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Patrick Andrews
I am involved in language teaching and other courses involved in language and education. Most of my work is online. I have experience of working in China, Russia, Slovakia, Oman, Hungary and Cyprus.
Location Bristol
Achievements
Activity
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This is interesting content and I learnt a lot from it. I realise my own ignorance about many of the issues. I wonder whether there is justified frustration and anger but directed at the wrong targets. For example, corruption is a problem but it wasn’t the Jews who were corrupt in this context.
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Patrick Andrews replied to lesley barrow
I would like to think that this is the case and I see many Jews and Muslims get on well within the UK context. I used to manage a teenage football team my son played for and the goalkeeping coach and his son who played for the team are Jewish and there were also two Muslim players and they all got on well and respected each other and were interested in rather...
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Patrick Andrews replied to Stefano Doglio
Interesting points. Presumably they are institutional Islamisists who are pragmatic and accept that Israel exists although they would rather it did not?
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My impression from several work trips to Oman is that the concept of the tribe/clan is important, at least there. Perhaps this replaces an emphasis on a nation to an extent.
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Patrick Andrews replied to Stefano Doglio
How fascinating @StefanoDoglio . How did Kissinger react?
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Patrick Andrews replied to Fernando Tucci
@FernandoTucci so fascinating. I also like your comment about wishing what you know was often not so unpleasant.
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Patrick Andrews replied to Fernando Tucci
@SuzanneB I would suspect this is right.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
Something that seems to be implied but not totally explicit was a link between anti Zionist and anti European sentiment. Perhaps this doubled the kind of hatred.
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It seems it was both https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_language_is_a_dialect_with_an_army_and_navy and (tangentially related to the course) originally stated by a professor of Yiddish linguistics.
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The variety in dialects suggests that they are called dialects rather than separate languages for political reasons rather than being objective statements of their relationship. Some separate languages seem to be more mutually intelligible than these dialects (e.g. my Slovak students told me they had no difficulty understanding Czech). Do you know the...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
It seems a loss of confidence led to a lack of tolerance. Perhaps a kind of inferiority complex resulted in resentment of others in their midst, who were perhaps in a similar position, rather than the western powers.
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My knowledge tends to be in the area of language where you are clearly a lot more knowledgeable about history. The dialects do seem to be very different and I would guess this is a large part of how the different countries see their identities along with other factors like their colonisers which will affect the second language (eg the importance of French in...
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Interesting but the pan Arabism was not so strong that there was just one nation. I really don’t know much about this (I am not an historian) but the nations seem quite distinct so although there were many that shared a common language and religion, they were separate countries. Are the different dialects part of the separate identities?
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
It is interesting that at the beginning Jews were involved to some extent in the nationalist movements (are there parallels to their involvement in the Russian Revolution?). However, it seems that the idea of nationhood did get linked to Islam.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
The introduction seemed to refer to three factors but then I only got a clear sense of the first two. The first was the influence of antisemistism from the west and this seemed to be expressed through the appearance of the blood libel in Damascus. The second is the increasing equality that meant that Muslims were losing their privileged position. Zionism is...
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@MarkFrancis it is an interesting position. I am not very knowledgeable about chess but it seems strange that he should have been caught in this position as it seemed so hard for the Muslim to get there. There also seem a lot of pieces on the ball for such a simple checkmate.
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How interesting.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
Again, others seem to have covered the content before me. The Jews were indigenous so they would not have seemed like outsiders. Probably many of their behaviours would have seemed similar to the Muslim behaviours. Secondly, they could not be considered the killers of the prophets (but in the case of Jesus wasn’t this the Romans anyway? I am not great on...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
It would be interesting to know how much this varied in practice. My impression from reading Frankopan is that there was peaceful coexistence along the Silk Route.
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I feel the same - a bit out of my depth here as I felt in some parts about the history in Europe.
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Interesting content. I don’t have much to add to what others have already posted.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
His attitude is described as one of disappointment.
Would I be right in thinking he was less hostile than he was to pagans? Nowadays, many Muslims I have met seem to be more puzzled by people who are non religious than people of different religions.
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@SharonMcCafferty yes, racism, including antisemitism, is rife in the Conservative Party, including the leader.
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@ElizabethEaves it was commonly alleged that the Jews are « rootless » and do not belong to the countries they live in - see Arendt, for example.
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These political assassinations or attempted ones have been going on for a couple of decades. Before Navalny, there was Nemtsov and a very prominent journalist, Anna Politikovskaya.
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Boris Johnson’s book https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-book-jews-control-media-general-election-a9239346.html
Corbyn liking an antisemitic mural that depicted Jews as controlling the world, Theresa May’s « citizens of nowhere », references to North London élites, references to « cultural Marxism » by Conservative politicians. -
Blimey. For anyone on the left to link genetic defects to “zionists” really boggles the mind.
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Patrick Andrews replied to Anna Ébner
Thanks @ChrisCheetham so is it perhaps implying a kind of collaboration with white men (as opposed to black people and women)? A sort of siding with those in power?
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Yes, I think there was terrorism involved pre the creation of Israel and we should all condemn that. However, we should also condemn the targeting of people just for being Israeli or Jewish.
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Patrick Andrews replied to Anna Ébner
You have been very thorough Anna. What is written on the devil’s arm? I can read capitalist but not the rest. That clearly supports your interpretation of the dollar signs.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
Very clear and persuasive. It is clear that some on the far left and a very large part of the Conservative Party hold very anti Semitic attitudes. May, Johnson and Suella Braverman have all used anti Semitic tropes and the current government is dangerous.
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I think these issues are interesting. Perhaps it is about good faith and ensuring that racial prejudice is not involved. Sometimes perhaps even facts can be misused. For example in the linking of Israeli training and George Floyd, there is bad faith that seems to link two things that are not related. It was not Israeli police who killed him - it was...
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Patrick Andrews replied to Patrick Andrews
Thanks, Phillip. That is interesting.
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But was it not the case that some of the organisations the Soviets supported targeted individuals for their nationality in terrorist acts like those at the Olympics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Munich_massacre and the Achille Lauro https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achille_Lauro_hijacking ? This is not saying that the Israeli government was/is always right but...
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My understanding of this is that the Soviet Union had prestige as an anti fascist country - after all millions of its citizens had died in the fight against the Nazis. It might be argued that its credentials as an anti fascist and anti Nazi country were unimpeachable. So, If it criticised Israel, its criticisms would be taken seriously in the way that...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
It seems that this form of antisemitism occurred because the Soviets saw the connection between the western powers, especially UK and US and Israel as an anti Communist one. The Soviets then took the side of the Arab countries and considered them as their new allies.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
The origins:
-among Palestinian Arabs
- religious Jews (I would like to know more about why)
- those on the left who presumably thought class rather than ethnicity should be the focus
- assimilationists who wanted Jews to just integrate into societyPost Holocaust
- opposition to the state of Israel in principle and practice. -
Patrick Andrews made a comment
In some parts of the far left, there was a link between Jews and the capitalist class and it is this link that led to the notorious mural that Corbyn liked.
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@SalliWard I would also place myself on the left although quite independently. None of my friends and allies would be antisemitic but I was shocked when I first started using twitter and saw how many antisemitic wolf whistles there were (e.g. “note the name” when referring to some Jewish people.
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I think this interview is interesting on the anti Israel issue https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/full-disclosure-with-james-obrien/id1454408831?i=1000487682061. I think Israel is seen as very powerful and cruel in a way that links to antisemitic tropes. I think we can be critical of the Israeli government and policies but it should not be held to higher...
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Yes, there seems to be plenty of documentation by the Nazis themselves. One of my friends’ grandmother was killed by them and they have the full details about when and where from the Nazi’s own records.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
There are gross denials where it is denied that it even happened. There are also distortions where it is claimed that it happened but not on the scale that the records suggest. Perhaps this is also linked to people wanting to rehabilitate old right wing leaders who had been antisemitic.
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I was listening to this very interesting interview with David Baddiel https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/full-disclosure-with-james-obrien/id1454408831?i=1000487682061. Some very interesting points:
1 he suggests that Jews do not receive the same solidarity that other victims of racism do
2 the fact that he is an atheist does not make him any safer than... -
Interesting content. I think we have to keep Israel and Jews separate in many instances. For some supporters of Israel, it may be its status of being a non Muslim state in the Middle East that is key rather than its place as a Jewish state. So, the use of antisemitic wolf whistles like the use of Soros can go alongside this because he is not part of their...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
The mention of the triple bracket is interesting as I think this was used to target Jewish people on twitter until some allies of Jewish people started using it themselves to confuse the Antisemites.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/aug/25/qanon-conspiracy-theory-explained-trump-what-is This is a worrying new group.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
One key issue seems to be how Jews are linked to the former regimes in these countries.
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Presumably the pro Israel stance depends on the maintenance of conflict in Israel. If the Palestinians are treated better, these far right groups will stop supporting Israel. So what is in Israel (and Palestinian) interests is not what is in the interests of the far right.
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Yes and presumably if they stop being the enemy’s enemy, they become an enemy themselves.
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@KayBader I suspect we will come to this later but in the Far Left, I think some of the dimmer members take a laudable siding with the underdog and then overgeneralise about who the oppressors are (I.e. some members of the Israeli government are overgeneralised for Jews in general).
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Yes and the links to Brexit seem so clear.
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In a way, this was the impression from a party like the National Front or BNP. There is a strong flavour of antisemitism, though, in Farage’s parties, though and even to an extent in the current Conservative Party - Johnson has made use of antisemitic tropes and the use of “ citizens of nowhere “ by Theresa May echoes “rootless cosmopolitans”. I suspect that...
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Interesting comments, Elizabeth. I wonder whether the Holocaust was so horrific that people did not even want to think about it (Maybe this was also a taboo) and as a result, did not address the issues.
I feel this temptation to turn my eyes away from the Holocaust although I know I should not. I don’t think I am brave enough to visit Auschwitz, for...
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What you write is interesting, Anita. My experience in Slovakia In the early 90s was that I did not hear antisemitic comments (does not mean they do not exist) but I heard very overt anti Roma comments. In Russia, prejudice against people from southern states of the ex USSR also seemed much more overt than prejudice against Jews in the early 90s. These...
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Patrick Andrews replied to Patrick Andrews
Yes and people making judgements on when things got too bad and they had to turn their lives around. Those who made it early survived but I can understand the reluctance to leave a home, a job and a life for the uncertainty of exile.
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My feeling is it is the bizarre rationales that I have a deeper understanding of.
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Maybe it is just impressionistic but Britain seems to have gone downhill in the past ten years in terms of antisemitism compared to the previous two or three decades.
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And of course, Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn have both been highly anti Semitic https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-book-jews-control-media-general-election-a9239346.html
Thankfully the new...
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@AnnaÉbner Soros’ name is often invoked by those who espouse Brexit too. There is a link between some of the Brexiters and antisemitism.
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Yes, we definitely need to learn from this. Sometimes blatant lies and illogical use of emotive terms work and we have to be very critical of what we see and hear today as well.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
It seems that it was expressed through undermining the Holocaust and also through the continuation of pogroms in some places.
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Every alliance seemed to be interpreted as being led by Jews rather than being for self protection and mutual self interest.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
I suppose it surprises me to an extent as my image was of an impersonal state. It also seems more troubling as it seems to imply more of a conscious decision to participate in evil rather than just ignoring it.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
I recently read a book on Hungarian football and some key players were greatly affected by antisemitism. https://nbmagazine.co.uk/the-names-heard-long-ago-by-jonathan-wilson/ Some fled for safe countries whereas others got stuck in the wrong places at the wrong time.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
I agree with the comments below but there are a couple of other things I find interesting.
1 “the Jewish nation will have to adapt......”. This seems deeply dishonest as he had no intention of allowing them to adapt and survive.
2 the dishonest use of the communist slogan and claiming it is the one of the Jews, -
Patrick Andrews replied to Salli Ward
And an interesting contrast to some contexts where people have been forced to change their names to be more like the majority community (eg the Turkish community in Bulgaria at one time https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bulgarisation).
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Patrick Andrews replied to Martin Sweeney
Yes, it is interesting as I suppose it is easy to assume that villages would be different.
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Patrick Andrews replied to Anna Ébner
Very interesting @AnnaÉbner
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Indeed, Henrietta. Very few did. There was also the novel “Alone in Berlin” about a brave couple https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Every_Man_Dies_Alone but these are exceptional, brave people.
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I lived in Moscow between 1989 and 1991 (a time of great economic problems) and many people I met said Russia needed a “strong leader”. There seems to be a psychological need for simple solutions at such times.
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Perhaps it was like boiling a frog and some thought that’s things would improve. One of my friends is the daughter of a man whose parents fled but his grandmother stayed behind, presumably as she thought things would get better.
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I suppose many people had too much invested in their positions to oppose and I would imagine that the Aryanisation Encouraged the new owners to support the regime.
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Thanks for this. I think you know more about this than I do.
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It is a very interesting film in many different ways.
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I wonder if we will find more accounts of this but I suspect there were reasons the German Christians did not generally oppose. One was fear. Have you seen the Terence Mallick film “A hidden life” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Hidden_Life_(2019_film) ? A Christian objector lost his life due to his moral opposition to the regime. Others were weak and just...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
My interpretation of the term is that it was argued that the Jews caused chaos (through the introduction of Christianity and also politically through Marxism). The logic was that if the Jews were eliminated, the world could return to an ordered one.
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Yes but from what I understand, the Christian church gave him some support.
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I think the paper is in downloads. It slightly expands on the talk and the transcript.
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I remember seeing the Museum of atheism in Leningrad in 1983.
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How interesting, Wendy.
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Yes so there is a sort of pseudo science here.
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@ZionWalkingTours I wasn’t referring to Marx in this point as he was a communist but not a Bolshevik.
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@ZionWalkingTours often nations proclaim the,selves with adjectives that bear no relation to the reality - isn’t North Korea the Democratic Republic of Korea? It is interesting that this stage overlapped with Stalin’s “socialism in one country” which was perhaps the main difference from Trotsky’s internationalist view of socialism and the need to spread the...
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Were ideas like phrenology (being able to tell a person from their facial features) not also part of this?
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
The mention of the Rothschilds is interesting as the use of the name (and also Soros) is still used by antisemites on the right and left.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
My interpretation is that the unstable political and economic conditions led to extreme parties becoming more influential (an idea that things cannot get worse with extreme policies although, of course, they could and did).
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The link between communism and Judaism seemed to allow anti communists to encourage anti Semitism and also antisemites could provoke it among anyone who opposed communism.
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Adding to this, I looked up Marc Chagall on wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Chagall. In the early days of the Soviet state, he suffered material deprivation but this seemed to be due to more general economic problems. He was able to work and he was able to work with a newly formed Jewish State Theatre. From what I understand (but perhaps I will learn...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
I would imagine it was complex but many Jews chose to associate the,selves with the Bolsheviks as the white army were so nationalist that they would definitely be a danger. I think there were also Jewish intellectuals who supported the Bolsheviks during the early days on an intellectual level and in the early days there was a flowering of the arts.
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Were there not other prominent Jews among the Bolsheviks? I thought so but am not sure.
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It is interesting but not very clear. I interpreted it as an “unmanly” man rather than a man dressed as a woman. My guess is that it was attempting to link the Jews to lack of courage and softness in contrast to German soldiers but I am uncertain about this.
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
There seem to be an interesting contrast between World War One and World War Two in that the idea of an internal group causing the defeat (The stab in the back) rather than the losing side reflecting in the aftermath that they had mistakes (to understate it). At the end of World War One, many Germans would have thought they should have won whereas at the end...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
The key point I take from this is that the countries became more homogenous and so the minorities that were left were more exposed. I take it that these were mainly the Jews and Roma whose fates seem quite intertwined. Nations like the Habsburg enemy had been more multinational/multicultural and to some extent, the Jews had been able to be just another group...
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Patrick Andrews replied to Salli Ward
The revival of Welsh seems pretty successful. Bilingual signs abound and there is an expectation of services in both languages. Welsh medium schools seem to be very popular.
From what I understand Czech and Slovak have both gone from being limited to some domains to important national languages.
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Patrick Andrews replied to Salli Ward
@SalliWard I wonder if the second of the two factors (the antisemitism that Jews faced in the countries they lived) was a key reason why a Jewish state came about. If they had been able to live safely around the world, perhaps the need would not have existed.
On the other hand, if there had been no Jewish state, it would have been the only major religion to... -
Patrick Andrews replied to Salli Ward
Yes but this is not the only example. Languages as varied as Czech, Slovak and Welsh have been revived from being very little spoken to national languages.
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@KayBader yes and deep fakes are becoming so sophisticated now that if you had some video of me, you could doctor it to make me say anything you like. This is obviously very dangerous. Of course, this is just a short progression from selective editing (e.g. the Conservative Party recently edited words that Keir Starmer used in a very distorted way) but these...
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Patrick Andrews made a comment
I would imagine that there are two factors that would be likely to help such a text to gain influence. The first would be an audience that wants such a text to confirm their prejudices. The second might be that the text seems believable (this is interlinked with the first but might also relate to its quality as a forgery). I would be interested to know more...
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In some ways, that seems even more shocking. Presumably, if is barred because of a Jewish wife, the same would be true of anyone married to a Muslim or someone from another country.
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Photographs were commonly doctored in Soviet times (e.g Trotsky being blanked out).
