My letter about antisemitism in today's Independent


By MatthewHarris
December 29, 2010
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When I see something that I don't like in a newspaper, I don't just sit there fulminating in anger, I write a courteous and constructive letter to the editor. Quite often, they get published, meaning that the thousands of people who read the original article also get to read my views - giving them something to think about, and hopefully changing some of their minds. I have such a letter in today's Independent (http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/letters/letters-criticism-of-israel...), responding to a letter (http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/letters/letters-cable-v-murdoch-a-g...) about Christina Patterson's claim that she has been "smeared as an antisemite" (http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/christina-patterson/ch...) in the furore about an unpleasant article about Jews that she wrote in July (http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/christina-patterson/ch...). My letter reads:

I do not understand David Pollard's argument that it has clearly not been "a vintage year for the Wiesenthal anti-Semitic slur awards, if an obscure Lithuanian Holocaust denier and a moan from Christina Patterson ... have both made it into the Top 10 Slurs of the year" (letter, 27 December).

The Holocaust denier in question is an adviser to the Lithuanian Interior Ministry and wrote his offending words in Veidas, one of his country's most popular weeklies. By what measure is he "obscure"? Christina Patterson, meanwhile, wrote her "moan" not in some fringe publication, but in a newspaper so very mainstream as The Independent itself, which is precisely why it merits consideration for a Top 10 placing.

An anti-Semite is someone who has a generalised dislike of Jews. Ms Patterson denies being such a person; in which case, why did she write an article that gave the impression that she dislikes Judaism, Islam and the people who practice them?

As for her assertion ("How I was smeared as an anti-Semite", 23 December), by way of Hannah Arendt, that one can only hate individual "persons", and not "any people or collective" – if wishing made it so. Events in Rwanda, Bosnia and Darfur surely prove that human beings are eminently capable of hating (and killing) each other not only as individuals, but also in the mass.

Ms Patterson wrote an article giving the (possibly mistaken) impression that she dislikes Jews and Muslims, and then blamed those who were offended for having taken offence. She reminds me of a saloon bar bore who drones on about immigration and then is surprised to be accused of racism.

COMMENTS

Yoni1

29 December, 2010 - 16:16

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"When I see something that I don't like in a newspaper, I don't just sit there fulminating in anger, I write a courteous and constructive letter to the editor"

You don't half fancy yourself, Mr Narcissistic Pomposity.


Yoni1

29 December, 2010 - 16:19

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"She reminds me of a saloon bar bore who drones on about immigration and then is surprised to be accused of racism"

Discussing immigration has nothing to do with being 'racist'. This stupid (or mendacious, depending) conflation by your party and that of McLoon is what has brought this country to its current sorry state.


jose (not verified)

29 December, 2010 - 17:21

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By the way, what about the other saloon bar bore named Tonge? Is she facing the expulsion committee anytime soon?


Yoni1

29 December, 2010 - 17:37

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If only she were a saloon bar bore ... not a term I would apply to dangerous Jew-haters like her.


MatthewHarris

29 December, 2010 - 18:15

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You guys mill around this blog addressing me and each other - do you ever do anything that involves reaching out to the general public and presenting them with an argument?


jose (not verified)

29 December, 2010 - 18:29

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You guys mill around this blog addressing me and each other - do you ever do anything that involves reaching out to the general public and presenting them with an argument?

Yeah, I say all the time antisemitism is bad, but nobody seems to listen.


jose (not verified)

29 December, 2010 - 18:30

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And especially, they don't listen at the LibDem Party. I pointed out that they cannot keep an antisemite like Tonge, but they keep ignoring me.


MatthewHarris

29 December, 2010 - 18:36

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And yet you never seem to have anything to say about similar people in the Labour Party?


jose (not verified)

29 December, 2010 - 18:45

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These people in the Labour Party don't have a blogger who pretends to be a friend of Israel.


Yoni1

29 December, 2010 - 18:49

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"do you ever do anything that involves reaching out to the general public and presenting them with an argument?"

You have no idea what we do in real life, clown.

"And yet you never seem to have anything to say about similar people in the Labour Party?"

Drivel. We say plenty about Livingstone and Linton when appropriate. If a 'Labour' mouthpiece came here spouting the same mealy-mouthed nonsense as you do, he'd get it in the neck plenty.


Joe Millis

29 December, 2010 - 18:55

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Yoni1, and if a Tory were to come here, would you pull him up over Hague and Cameron, both of whom -- I hope you agree -- are far more important than some siren-voiced backbench Lib Dem peer or discredited former London mayor.


Yvetta

29 December, 2010 - 19:09

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What I've found, in writing to the Torygraph, is that I'm ignored because I ain't a personage of note.
I did, however, manage get a letter in that esteemed organ once: early in 1998 or thereabouts - about the total lack of passport checks at Waterloo or on Eurostar.
Many a time my local rag carries letters from the PSC harpies - but ignores letters supporting Israel.


Yoni1

29 December, 2010 - 20:05

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"if a Tory were to come here, would you pull him up over Hague and Cameron"

Most certainly. In fact, not only that, but I have written to my own Tory MP about them, in very strong terms indeed. We fell out over this issue big-time, having been on the most cordial terms for a number of years.

"far more important than some siren-voiced backbench Lib Dem peer or discredited former London mayor"

Except that he is planning a comeback, and is still strong enough within the party to have survived what should have been certain expulsion for anyone else after brazenly flouting the party rules during the GE: they were too scared to touch him (mind you, the Millipedes would have been too scared to expel a wet paper bag). The fact that he is discredited to you or me doesn't mean that he is discredited in the eyes of hordes of loonies within Labour.


Joe Millis

29 December, 2010 - 20:36

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Yoni1, ken ain't got a chance of a comeback. Boris will probably win after making sure some more of livingstone's abominations disappear.


Jonathan Hoffman

30 December, 2010 - 08:30

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"do you ever do anything that involves reaching out to the general public and presenting them with an argument?"

You know now that we talk to the general public in the Ahava counter-demos, because I told you here:

http://www.thejc.com/blogpost/is-nick-clegg-cracking#comments

So please don't ask this question again

Maybe you might even come on 9 January, I think it would be appropriate for someone from LDFI, don't you?

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