Remember when Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader? Now back in 2015. It was pretty clear that a black propaganda campaign would be unleashed against him. But most of us (including me) assumed it would continue in the vein it had before, merely more concentrated. Which had chiefly been to accuse him of supporting the IRA. Instead, they almost entirely pivoted to accusations of anti-semitism. Which at first seemed odd. They had one script already written. Why switch to another?
Does this distinction matter much? After all, both serve the same purpose – which is really not much more than a heckle. What the heckler is saying is secondary, the point is what he prevents the speaker saying. The heckler’s role is to sidetrack them.
But treat this as a clue… Since then, it’s only become more widespread. It’s not just that the accusations against Corbyn are now taken as fact, including by the supposedly ‘liberal’ media. (I’m not bothering to debunk it all here. That stuff is easy enough to find if you want to read it.) It’s that it became their default brand of mud to sling against anyone they want to paint dirty. Partly they may just be building on success, of course.
But more is afoot…
It’s origins are easy enough to find. Criticism of the Israeli occupation of Palestine had been painted as anti-semitic for some time, and with some success in making mud stick. (We have had rather a lot of that lately, as it happens.) That worked over there. Why not try it over here?
But more is afoot…
Rare… perhaps even alone among racisms, modern anti-semitism isn’t linked to material deprivation. Jewish people living in Britain aren’t, on average, worse off than white folk. This doesn’t mean they don’t encounter prejudice, or that this prejudice is somehow without significance. (Anyone saying there are acceptable forms or degrees of racism is now being escorted to one of the exits.) But it makes it something distinct from anti black or Asian racism.
In short it takes institutional racism out of the equation, leaving individual prejudice. And individual prejudice is the definition of racism they like to push, because it lets them off the hook. Racism becomes a problem with a few retrograde types, usually portrayed as ‘uneducated’ or working class. To which the solution is performative public statements, or progressive educational campaigns. (Anti-racist slideshows and the like.) In this way the source of the problem dresses itself up as the solution, it even sells itself as the expert who can heal our poor contaminated souls.
(This is of course how they tried to portray Black Lives Matter. But then there was a conflict between a ground-level movement and its twisted official reflection. A slogan widely used by BLM demonstrators was “white supremacy is the enemy.” While corporations used “black lives matter” as a buzz term to slap beneath their logos. Post a black square on Twitter, job done, racism defeated.)
But more is afoot…
Depicting anti-capitalism as anti-semitic is of course an old trick. But this brings a new dimension to it. The demise of Corbyn was the last hurrah of social democracy in Britain. Those who had been allowed to inhabit the leftmost fringes of Labour, provided they didn’t try to actually influence anything, are now to be (in that delightful phrase) shaken off like fleas.
Neoliberalism is now to be presented not just as the dominant strand of capitalism but as capitalism. Earlier, more pluralist forms have been memory-holed. And those who try to criticise or ameliorate it are to be painted the same way us anti-capitalists always were, as dangerous hate-ridden extremists.
In essence, it works like this… You are by your own admission against capitalism, which of course means you are against money. Money is of course to do with the Jews. Therefore you are against the Jews. In short the accusation is itself anti-semitic, as it actively recycles anti-semitic tropes.
It’s sometimes suggested that these smear tactics may at times get over-excessive in their zeal, but they’re coming from a good place, the desire to combat racism. They’re really not. They’re an instruction to look out for anti-semitism where it isn’t, leaving it alone where it is.
Further, it is a worrying but undeniable fact that anti-semitism is growing. But that needs to be seen in context, of racism in general growing overall. Those on the receiving end of other forms of racism often feel there’s a hierarchy of racisms in supposedly ‘centrist’ political culture, with them on the bottom. They’re excluded by racists, and also by supposed anti-racists.
The main incubator of anti-semitism today is conspiracy theories. In fact anti-semitism at root is a conspiracy theory, in a way other forms of racism aren’t. Conspiracy theories always end up saying “because of them”, and while "them” doesn’t necessarily has to be "the Jews" a whole lot of working out has already been done for you once you accept that. Abbie Richards coined the term ‘anti-semitic point of no return’, for the point where you cross the event horizon of lunacy and QAnon shreds your capacity for reason forever more.
White supremacy is a material fact about the world. You could pretty much prove it by looking out the window. So anti-semitism, the pretence of Jewish supremacism, is required to let whiteness off the hook, in fact absurdly claim victim status for white people. Claiming there’s something inherently strange and suspicious about George Soros having all that money is a way of saying it’s perfectly normal for Elon Musk to have even more money.
And precisely because there’s no material basis to the claim it's magnified to a ludicrous degree, where “the Jews” are supposed to direct everything that happens. Lack of evidence is presented as proof of how clever the sinister forces have been in covering their tracks. Hence the common tropes of the trapping web, the puppeteer’s strings and all that crap.
The widespread use of money was the inevitable consequence of the rise of commodity production. When we use the word ‘capitalism’, we essentially mean the expression of commodity production across society. But in the conspiracy theory it becomes a malevolent magic force, a kind of sinister spell cast by “the Jews” to disrupt the natural order of things. We have been calling this stuff “the socialism of fools” for nearly a hundred and fifty years now.
(There is of course a more convoluted relationship between conspiracy theories and power than that. Right-wing governments react by trying to pin their anti-semitism on us. But they also indulge aspects of it, such as the ‘white replacement’ conspiracy. But let’s leave that aside for now.)
Reader’s voice: “Well that’s all very clever, Gavin. But what should we actually do to deal with this?”
For one thing, we should ensure we never entertain conspiracy theories in any form. It’s not enough to just state that we don’t. Any more than you get to shower once in your life and be clean forever after. We need to stay perpetually watchful.
But of course that’s not an answer to the question. Even if we were to get a completely clean bill of health, the accusations would persist. They are not being made in good faith, but out of opportunism.
There isn’t a magic bullet answer here. But the short answer is to look at everything Corbyn did. And then do the opposite. Some will not want to hear this, but his response to the attacks against him was hopelessly naïve, a how-not-to guide. Explaining patiently one more time just what his position was and how they must have misunderstood it, that didn’t really work too well for him.
The answer was given earlier on. We should avoid all forms of anti-semitism, but that’s because we don’t want to be anti-semitic. We should deny all conspiracy theories, but that’s because they’re all wrong. And we should regard these charges not as tests of our resolve, but as smears, as heckles, as derailments - and treat them as such. We should not let our enemies set the terms of debate.
Next time, not more politics. Would I lie to you, guv?
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