On Thu, 11 Apr 2002, Matt Grimaldi wrote: > > > > To begin with, that anyone thinks were acting appropriately. > The beginning of this argument started with the position that > all of Europe leaned towards the anti-semetic, and that this > was an example of such.
I don't think the point was "all of Europe." I think it was more along the lines of "anti-Semitism is alive and well," comparable to the way racism is alive and well in the US. Jeroen was asked for an explanation, > and provided the best one he could come up with, that they > panicked and overreacted. The rest is just everyone trying > to paint everyone else into a corner. Jeroen did not argue that anyone panicked. He argued that preventing displays of Jewish symbols was likely part of a well-reasoned strategy of protecting public safety. I and others have already allowed that what happened in Norway was probably the result of a few individuals, and did not represent the policy of Norway as such. However, I have earnestly argued that the strategy described by Jeroen, if it's being used, is a very bad one. Ok, I'll admit that I was coming on too strong, probably, and that I was picking a bit of a fight at first. But the rest of the argument, it seems to me, has been over a valid point of dispute: does protecting public welfare justify suppressing some of the rights of the victims of certain kinds of attacks? I think the answer is clearly "no," especially in places like Europe and the US, for reasons I've already articulated. Finally -- and I don't mean to offend anyone, but this is how I feel -- I think that if state and society were to urge Jews, or members of any other minority, not to display their religious or ethnic symbols on the grounds that they "provoke" attack, then what you are seeing at work is a kind of racism. It might be subconscious, but it's there. I say this not because I'm anti-Europe, but because I'm aware of America's own sad history of bigotry, and I cannot imagine a strategy of that sort being employed in the US (for blacks or Jews or gay people, say) without prejudice being at its core. Think of the "Don't ask, don't tell" policy in our military, which tries to reduce trouble without actually endorsing the basic rights of gay people. In my opinion, asking Jews to conceal their symbols, i.e. to hide their identities, is the same kind of weasely evasion of a state's fundamental responsibility to guard equal rights. A responsibility which must be allowed occasionally to hinder short-term public safety because allowing all people to be free inherently means running the risk that one subset of people will take exception to another. Marvin Long Austin, Texas
