And what do you have to say about today's anti-Christian prejudices, Carrol?

Peter
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Carrol Cox" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, November 21, 2010 10:16 AM
Subject: Re: {Disarmed} Re: George Orwell's take on the subject


> Further note.
>
> In the early 20th-c every literate person could be familiar with the
> Dreyfuss case, an anti-semtic prosecution that had nearly led to civil war
> in France
>
> I make this point to underline the fact that intelligent people did not
have
> to wait for Hitler's holocaust to recognize that even parlor-anti-semitism
> was a real danger to civilized society. Casual ant-semitic remarks in
> cultured circles killed people.
>
> Historical justification of what we disapprove of today requires at least
> being a decent historian: you have to have some minimal understanding of
> history in order to know what was, in any fundamental way, a "given" of a
> particular society and what was as contemptible in that society as it is
> now.
>
> Anti-semitism has in fact _always_ been condemned by decent people. Read
> Boccaccio. One of his better stories features a Jew as hero.
>
> Eliot's anti-semitism, which is undeniable, is, of course, only one factor
> and not a major one in understanding his poetry. But CR & obviously have
no
> interest in understanding the poetry, so that is irrelevant to this
> discussion, the real topic of which is the slimy racism of P & Cr
> themselves.
>
> Carrol