On Thursday's New Day, CNN's John Avlon rushed to defend liberal View host Whoopi Goldberg from charges of anti-Semitism after her offensive comments about the Holocaust. As part of one of his "reality checks," Avlon instead tried to deflect the controversy by claiming critics of left-wing billionaire George Soros using his immense wealth to push a radical political agenda were the real villains.
Avlon got going by citing:
The number of anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S. has spiked since 2017, which happens to be the first year of the Trump presidency. Now, some of these incidents are infamous like the mass shootings at synagogues in Pittsburgh and Poway. Others are more anonymous, but they all reflect the brazen anti-Jewish hate we saw at the Unite The Right rally in Charlottesville.
"All?" It was not that long ago when a "Lady Al-Qaeda" sympathizer took hostages at a Texas synagogue.
Continuing to portray anti-Semitism as only a right-wing problem, Avlon added:
Online conspiracy theories like Q-Anon tapped into anti-Semitic themes from blood libel accusations to the belief that sinister groups of elites are secretly running the world. That's in addition to the negative obsessions with George Soros, parroted by the folks at Fox News or Marjorie Taylor Greene's belief that Jewish space lasers cause wildfires. Amid this raising tide of hate and absurdity, the repeated Nazi comparisons directed by Republicans at COVID vaccine efforts, sometimes it can be hard to know whether to laugh or cry.
Criticizing mega donors is cool when the left does it, but when Fox does it, it suddenly becomes anti-Semitic. And of course, Avlon won't criticize his CNN colleagues for their Nazi comparisons and conveniently forgot to mention various progressive lawmakers engaging in the same anti-Semitic themes.
Transitioning to Goldberg, Avlon claimed:
And it’s precisely because the haters seem so emboldened these days, that it is essential to distinguish between people who use hate as a core part of their identity politics and people who make honest mistakes, which brings me to Whoopi Goldberg, who was suspended for two weeks from The View for saying the Holocaust was not a matter of race. Now, it seems clear she was trying to distinguish between America's legacy of anti-black racism and the religious and ethnic prejudice that led to the Nazis to murder some 6 million Jewish people....but here’s the critical point, Whoopi Goldberg was not indulging in anti-Jewish hate. She had no repeated history of making anti-Semitic comments. In fact, quite the opposite and when it became clear her comments crossed the line, she apologized, repeatedly and sincerely.
After playing a clip of the ADL's Jonathan Greenblatt hypocritically saying he doesn't support cancel culture, Avlon then tried to analogize Goldberg's suspension to Ilya Shapiro fighting for his job at Georgetown. He said the outrage at Shapiro was "totally understandable," but it wasn't. It was a group of hard-leftists who deliberately twisted his words. Meanwhile, virtually nobody has demanded Goldberg be fired.
After his partisan diatribe, Avlon concluded by urging everyone that "in order to build the broadest coalition to confront bigotry, we need to distinguish between poorly chosen words and those that are repeatedly designed to promote division. And hate and that's your reality check."
As per usual, Avlon's view of reality left a lot unmentioned.
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Here is a transcript for the February 3 show:
CNN New Day with John Berman and Brianna Keilar
2/3/2022
7:55 AM ET
JOHN AVLON: The number of anti-Semitic incidents in the U.S. has spiked since 2017, which happens to be the first year of the Trump presidency. Now, some of these incidents are infamous like the mass shootings at synagogues in Pittsburgh and Poway. Others are more anonymous, but they all reflect the brazen anti-Jewish hate we saw at the Unite The Right rally in Charlottesville.
CROWD: Jews will not replace us. Jews will not replace us. Jews will…
AVLON: But also anti-Semitism affects our politics in more subtle ways. Online conspiracy theories like Q-Anon tapped into anti-Semitic themes from blood libel accusations to the belief that sinister groups of elites are secretly running the world. That's in addition to the negative obsessions with George Soros, parroted by the folks at Fox News or Marjorie Taylor Greene's belief that Jewish space lasers cause wildfires. Amid this raising tide of hate and absurdity, the repeated Nazi comparisons directed by Republicans at COVID vaccine efforts, sometimes it can be hard to know whether to laugh or cry. All of this done though, comes at a time of increased fatality from domestic violent extremist incidents and things like the recent bomb threats directed at historically black colleges and universities.
And it’s precisely because the haters seem so emboldened these days, that it is essential to distinguish between people who use hate as a core part of their identity politics and people who make honest mistakes, which brings me to Whoopi Goldberg, who was suspended for two weeks from The View for saying the Holocaust was not a matter of race. Now, it seems clear she was trying to distinguish between America's legacy of anti-black racism and the religious and ethnic prejudice that led to the Nazis to murder some 6 million Jewish people.
She apparently didn't appreciate that Nazis often called Jewish people a separate race, and she ignored one of the basic rules of civil debate, there are no comparisons to the Holocaust, but here’s the critical point, Whoopi Goldberg was not indulging in anti-Jewish hate. She had no repeated history of making anti-Semitic comments. In fact, quite the opposite and when it became clear her comments crossed the line, she apologized, repeatedly and sincerely. As ADL Jonathan Greenblatt explained on CNN, he didn't think the clumsy phrasing should be considered an irredeemable civic sin.
JONATHAN GREENBLATT: I don't think her intent was malevolent. I think it was mistaken and I think, you know, I don't believe in cancel culture, Brianna. I believe in counsel culture. So while she made a mistake, we need to recognize that all of us can do that, and if you apologize, you know, I think there is an opportunity for repentance.
AVLON: Now let's connect the dots to a lesser noticed and distantly related case. This week’s suspension of Ilya Shapiro, the incoming executive director of the Georgetown Center for the Constitution. After tweets that complained President Biden’s commitment to appoint a black woman to the Supreme Court would exclude what he believed were more qualified candidates like the Indian-American chief justice of the D.C. Circuit Court Sri Srinivasan. Now, Shapiro concluded the nominee would therefore be “a lesser black woman,” which is a toxic phrase that smacks of centuries of structural racism. The outcry was swift and totally understandable. Shapiro deleted his tweets and right apologized telling Reason that his poor choice of words undermined his intended message “that no one should be discriminated against for his or her gender or skin color,” but the university said his tweets here antithetical to the work of building inclusion, belonging, and respect for diversity and it’s now conducting an investigation.
Now when it comes to the public face plants along the fault lines of faith, gender and race, it is easier to remain silent often, but intent and context and patterns of behavior matter, a real commitment to liberal values means open an dialogue that doesn't immediately assume the worst about people who say disagreeable things. And as Susan Nossel, the head of PEN America, cautioned, if suspensions were prompted solely by offensive speech rather than biased conduct, they could add to the existing sense of chill in our public discourse regarding sensitive topics. “The drive to appease upset stakeholders must not override institution's commitment to free speech,” she said. So, what are the takeaways? Well first, these viruses of group hate will only be defeated when we all take them as a personal insult, not to our tribal identity, but to our common humanity. Second, that some historic tragedies are not like anything else. The Holocaust is the Holocaust. Just as slavery is slavery. Third, and finally, in order to build the broadest coalition to confront bigotry, we need to distinguish between poorly chosen words and those that are repeatedly designed to promote division and hate. And that's your reality check.
