Part I: The Suicidal Pursuit of Perfection
Self Criticism and its Pathologies
One of the prime divides between democratic societies and totalitarian societies is their relationship to self-criticism. Successful democracies institutionalize self-criticism. The American two party system thrives on the tension between the two parties, with significantly differing approaches to governing (at least in theory) in usually peaceful conflict over power. There is a built-in governor to the process since the party out of power is always only two years away from potentially sharing power, and only four years away from attempting to monopolize power. This offers powerful incentives to the "outs" to criticize and for the "ins" to accurately evaluate the rational basis of the criticism. If either side miscalculates too egregiously, they are likely to lose, or remain out of, power.
Historically, and into the present, Jews have been famous for self-criticism. The old joke that if you have three Jews in a room, you will inevitably have four opinions has more than a grain of truth. Jews have always been noted for their tendency to argue among themselves. This is often laudable and such self-criticism, even when over the top, has been of great benefit to the Jewish people. No one can learn if they cannot tolerate criticism.
Unfortunately, self-criticism can degenerate into what Richard Landes has referred to as MASOCHISTIC OMNIPOTENCE SYNDROME:
In the most extreme cases, we encounter Masochistic Omnipotence Syndrome (MOS): “it is all our fault; and if we can only be better, we can fix anything/everything.” This hyper-critical attitude can be seen with particular clarity in the response of some progressives and radicals to both the 9-11 attack in 2001 in the US, and the 7-7 attack in 2005 in London. For many, “What did we do to make them hate us?” trumped “What are they telling themselves that makes them hate us so?” In a sense, the very preference for the former question underlines our desire to be in control. Maybe we can fix what it is that we do to them, so they’ll not hate us so. Maybe even, they’ll like us.
At some level, this hyper-self criticism operates as a kind of prophetic rhetoric: by inflating the sins, by self-flagellating, one hopes to whip the offending Western party into changing their behavior, a kind of public shaming designed to provoke so much outrage and guilt as to change the situation.
As Richard points out, this causes a two-fold problem. The Moral Masochism of those who insist that any flaws in reality are reflective of Western perfidy leads them to misperceive the animus of the enemy. Further, by absolving the enemy of responsibility for their own heinous acts, it encourages them to believe they can successfully pursue an agenda inimical to civilization with the tacit support of the West.
In effect, the Jew has empowered his enemy and impaired his own ability to defend himself. If your positions are subject to hyper-self critical exegesis, your justification and defense of your positions is gravely weakened. At the same time, when your enemy brooks no criticism and allows no doubts, their resolve is only strengthened by your apparent and/or real weakness of will.
The tendency to hyper-self criticism is pronounced on the Jewish Left. It emerges out of the conflation of needs that drive many Jews to look for ways to fit in, accommodate to the majority, and attempt to make the post-Holocaust world safer for Jews. Most Jews growing up in America since WWII have heard the worried question, whenever a situation of significance to Jews has occurred, "is it good for the Jews?"
During the Passover Seder, which even relatively non-observant Jews tend to celebrate and which will be coming up in two weeks, Jews read from the Haggada and note:
In each and every generation they rise up against us to destroy us. And The Holy One, blessed be He, rescues us from their hands.
One does not have to be a believing Jew to note the tendency toward anti-Semitism that has been an historical reality. (For a summary of attempted genocide of the Jews, consider this post at Aish.com.) For such people, the experience-nearness of the Holocaust, in recent and distant history, is almost a part of their cultural DNA.
The Leftist Jew has taken the position that by demanding and fighting for (Utopian) "true equality", the Jew will finally be safe. This equality typically includes a repudiation of religious Judaism (as all "fundamentalist" religions are suspect, with an obvious exception that I will explore shortly.) It also typically includes a requirement of an equality of outcome, rather than simply of opportunity since unequal outcomes is a predictable source of envy, which is the enemy of the Jew. Further, the Leftist Jew, in consciously aligning himself with the oppressed victim and denouncing himself for his membership in an assigned oppressor group, imagines he has inoculated himself against the nearly ubiquitous anti-Semitism within which always lurks the threat of genocidal rage; he imagines himself safe.
More tomorrow...
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