Opinion | David Duke Is Back—Or Is He?
On August 12, David Duke stood on a picnic bench in a Charlottesville park and addressed white supremacists gathered there for the far right’s biggest rally in years.
On August 12, David Duke stood on a picnic bench in a Charlottesville park and addressed white supremacists gathered there for the far right’s biggest rally in years.
By the time you read this, the neo-Nazi march in Charlottesville will likely be old news. Although news cycles now fly by fast and furious, blurring and short-circuiting our memories, I still want to talk about these young white supremacists.
In the wake of Charlottesville and the moral equivalency debate spawned by President Donald Trump’s comments, Noah Rothman has argued that, while it’s incumbent upon the right to get its house in order and expel white supremacists from its coalition, the left would do well to examine violent tendencies within its own ranks.
The Anti-Defamation League has been asking people what they think of Jews for a long time.
The alt-right and the “alt-lite” are new movements, with ideologies and boundaries still forming. This blurs the line between the two, pitting overt hate against a more discrete kind of hate that is nonetheless laced with misogyny, racism, Islamophobia and anti-Semitism.
On June 1, The European Parliament adopted a working definition of anti-Semitism for the first time. The definition, borrowed from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, serves as a politically important descriptor of the phenomenon. “Antisemitism is a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews,” the definition reads. “Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/ or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”
The notion that Germany has special responsibilities due to the Holocaust influences Merkel’s outlook on the world significantly. But this is not to say everything is rosy.
The term “anti-Semitism” has evolved. As scholarship on the subject grew, the available vocabulary expanded. Today, its definition—and its boundaries—are uncertain. “Anti-Semitism” is but one of a convoluted, interconnected web of similar words—including “anti-Judaism,” “anti-Zionism,” “Judeophobia” and “Zionophobia.”
While Martin Luther initially had a relatively positive relationship with German Jews, he eventually adopted vociferously anti-Jewish rhetoric and promoted violence against Jews.
I feel oddly comforted by remembering that, while purveyors of anti-Jewish sentiments have always pressed their advantage during unsettled political times, they always vanish back into their netherworlds.
When I left off writing in our last issue, anti-Semitism had made a startling comeback in the United States, and Steve Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News, was about to be installed as chief strategist to the new man in the White House.
It didn’t take long for the recently elected government to have a troubling impact on the state of the country’s democracy.