New York Sense of Humor

[orichalcum]

Roger Cohen of the NYT points out this answer from Palin during the V-P debate:

"“One thing that Americans do at this time, also, though, is let’s commit ourselves just everyday American people, Joe Six Pack, hockey moms across the nation, I think we need to band together and say ‘Never Again.’ Never will we be exploited and taken advantage of again by those managing our money and loaning us these dollars.”

Um. I'm not saying it's necessarily anti-Semitic to use Holocaust terminology to castigate New York moneylenders, but, at the least, it's remarkably insensitive hyperbole. I'm not underestimating the impact of the economic crisis, but last time I checked, six million people hadn't died as a result.

Still, it's better than her permitting chants of "Kill Him!" during her political rallies.

Comments

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Really? Huh. I feel like "Never Again" has a definite strong connotation for me with the Holocaust. And while I did frame it, she chose to blame the economic crisis on "those loaning us these dollars," which is not precisely accurate and does convey images of moneylending. (Not to mention the fact that Lehman Brothers and various other of the relevant companies are actually run by Jewish people, which makes me suspicious that she was indeed dog-whistling.)

[marginaleye.livejournal.com]

she chose to blame the economic crisis on "those loaning us these dollars"

Pa-bloody-thetic.

I thought the Republicans were supposed to be the party of "personal responsibility." Hah!

No, the bankers didn't put guns to their heads and force them to sign on the dotted line. The greedy/status-conscious sheeple were so intent on pursuing the 'Murikan dream of continuous conspicuous consumption that they did it to themselves. I have no sympathy whatsoever.

[meepodeekin.livejournal.com]

I think it's the direct connection you're seeing from the lenders to the big New York firms that I'm missing. The people who are actually giving out huge amounts of money to average Americans mostly work for places like BofA and aren't anything like Jewish. You have to make the connection from there to the market and the underlying market forces that led to the moneylending bonanza (a connection I doubt Palin understands). Is the myth of Jewish moneylenders still active and something that an average "Joe Six-Pack" will pick up on immediately? I guess I think people like Palin and her supporters are generally so ignorant that even historical forms of anti-semitism are probably beyond them. I'd almost be happy to be wrong--it would mean she's aware of at least some history, even if it's bad stuff.

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

Yeah, Joe Six-Pack loves the story in the New Testament about Jesus breaking up the moneylenders in the temple, and still extrapolates to presume that all Jews are bankers or Hollywood producers. It's still what happens in regions where the Jewish communities are few and far between and most folks don't like to drive an hour or more to temple so that means a lot of small towns with no Jewish residents at all. It's sort of a subliminable thing, but yes, that association of Jews with lending is, sadly, still there.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Yeah, thanks for that note. I know certainly that I've seen other people called out for (what they thought were "harmless") praises of Jews as being "good with money" and so forth, and I do think that there's still that association. That said, you may all be right that it's too complex a set of associations for most people to have picked up on - though her speechwriters are masters of subliminal messaging.

[stone-and-star.livejournal.com]

I didn't pick up on any of the alleged anti-semitic associations being discussed here, but I *definitely* consider "never again" to refer to the Holocaust. I've heard it used more appropriately in other settings where people were discussing the threat of genocide to groups other than the Jews.

[orichalcum.livejournal.com]

Where it's unfortunately kinda ironic, because what force does "never again" have when there have been 10+ genocides since 1945?

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

That having been said... I'm not sure most Joe Six-Packs would have picked up on it in this case because it went by pretty fast... and a lot of majority-Christian middle America really does NOT understand the holocaust, so they'd have to both get the significance of "Never Again" in that sense (which they just haven't been very exposed to), AND also have their hokey Jews as moneylenders bullshit activated, and that's kinda a lot of stuff for them to have taken in all at once.

So, um, I'm saying it's possible in theory. I'm also saying that in practice I don't think it was successful dog-whistling. Cuz i don't think Palin is actually capable of successful dog-whistling, she doesn't have the finesse.

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

And not to post a third time, but I was just thinking to myself "Huh, census.gov could help us with this question!" Except I then remembered they won't touch religion questions with a ten foot pole, so you'd have to get population density data from them and distribution of Jews from some other source and overlay it with GIS software, and I just don't have the librarian fu for that. And it's really only accessory to your query anyway. But it got me thinking. I should shut up and go work now.

Here are some statistics... knock yourself out

[marginaleye.livejournal.com]

Census.gov won't help you, but the Association of Religion Data Archives will provide the missing religious statistics, with very nice color-coded maps, broken down to the county level). It will also provide mundane demographic information in exactly the same graphic format, which facilitates the identification of correlations. Sadly, the data is getting a bit long in the tooth (it dates back to 2000), but it's still pretty spiffy.