Marc Lamont Hill and the restraints on fair rhetoric

Marc Lamont Hill

Marc Lamont Hill used to be a foil for Bill O'Reilly. Remember those days? Jane Hall was another. Then Mr. Bill had to fork over something like $32 million to prevent a sexual harassment suit. As much as O'Reilly talked about "the folks," like he could relate to the average citizen, such dollar figures suggest a quite contrary picture. Think what $32 million could do for any number of causes.
I wonder what O'Reilly would do today as part of the Fox News crusade to defend Trump and assail (and crush) anyone who would suggest anything negative about our porn star president.
I find Marc Lamont Hill to be quite the agreeable person. Now he's trying to put out a little fire, having erupted for reasons I cannot fathom. He has been fired by CNN. The people who appear on cable news panels do indeed have to weigh words carefully. Remember what happened to E.D. Hill at Fox News? Her controversial comment was so offensive, I don't wish to quote it here. But Marc Lamont Hill made a statement, the controversial nature of which I have a hard time understanding.
It's another case of where criticizing Israel can morph into something that is understood or interpreted as "anti-Semitic." I consume lots of news and consider myself rather worldly - excuse any vanity I may exude - and I hardly recoiled at the comment that Mr. Hill made. Do I need to be edified? I don't think so. The late Robert Novak dealt with this a lot - a comment critical of Israel being interpreted as anti-Semitic. It dilutes the true ugliness of anti-Semitism.
 
"River to the sea"
Mr. Hill did not make his allegedly over-the-line comment on cable news. He was speaking at a New York meeting of the United Nations' Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People. He encouraged skepticism toward Israel until such time as "there is a free Palestine from the river to the sea."
One can argue about the merits of this argument. I see nothing intrinsically anti-Semitic about it, if anti-Semitism is to be understood as a fundamental racist attitude. I remember years ago when Israel advocates including Mark Rotenberg, legal counsel for the University of Minnesota, were incensed at the Star Tribune's use of the term "suicide bomber." The protests broke through to have a fair amount of success. The readers' rep of the Star Tribune, Howard Gelfand, was rather puzzled, as he felt "suicide bomber" was quite precise because "you wouldn't expect a bomber to take his own life." The term in question got to the heart of the matter, n'est-ce pas?
Many Israel advocates took umbrage. Because of the sensitivity of such matters, some news enterprises including Fox News began saying "homicide bomber" which is a ridiculous mutant type of term. It's obvious to all that this term is concocted for purely political purposes as a matter of accommodation. I don't hear it much anymore. It is obvious that "suicide bombers" intend to kill other people. The distinguishing feature is that the bomber intends to kill himself too.
Marc Lamont Hill was assailed for what specific reason? It has to do with how his quote is interpreted, not its exact content. I guess his "free Palestine" comment, "from the river to the sea," has been used by Hamas. The quote was seen "by some," according to the Huffpost report, "to be an attack on the Jewish people."
Don't the Jewish people hurt themselves by setting such rigid parameters for what is considered proper comment?
 
Compare with another issue
I can think of a bigger issue the Jewish people might make, if one or two well-known people would just bring it up. It is an issue waiting to explode. All it takes is a catalyst.
Background to appreciate: Remember when the series of "Charlie Chan" movies came under such fire, to the extent I don't think they are seen on cable TV anymore? What was the problem? It was just the old Hollywood habit of gravitating to stereotypes. We have to give Hollywood a pass with so much of this stuff like in the cowboys and Indians movies. I remember the stereotype of black people projected in "Three Stooges" shorts, black people being wide-eyed and scared at a little unexplained noise. They spook easily!
The problem with Charlie Chan movies is that a cable channel many years ago started promoting a "Charlie Chan Marathon." A fuse got lit. Minus that "marathon" attempt, these movies would harmlessly pass through our innocent little TV universe where we just yawn at race/gender stereotypes.
So: What if a Jewish advocate were to make an issue of the Lutheran Church?
How's that?
What if a Jewish leader were to take issue with the very existence of a major religious denomination named for Martin Luther? I mean, what could be more offensive than that name?
Didn't you know? Martin Luther was the most notorious kind of anti-Semite, spewing language that actually contributed to the mid-20th Century disaster in Europe. I personally have become concerned about continuing to support the Lutheran Church in any manner. I'm sure my late mother knew nothing about this.
How do I feel about Jewish people? Left on my own, I'd have no particular opinion at all. They're just people. My only stereotype would be a most respectful one, that Jewish people have drive and are intelligent and well-educated, the latter two traits being connected of course. Furthermore, wasn't Jesus Christ a Jew? I'm not Mr. Theology so I can hardly explain such things. My late cousin Paul, son of my father's brother Andy, converted to Judaism toward the end of his life. He had a Jewish funeral. RIP Paul.

The question of Israel vs. Jewish people
When you hear a right-winger like Steve King of Iowa say "I've always supported Israel," here's the next question you should ask him: "Do you feel Jewish people will enter the kingdom of heaven?" Actually, Israel advocates are happy to accept the support of the likes of King because it's convenient in the present - never mind the long-term projection re. their souls.
I approach all of this as rather an agnostic, as someone who doesn't like to get into all the mumbo-jumbo of religion. In our new age where all the information in the world is at our fingertips, doesn't religion seem more than ever like mumbo-jumbo? My old boss Jim Morrison would say it is. I try to embrace Christianity because in the afterlife I'd like to be reunited with old family and friends. Also, Neil Thielke would want me too! Seriously.
I'm waiting for the politically right wing Christian crowd to wake up and smell the coffee. I really think it will happen. 

Luther's anti-Semitic treatise

For the record, re. Martin Luther's feelings about the Jewish people: He argued that Jewish synagogues and schools be set on fire, their prayer books destroyed, rabbis forbidden to preach, homes burned, and property and money confiscated. They should be shown no mercy or kindness, Luther argued, and afforded no legal protection, and "these poisonous envenomed worms" should be drafted into forced labor or expelled for all time.
Can't we even be "kind?" And, to think there is a "Lutheran Campus Ministry" house just outside of UMM. Does UMM have any official connection with it?
In context, are the Charlie Chan movies really that bad?
Can't we cut some slack for Mr. Marc Lamont Hill, a very caring human being?
 
Addendum: Martin Luther in his treatise "On the Jews and Their Lies," described Jews as a "base, whoring people, that is, no people of God, and their boast of lineage, circumcision and law must be accounted as filth." Did he want Jews murdered? He wrote "We are at fault in not slaying them."
  
- Brian Williams - morris mn minnesota - bwilly73@yahoo.com