Posted on 08/03/2006 10:24:47 AM PDT by Conservative-Ranter
I have no idea what was in the heart of Mel Gibson when he made his comments, but what I am about to say, I believe, is felt by many Americans.
I love Israel. I support, without condition, the actions it has taken and will continue to take to preserve its integrity.
I also love Jews of a conservative political bent. In a community that is overwhelmingly liberal, these men and women have courage, and they have overcome a liberal political mindset that I believe is poisonous. Jews typically only give 25% of their votes to Republicans or conservatives. Still, 25% of about four million American Jews is one million. No small number. Some of the luminaries within that million are Bill Kristol, Paul Wolfowitz, Ben Stein, Dr. Laura Schlesinger, Charles Krauthammer, Michael Savage, Mark Levin, Jackie Mason, and David Horowitz.
Europeans murdered millions of Jews, and the continent, in general, has no love of Jews. Arabs want to murder Jews and push Israel into the sea. In the UN, almost every Third World country consistently votes against Israel or votes in favor of “Zionism is racism” resolutions. With few, if any, exceptions, there are but two places on the entire planet where Jews are welcome and where they can thrive: and those places are Israel, and the United States of America.
Of course, Israel is an officially Jewish state. The US, on the other hand, while secular, has a population that is overwhelmingly Christian. Despite this, and unlike nominally Christian Europe, this country and its people have welcomed Jews. Mind you, I am not saying Christians are responsible for Jewish success. Jews are responsible for Jewish success. But the Christian majority here has provided a benign atmosphere for that success to be nurtured and thrive unlike any other place on the planet. Sure, there have been ugly incidents of anti-semitism in the US, but no worse than the bigotry that has attached to Black-, Irish-, Italian-, Asian-, and Latin-Americans.
Of all the groups just mentioned, Jewish-Americans have thrived more than any other. In disproportionate numbers they occupy professional fields (physicians, lawyers, etc.). In disproportionate numbers they possess higher levels of wealth than other Americans. In disproportionate numbers they attend or have graduated from the nation’s best universities. In disproportionate numbers they are members of the nation’s intelligentsia. In disproportionate numbers they wield power in fields of influence in the US (newspapers, media, culture, the arts, and entertainment). They are exceedingly and disproportionately low in crime and imprisonment. In disproportionate numbers they serve in the Senate and House.
These are all good things and are the product of a hard working, close-knit people that values education and achievement.
On the negative side: Jews have disproportionately low representation in the Armed Forces. And they are disproportionately high in membership in the ACLU. They are also disproportionately represented in far left social and political groups in the US, groups that push for abortion rights, removal of religion from the public square, that favor excessive rights for criminal, open borders, and that have a general hostility toward the Christian majority that has welcomed them in this country like in no other place on earth (save Israel).
In 1967 I saw Jewish students in my neighborhood collecting money for and demonstrating in favor of Israel during the six-day war. That same year I saw those same students demonstrating against the Vietnam War. Vocal, prominent leaders against the Vietnam war (and in the radical groups of that era) were disproportionately Jewish.
In 1973 President Nixon virtually emptied the arsenals of the US military and sent bombs, guns, planes, and tanks to Israel in unprecedented numbers in order for the Jewish state to achieve success in the Yom Kippur War, yet Jews were disproportionately in the vanguard of the anti-Nixon cancer that led to his resignation.
It is hard for non-Jewish Americans like me (and many others, I suspect) to understand the disconnect here. The US supports Israel like no other country does. And, in the US, Jews have been more welcome and have had more success than in any place since biblical Zion. So, why do so many Jews figure disproportionately and prominently in groups that oppose the culture, religion, and sensibilities of the people and nation that have been so good to them?
This disconnect, this seeming ingratitude, grates.
Evidently the policeman that arrested Mel Gibson was Jewish. Gibson, I am guessing, discerned this fact either from the cop’s physical appearance or by his name. (And, please don’t lecture me on physical stereotypes, and names…despite PC pretenses to the contrary, people of different ethnic groups share some commonality in terms of looks and names. This, of course is not universal. You can see blond Latins and dark Swedes. But these are the exception. And sure, there are Christians with “Jewish” names, and Jews with “Christian” names, but these, too, are the exception, Whoopie Goldberg notwithstanding).
So, here was Gibson, drunk, and certainly not happy with the cop (any cop) that apprehended him. It is not hard to understand how drunken comments toward any arresting cop can get personal. If the cop were fat, or pimpled, or bald, or had an English accent, or looked Irish, or whatever, you can imagine how insults directed toward those characteristics might have surfaced. But, evidently, Gibson discerned the cop was Jewish, so that is the characteristic he personalized.
Gibson, like many Americans, is not blind, and he like others can readily see all the things I described earlier: the success of Jews in the US, yet their disproportionate prominence in groups that oppose the culture, religion, and sensibilities of the majority of Americans. And I have no doubt that those disconnects fueled his hostile, drunken words. If the cop had an English accent a different set of epithets might have surfaced.
Is the mental comparison of the success of Jews in the US, with the opposition of many of them to tenets held dear by the Christian majority an act or thought of anti-semitism? Should we unleash the thought police?
Importantly, in Gibson’s case, let’s remember, that just two years ago many Jews and Jewish groups vociferously opposed his “Passion of the Christ,” and hurled accusations, charges, and epithets toward Gibson. Is he supposed to forget this?
Can any one imagine how, in the drunken embarrassment of being arrested, by a cop he discerned to be Jewish, those attacks against Gibson and his film, still fresh in his mind, could have surfaced, and resulted in his hurling of epithets toward this target of opportunity? If Brits had opposed his film, and the arresting cop had a cockney accent, might not anti-British epithets have resulted?
Some say that “Gibson had to believe those (anti-semitic) rants if he said them.” If the epithets had been toward the British-accented cop, and Gibson had said “your Queen is a whore,” would anyone suggest that Gibson actually believed that Elizabeth II turned tricks for a living? Epithets are meant to be over-the-top, and are meant to incite their targets.
Personal insults are never good. If Gibson had used anti-fat, -bald, -pimply, -Irish, or -English epithets he would have been guilty of incivility and boorishness. But insults of this nature and his boorish behavior would never have made the press. And if they had, Gibson would not have to wear sackcloth and ashes, in repentance, for the rest of his life. Anti-anything words are not good. But this is a gross over-reaction.
I didn't type the "but the courts are wrong and I'm right."
But I can't say I've never gotten ahead of myself. And anticipation like that isn't very smart, is it? I asked you something because I was interested in your view.
Given the events over the entire period of the state of Israel, even ignoring the previous millennia including Biblical times, I would say that their response was disproportional.
Far too mild.
Hopelessness of repeated profound intoxication even of the most mild mannered and fun-loving can produce a creature that none want to be around.
This is the true problem with understanding the illness or disease nature of alcoholism: When you are seated next to a totally wasted guy on a three hour airplane ride, it is pretty hard to say, "Oh, poor guy, he has a disease."
Gone, but not forgotten.
Amen to your post #23
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.