governor mcgreevey has called for the resignation of amiri baraka, based on four lines from a poem he read at the poetry festival. it's not a happy poem. it's angry and unkind. it talks a lot of smack about traditional america. but that's not the charge. the anti-defamation league is claiming that because baraka's poem (written last year after september 11) questions whether israel was in some way responsible for the attacks, it is anti-semitic. is it an angry poem? yes. does it make some ugly accusations? undoubtedly. did i feel uncomfortable after hearing the line about israel? yes.
is it anti-semitic? no. the beginning of the poem raises issues with israel. it goes on the raise issues with skinheads, Klan members, and people in power. it also goes on to ask
"Who killed the most n----
Who killed the most Jews
Who killed the most Italians
Who killed the most Irish
Who killed the most Africans
Who killed the most Japanese
Who killed the most Latinos"
and a whole lot of other questions. it's a poem of questions, and it's not entirely made clear who is doing the asking.
"Like an Owl exploding
In your life in your brain in your self
Like an Owl who know the devil
All night, all day if you listen, Like an Owl
Exploding in fire. We hear the questions rise
In terrible flame like the whistle of a crazy dog
Like the acid vomit of the fire of Hell
Who and Who and WHO who who
Whoooo and Whooooooooooooooooooooo!"
it's actually a poem about people who hate. it just so happens that quite a lot of the hate and power-mongering in the world is done by white people, by people in power, and by people in the name of religions. and yes, that includes israel.
and i'm not going to say that i'm completely behind amiri baraka either, however interesting and politically aware i think he is. he's made questionable comments other times in his life, and he's confessed to having problems with jewish people. mostly i think he's a cranky old man, but the world needs cranky old men. if nothing else, he's a pretty damn good gadfly.
(and what do we do with gadflies?)
there are two separate problems that i'm having. possibly three. but the first is the equation of israel with judaism. criticism of a government, even of a theocracy, is not criticism of a religion. incidentally, questioning, or even criticism of a religion is not tantamount to hate speech. to question whether israel may have had knowledge of terrorist attacks is not a statement of hatred for jewish people, or the religion of judaism. to accuse someone of anti-semitism because they disagree with israeli politics is misguided, and dangerous. at the very least, it dilutes the pool of actual hate speech. there is true hatred in the world, and some of it is sanctioned by government. and some of it is in israel, and some of it is named sharon. (some of it is named bush, and asks the prime minister of veneuala "you have blacks here, too?") but what i'm getting from the anti-defamation league site has very little to do with actual defamation, and a lot more to do with people who criticise israeli policy.
second. the fact that the governor, whom i voted for, is asking for a resignation. i was extremely proud of my state for having the guts to appoint a politically radical poet to the post. most people want nice, happy poems. not poems that challenge them to think, to rethink old assumptions. and now, they're willing to run back with tails tucked, because someone is crying foul. i'm disappointed in you, new jersey.
which brings me to yet another question: why are the truly anti-semitic poets still considered great? ezra pound, who is hailed as a great, and one of the fathers of modern poetry, was a raging anti-semite, and a fascist. ts eliot, to whom i was subjected rather forcefully by my high school lit teacher (murder in the cathedral), was also an anti-semite. is it because they are white, male, and socially acceptable?
this entry is getting unwieldly. i think i'll close it with that point. i don't know that i've reached any conclusions, but i'm sure i've generated quite a lot of hate mail.
dona nobis pacem. -beatpoetgrrl
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