Trump has a genius for knowing what will get a rise out of people. I would not be surprised if knows somewhere in his bones that using this word will get Jewish people mad at him, but in a way where he can claim he didn't know what he was saying.
While I appreciate your well reasoned commentary that notes that Trump is illiterate, you have forgotten one very important thing!
That is that one is a product of one's environment. We know for certain that Trump's father was a member of the Klan and that he was raised in a racist and anti-semitic home and community. The evidence that he had absorbed and continues to agree with those beliefs are easlily demonstrated first by the fact that he was accused of discriminatory (racist) practices by the government early on in his career as a "landlord" and most recently by describing neo-nazis and white surpremicists marching in Charlottesville chanting "Jews will not replace us" as "fine people."
Add to that that he has had overt racists and neo-nazis for dinner at Mar-a-Lago and has Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense! I have no doubt that he is not familiar with the literary reference of "Shylock" but, come on, not knowing that it is used as an antisemitic trope is like saying he doesn't know what the word "kike" means!
Fair points. FWIW, there is no proof Fred Trump was in the Klan (you can Google it--seems he was arrested at a Klan event, but that is not proof of membership). He clearly is not put off by white supremacists, but I am not sure that gets us to "he knows what 'shylock' means." Fun fact: a lot of kids have no idea what "kike" means. These days, the preferred slur is just "fuckin' Jew" or maybe "Zionist." "Kike" is, I think, going the way of "sheeny."
Mark Zuckerberg, another ill-educated person, had to be pressured by an avalanche of outrage into changing Facebook’s policy on Holocaust denial. Until he brought it up in an interview— in an idiotic attempt to explain his views on the First Amendment — the company policy was that Holocaust denial was just another “opinion.” Such opinion was “deeply offensive,” he said, but “at the end of the day, I don’t believe that our platform should take that down because I think there are things that different people get wrong. I don’t think that they’re intentionally getting it wrong, but I think — —”
I don’t know whether Trump is an antisemite. I’m pretty sure Zuckerberg is not. But both these giants are definitely shockingly ignorant people.
Trump has a genius for knowing what will get a rise out of people. I would not be surprised if knows somewhere in his bones that using this word will get Jewish people mad at him, but in a way where he can claim he didn't know what he was saying.
While I appreciate your well reasoned commentary that notes that Trump is illiterate, you have forgotten one very important thing!
That is that one is a product of one's environment. We know for certain that Trump's father was a member of the Klan and that he was raised in a racist and anti-semitic home and community. The evidence that he had absorbed and continues to agree with those beliefs are easlily demonstrated first by the fact that he was accused of discriminatory (racist) practices by the government early on in his career as a "landlord" and most recently by describing neo-nazis and white surpremicists marching in Charlottesville chanting "Jews will not replace us" as "fine people."
Add to that that he has had overt racists and neo-nazis for dinner at Mar-a-Lago and has Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense! I have no doubt that he is not familiar with the literary reference of "Shylock" but, come on, not knowing that it is used as an antisemitic trope is like saying he doesn't know what the word "kike" means!
Fair points. FWIW, there is no proof Fred Trump was in the Klan (you can Google it--seems he was arrested at a Klan event, but that is not proof of membership). He clearly is not put off by white supremacists, but I am not sure that gets us to "he knows what 'shylock' means." Fun fact: a lot of kids have no idea what "kike" means. These days, the preferred slur is just "fuckin' Jew" or maybe "Zionist." "Kike" is, I think, going the way of "sheeny."
Mark Zuckerberg, another ill-educated person, had to be pressured by an avalanche of outrage into changing Facebook’s policy on Holocaust denial. Until he brought it up in an interview— in an idiotic attempt to explain his views on the First Amendment — the company policy was that Holocaust denial was just another “opinion.” Such opinion was “deeply offensive,” he said, but “at the end of the day, I don’t believe that our platform should take that down because I think there are things that different people get wrong. I don’t think that they’re intentionally getting it wrong, but I think — —”
I don’t know whether Trump is an antisemite. I’m pretty sure Zuckerberg is not. But both these giants are definitely shockingly ignorant people.
Perfect, Mark.