DEMOCRACY/HISTORY/ANTISEMITISM

Defending Democracy and The Path to What is Right is Not Easy 🕊️

Many schools of higher learning these days are nurturing views that undermine classical liberal values and core American principles

Over the past several decades, a distinct and real set of politics has infected elite institutions — rooted in a moral relativism that is not just unrealistic, it’s dangerous.

Last week’s performance by three elite school presidents before Congress tore the mask off the intellectuals and political corruption of much of the American academy.

We have witnessed the shocking equivocation of academic leaders when asked if advocating genocide violated their codes of conduct. Their answers failed in their unwillingness to affirm that their universities unequivocally condemned antisemitism, especially calls for genocide of the Jews.

Many schools of higher learning these days are nurturing views that undermine classical liberal values and core American principles.

The tolerance for antisemitism is one ugly example.

It is no wonder that millennials and subsequent generations have become conscientious objectors on steroids, proselytizing pacifists who type “taking life is never justified” on Instagram from gentrified neighborhoods disconnected from war zones by large oceans.

Americans are not required to serve. And only 40% of Democrats say that they would stay and fight a Ukraine-style Russian invasion on American soil.

This mindset that no one should fight to defend themselves and protect a democratic way of life ignores human history. Unfortunately, we don’t live in a world without violence or death. The hard truth is that our existence already came at the cost of other lives because of previous wars fought on our behalf.

Had America laid down its arms, Hitler would have sailed across the Atlantic in a quest for global dominance and the obliteration of all Jews, which doesn’t sound that different from the explicit goals of Hamas.

Had we not stopped Bin Laden in his goal to subject all of America to Shariah under a global caliphate, it would also have ultimately meant the slaughter of Jews — not to mention the oppression and possible enslavement of millions of others.

Freedom always comes at a cost. It just hasn’t been our cost, not even intellectually — as is evident from all those recent Instagram videos in which current college students can’t even answer who attacked us on 9/11.

Can’t even name which river and which sea “Palestine Will Be Free,” the catch-all slogan symbolizing Palestinian domination over entire Israel, from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea.

There is now a direct line drawn from educators remaining silent. At the same time, students demanded the removal of hummus from the campus store to the cries of “globalize the intifada,” the Arabic word for “uprising,” also calls for widespread violence against both Israelis and Jews across the globe.

Something has been going sideways educationally. “Acceptance” has begun to apply to antisemitic opinions. For years, schools invited speakers who supported BDS, claiming they were trying to “present both sides.” Yet, no boycotts of any other countries were ever debated.

On one particular school’s website, they write: “Our vision: To awaken courage and intellect and peacefully transform the world.” Really? How about teaching right from wrong? How about creating a world with meaning, purpose, morality, and humanity?

Instead, imagine and demand a world where teachers are unafraid to correct misinformation. In this world, we recognize that the freedoms we enjoy have come from the great sacrifices of others.

A world where we do not let so-called educators justify rape, murder, and kidnapping babies. Where we allow the entirely sensible argument to be made that calling for a “cease-fire” may very well not lead to peace but rather — as in the case of jihadi terrorists — even more violence and bloodshed, a world where we should not discover such lessons from podcasts but where the unspoken morals that frame our daily lives are taught, protected and celebrated openly.

To the 48% of 18- to 24-year-olds who don’t condemn Hamas, and to everyone else: We Jews are not asking you to fight.

We’re just asking you to stop trying to inhibit those who are. Those who bravely try to protect our right to dance at Coachella without worrying about paragliders with machine guns. Those trying to protect the right of women to dance at all. Those protecting Jews’ right to exist.

We’re not asking you to send money to the Tel Aviv Sexual Assault Crisis Center or the Nova Musical Festival Survivors’ Fund.

We’re just asking you to simply acknowledge that defending democracy and the path to what is right is not easy.

There is, of course, nothing antisemitic about supporting Palestinians to have their own state. However, calling for the eradication of the Jewish state, hailing Hamas or other entities who call for Israel’s destruction, or indicating that the Jews alone do not have the right to self-determination is antisemitic.

Thank you for reading. ☮️🕊️