This semester I have been teaching a course on the history of antisemitism. I have never been one to see antisemitism behind every rock and crevice; I confess that I probably have minimized the problem. Now, though, I think about antisemitism frequently, and I see more than I ever have – perhaps more than is really there.
So in that vein, I felt a moment of alarm at an extraneous clause I saw in an article in the New York Times. Shane Goldmacher wrote an article on how the GOP presidential race is beginning to take shape, using an event sponsored by the Republican Jewish Coalition as the backdrop. He described the RJC as, “a group whose leaders include some of the party’s biggest and most dependable contributors.”
- The line is imprecise. When I actually compared the list of “leaders” of the RJC with a list of top major party donors, I found very few overlapping names (and one is dead). So I’m unsure what would count as criteria for ascertaining the veracity of the claim.
- Such a line can, of course, be used for any one of dozens, if not hundreds, of political gatherings. In my quick search of the NYTimes site I saw the phrase, or one similar to it, many times, but never applied to any other specific group.
- Given the thrust of Goldmacher’s article, this qualifier was utterly unnecessary. The point is that the GOP is wrestling the potential of a fractured field – it was not about campaign financing. If he wanted to put in a descriptive line about the RJC, why not just take it from their About page?
Minor, to be sure, but still this troubled me. At a time when the old trope of Jews conspiratorially controlling wealth and power is very much back in public view, is such a line really necessary or wise? I wrote to the news department at the Times to express my concerns and will report back if I hear anything from them.