>By calling people suspicious of powerful individuals anti-semitic you are protecting those powerful individuals in a shroud of identity politics despite evidence and survivor testimony - while simultaneously lowering the reputation of an entire religion.
I'm doing no such thing. I'm referring to people who believe in the Pizzagate/QAnon conspiracy theory - these are not merely people who are "suspicious of powerful individuals." Plenty of people are suspicious of powerful individuals who don't buy into that nonsense.
They don't need to be antisemitic per se to buy into a conspiracy theory that is based on antisemitism. Many people who believe in cultural marxism likely aren't aware of the origins of that term either, but it remains the fact that antisemitism is the thematic root for fears of neo-marxist influence over academia. The association of New York and Hollywood with Jews leads to terms like "New York Liberal" and "Hollywood elite" becoming anti-semitic dogwhistles among the alt-right, while seeming perfectly benign in context. These things are so deeply baked into our politics and pop-culture that many people simply can't see the ingredients, but they're still there.
And as far as lowering the reputation of a particular religion, in this specific case, blame that on the communities that came up with these conspiracy theories to begin with, and that turned anti-semitism into a pop culture meme, and whose dialogue is replete with it.
>Also the Hillary Clinton conspiracy theory [0][1] is not a modern retelling - she's not even Jewish. I'm not sure what your point is...
You're being purposely obtuse. Hillary Clinton's actual religion doesn't matter - they draw from the same archetypes and cultural associations.
I'm doing no such thing. I'm referring to people who believe in the Pizzagate/QAnon conspiracy theory - these are not merely people who are "suspicious of powerful individuals." Plenty of people are suspicious of powerful individuals who don't buy into that nonsense.
They don't need to be antisemitic per se to buy into a conspiracy theory that is based on antisemitism. Many people who believe in cultural marxism likely aren't aware of the origins of that term either, but it remains the fact that antisemitism is the thematic root for fears of neo-marxist influence over academia. The association of New York and Hollywood with Jews leads to terms like "New York Liberal" and "Hollywood elite" becoming anti-semitic dogwhistles among the alt-right, while seeming perfectly benign in context. These things are so deeply baked into our politics and pop-culture that many people simply can't see the ingredients, but they're still there.
And as far as lowering the reputation of a particular religion, in this specific case, blame that on the communities that came up with these conspiracy theories to begin with, and that turned anti-semitism into a pop culture meme, and whose dialogue is replete with it.
>Also the Hillary Clinton conspiracy theory [0][1] is not a modern retelling - she's not even Jewish. I'm not sure what your point is...
You're being purposely obtuse. Hillary Clinton's actual religion doesn't matter - they draw from the same archetypes and cultural associations.