RACISM

Sub TypeRacism()
'
' TypeRacism Macro
' Macro recorded 1/12005 by the SC-SDP
'
Selection.TypeText Text:="racism"

End Sub


 

It's already been noted how the So-Called Somerville Divestment Project (SC-SDP) would be rendered speechless if the term "apartheid" was removed from their vocabulary (see Apartheid). By the same token, if the word "racism" was edited from their communication (no doubt the word is already programmed into their word processors as a macro - see above), the SC-SDP's resolutions, Web site and letters to the editor would consist of little more than blank pages.

Is it just me, or has the SC-SDP cry of "racism" at every criticism and perceived slight escalated significantly since their campaign left the back room of the Aldermen and entered the public square? In the last two weeks alone, their campaign has seemed to jettison every other argument that once worked in their favor: that divestment is a form of "evening the playing field," "let the people decide," even the cynical equating of divestment with human rights for an endless chorus of "racism, apartheid, racism, apartheid, racism, racism, racism!"

This increasing use of vulgar, shrill accusations has not come without cost. Just a few weeks ago, a leader of last year's divestment campaign publicly condemned the current caricature that passes for discourse among this year's anti-Israel petitioners, revealing the ugly internal politics that has allowed the takeover of the SDP by a group even more fanatical than last year's crew. And I can't tell you how many people have refused to sign their 2005 petition now that it no longer contains even a mealy-mouthed acknowledgement of the existence of murdered Israeli civilians, replacing the escape hatch "victims on both sides" clause from last year's petition with another string of "racism" and "apartheid" accusations.

Just as patriotism is the last resort for certain types of scoundrels, accusations of racism seem the last resort for what now passes for leadership in the local divestment "movement." Indeed, if hypocrisy is the compliment vice pays to virtue, then the SDP must consider the citizens of Somerville to be very virtuous indeed. For within their endless changing of "racist, Racist, RACIST" is a sly understanding that most citizens of Somerville, including all of us who battle divestment in the city, actually care about the fight for racial justice, care about it enough to use the term "racism" for something other than a blunt instrument to shut up our political foes.

Israel's critics suffer from no such conscience (or perhaps they've moved past our bourgeois "false consciousness" in which "racism" is a term with meaning, not just a verbal weapon). I don't know how many times I've pointed out the hollowness of the Israel = Apartheid slur, sponsored as it is by Israel's Arab neighbors who spent the Apartheid era enriching themselves by selling oil to pre-ANC South Africa in exchange for blood gold. Yet divestment's champions seem to think that if they just sing the ANC Anthem loudly enough, throw out enough accusations of "Apartheid" against their critics, they will never have to acknowledge this overwhelming truth.

The whole "R-word" shtick is particularly rich coming from a group that has introduced more crude, race-based bile into the city's discourse than any other movement has in the last forty years. I've already pointed out how the SDP itself has recently attempted to cleanse its Web site of some of the more lunatic articles and "Think Pieces" (see Links) that rant about "Ashkenazi supremacy" and other claptrap, ethnic slurs that - if applied to any other minority - would earn the SDP a quick frog march to five years of racial sensitivity training. The fact that they continue to highlight the writings of some of the world's most notorious Jew baiters, nutcases who even Europe's premiere Israel haters have distanced themselves from, is particularly telling. A few lame qualifiers attempting to put some distance between the SDP and the views they choose to highlight (even as they flush any dissenting opinion down the memory hole) only serves to demonstrate the yawning chasm of integrity between the two sides in this debate.

Through careful fishing and filtering, the SDP has managed to find those few Israeli voices that parrot their endless accusations of racism and Apartheid (while ignoring the views of a thousand other voices that put lie to their curses - see Voices). They have also managed to find other organizations infected with their same illness that have produced anti-Israel divestment calls even more vulgar than their own. Well bully for them.

Just remember that every time an SDP member speaks or writes or shouts "racism" at the top of their lungs, what they are really saying is that they have lost the argument about divestment, but that hope springs eternal in their bosom that their abuse of this term will prick the conscience of those who truly care about the battle for racial justice, as opposed to Israel's accusers who could not care less.