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Culture War Roundup for the week of May 13, 2024

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Especially when you compound it with a (well-founded) persecution complex based on the events of the Holocaust and prior pogroms. It seems to me that it leads to an escalatory spiral where influence is exerted to stop people from discussing the use of that influence, leading to spiralling paranoia on both sides.

What exactly is the nature of this Jewish influence? If we're still talking about the UK, I can only think of the Corbyn situation, and that strikes me as pretty weak. If he'd been openly friendly with the KKK, and refused to even say that associating with them might have been poor judgement, then the gigantic number of articles you'd have seen written by black journalists about how frightened they were by the prospect of his premiership would probably dwarf those written by jews in rough accordance to the ratio of black people to Jews. I wouldn't say that would be an example of "black influence".

The most obvious element is that it is very dangerous to stand up in public and discussion Jewish overrepresentation. Beyond that, I think that the continued mawkish emphasis of the Holocaust in my country is mostly down to Jewish activism; it was horrible, but it happened hundreds of miles away, in a totally different country with whom we were at war, seventy years ago. And yet we are spending 100m of public money in 2024 to pave over a park in Central London so that it can be turned into a Holocaust memorial*, even rewriting our own planning laws because they forbid it, and heavily implying that the only difference between Britain and Nazi Germany is that the anti-semitic fascists happened to turn up there and not here.

Beyond those two points, I have no idea what influence is going on behind the scenes. I hope not too much, but I am not so naive as to think that a group with disproportionate influence is not wielding it at all. Thus my desire for transparency.

*The designer of the memorial has said publicly that ruining the pleasure of people who people who want to use the park is key to the memorial's effect.

The most obvious element is that it is very dangerous to stand up in public and discussion Jewish overrepresentation.

I appreciate that but that's true or any minority in the UK . How secure would your job be if you tried to discuss Indian overrepresentation? Or black overrepresentation at the other end? I'm not even sure Jews are overrepresented in the UK. I can only think of a small handful of political figures/journalists. Alan Sugar I suppose?

Beyond that, I think that the continued mawkish emphasis of the Holocaust in my country is mostly down to Jewish activism; it was horrible, but it happened hundreds of miles away, in a totally different country with whom we were at war, seventy years ago.

I'd want to see evidence of that. I'm sure Jewish communities appreciate it being remembered but the Holocaust is emphasised far more IMO in order to underline that we in the UK were on the "right side" of the war, against the indescribably terrible Nazis. It's basically our crowning 20th century achievement! Compare that to our relationship with WWI, where even though we won and didn't lose our empire immediately afterwards, the main sentiment towards it is almost one of national regret that our incompetent (in the public imagination) leadership frivolously threw away the lives of so many young men. Could you imagine any piece of media depicting the role of UK in WWII similarly to how it is in Blackadder goes forth?

And yet we are spending 100m of public money in 2024 to pave over a park in Central London so that it can be turned into a Holocaust memorial*, even rewriting our own planning laws because they forbid it, and heavily implying that the only difference between Britain and Nazi Germany is that the anti-semitic fascists happened to turn up there and not here.

I haven't heard about this, so would be interested in learning more. Did this happen because Jews were clamoring for public money to be spent on ruining green spaces in London? I'd assume this is far more likely to be the brainchild of the sort of public sector worker who put Hadiths on the display board in KX, and likes bringing up the Holocaust so they can claim that it's imperative we don't allow "fascists" (i.e. anyone opposed to immigration) to get into power, because clearly we're only ever a hair's breadth at most from what happened in Germany in the 30s.

Beyond those two points, I have no idea what influence is going on behind the scenes. I hope not too much, but I am not so naive as to think that a group with disproportionate influence is not wielding it at all. Thus my desire for transparency.

So apart from not being able to discuss the influence of British Jews, what is the main influence of British Jews (beyond that they're probably up to something)? It's not like they even affect our relationship with Israel that much, tied as it is to American foreign policy in the region. Most of the media left of the Telegraph is pretty relentlessly hostile to Israel, and it's hard to imagine a group with much influence allowing London to be taken over most weekends by thousands of people chanting genocidal chants about them. If anything increasing Muslim immigration is likelier to play a far larger role in affecting our geopolitical stances in the future, and Indian immigration has already led to a member of that group being Prime Minister (the Jews, despite having been here much longer, haven't had one since Disraeli). It seems like Jews are one of the least influential groups in the country.