable way). I should have known better and surely will try to know better in future.

And even if I cannot defend myself against the abuse of what I just said by jokes by Jackson Dyer (and that I do not expect from you, since I know how to distinguish angry irritation from gratuitous and trollish fury) I still say it. Don't know exactly why.

- luispc

April 9, 2008 at 4:09pm

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"And even if I cannot defend myself against the abuse of what I just said by jokes by Jackson Dyer (and that I do not expect from you, since I know how to distinguish angry irritation from gratuitous and trollish fury) I still say it. Don't know exactly why."

Oh please, Luis, you are entirely innocent of "gratuitous and trollish fury." Not that it matters.

- jacksondyer

April 9, 2008 at 4:31pm

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CORRECTION:

"And even if I cannot defend myself against the abuse of what I just said by jokes by Jackson Dyer (and that I do not expect from you, since I know how to distinguish angry irritation from gratuitous and trollish fury) I still say it. Don't know exactly why."

Oh please, Luis, you NOT are entirely innocent of "gratuitous and trollish fury." Not that it matters.

- jacksondyer

April 9, 2008 at 4:43pm

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Luis I bear you no ill will; and in the past have enjoyed discussing matters with you. I tend to respond in the terms and tone with which  I perceive I am addressed. I did not understand every word  said in your last post to me, but I am content to leave matters for now where they seem to me to be, and perhaps in the future look to returning to more civil, more temperate exchanges.

- basman

April 10, 2008 at 12:12am

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I just realized that I did it again. Oh well it's been a busy day:

CORRECTION #2

"And even if I cannot defend myself against the abuse of what I just said by jokes by Jackson Dyer (and that I do not expect from you, since I know how to distinguish angry irritation from gratuitous and trollish fury) I still say it. Don't know exactly why."

Oh please, Luis, you  are NOT  entirely innocent of "gratuitous and trollish fury." Not that it matters.

- jacksondyer

April 10, 2008 at 12:16am

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Jack we probably don’t need to discuss my exchanges with Luis, no profit in it.

I don’t get intimidated by someone else’s breadth of learning, though I respect that in others. I defer to people who know more about a subject than do I, but am comfortable with my analytical abilities.

If I had world enough and time I would quarrel mightily with your assertion that “From a nonbeliever’s and rationalist point of view the problem is that it’s just as problematic to assert belief as it is to assert disbelief.  Kierkegaard had it right here.” Why is that so? Belief requires faith and operates on revelation’s side in the divide between reason and revelation. Disbelief requires that which can transform it into belief; but then it is no longer disbelief. Disbelief  is an absence and the problematics are conceptually different, whatever the problematics for disbelief are. What are they, by they way—these problematics of disbelief?

I have no idea in what sense you mean that “Kierkegaard had it right here”. For Kierkegaard, among hosts of other things, Christianity embodied paradoxes which offend reason. The fundamental one, for Kierkegaard, is a transcendent God simultaneously incarnated as  human—Jesus. To this, we can have faith, or we can take offense. But we can’t, for Kierkegaard, believe by reason. For faith we suspend reason to believe in something higher than it. We believe by virtue of the absurd—the absurd for Kierkegaard being an ultimate value. Where is there a similar problematic for disbelief, or, put another way, in the face of this paradox, in choosing reason?

I don’t understand how religion can exist without belief. A plain and standard defintion of religion is “belief in and reverence for a supernatural power or powers regarded as creator and governor of the universe.” On this, religion is constituted by belief.

The clutural history of religion is just that—a cultural history. It is not the thing itself. For Kierkegaard, as you well know, doctrine/dogma at its essence is the articulation of the absurd, which man must choose to embrace. Besides Communism being Christianity on Earth, once you move from religion as the thing in itself to political movements to psychotherapy to diet groups, and sports events, you move from metaphysics to metaphor. Religion as the thing in itself being ontological and diet groups as religions being metaphoric. But if you probed the metaphor, I suspect belief would constitute it as well.

- basman

April 10, 2008 at 2:07am

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p.s.

Don't get me started on Kierkegaard for whose Fear and Trembling I have Contempt and Loathing, and whose magnificent intellect and literary briliance were, like Hamlet, exceeded by his too, too magnificent exquisiteness.

- basman

April 10, 2008 at 2:18am

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Sorry to have introduced Kierkegaard into the discussion.

I was quoting from his Either/Or which is a literary work rather than a work of expository prose.

I should have used Wittgenstein who said that even after all the questions have been answered by science a mystery would still remain. On the other hand the same mystery remains even if one were to accept any religious dogma in as much as the notion of a god (any god) doesn’t even begin to answer them.

- jacksondyer

April 10, 2008 at 9:39am

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You seem to know a lot about "god (any god)" and about what "that" is able or isn't able to explain...

As you seem to know a lot about what is "religion": either it falls in the definition determined according to this and those criteria that I, Jackson Dyer, take for relevant or it isn't a "religion" (even according to a "functionalist" definition, using the terms the anglo-saxon world likes so much...)

You know so much Jackson Dyer! Everything, actually!

- luispc

April 10, 2008 at 10:42am

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"You know so much Jackson Dyer! Everything, actually!"

No, Luis, you are the one who knows "everything."

I know everything else.

- jacksondyer

April 10, 2008 at 12:09pm

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Luis--totally off-topic here, but what do you think of Ryan Air--is the potential nightmare worth the absurdly (though not in any Kierkegaardian sense) low fare?  I've heard terrible things . . . . but oy, those prices.  

ND--if you still happen to be around these parts, let me know what you think.  

I'm counting on you members of the EU.

- MOLLYSIMON

April 10, 2008 at 12:49pm

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Ryan Air? Can't really help you Molly. Never travelled in it. But I know many people that have already travelled low cost and keep doing it, profiting from the prices that are indeed appealling. As long as it is safe, and if we're talking about short distances, there's no problem, if you ask me. Do be aware of the transport conditions from the airport used by the low cost to the place you're going. Or you'll end up spending in taxis most of the money you saved on the flight.

- luispc

April 10, 2008 at 1:48pm

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Why the fuck do you address posts to the bigot mackenzie, Moll Simon?

Haven't you had enough of Jew haters?  

- jacksondyer

April 10, 2008 at 5:30pm

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Jackson Dyer imagines himself to be the "maître de cérémonies" of The Spine. There is an etiquete to be followed in which one does not address those that Jackson Dyer takes to be the "outcasts" and the "anathemized". How stupid of you to address mackenzie, Molly!

- luispc

April 11, 2008 at 2:54am

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