My response to Nick Cannon’s statement on Facebook

Here is what I wrote in response to Nick Cannon’s Facebook statement (see my last post.) it is really aimed more at the Black people who are his fans, and I doubt it will make a difference (especially being buried under hundreds of other comments) but I wanted to at least try to inject some truth in what was a pretty bad thread.

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I hope that Nick Cannon is serious about wanting to learn. Because this thread includes so much further antisemitism, I hope I can explain a few things:

1. Jews did not dominate the slave trade. There were some Jewish slave owners and traders but they were a small percentage. Blaming Jews for the bulk of a reprehensible practice is an excuse for bigotry against Jews.

2. Some Jewish landlords are unethical, just like some Black landlords and some white Gentile landlords and everyone else.

3. I saw a guest on another of Nick's shows say that the US gives $80 billion a year to Israel. The number is less than $4 billion, and most of it goes towards US companies and jobs. You can argue about whether Israel should get anything but at least base it on truth.

4. There is no grand conspiracy of the Rothschilds controlling the world. Of course bankers have influence but the Rothschilds are not even in the top tier of the Forbes richest billionaires. Most of the billionaires are not Jewish.

5. The idea that a lack of melanin causes one to become a savage is EXACTLY as racist and offensive as the idea that the presence of melanin causes one to become a savage. It is pure hate and Cannon should apologize for that extraordinarily racist statement immediately. Otherwise he is literally no different than the KKK.

6. If there is any evidence that most Blacks are descended from the Hebrews, for example from the Ten Lost tribes, I would be happy to welcome you as a Jew. But to claim that today's Jews are not really Jews is false and offensive. There is an unbroken chain of tradition and written records, as well documented as anything can be, that show how Jews migrated from Judah throughout the world, often oppressed and expelled from one country to another, but always keeping their traditions and laws and peoplehood and religion. I myself am descended from the tribe of Levi and this is an unbroken tradition in my family. Telling me I am a Khazar or whatever is hugely offensive.

7. Nick Cannon says that he values truth, so I must say the truth: Farrakhan is a bigot. Nation of Islam can deny it all they want, but just like Black people don't want white people to tell them when to be offended, Jews don't want to be insulted as satanic and then told that it really isn't offensive. It is. Jews don't want to be told by Farrakhan that they are not really Jews and that he can decide who is and who isn't a real Jew. In the July 4th speech, he claimed that he prayed for Florida to get the coronavirus because, he claims, Jews from Cuba moved to Florida to turn America against Castro. What kind of a person wishes that so many people die because of a bizarre belief about Jews? Not to mention his anti-gay positions. The minister may say some good things but his bigotry should not be condoned by a community that knows the dangers of bigotry.

8. American Blacks who want to raise themselves up can learn a great deal from the American Jewish experience. While of course we were never treated as badly as Blacks have been in America, we came as outsiders - and the Holocaust survivors, like my own parents, were literally slaves themselves. Not figuratively - literally. Nevertheless, Jews in America built our own businesses and schools and hotels when the Christian majority placed restrictions on where we can work and learn and vacation. Some tried to assimilate, some held on to our traditions and didn't compromise. This sense of being outsiders is what animated so many Jews to support the civil rights movement in the 1960s. There are Jewish racists just like any other group, but Jews have been more anti-racist than any other group in America. We are not the enemy, and it is disheartening to see so many Black people subconsciously accept the hate spewed out by Louis Farrakhan and others.