Alyssa Milano, the actor and activist (she was a prime mover of the #MeToo movement), has taken a principled stand that I have to admire even more, as it pits her against her fellow feminists who fall on the Control-Left. As reported by several venues, including The Independent and the left-wing Jewish site Haaretz, Milano has condemned two leaders of the Women’s March, Linda Sarsour and Tamika Mallory, and refused to speak at further Women’s Marches until those two leaders repudiate the anti-Semitism of their hero Louis Farrakhan. (Note that Carmen Perez, the third of four founders of the Women’s March, also admires the looney Farrakhan.)
As I’ve mentioned several times, Sarsour, Perez, and (especially) Mallory are unapologetic in their admiration of Farrakhan, head of the Nation of Islam (the Black Muslims) and one of the worst and most vocal anti-Semites in America (see here, here, here, and here). Farrakhan is also a homophobe.
Farrakhan on one hand vs. Jews and gays on the other: this poses a dilemma for intersectional feminists and control-Leftists. That’s because Farrakhan is black, but homophobia and anti-Semitism are not supposed to be part of the intersectionalist agenda.
Yet the resolution is always the same: Jews and gays go under the bus in favor of blacks and Muslims—presumably because they’re people of color. And when a black man demonizes Jews, well, Sarsour, Perez, and Mallory just keep extolling him.
Make no mistake about it: Farrakhan and the doctrine of the Nation of Islam exude hatred of Jews, and by proxy so do Perez, Sarsour, and Mallory, even though they sometimes make propitiating noises to the contrary, as Sarsour did after the Pittsburgh synagogue attack. But those noises ring hollow (note that Sarsour pointedly doesn’t mention Jews):
But let’s have some kudos for Milano, who, as Haaretz reports, said this:
In an interview with the Advocate published last week, Milano criticized Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour for not distancing themselves from the Nation of Islam leader, who has repeatedly made anti-Semitic, homophobic and transphobic comments.
“Any time that there is any bigotry or anti-Semitism in that respect, it needs to be called out and addressed. I’m disappointed in the leadership of the Women’s March that they haven’t done it adequately,” Milano said.
Earlier this year, Mallory was criticized for not speaking out after she attended an event during which Farrakhan said “The powerful Jews are my enemy.”
Sarsour later defended Mallory from criticism.
“I will not sit back while a strong, bold, unapologetic, committed Black woman who risks her life every day to speak truth to power and organize and mobilize movements is questioned, berated and abused,” Sarsour wrote on Facebook. “I stand with Tamika Mallory every day, with every fiber of my being because she has so much of what we need in the movement right now to win.” [JAC note: Mallory called Farrakhan the GOAT: “The greatest of all time”.]
In the Advocate interview, Milano said that she would not feel comfortable speaking at the March.
“I would say no at this point,” she said. “Unfortunate that none of them have come forward against him at this point. Or even given a really good reason why to support them.”
Indeed! And much as I applaud the goals of the Women’s March, women themselves should, like Milano, disassociate themselves from the March until the three founders Sarsour, Mallory, and Perez denounce Farrakhan’s anti-Semitism. Especially in these times of purity tests, women should not be led by those who cozy up to anti-Semitic loons like Farrakhan. (Sarsour, who promotes sharia law, isn’t exactly a shining light for women’s rights, either.)
White actress announces boycott of Women's March unless its gets rid of the Palestinian-American woman and African-American woman who founded it, or until they recite from the script she demands. https://t.co/X27aQV2puQ
— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) November 7, 2018
My respect for Alyssa Milano goes up infinitely. My feelings about Greenwald were already less than complimentary, but now they sink even lower. Or as Greenwald would put it were the proverbial boot on the other foot: “Cisgendered white male mansplains to women what they ought to be thinking, tries to shame them publicly for having Different WrongThink.”
For me, people’s attitude toward Linda Sarsour is a touchstone of whether they’re truly progressive. If they admire her, they are admiring an anti-Semitic woman who favors the oppression of sharia law, all because she is supposedly an oppressed woman of color. Well, Sarsour is neither oppressed (she’s widely admired), nor is she a woman of color (she’s a light-skinned woman of Palestinian descent). Anyone who marches with or admires Sarsour is rubbing elbows with bigotry and hatred.
“Anyone who marches with or admires Sarsour is rubbing elbows with bigotry and hatred.”
Yep. You can’t shake the Devil’s hand and then say you were only kidding.
sub
So why do these women respect Farrakhan so much? From my admittedly naive perspective, his teachings seem to be somewhat far removed from ought to concern the Women’s March. Is it his general position as a rebel with a cause, reminding me of those who wear Che Guevara tee-shirts.
Is the simplest answer not sufficient? His anti-Semitism aligns well with their anti-Israeli position. Sure,they don’t consider themselves anti-Semite the way he is, but a Venn diagram of their positions regarding middle-eastern geopolitics would overlap significantly.
Farrakhan is actually a misogynist. https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Louis_Farrakhan#Misogyny
I have no idea why the Women’s March leaders are so fond of the guy. He seems to be not just removed, but in deep contrast to the progressive principles of the Women’s March.
I think darelle’s theory that the two founders of the march are subverting a cause to promote their own and their own is ok with misogyny. The rest are just blinkered because he’s a minority.
Good thing Glenn’s there to mansplain what this woman actually meant as opposed to what she said.
It’s pretty bad that a reporter like Greenwald would so misrepresent Milano’s position. He’s evidently gotten a little full of himself.
Greenwald once was an eloquent voice for free speech and liberal values. Then he got himself a moslem boyfriend, and he’s been a tendentious zealot on ‘islamophobia’ ever since.
Sometimes it is that simple.
He’s also a shill for Putin and Assad apologists, and seems very comfy in the “false flag” crowd that deny Assad’s chemical weapons attacks.
He is incredibly hostile to liberals and progressives, and this can be seen with his horrid attitude towards liberal Muslims, ex-Muslims, etc.
He does get some criticism from his fellow regressive Lefties for appearing on Fox, esp. Tucker Carlson, although this sin is not as grievous as the former examples, AFAIAC.
Why is it mansplaining? He clearly got Milano’s position wrong but that isn’t mansplaining.
But the way, it’s worth reading the replies to his tweet. He got totally roasted.
I think Harrison is using Greenwald’s own tactics and language against him. In the same way Greenwald made Milano’s statement about a her being white woman, Harrison has made Greenwald’s about being a man.
Good for Ms. Milano. She’s always been aces in my book.
And let’s get one thing clear: there’s never been a damn thing liberal or leftist in anything Louis Farrakhan has ever preached. He’s just a charismatic crypto-fascist cult-of-personality leader who collects sycophantic acolytes.
He’s a reactionary nutjob. We should keep well clear of him. In fact someone as repellent as that should be a sworn enemy.
I’ve always been a big fan of Alyssa Milano too. Initially that was as an actress, but in recent years it’s been a pleasure to discover we’re pretty much on the same page when it comes to politics, ethics, morality etc. It’s music to my ears that she’s taken this stance.
My opinion of Glenn Grenwald has been getting lower and lower as the years go by to the extent I no longer have much time for him and this reaction doesn’t surprise me. I once thought he was okay, but haven’t for a long time.
I identify with Alyssa Milano because we’re both really pretty. 🙂
Going by your portraits in post offices, I’d have to agree. 😎
You might be really pretty. These days it’s more that’s what I wish I looked like for me!
+10 for Milano. And the bullshit response from Sarsour, to frame her and Mallory as put-upon heroes…give me a break.
Sarsour’s only talent seems to be an instinctive ability to reframe any action by her and her followers as toweringly noble.
Her mate is accused of empowering a Jew-hating bigot? Well, she “will not sit back” while her strong, proud black female friend is “questioned, berated and abused”.
That is a talent: to take the tawdry reality of your own hypocrisy and reframe it so completely. Of course it needs a willing line-up of misguided faux-feminists who’re prepared to let her off as soon as she says the magic words ‘strong proud woman’, but even if they weren’t there she’d still be selling a vision of pure, unbowed nobility to some other group of people.
That’s why she has followers: because she makes them feel like they’re Joan of Arc even when they’re defending a cheap, nasty old racist who hates women almost as much as he hates Jews.
My guess regarding Sarsour is that she’s simply engaged in subversion. Womens’ rights / feminism are not her goal. Her goal is increasing acceptance of Islamic culture, including the worst aspects of it like Sharia. She has subverted women’s rights activism to further that goal. Note that Louis Farrakhan is a fellow Muslim activist who does the same kind of thing. They use activism for more righteous causes as cover to normalize nasty things like antisemitism and Sharia.
Yes, I think you are spot on here. She can get people to accept anti-semitism in the name of women’s causes & thereby slowly introduce her real cause – Islamism & Sharia Law. It is always a shock when I see female Jews supporting her….that’s how good Sarsour is at doing this.
“It is always a shock when I see female Jews supporting her….that’s how good Sarsour is at doing this.”
I think that’s less a result of how good Sarsour is at this and more a result of how good the progressive/social justice portion of the Left has been at getting Jews to accept that they have to oppose most of their own people in order to be good “progressives.”
I’ve told this story many times, but I went to an extremely “progressive” liberal arts college back in the early 2000’s. Even professors spread conspiracy theories and lies about Israel in class, and there were student groups throughout the campus doing the same. As a young, idealistic person who assumed the good intentions and honesty of my professors, I came to believe all those lies — lies like Israelis kidnapping and torturing Palestinian children, poisoning water, etc., and conspiracy theories like the Jews controlling all the world’s money to their own benefit.
Thankfully, as I grew older, I learned to think critically and research things for myself, but most people never develop those skills or habits. For most people, they consider themselves part of a tribe, and if the leaders of their tribe tell them they need to do, say, and believe certain things to be good members, they will do them.
It amazes me how many feminists are willing to prioritize progressive leftism over feminism, in cases where circumstances put the two philosophies at odds.
Milano’s actions here surprise me a little. That statement took some fortitude.
Progressives (and Islamic people) are much harder on apostates than they are on their normal opponents.
I think you’re right.
I always considered Ms Sarsour (plz appreciate my effort here to omit the ‘odious’ adjective) a Saudi shill.
But indeed maybe just an Islamic fundamentalist trying to infiltrate the Western discourse by ‘honeying’ the Ctrl-left, maybe not directly funded by Saud.
And yes, here in South Africa -and Ceiling Cat knows we are ‘experts’ on race here- Ms Sarsour is lily-white.
I agree with Diana that you’re right on this darrelle.
Most feminists aren’t the extremist misandrist intersectionalists that make it into the news. In fact most of us view them with as much horror as we view Women For Trump.
Exactly. Besides, the constant wailing and gnashing of teeth from resentful alt-right internet virgins about the evils of feminism is ridiculous. Pick a Trump-supporting Republican activist at random and I consider them exponentially more dangerous than even the most extreme feminist. It’s like comparing a slightly scratchy kitten with a grizzly bear
There is a certain kind of ‘well both sides are as bad as each other’ argument that really grinds my gears. ‘Men hating feminists are just as bad as women hating misogynists’? F— off.
I don’t like either side, but when the former start raping and murdering young male stand-up comedians and then desecrating their graves the comparison might come close to holding water. Until then it’s pernicious nonsense.
I’ve just seen some stats from Pew about the mid-terms that gave me pause. 79% of those who think that the problem of sexual harassment is “not too serious” voted Republican. 85% of those who think that minorities are favoured in today’s US voted Republicans. 69% of those who think no racial group is favoured voted for the GOP.
Scroll down a bit on this page:
http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/11/08/the-2018-midterm-vote-divisions-by-race-gender-education/
And let’s not forget Donna Hylton who talked at the the women’s march about her time in jail but forgot to mention she was there for torturing a man to death.
“Donna Hylton and three female accomplices drugged and kidnapped 62-year-old Long Island real estate broker Thomas Vigliarolo … The kidnappers held Vigliarolo prisoner for 15–20 days. During that time, three men and four women, including Hylton, starved, burned, beat, sexually assaulted, raped, and tortured him.[4] On April 5, 1985, with Hylton asleep in the next room,[20] Vigliarolo died of asphyxiation. Three days later, his body was found locked in a trunk in a Manhattan apartment.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donna_Hylton
She is now a feminist icon and her memoir “A Little Piece of Light: A Memoir of Hope, Prison, and a Life Unbound” gets glowing reviews from Kirkus and Barnes And Noble.
https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/donna-hylton/a-little-piece-of-light/
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/a-little-piece-of-light-donna-hylton/1127171952#/
Quite a few of us raised the issue of Donna Hylton when many were fawning over the Women’s March, or at least, some of the leaders of it.
They never addressed it.
The error Sarsour makes, or at least the error she would like all of us make, is that you can’t hold two things in your mind at the same time. Specifically, Sarsour can’t seem to recognize that Tamika Mallory can be both a strong black woman who is oppressed and bravely speaks out against this oppression, while at the same time be the kind of person that accepts Louis Farrakhan’s anti-semitism. Greenwald makes the same error (while completely twisting Milano’s words). In doing this, they have decided that anti-semitism is an acceptable price to pay for women’s causes. Shame on them for their bigotry and faulty thinking.
Reminds me of ol’ F. Scott F’s observation that “[t]he test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”
And those ideas aren’t even opposing. They are just different.
Consistency is the hobgoblin O.F. small minds. (Or something like that.)
Emerson
A foolish consistency – that is
It’s possible that they look beyond Farrakhan’s hatred because it they think it furthers women’s causes. Or it’s because they themselves are anti-Semites. I think it’s more the latter, but it’s a distinction without a difference in any case.
Does Farrakhan furthers women’s causes? As he is Muslim I would think that a bit of a stretch.
No, I don’t believe he does. I was para-quoting Diana.
The myth of human beings fitting into binary categories of ‘good’ and ‘evil’, and not being a mix of each, is extremely powerful. Considered in the abstract, the vast majority of us would readily agree that of course the world isn’t so cut and dried, and that every human being is in fact a mix of good and bad. But in practice, we have an extremely hard time admitting that Joe Racist had a good point or that Joan FriendOfMine said something horrible.
To them and those who follow them, this is not an error. The Jews are the one group who have experienced oppression throughout history and which the social justice crowd steadfastly refuses to recognize as such. I don’t support their philosophy, with its hierarchy of oppression and victimization, but, if they really did care about any and all people who experience hatred and oppression, they wouldn’t act the way they do. They’re a special interest group for certain “identities,” rather than a group fighting against oppression and for equality for all no matter who they are or where they come from.
To them, Jews are evil people who control the world’s finances and are white oppressors. And here’s an interesting experiment: if you walk into most radical Left bookstores, you’ll find copies of books like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and Henry Ford’s The International Jew, among other extremely antisemitic writings. So, to put it bluntly: none of this is a mistake, and is part of the ideology for a very large portion of this crowd.
Mallory was raised in the bosom of Farakkhan and fully embraces his racist and hateful ideology. She also idolizes the murderous domestic terrorist, Assata Shakur.
I see no real upside to Tamika Mallory.
Forget all her other faults, Sarsour’s misuse of “whomever” in her tweet irks me.
If you don’t know how to use who/whom correctly, just stick with “who”.
The “whomever” bothers me as well. I guess that makes me a grammar nazi, which is still better than an actual nazi. 🙂
There is one quote attributed to Farrakhan that I do agree with. He is supposed to have said:
I don’t know if he actually said that, but if he did, it’s a stopped clock case, and the only Farrakhan item in my extensive quote collection.
I lost all respect for Greenwald when I pointed out in a comment to one of his screeds that, in the case of then-representative Mark Foley hitting on congressional pages, that he was not a pedophile for two reasons – pedophilia is a sexual fixation on pre-pubescent children and that the age of consent in D.C. and Florida is 16 and that pages had to be 16 to hold that position – therefore, the pages were not underage. I maintained that his wrongdoing was in using a position of authority to make sexual advances and Florida’s laws prohibiting use of the internet to solicit sex (note that I did not absolve Foley – I questioned Greenwald’s judgement).
Greenwald wrote me back with (what he probably thought was) a scathing reply that pedophilia was whatever he said it was and that if I disagreed with him, I was promoting Foley’s crimes.
I wrote him back quoting the coachman’s line from Ghostpusters: “Jeez, what an asshole!”
Typo apology: “Ghostbusters”.
This does sound like a case where technical meaning of a term matters. In ordinary usage “pedophile” *does* seem to be anyone who is attracted to under-aged.
The defense for Farrakhan by supporters like the various Women’s March officials is that the Black Muslims help people in poor African American neighborhoods. Of course, there’s no reason their good works can’t go on shorn of anti-Semitism and homophobia, but Farrakhan has no motivation to change his message if no one stands up to him. Good for Alyssa Milano.
OK so this tweet from Linda Sarsour:
Isn’t the corollary to that that she thinks it is OK to gun people down anywhere that isn’t a place of worship?
Think ya might have an undistributed middle there, jeremy.
Well if you want to be technical, I guess the fact that she wants places of worship to be sanctuaries does not exclude the possibility that she wants other places to be sanctuaries too. But the implication of her Tweet is that places of worship should be treated in a special way.
I’ve got no truck with Linda Sarsour; indeed, I rather strongly dislike her. But I don’t think there’s anything much different in what she said in the brief passage you’ve quoted from what any other public figure might say under such circumstances — that there’s something particularly detestable in attacking a synagogue or church (or a school or a hospital or a seniors’ center or similar establishment) since such places seem especially defenseless. As much as we may dislike Sarsour, I don’t think it’s fair to conclude (from that statement alone, anyway) that she approves of gunning down people elsewhere.
She needed to make some kind of statement — not doing so would bring further attention to her antisemitism — but notice that, in contrast to nearly every other statement on the matter, she did not mention anything Jewish in any way, to say nothing of condemning antisemitism.
To condemn antisemitism would be to condemn her allies.
To condemn antisemitism would be to condemn herself.
I think that what was really on her mind when she wrote that was not Judaism but Islam.
We know why as pointed out repeatedly here, these women (Sarsour, Mallory, and Perez) behave so badly, what we want to know is when one, a light will go on and they see hypocrisy in full glare and two, when will Greenwald stop running around at their heels, like a dog pleading for a bone.
Well as long as the are stuck up to their crotches in that dank dark swamp we know where they are, we can observe cognitive failure close up, repeatedly, boringly,
I’d prefer not too…
Greenwald has been promoting conspiracy theories against Israel for years now, as well as vaguely hinting at Jewish control of financial institutions (of course, he was always far less explicit about this, as promoting those views outright would strip him of his “I’m only criticizing Israel, not Jews” cover). He was only a step away from supporting outright antisemites, and he crossed that line well before his recent idiocy.
What a bunch of rotters the likes of Glenn Greenwald are.
I told you Glenn is a New Racist, and this is yet more evidence of it.
Who still takes him seriously, except PutinBros, Islamists, and far-left regressives?
Unfortunately, there are millions of people on the Left who still consider him a brilliant investigative journalist who speaks truth to power. They’ll believe anything he says. He’s taken very seriously by a great many people and is not at all “fringe.”
Dang, BJ, figured I’d draw a parry from you on #6 in today’s Paris post. Ya slippin’, son.
Sorry, I missed it! Your parry has been posted 🙂
I take it that all of you are aware that Mr. Greenwals is gay.
BTW, it’s been obvious for years that gays and Jews are of secondary, or lower, importance in the intersectional hiearchy.
That, ultimately, is why gay and Jews have little chance of a happy future in Europe, especially France.
Yes we know that Hlen Greenwald is gay and Jewish. But I’m not surprised by anything people do that is against their own self interest anymore. Women have been doing it since forever and the working class does it to themselves in every election.
I’m always surprised when anyone does anything contrary to their own self-interest, altruism being a quality in such short supply.
But I think what’s going on with Greenwald is that he perceives promoting his outré pro-Putin/Trump/Wikileaks/Muslim agenda to better serve his own narrow self-interests than would standing up for his fellow Jews and gays.
Really? Gays and Jews have little chance of happiness in Europe? Where exactly do they have a chance of happiness then? Because I struggle to think of many more tolerant places than Europe, especially France, which, contrary to the fever dreams of right-wing apocalypse mongers like Breitbart is not some kind of hideous hellhole where gays are executed by roving gangs of brown skinned men. As for Jews, what’s the solution? Pull up the drawbridge and head back to Israel for the rest of their days?
The poster said “a happy future,” and I can see why. To say that France is “especially tolerant” of Jews is…a strange thing to say. France has a bigger antisemitism problem than any other country in Europe right now, and it only seems to be getting worse. In 2015, hate crimes against Jews rose to historic levels in France and, after falling for two years, just shot up another 69% so far this year. There have been very well-publicized incidences of extreme violence against Jews in France over the last few years, almost exclusively by the Muslim population.
I don’t know what the answer is, but something needs to be done. Perhaps we can start with better assimilation of migrants and refugees, as well as a media that doesn’t spread lies about Israel and blow every single thing it does out of proportion, as we know that doesn’t help anything either.
Good for Alyssa Milano. As someone said after Charlottesville, a nice person will not associate with hateful bigots on their terms.
As for Linda Sarsour… I feared that she would be catapulted into the Congress after these elections; I am very happy to have been wrong.