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The rise of the theophobic nihilists within
Jewcy, Jewish intellectual self-hatred, and the demographic threat

Seth Mandel
THE JEWISH STATE
October 23, 2009

The Jewish proclivity toward self-hatred is no secret. There is a new version of this, however, and it is an entertaining one.

Intellectual Jewry has advanced the cause of self-hatred to the point where Jews now hate their own ideas, promulgating ways to address issues that will surely torpedo their efforts.

Welcome to Jewcy.com.

In a recent column for the site, which is a division of the Jewish music company JDub Records, Robin Margolis predicts the future of American and Israeli Jewry in the year 2040.

Margolis paints a bleak picture — but not because intermarriage has ravaged the Jewish population. Rather, the problem lies in how well we adapt to pretending non-Jews are Jewish.

Here’s Margolis: “The Jewish population count in North American has dropped dramatically from 2009. It may be 30% to 50% smaller than it was in the year 2009. This is because, in the year 2009, most Jewish establishment organizations actively snubbed half-Jewish people.”

Her view of Israel’s horizon is even more ominous. Margolis writes that in the year 2040, American Jews aren’t flying Israeli flags at their shul. These Jews can’t support Israel anymore — it is far too Jewish a state.

“In the year 2040, the Haredi/Hasidim are poised to take over the Israeli government — they are at least one-third to one-half of Israel’s population,” Margolis writes, the bile rising in her throat at the thought of hats and beards. “Their primary election promise, announced as far back as 2009, is to create a sort of ‘Halachic Republic of Israel,’ like the Islamic Republic of Iran.”

Half-Jews — the term Margolis transparently uses for non-Jews (children of a Jewish mother are “fully” Jewish, so there is no need to clarify their status) — have disappeared from Israel. The interesting facet of this theory is when that began to happen.

“In the year 2009, thousands of half-Jewish Israeli citizens, mostly the children of intermarried Russian Jews, were caught in a web of negative social policies and laws directed against them,” Margolis fumes. “Few voices were raised in Israel to defend them.”

What else happened in the year 2009 that had to do with intermarriage and Russian Jews?

Ah, now I remember. A vociferous defender of the “children of intermarried Russian Jews” surfaced, ran an election campaign partly on his dream of a more secular Israeli state and more rights and social opportunities for secular Jews and immigrants, and won more seats in the Knesset than the Labor party.

In sum, that man should be the hero of the Jewcy community: Avigdor Lieberman.

But wait — Lieberman was elected the better part of a year ago, and Margolis published her column Oct. 8. That means Margolis had to intentionally ignore Lieberman’s election in order to write her anti-religious screed.

This is bigoted writing, and the emphasis on removing religious tenets and traditions in order to turn Judaism (or any religion) into a social networking club can best be described as theophobic nihilism.

In February, Haaretz reported that, as Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu was attempting to form a governing coalition, Lieberman and Kadima head Tzipi Livni were “working to form a ‘civil front’ to counter the right-wing and ultra-Orthodox parties which Likud has been wooing in the coalition talks.”

Later in the story, Haaretz explained that Lieberman, head of Israel Beiteinu, “will try to show his electorate that he is promoting the so-called civil agenda he advocated during the election campaign, sources say.”

That sounds like great news for the folks at Jewcy who are worried about the lack of civil rights for secular Israelis. How did Jewcy respond to this good news? With encouragement?

Nope: “this is the first government in Israel’s history that has formally called into question the health of the country’s democracy,” Joel Schalit wrote on Jewcy.com. “Best identified with the anti-Arab incitement of Deputy Prime Minister Avigdor Lieberman, (and now cabinet member Alex Miller) and to a lesser degree, their Israel Beiteinu party’s proposals to swap Israeli Arab communities for settlements, for Israelis to sign loyalty oaths to the state, obtain national ID cards, and to restrict civil rights, the concerns are wholly justified. Such a political program is patently authoritarian.” (Emphasis added.)

Lieberman, of course, is the country’s most powerful proponent of civil marriage, of stripping the rabbinate of some of its conversion authority, and of reforming Israel’s election procedures to decrease the presence of unelected party hacks in the Knesset and increase direct democracy.

So the views of Jewcy’s resident theophobic nihilists are self-hating. They can’t bring themselves to admit that Lieberman should be the champion of their ideals. Instead, they prefer to take down the Israeli flag and compare Israel’s Orthodox Jews to the genocidal terrorist regime in Iran.

Yet, this Jewcy worldview is the type of thought that Margolis envisions being the voice of American Jewry in the year 2040. So in one sense Margolis is absolutely right when she says, “We need to start planning how we are going to transition Judaism to its next era.”

Whatever Jewcy has planned for its cultural revolution, Judaism’s survival will clearly be up to the rest of us.

Seth Mandel is the managing editor of The Jewish State.