2 min read
As one who has always been keen to be a Jew (I pretended to be one as a teenage hack at the New Musical Express, and attempted to convert a few years back - both of which I write about at entertaining length in my latest book, Unchosen), I've always been absolutely incredulous at those people who are born Jews and seem not to want the blessing.
It's always weird meeting a dumb Jew - like meeting a gay man who can't dance. But there are a few out there, and quite a few of them seem to be in the media; these seat-sniffers have really shown their colours over the recent atrocities in Paris. Simon Schama set the bar brilliantly - ''From now on, Charlie Hebdo will be the rallying point for all those who cherish life and laughter over the death-cult of sanctimonious gloom. So we owe it to the fallen to remind ourselves...that just because the unhinged perpetrators are murderers does not mean they are also not clowns''- but the usual suspects fell at the first hurdle. After the Lord Mayor's Show, as the Cockneys have it, la merde. The Three Stooges of Islamofascism - Naomi Wolf, Will Self and Laurie Penny - were not backward in coming forward with speeches, tweets and essays which used high-flown language and commendable sentiments to obscure the fact that all three are basically 50 shades of yellow.
Wolf has been barking for a while - she has, incredibly, become even crazier than her old adversary Camille Paglia - and her repeated suggestion that Islamic State videos of murdered hostages might be faked, populated by actors and CIA agents, have certified her as a top shelf fruit-cake.
Of a video showing Israelis apparently celebrating Muslim exclusion from the Al-Aqsa mosque, Wolf hyperbolised: "The expressions of gloating and sadism exactly the same as those of Nazis cutting off the beards of Jews.'' I bet she's fun at a house party! True to away-with-the-fairies form, she reacted to the Islamofascist rampage with ''So weird that French political leaders now, as US leaders have before, claim that by 'declaring war on radical Islam' they can forestall rather than foment more terrorism. What about declaring love, declaring peace, declaring openness, declaring engagement with the ideas of radical Islam?'' Does she still consider herself a feminist, I wonder? How does a feminist engage with people who believe that raped women should be stoned to death?
Next in the addle-pated parade came Will Self, who seemed to be tying himself in knots on the Channel 4 news explaining why it was essential for fascists not to have their feelings hurt. But I suppose that when you're such a self-loathing half-wit that you "formally resign" from being a Jew (as Self has) sucking up to those who hate you most is the logical end-game. Like Self, Laurie Penny is a Jew who seems almost parasexually obsessed with being punished by Islamofascism. (She once wore a hijab and gushed about how happy she felt it in, the entitled ass-hat.) Her opinion on the Paris atrocities: "Racist trolling is not heroism. Je Ne Suis Pas Charlie." On their rampage, the Islamofascists murdered, amongst others, a Muslim policeman, a French-Caribbean policewoman, an Algerian cartoonist and Jewish civilians. And she calls us racist! Isn't racism hating everyone who's not like you? Sums up Islamism perfectly.
The most charitable view of these clowns is that they suffer from "rationalist naivete"; the liberal error of assigning our own motives to the all comers (self-interest, reason, logic) and believing that we are all rational actors. Whereas in fact - as with the Nazis - there are on this earth non-rational actors who cannot be reasoned with and whose ideas must be fought to the death. The uncharitable view is they are simply vile cowards. Never mind: as I write this, I am happy to read the news that no other than Cameron Diaz had a traditional Jewish wedding and has "publicly identified as Jewish" despite having no Jewish ancestry. The most interesting, intelligent and attractive people have long clamoured to join the clan; you can afford to lose a few bed-wetting, self-immolating runts.
Julie Burchill's book, Unchosen: Memoirs of a Philo-Semite, is published by Unbound
