Anti-Semitism is on the rise, including on university campuses. Unfortunately, despite this explosion in anti-Semitism, some universities continue to appear concerningly blasé.
Worse, they are actively appeasing activists. This eerily resembles how Neville Chamberlain appeased Nazi Germany, letting it seize the Sudetenland in return for assurances that Hitler’s aggression would end. It didn’t. Hitler invaded Poland. Genocide ensued. Appeasement does not work. It is sadly ironic therefore, that universities are now pursuing this failed strategy.
Mark Scott, the Vice Chancellor of Sydney University and former ABC managing director, appears to have forgotten the lessons of history. He has invited protesters to review defence research ties and defended his actions.
Anti-Semitism clearly dovetails into the protests at many campuses. Anti-Semitism has been increasing but it is not new. Much attention has focused on the United States where there have been 1,826 anti-Semitic incidents on campuses since October 7, 2023, an increase of 700 per cent since the corresponding period the year before. Harvard, together with many other top US universities, has been awarded a failing grade in its treatment of anti-Semitism. University presidents equivocated over whether calls for genocide could violate university policy.
As Nobel Laureate Gary Becker pointed out, discrimination, of which anti-Semitism is the most extreme form, hurts the perpetrator in addition to the victim.
Hitler’s genocide against Jews contributed to his failure to produce the atomic bomb as nuclear physics was created by Jewish scientists.
To their cost, elite US universities set exceedingly restrictive quotas on Jewish students in the 1930s while Jewish faculty were basically non-existent. This was especially so in the social sciences and economics. Restrictions continued despite the flight of talented Jewish scholars from war-torn Europe. While today Jewish students make up 53 per cent of the Harvard postgraduate body, Harvard is still singled out as one of the worst campuses for anti-Semitism.
Bias and discrimination are ultimately revealed as destructive of the perpetrator when exposed to realities of free markets. In the late 1930s, MIT became more open to Jewish academics than other universities, picking up path-breaking economist Paul Samuelson that Harvard shunned. In so doing, MIT turbocharged its growth to one of the World’s top-three universities by hiring many distinguished Jewish scholars. For example, the Nobel Laureate, Robert Solow, joined MIT in 1949. He died recently at the age of 99. MIT’s dismal performance in Congress belies its openness to Jews as the basis for its success.
Australia and particularly ANU was historically more welcoming. Australia welcomed the likes of Heinz Arndt and Max Corden. Max, who was one of Australia’s most distinguished economists, died recently at the age of 96. But, Australia was far from perfect. For example, ANU could once have recruited the greatest 20th Century philosopher, Sir Karl Popper.
Popper pointed out that anything that cannot be refuted by experience is not science. He was praised for this by journalist, Chris Uhlmann, recently. The appointment was strongly supported by the likes of ANU foundation economics professor, Trevor Swan. However, anti-Semitism reared its ugly head, sinking the appointment. Both ANU and Australian scholarship lost a superb opportunity.
Universities refuse to learn the lesson: discrimination is morally repugnant and harms performance as well as destroying reputations. Harvard’s race-based affirmative action was so discriminatory, that the US Supreme Court ruled it to be illegal in 2023. But, despite this, the University continues to affirm that ‘diversity and difference are essential to academic excellence’. It appears that some university administrators are unable to comprehend that not only is discrimination illegal, but it harms performance.
The current protests involve clear and obvious anti-Semitic elements. Anti-Semitism involves many things. The most obvious includes targeting people simply because they are Jewish or Israeli. Clear examples include school girls being harassed for wearing the uniform of their Jewish school, companies refusing service to Jewish schools, targeted harassment of the families of victims of the October 7 terrorist attacks, and graffiti on Jewish schools. These are all anti-Semitic as they involve singling people for discrimination based on their Jewishness or nationality and are not genuine policy critiques.
Anti-Semitism also includes calls for genocide. An obvious example are those who chanted ‘gas the Jews’ at a protest in Sydney. It can also include euphemistic chants that ‘From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free’. Some people might blindly chant a rhyming slogan, mistakenly believing that it is mere sympathy for dead civilians. But scratch beneath the surface and the implications are obvious: Israel is the territory between the ‘river’ and the ‘sea’ and words imply Israel’s elimination together with all Jewish citizens.
People should think twice before they chant a catchy slogan. Universities should force them to do so if universities genuinely claim to be places of learning. Not all chanters want genocide. But words and symbols have implications. Focusing on the asinine superficial meaning is a deflection. Universities have a responsibility to educate genuinely ignorant students and to castigate malfeasants.
Genuine policy critiques are not anti-Semitic. Israel is not perfect. Israel has made mistakes. But thoughtful policy criticism is not the same as slathering a thin veneer of faux policy sophistication on otherwise shallow demagoguery.
The net result is that bias and discrimination harms universities themselves in addition to hurting students and faculty.
Universities promulgate rhetoric about ‘social justice’, ‘diversity’, ‘equity’, and ‘inclusion’ (DEI). These words are meaningless if their same progressive champions fail to also defend Jewish students. If universities do not protect Jewish students, and if they tolerate calls for genocide, it shows claims of ‘social justice’ to be a farce characterised by Division, Intolerance, Exclusion (DIE).
If universities do not defend Jewish students, it will expose universities’ ‘social justice’ rhetoric to be mere weasel words to be rolled out to attack conservatives but to be ignored when it comes to trendy ‘progressive’ causes. Appeasing the activists will only make matters worse.
