to think Kanye West's racism is going to lead to an increase in violence against Jews?

[smokedsalm0n]

Firstly, I am Jewish, no connection to Israel, I'm not Israeli (not that I need to qualify my post with that) and have lived in the UK all my life.

So, after his recent rantings about loving Hitler, Nazis and the holocaust (torontosun.com/entertainment/celebrity/i-like-hitler-kanye-west-doubles-down-on-hate-speech-on-alex-jones-infowars-show)

I'm feeling very scared and scared for my kids, especially reading recent threads like this:

www.mumsnet.com/talk/secondary/4662884-kanye-wests-harmful-views-tackling-antisemitism-at-school

Kanye is very influential and popular with the younger generation and my Jewish children are already getting more racist comments said to their faces without any fear of retribution. I am genuinely scared for their physical safety. Jews shouldn't have to live in fear, its 2022 ffs not the 1930s!

It's really quite frightening to watch him descend into madness in front of our very eyes but yes, also terrifying to watch him stoke the flames of antisemitism to an audience that is already predisposed to believing misinformation on a grand scale.

I agree that his words will likely lead to attacks on Jewish communities.

I wish more people of influence would speak out against it and try to balance his non-sensical rants with reasoning & empathy.

I also hope Kim will stop her children from spending any time with Papa for the foreseeable!!

We're already seeing it in the US. It's quite frightening how people on the right avoided criticising Donald Trump for his dinner with West and Nick Fuentes. And yes, it will spread, because the right isn't isolated.

Israel is really irrelevant so please don't bring up Israel/Palestine--it's always a dead giveaway when people are talking about antisemitism in Western countries and someone brings up "but Palestine".

You get people who are just racist against certain groups, travellers, muslims etc. Plus some people may use it to support their racism, after all someone who is also racist against black people may do the whole “well if even a black persom thinks it, and black people are (insert insult) then they must be awful” to justify their own racism.

Well, the thread that I linked to in my OP (made by a teacher in a very multi-cultural school) makes it clear that it is not just a threat coming from the far-right and Jew-hate is quite prevalent amongst lots of disparate groups. The people who have said racist things to my children most recently were not typical far-right types (we live in a very multicultural area).

So is anything then. What is your opinion on what he said?

It was only recently that the far right Roger Stone endorsed the idea of West as Trump’s Vice President in ‘24.

It’s one of the world’s oldest and ugliest prejudices, for nigh on 3000 years the Jewish People have been persecuted under many empires. Terrifying how anti-Semitism has escalated to the extent it has. As pp mentioned, it’s on the extreme Left as well as the far Right.

I agree with you. This is a man in a frightening mental health crisis, not a free-speech pioneer of unsayable things.

@CountZacular
Without sounding like ‘whataboutary’, I also feel like there’s been a huge rise in misogyny and homophobia too and I wonder why, at time when we’re supposed to be more aware of combating hate is society becoming abhorrent in general?

Whenever there’s an economic downturn, I think people tend to look for scapegoats to vent their frustrations on. Sadly I suspect we’ll see further prejudice, conspiracy theories and hate crime until the global economy recovers.

YANBU @smokedsalm0n. The rise and acceptance of antisemitism recently is frightening. WTF has happened to our society?

Some people are saying racists will be put off by messages coming from someone of colour, but remember most aren't overt racists, some of them see this as a opportunity (ironically) to say 'See I'm not a racist, I agree with this black person - he's got a point'. Although they like this view on the erroneous front that they think 'woke' people's worldview means that they can never criticise women/ black people/LGBTQ people, which is of course not the case at all!

I watched the whole 3 hour stream, unlike anyone on here, and no, I would not be worried.

God well done. I imagine it’s a challenge to do 3 hours of Ye and Alex Jones 🤐

He is an appalling man. He is also very mentally unwell. But I don't think he is as influential with the younger generation as people think - his views probably chime with the QAnon subset in the US and their followers and that is concerning, but the average young person (and I have a household of them) think he is a mentally unwell racist who should not be listened to by anyone.

I take it he knows fuck all about Hitler's Aryan Race beliefs and the Reich's treatment of Black people.

Roger Stone is a frightening individual. I can imagine hard right backers pursuing this ticket.

West being Black will have its advantages. His musical legacy is kind of irrelevant now. He still has a huge platform, draws the headlines and is probably open to the possibility of a big platform - a political one - to reach more ears.

I agree, OP. He's dangerous. Perhaps not him per se, but the right wing machinery that is growing around him to drive the most aggressive right-wing agenda.

Quite, I hold KW responsible for the hate speech and using his platform to spread it, but where I think whatever MH crisis he is experiencing is a real factor is not being able to see that Nick Fuentes and the rest of the loathsome lot are using him.

His ranting is horrific and is sickening. Some of the messages recently sent to David Biddal on his recent documentary were eye opening to me. The fact today children in the UK have to practice drills is absolutely heart-breaking.

I am in Ireland - we have a tiny Jewish population, and I believe there is generally a respect, interest and curiosity of Jewish traditions and history.

I would be interested to know, and this is in no way an excuse - doesn't Kanye have well documented mental health issues - is his illness leading to this disgusting rants?

I don't think hate speech should ever be facilitated under "freedom of speech".

@smokedsalm0n as a fellow Jew, I don't think this one incident will cause anymore of a rise than what we have seen already. We live in Manchester and are more cultural than religious. DH looks much more obviously jewish than I do, strong ME genes. He has had an increasing amount of abuse on the streets in the last 5 - 10 years. I am afraid the ship has sailed and I worry for our DC's future. DD has just started school, at a C of E school, because we were so worried about security at the Jewish schools. DH and I are very to have to make that choice.

Antisemites and racists are not always one and the same. One encounter I had was with someone who would describe themselves as anti racist, but still made a remark about 'fucking jews in Isreal' in my hearing.

@PipinwasAuntieMabelsdog that’s disgusting but that person is not an anti-racist. You have to be an equal opportunities anti-racist, not some are more equal than others.

Kanye West is very troubled, and I think almost everyone recognises that he spouts nonsense. However it is worrying to think where the hatred he is expressing really comes from, what voices he has been listening to that feed his resentment and anger. And who else is listening to those voices.

I wish people wouldn’t compare racism and anti semitism in this way. Yes I can imagine a teacher doing the same about racism, because it happens all the time.
Racism in my experience is far more acceptable socially than antisemitism. You only have to look at threads where an op has experienced racism and they are repeatedly told maybe that isn’t the issue or any other excuse. I’ve yet to see that on a thread about anti semitism, I’m not saying it’s never happened.

@PipinwasAuntieMabelsdog Yes, this. There was another thread quite recently where many posters proudly declared their antiracist credentials, yet for them Jews were fair game to be mocked and disbelieved. Their racism was a lot more veiled than the more explicit rightwing variety or extreme cases like Kanye.

@Desdem - I agree, KW isn't the threat so much as the extremists infrastructure that will make use of his views.

@Testingprof - you may not have seen it here, but Jews do get a lot of 'You're too sensitive', 'You just see antisemitism everywhere'. Tbh, some of my co-religionists are oversensitive but I always ask people to try to understand why that might be.

I think sometimes people who would consider themselves anti racist have no problem making anti semitic remarks (the word "consider" is deliberate) but Nick Fuentes is a white supremacist. KW is very much included in the people he hates, if he could see it.