To think this was antisemitic and I should have said something?

[Koelaid]

NC in case outing. A colleague at work started a conversation about media coverage of Israel / Palestine after seeing an article in the paper.

He said that in his view media coverage is quite biased towards Israel and what did I think. I didn’t particularly want to have the conversation, tricky subject, not quite right for work etc. so I just said that while I didn’t agree with some of the Israeli government’s actions, I didn’t feel like I knew enough about the reality of the situation on the ground to know if the reporting of xx event was biased in favour of Israel or not. But that I did think the amount of coverage the conflict got was disproportionate compared to things like Kashmir or South Sudan, which were fairly similar in nature but got much less media time, and that there was something a bit strange in the big focus on Israel / Palestine and how invested people that were neither Israelis not Palestinians or had relatives there got in it, vs other conflicts.

He replied and said that he supposed that I was right (about other conflicts not getting attention) and then said that he supposed the conflict got so much pro Israel coverage because the majority of the senior people that worked at the BBC were Jewish.

I was a bit shocked / frozen that he’d said this in such a nonchalant way and mumbled something vague in response like, I’m not sure that’s the case. But it’s stuck with me since and I wish I’d said something a bit stronger. I mentioned it to a couple of people (not at work) afterwards. One was quite shocked and thought it was really AS and the other was like, what are you on about that’s a valid point to make.

Im not Jewish btw, not that it matters.

Views?

While I agree with some of his points around bias and coverage I think what he said is anti Semitic.
Traditionally I do think the western media tends to be on the side of Israel but I dont believe there’s any big conspiracy or undue influence from anywhere.

Making a comment that from media coverage being pro-Israeli because Jews are controlling the BBC is definitely an antisemitic trope. He may have just been naive /young / heard these ridiculous theories and not questioned them but it is still antisemitic train of thought. Worth robustly challenging it and educating him.

Incidentally many Israelis complain that the BBC is biased AGAINST Israel!

the majority of the senior people that worked at the BBC were Jewish.

Yes, it was anti-Semitic. It is also quite easily proven to be wrong.

The BBC produced a report in 2018 about their demographics that says (on page 18) that only 1.5% of their senior leadership is Jewish.

This is actually an over-representation compared to the population as a whole, which is 0.5% Jewish in the UK. But it's not anywhere close to the majority.

Once you mention Jews as a single entity controlling anything then definitely anti-Semitic. Framing opposition to Israel's treatment of Palestinians then the state is fair game.

I think this is a rather useful rule of thumb, yes!

Naturally, it isn't perfect. Rules of thumb never are. And it is also perfectly possible to be deeply anti-semitic without ever resorting to "the Jews ...".

Since I'm still on a name change: my father happens to be a rabid anti-semite (in my, on this particular subject, not-so-humble opinion). But he will practically never say "the Jews". He talks about "financial elites", "Rothschild money", "George Soros", and a bunch of other dogwhistles.

Personally, I happen to think this is quite a lot more insidious than people who just say "the [monolith of] Jews" as in that it takes a lot more work to unravel it for what it is.

Yes, "globalists" is another . Trump dog whistled away in his final election campaign video despite his daughter being married to a Jew and a great friend of Israel in the end.

www.jta.org/2016/11/07/politics/that-trump-ad-is-it-anti-semitic-an-analysis

Is the ad anti-Semitic? Not declaratively. But in its insinuations, it’s hard to deny it traffics in conspiracies of control and destruction identified with classical anti-Semitism.
Trump’s ad features a portion of his Oct. 13 speech in West Palm Beach, Fla. outlining what he said were “the global special interests” that “don’t have your good in mind.”
That speech, as we noted at the time, was a curious replay of themes and language familiar to those of us who are steeped in the monitoring of anti-Semitism. There were precise echoes of the notorious Russian anti-Semitic forgery, “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” which I explored here.
What there wasn’t, in the speech, was any mention of Jews. The phenomenon of anti-Semitism absent of Jews is not novel.
Now, in this ad, Trump has introduced Jews — three of them: Janet Yellen, the chairwoman of the Federal reserve; George Soros, the hedge funder and global philanthropist, and Lloyd Blankfein, the CEO of Goldman Sachs (the later two are Clinton backers).

The comment about the BBC was definitely anti Semetic, yes

Yes I think it was an antisemitic comment, but it's often difficult to think of the right thing to say in the moment when youre caught off guard.

incidentally an Israeli Jew once told me he thought the BBC was biased against Israel because a lot of Muslims worked in high up positions there! I've heard they try to aim for a roughly equal number of complaints of bias from both sides - on all controversial issues, not just Israel/Palestine - and if the numbers are about the same they assume they're getting the neutrality thing more or less right.

There's a.couple of questions

How many managers are of that specific nationality
Is the coverage more weighted in favour of Israel

Then if the results were that your colleague is accurate in his perspectives and the facts back it up, then why does the truth equal anti Semitic ?

@Koelaid

Just wondered why his opinions matter OP and how it affects you?

If you were living in Northern Ireland and it was a comment about the situation there, then I could understand it but not the situation you describe.

@Fromthedarkside so you wouldn’t call out racism unless you were PoC?

Being Jewish is either an ethnicity or a religion or both. It’s not a nationality.

And to answer your questions.

How would he even know how many senior managers with editorial decision making in the news division were or were not Jewish? The BBC probably reports it’s D&I statistics, but not by division or role. So there would be no way for him to know. It’s an assumption on his part and one that cannot possibly be informed by anything.

Even if there were more senior news managers that were Jewish, why would that mean they were a) always pro Israel? b) prepared to let that influence the decisions they made about coverage? And c) always able to override other colleagues decisions?

Even if there were lots of senior managers in the news division that were Jewish, they would most likely be British Jews, not Israeli Jews. They might be pro anti or neutral on the policies of the current Israeli government. And even if they were Israeli Jews they might not be supportive of their country’s government, because they might not have voted for them. In the same way that being American didn’t make you a Trump supporter, or being religiously or culturally Hindu or Muslim wouldn’t make you supportive of Modi or of the Iranian government.

On your second question. How would anyone independently determine if the coverage is biased or not? There isn’t an objective answer to that question.

So the answer to both your questions is that it’s impossible to say if my colleague is accurate or not in his perceptions, but that it’s very unlikely that he is, and that his perceptions quite accurately mirror very old tropes that have been used to justify terrible things.

@TightDiamondShoes What's PoC ?

@TightDiamondShoes Apparently it's not a race

www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/are-jews-a-nation-or-a-religion

Sorry a bit off topic but what I find interesting is that Catholics get openly bashed by people and it's seen as openly fair game but the minute Islam faith or Jews get criticised or something intolerant said against them it's heavily frowned upon.

I'm atheist btw but just an observation.

@voiceofmarion Sorry a bit off topic but what I find interesting is that Catholics get openly bashed by people and it's seen as openly fair game but the minute Islam faith or Jews get criticised or something intolerant said against them it's heavily frowned upon.

It's Christians generally that get attacked for their beliefs in Sky Fairies 🙄

It's Christians generally that get attacked for their beliefs in Sky Fairies

no it's more because of the sex scandals which was a minority who did it yet it's fair game to blame every priest etc for it.

Meanwhile if anybody dared tries to taint all Muslims because of the terrorist attacks in recent years they'd be seen to be promoting hate etc.

I don't support either view btw but just irks me how it's ok to bash 1 and not the other.

Excellent points and analysis, much appreciated.

I can't believe he felt so free to espouse his views to you like that!! I'm very hot on my views regarding racism but even I know there are levels to it.

He is entitled to his opinion what ever that may be. I wouldn’t report my colleagues for having different opinions to me and I wouldn’t think less of them. We often had lively debates in my old workplace , lots of different opinions. No one would ever think of reporting anyone for anything they said, we are grown ups with different political opinions / ideology on a lot of things. It’s nice to see things from other points of view sometimes and sometimes it could steer you in a different direction. Sadly haven’t had this in new jobs I’ve had , too much of PC culture and fear of upsetting people.

It's never nice to hear anti-semetic statements.

Odd conversation to start, especially given the speed to other news today.

Comments about Jews running the BBC (and apparently influencing coverage to favour Jews) are absolutely anti-Semitic. If someone I was talking to said that I would tell them that it’s unacceptable, not true, and a dangerous old trope.

Regarding the rest of the conversation, it is well established that coverage of the conflict is heavily biased against Palestinians and in favour of Israel. By established I mean empirical, objective studies of headlines, phrasing, sourcing etc. Sometimes that is attributed to the influence of Israeli lobbying on the media, but that’s very different to what your colleague actually said.

Your own points about the volume of coverage and motivations re other conflicts are red herrings. Look up whataboutism.

I wouldn’t report my colleagues for having different opinions to me and I wouldn’t think less of them

same and even if they said something to me that showed they were homophobic etc I still wouldn't report it. I'm gay myself but really couldn't give a hoot what a colleague thinks/says.It's very easy on mn to say report them but in reality this can be dangerous and get your card marked in work. I've heard countless inappropriate shit said at work and report it would mean reporting my established managers at times who were in close cahoots with the leadership. Would hardly end well for me.

I try to keep my head down.

He's not wrong that the media treats the Palestinian/Israeli conflict quite differently than many others, and the way which they do that often has a significant political element in it.

He's not right about the majority of the BBC top brass being Jewish, although it is probably the case that the BBC's coverage tends to reflect the political biases of those who are in charge.

Personally, I tend to think that unless someone is actually trying to be an asshole, it's not useful to accuse them of bigotry. Or report them, (with a few exceptions potentially) to HR. People do sometimes get crazy, wrong ideas about facts, which they really believe to be true, and it's often quite possible to say something like "I'm pretty sure they aren't mostly Jewish" and it can make an impression if you already have a good working relationship.

It's way more effective at prompting people to rethink, and to change their own minds in doing so, than cutting them out or reporting them would be.