New Article: Bret Stephens and the SAPIR Journal on Jews and “Social Justice”: Another Racist Tikvah Triumph in the White Jewish Institutional World
David Shasha
Bret Stephens and the SAPIR Journal on Jews and “Social Justice”: Another Racist Tikvah Triumph in the White Jewish Institutional World
As I was posting my article on Bret Stephens and his offensive White Jewish racism, both eJewish Philanthropy and the Jewish Insider were hard at work promoting his new Neo-Con Troll the Libs venture, the SAPIR Journal:
https://mailchi.mp/87fb866c2a14/your-daily-phil-4918154?e=400f0fcddb
https://mailchi.mp/jewishinsider/daily-kickoff-780126?e=7438779c41
It is a momentous event!
https://sapirjournal.org/news/announcing-sapir-a-journal-of-jewish-conversations/
Here is the TOC:
https://sapirjournal.org/journal/social-justice/
Can’t you just smell the money?
The journal is a Jewish institutional powerhouse, led by bigwigs like The Maimonides Fund’s Mark Charendorff:
https://sapirjournal.org/social-justice/2021/04/welcome/
Charendorff’s institution apparently knows nothing of Maimonides and the classical Sephardic heritage, but I suppose it is better to use the Sephardic name than to use Rabbenu Tam or RAVAD, who both stood proudly against science and rationalism.
It is easier for Ashkenazim to get along in the modern world by using Sephardim, and then acting like Ashkenazi Shtetl obscurantists anyway.
Apparently with a straight face, Charendorff wants us to know that the journal will be about “argument” and “dissent”:
Judaism has long embraced and celebrated argument. The Talmud records not only conclusions but also dissenting opinions and often the full course of the discussion. Dispute, ideally, is not resolved; it endures. It continues to educate us, challenge us, and impose gray in a world that too often seeks the simplicity of black and white.
The “conversation” will be White Jews only.
There are, naturally, no Sephardim included in the list of contributors.
But there are many Tikvah Fund stalwarts.
The Brooking Institute’s James Kirchick:
https://tikvahfund.org/library/podcast-jamie-kirchick-europes-coming-dark-age/
https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/james-kirchick
The World Affair Institute’s Joshua Muravchik:
https://tikvahfund.org/faculty/joshua-muravchik/
https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/joshua-muravchik
Rabbi Shlomo Brody:
https://tikvahfund.org/faculty/shlomo-brody/
https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/shlomo-m-brody
Anti-Maimonidean New Talmudist Moshe Halbertal:
https://tikvahfund.org/faculty/moshe-halbertal/
https://www.tabletmag.com/tags/moshe-halbertal
Rabbi to the Beverly Hills elite David Wolpe:
https://tikvahfund.org/faculty/david-wolpe/
https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/david-wolpe
Tikvah Fund Beren Summer Fellowship recipient Kylie Unell:
https://tikvahfund.org/beren-fellowship/alumni/
She is apparently a Tikvah Tablet podcast star:
https://www.tabletmag.com/podcasts/unorthodox/wonder-women
https://www.tabletmag.com/podcasts/take-one/pesachim-95
Who knew?
Enemy of the Sephardim, friend of Bari Weiss, Matti Friedman:
https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/matti-friedman
He too is a Tikvah podcast maven:
https://tikvahfund.org/posts/podcasts/podcast-matti-friedman-the-end-of-the-israeli-left/
https://tikvahfund.org/library/podcast-matti-friedman-on-israel-the-mizrahi-nation/
https://tikvahfund.org/library/podcast-matti-friedman-on-the-russian-aliyah-30-years-later/
https://tikvahfund.org/library/podcast-matti-friedman-on-israels-first-spies/
Israeli politician and strident HASBARAH macher Einat Wilf:
https://tikvahfund.org/faculty/einat-wilf/
https://www.tabletmag.com/contributors/einat-wilf
Then there is Pamela Paresky, whose contribution to the journal is an attack on Critical Race Theory, because what else would it be?
https://www.aspencenterforhumandevelopment.org/about-us.php
It comes as little surprise, given her involvement with our dear friend Jonathan Haidt:
In addition to directing the Aspen Center for Human Development, Dr. Paresky serves a select clientele through her consulting practice, MultiGenerational Consulting Services, LLC, and is a Visiting Senior Research Associate at the Stevanovich Institute on the Formation of Knowledge (SIFK) at the University of Chicago. Her work there focuses on both experiential education and creating “Habits of a Free Mind” courses and programs that facilitate the ability to think in new ways and to lead and engage across lines of difference –– without feeling traumatized and without dehumanizing ideological opponents. Before joining SIFK, Dr. Paresky taught leadership at the US Air Force Academy in the Center for Character and Leadership Development. She also served as Senior Scholar in Human Development and Psychology at the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) where she was the primary researcher and in-house editor for the New York Times bestseller, The Coddling of the American Mind by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt.
For those who might have missed it, here is my article attacking Haidt and his own version of Trolling the Libs:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1wRa-UjQrGtOZOcPTN75mjGsA_dlpzoCxMulxk4Xvo-c/edit
Dr. Paresky seems to believe that Social Justice is “Bigotry”:
And, naturellement, she is against the California Ethnic Studies curriculum:
And of course, there is the required University of Chicago Straussian connection:
https://twitter.com/pamelaparesky/status/1144057894897369091?lang=en
Because there is always Leo Strauss!
There are apparently a few token SAPIR “Libs,” who have their own worrying issues, but who do not mind to be in such august Tikvah Neo-Con company.
We have Jeremy Burton:
https://www.jcrcboston.org/about-jcrc/staff/jeremy-burton-professional-biography/
Burton is apparently involved with a Mixed Marriage version of Birthright Israel called Honeymoon Israel:
It has a very unique understanding of “diversity”:
Here is the description of the HASBARAH program:
The program is designed for “intermarried families, LGBT families, and multiracial families … and people who have low commitment and low exploration” of Judaism. “If you are too engaged and have figured it out, this program isn’t for you. We want to try to get the people who are not walking in our doors.”
Pinkwashing, Shiksawashing, Jews of Color washing – it is all there!
Very Tikvah.
There is NATAN President Felicia Herman:
http://natan.org/cgi-bin/about/team.pl
Her bio is a truly robust iteration of White Jewish Institutional Supremacy:
Felicia Herman became President of Natan in 2021, after
16 years as Executive Director. Since April 2020, she has been Director of the
Aligned Grant Program of the Jewish Community Response and Impact Fund; she is
also Managing Editor of Sapir, a new journal of Jewish ideas being launched in
spring 2021.
Felicia is Chair of the Advisory Board of Shomer Collective, which Natan
launched in late 2020 and Founder of Amplifier (now Amplifier@JFNA), a network
of giving circles inspired by Jewish values that Natan launched in 2014. She is
President of the Board of the American Jewish Historical Society and also
serves on the boards of Sefaria and the DreamStreet Theatre Company, a
performing arts company for adults with developmental disabilities. She is a
proud recipient of the Jewish Funders Network's JJ Greenberg Memorial Award.
Felicia holds a Ph.D. and M.A. in American Jewish History from Brandeis
University, and a B.A. from Wellesley College. She lives in Brooklyn with her
husband and their three children.
Even more interesting is Ethan Felson:
https://www.timesofisrael.com/lgbtq-rights-group-names-longtime-israel-advocate-as-director/
Felson is a veteran HASBARAH hack who was actually hired by a group called A Wider Bridge, which advocates on behalf of LGBTQ rights in Israel:
An LGBTQ rights group has named a longtime Israel advocate as its leader amid increasing criticism of the Jewish state from the left.
A Wider Bridge announced the appointment of Ethan Felson, formerly executive director of the Israel Action Network, on Monday. The network is the Israel advocacy arm of the Jewish Federations of North America. Felson is a longtime leading pro-Israel professional with roots in Jewish community outreach to other minorities.
The announcement by the 10-year-old New York-based group, which advocates for LGBTQ rights in Israel and for Israel in the international LGBTQ community, comes as the pro-Israel movement faces twin challenges: Defending Israel as it appears set upon annexing part of the West Bank, and grappling with the role of Jewish groups in advocating for civil rights reforms in the wake of unrest triggered by police violence against African-Americans.
Indeed, Felson takes Pinkwashing to new heights!
The SAPIR website has only posted two of the articles on-line.
The first is of course by Stephens himself:
https://sapirjournal.org/social-justice/2021/04/jews-and-the-dilemmas-of-social-justice/
Stephens is writing on Jews and Social Justice!
Excellent.
Just what we needed:
In 2016, the Movement for Black Lives published a platform (since deleted) calling Israel “an apartheid state” that was committing “genocide” against Palestinians. In 2017, marchers carrying Jewish Pride flags were expelled from the Chicago Dyke March. In 2018, leaders of the Women’s March were revealed as proud sympathizers of Louis Farrakhan’s. In 2019, the U.K.’s Labour Party ran under the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn, a man who, as James Kirchick notes in our inaugural issue of Sapir, petulantly denies being an antisemite even as he delights in making common cause with them. In 2020, basketball legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar courageously denounced the shocking indifference of so many social justice warriors to antisemitic outbursts from prominent black athletes and artists.
Examples such as these have persuaded Jews of the political Right and center that “social justice,” whatever it may be in theory, is profoundly hostile to Jewish interests in practice. And progressive Jews are themselves frequently dismayed by the degree to which movements that tout their tolerance and inclusivity are anything but tolerant and inclusive when it comes to Jews. In the progressive world’s new intersectional hierarchies of race and oppression, American Jews who enjoy economic privilege and “conditional whiteness” while participating, through their support for Israel, in the oppression of Palestinians are now considered leading malefactors in the American system of “white supremacy.”
Jewish “Social Justice” is about attacking the current Social Justice movements and their leaders.
Well played.
The Zionists attack them, they attack the Zionists – it is all very neat and symmetrical.
Finally, there is the sad specter of Rabbi Yitz Greenberg, a tragic figure who I met some years ago at the offices of the deplorable Michael Steinhardt and his bully pulpit White Jewish Philanthropy.
Indeed, it is very bully!
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/03/21/michael-steinhardt-accused-of-sexual-harassment-in-nyt-report.html
To be fair, Greenberg is a man who really means well, but is so weak and ineffectual that his advocacy is less than meaningless. I recall him as a man without a spine, without a combative bone in his body. He made me feel that he, not me, was the oppressed one!
No one can whine like an Ashkenazi without purpose. And no one can throw you under the bus while expressing self-pity.
There is no courage in such a man, only cowardice; with the knowledge that his position in the White Jewish Supremacy institutional hierarchy is quite secure.
It is a brilliant combination that could only be possible through PILPUL.
His equivocating contribution to the SAPIR Neo-Con festa is on Tikkun Olam:
https://sapirjournal.org/social-justice/2021/04/judaism-and-the-politics-of-tikkun-olam/
It starts off rather ominously:
The Jewish worldview enables us to reject simplemindedness and silver bullets. It embraces incrementalism over radicalism, even in striving toward revolutionary goals. Judaism’s approach acknowledges the complexities of human existence. It puts forward flawed people as role models, rather than impossible ideals. And it moves, inexorably, though not always linearly, toward the perfection of the world.
Until it firmly settles in on the usual Bret Stephens Straussian Troll the Libs racism:
This brings us to the frontier of contemporary American social justice movements, especially racial justice efforts. A new understanding of structural racism, recognition of continued inequality, and high-profile incidents of the deaths of black people at the hands of the police have led to demands for all-out efforts and drastic, extraordinary action, ranging from reparations for slavery to unprecedented levels of investment in and attention to black communities.
The time calls for serious action. The Jewish community should join in making the case for directing extra attention and resources to resolve areas of long-standing deprivation and inequality. Given the cumulative suffering of African Americans from centuries of slavery followed by systematic discrimination, their need for support to overcome deprivation deserves an out-of-the-ordinary response.
However, this work is so important that it should be guided by our own tradition, which upholds both justice and a process that shows fairness and respect to all groups. Significantly, it includes trying to prevent one-sided or extreme policies that will damage one group in service of another and that can erode the trust and mutual interests upholding democratic institutions.
A moderate approach is needed, because a more radical wing has emerged of late, usually called the “antiracism” movement. (This is not dissimilar from the phenomenon whereby a more radical black nationalist movement emerged from the liberal civil rights movement.) This group brings a new narrative that rejects the inherited story of America as a land of opportunity. This worldview holds, instead, that the true story of America is one of unalloyed exploitation and abuse, primarily of black citizens. It follows that all white Americans are beneficiaries of structural racism and are thereby implicated in this entrenched evil.
Aside from the unfairness of indiscriminately impeaching all members of a group — any group — this approach contradicts the hard-earned lessons of Jewish tradition that each person should be judged by individual behavior. Jewish tradition once demonized whole groups or tainted them by dint of their belonging to an evil community. However, as it matured, it eliminated such rulings because they violated the image of God of the “outcasts.” (Consider the neutralization of the laws to wipe out the seven Canaanite nations [Yoma 54a] or to execute the rebellious son [Sanhedrin 71a].) Such wholesale condemnations also undermined the checks and balances that govern action and prevent a just system from turning violent and destructive.
Here is the racist climax of the article, replete with all the Jewish paranoia and hypocritical duplicity that Greenberg could muster:
One of the most dangerous elements of this new ideology is many of its proponents’ unwillingness to brook dissent. They label resistance, hesitation, critique, or proposed moderation of extraordinary steps as evidence of racism itself. If you are not an “antiracist” as the ideology defines it, you are necessarily a racist. The effect is to stifle discussion, damaging the integrity of political discourse and hampering our ability to create a broad consensus.
This approach violates the central covenantal principle of not imposing even good policies by force, out of respect for the dignity of the other. The delegitimization of dissent is nothing less than religious coercion disguised as upholding morality. Those who challenge or criticize are excommunicated: They are labeled “racist,” which puts them beyond the pale, unworthy even of getting a hearing. Accepting this approach means that if anything goes wrong — which happens in any human system — there is no built-in review or check. A systemic warping and metastasis of abuses become inevitable and uncorrectable. All policies need independent feedback in order to function at their best.
SAPIR is a White Jewish Supremacist entity that brooks no dissent on Zionism and Ashkenazi hegemony. It is part of a deeply incestuous Jewish institutional world that excludes those who do not toe the party line. It is a branding and marketing exercise that is carefully organized and presented as a counter to the current Racial Justice movements and institutions.
It is not surprising that Sephardim are not permitted in such an exclusive
racial enclave. Of course, Bret Stephens believes that we are not the equals of Ashkenazim in the first place:
https://groups.google.com/g/davidshasha/c/kyX5EqjLwY8/m/4XMKDLIPBgAJ
“Jewish Genius” is limited to the Ashkenazim!
Indeed, my meeting with Greenberg at the Steinhardt Foundation offices gave me a personal insight on the exclusionary process: How no one really wants to know anything about the classical Sephardic heritage, and how the moneybags philanthropists are averse to reading and learning about Judaism.
There is nothing ironic about those bully philanthropists lending their names to schools of Education, when they do not, as Greenberg sheepishly told me, read:
https://nyunews.com/news/2019/09/12/michael-steinhardt-name-change-school-nyu/
As Greenberg shows in his reprehensible article, all that is needed in the Jewish institutional world is to repeat the standard echo-chamber talking points, which must be repeated ad nauseum by all members of the club.
These talking points, firmly rooted in HASBARAH and White Jewish Supremacy, are then transferred to our Synagogues, Yeshivas, and JCCs, where impressionable young people can be indoctrinated in the ways of the closed system and its prejudices.
The key is always to coat the indoctrination in a sheen of respectable “diversity” and “tolerance,” when in fact the system is hermetically-sealed and brooks absolutely no cultural diversity, inclusion, and ideological openness; as it speaks militantly in the institutional monolingualism of Ashkenazi hegemony.
David Shasha