[WikiEN-l] Stevertigo should not be allowed to write about Jews

Wed Oct 1 16:36:23 UTC 2003

I really am unhappy with the way that Christian Identity
anti-Semites such as Stevertigo are being allowed to push
hatred of Israel and Jews on this e-mail list, and on
multiple Wikipedia articles.

I am even more unhappy about the way that several people
are writing me privately, admitting to me that they too see
huge amounts of anti-Semitism, but that they are publicly
unwilling to say or do anything about this, especially in
regards to Stevertigo.

This man is a violently hateful anti-Semitic racist, and
the way that so many people consider him a valuble
controbutor onl serves to further the impression that
Wikipedia is becoming an internet haven for anti-Semites,
as well as people who Catholics and others.

The following analysis of Stevertigo shows that he is a
"Christian Idenity" style anti-Semite. What people do with
this information will show whether or not anti-Semitism is
considered acceptable or not on Wikipedia.

Just stop allowing him to edit articles on Jews,
Christians, Israel, etc.

******************

Stevertigo's latest efforts have been to whitewash
that much maligned beacon of academic integrity, [[David
Irving]]. I immediately removed the text, only to start a
minor edit war and provoke censure for the act, even from
people I believe acted out of good intentions. You might
also want to see the essay on Irving that SV posted on his
personal page. 

Before you react, here are some thoughts. SV is acting
cleverly-so cleverly, in fact, that for a while I thought
that SV was actually Irving himself. By the way, it's not
that far off. Notice how, on the Talk Page, when I called
Irving a Nazi apologist, he signed his response "The
Apologist." I was up to three this morning, tracing his
contributions, and their development is too sophisticated
for the standard anti-Semitic gibberish that people post.
In short, his argument over several weeks is leading
somewhere. The points he is trying to make are as follows:

1. Anti-Semitism should be defined as taking extreme
actions against Jews: killing them, maiming them, or
hurting them in some other, physical way. Anti-Jewish
sentiment is not anti-Semitism. 

2. [[Henry Ford]] may have published anti-Semitic articles,
but
by this definition, he is not an anti-Semite. 
I call this stage, "testing the waters." He continues:

3. [[David Irving]] is a much-maligned academic. He is a
"young
and talented writer," who has simply, and misguidedly tried
to point out that post the second generation of Germans
after the Holocaust "were no less victims of Hitler than
the Jews were." Irving then wants "to bridge the gap
between victor and victim." 

4. David Irving gave reasons why the numbers attached to
the [[Holocaust]] could not be authentic. He repeats
Irving's famous assertion: "more women died on the back
seat of Edward Kennedy's car at Chappaquiddick than ever
died in a gas chamber in Auschwitz." 

By following this logic, 

5. The Nazis could not possibly be anti-Semitic (point 1),
because while they spoke about the Jews harshly, they did
not actually do any harm.

Therefore:

6. Who is responsible for the supposed imbalance between
Germany and the rest of the world if not the Jews?

As evidence for this, I quote Stevertigo's misquote of
Chomsky on his homepage: "Those who express their fear and
concern over manifestations of anti-Semitism among Blacks
and others might be taken seriously if they were to pay
even the slightest attention to what is said by their
friends and associates. They do not." In other words,
Blacks are justified for anti-Semitism because of
anti-Black racism supposedly prevalent among Jews. In other
words, anti-Semitism can be justified. Once again, we go
back to "testing the waters." 

This argument is remarkably sophisticated-more so than, for
example, Clutch's rantings. Stevertigo is using quite a few
techniques used in top-notch propaganda efforts:

* He is combining fact with fiction in sophisticated ways,
so that readers immediately make the assumption that if one
statement is truthful, the other must necessarily be
truthful too. 

* He is appealing to the innate sense of identification
with the underdog that most people have: notice his quote
from Thomas (originally in Psalms, but who is gonna check):
"the discarded stone is the keystone."

* He presents as fact things that only people with
specialized knowledge will know is wrong. In "Letter versus
Spirit" last night, he wrote: The Hebrew word "Torah", in
fact, similar to the Christian Old Testament, translates as
"the Law." He got a little snide when I called him on that.

* He is trying to drive wedges between people involved in
the debate. 

* He is employing cynicism to fend off criticisms of him:
"And due to my ties to the Neo-nazi Filipino hemp mafiaâ€¦"

* He is citing NPOV as a justification for promoting his
agenda. 

* He is transferring guilt from the victims to the
oppressors. For instance, "Even though they were only small
children while Hitler was alive, they still shouldered the
heavy hand of guilt - of War-raped mothers and sisters, of
destroyed country, and a long lost sense of who they were."
In other words, the poor German children watched their
mothers raped by the Allies, their country destroyed by
them, and their sense of identity "long lost."

Poignant, painful imagery, but what the fuck is "long
lost?"  "Long lost identity" is actually a Nazi phrase
regarding the lost of German culture because of Jewish
infiltration, but who the heck is gonna know that unless
they actually studied the history.

* He is claiming to take a middle ground between two
extremes: "I think Irving represents an important middle
ground between victim and victim." In other words, Nazis
should be rejected (or at least at this point, their
arguments should be rejected), but so should Jews, because
the two represent extremes. 

Please understand that we will not change SV's mind. He is
too steeped in his belief system for that. My concern is
that he is fooling others.

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