I very much appreciate your efforts at compiling a vast array of different viewpoints and sources on this topic for someone as lazy as I to pour over. The history of strife between different groups in America continues to fascinate me. Ethnic politics is a relatively novel concept over here in Sweden. The Nordic countries have traditionally been relatively homogenous, but recent decades have seen an influx of immigrants - from the Balkans in the 90's to the 2015 refugee crisis. To be clear, I do not oppose this. Many of my closest friends are first-or second generation immigrants from the areas mentioned above, all of whom are extremely well adjusted. However, we are also dealing with integration problems reminiscent of those America has faced pertaining to urban decay and increasing segregation of society. The language barrier in particular is a difficult obstacle to overcome, as community leaders in these areas have been revealed to say one thing to the Swedish government and an entirely different thing to the newly arrived. This is, of course, a topic that has very easily utilized as a political battering ram by the more... dubious parts of the political right, even in America. My country is however no hellscape, and I am not worried about a growing minority of muslim immigrants subverting our government and establishing a Scandinavian caliphate or something. My concern is rather that this problem becomes a fixture in Swedish society, much like it has become in America. I understand that your focus is on American politics (as has been made abundantly clear by your coverage of the Russo-Ukrainian war), but what do you think small European countries should do to avoid the pitfalls that the US has struggled with in regards to, as Dr. King would have put it; "making the crooked places straight"?
On a completely unrelated note: when tf you getting back to the Aztecs? I've been waiting an E T E R N I T Y .
What books are you working from about upper class wasps using blacks as a battering ram to break up neighborhoods. Very curious about this due to family connections in places like Detroit and Philadelphia
I am old enough (barely) to remember how terrible the late 70’s were for the larger cities in the US. Darryl mentions (in God’s Socialist) how the commentators of the 1977 World Series openly comment on the fact that the Bronx is on fire again. I actually have a memory of that since my father and I were watching the game (I was 7). Therefore, I also remember the violence of the 80’s as a teenager. Luckily for me, I grew up in rural SC and watched from afar as cities destroyed themselves. And, being a teenager, had no idea what underpinned all this violence and degradation. All this context leads me to ask DC this question(s): what books have you read that try to explain the link between the collapse of the civil rights movements of the late 60’s into chaos and the ensuing violence and institutional collapse (at least in the cities) of the 1970’s? Second, you mention the Third Worldism ideology and the effect it had on the relationship between Blacks and Jews. Do you consider Third Worldism to be connected to or the same as the exporting of Marxism from Western intellectuals to the former European colonies so that the oppressed peoples of the world could throw off the colonial masters? Professor Bruce Gilley was on the Uncancelled History podcast and he referred to this exporting of Western Marxism as the true imperialism. What role does the Third Worldism outlook play in many people, particularly Blacks, in viewing the Jews as nothing more than the new imperialists (whether in the Middle East or the management of so many global businesses)? Maybe I am drawing too many connections here but there seems to be something there. Anyway, thank you for a great series! I needed a bit of a break after reading Stalin’s War and currently reading my 6th book on the Rwandan genocide.
Curtis Yarvin talks about a divide between German and Yiddish speaking Jews in NYC. Did you notice this dynamic come into play when you were researching school integration there?
I feel like DC gets a little bit too charitable in these articles about the violence and depravity that was unleashed on the white working class by abolishing de facto urban segregation in the North. This was a deliberate policy inflicted on people without any regard for the fallout it caused. The government-enforced integration of cities from the 50s-70s caused incalculable harm- physically, as in the many victims of the now-unleashed criminal black youth element- see Left Behind in Rosedale if you have a strong stomach. But the financial damage, from loss in property value (most Americans' largest asset), police budgets, building new suburbs, costs to jail criminals, the lost time to commutes and car buying, the gutting of city tax revenues, urban decay, etc may never fully be calculated. Look at Detroit today versus Hiroshima today. The ruling class since 1945 has been absolutely arrogant and cruel, and they don't give a damn about who suffers for their utopian projects.
This series absolutely clinches your status as my very favourite podcaster.
My question is:
How is it that you are drawn to the most controversial topics that exist?
(I wonder if you are a Type 9 on the Enneagram... that's not part of the question, feel free to ignore)
This is a heavy burden you have taken on.
My second question:
Are you feeling the weight of these issues and the controversial opinions that they stir up in others or do you thrive on this kind of work? Peterson has spoken about the burden these sorts of controversies have had in his psyche.
I was in 9th grade when JFK was assassinated (1963) so my high school and college years coincided with the events described in this series. As I read I visualized and recalled so much about where I was and what I was doing when these events took place. Its created a unique opportunity to relive the 60's -70's and remember people, music and events from the times. It was glorious. Thank you.
I am a 60 year old Jew, from New York and then New Jersey. I grew up around very few Protestants. Most of the Christians in my school and neighborhood were Roman Catholic or Greek Orthodox. I’ve lived in Florida, California and Massachusetts over the past 25 years, where I’ve met many more Protestants than from New Jersey. I found there was a fair amount of Anti-semitism growing up. Nothing really problematic, more annoying than anything. I have been fascinated, however, as I’ve grown older, and been around more Protestants, that the attitude toward Jews and Israel, in particular, is far more accepting. My question is, has there been a change with more evangelical influence, or is it just my environments have changed?
In one of the earlier essays you mentioned the blacks being offended that the Jews would challenge them for status for most prolific victim. It seems that in the 50 years since then, that feeling has only increased, from all sides, to the point where one’s elevated status in the modern world is contingent on the depth of one’s victimhood. From your perspective as the researcher, what has to happen or change, both in individual cultures and society as a whole, for this morality of victimhood to be changed or done away with?
I am curious to know if you believe as I do that some groups, if we are going to assign a label let’s say the alt right or “white Nationalist’’ which I’m not sure what that means because I’m white and a nationalist. That some of these groups are amplifying tensions between the blacks and Jews by asserting the Jews were the financiers of slavery and owned the slave ships. I would like to know if this is in fact true and to what degree were they involved.
One of the threads I detected throughout the story had to do with “whiteness” in America, what it means, and who gets to decide who is white and who isn’t. After the first rounds of immigration to NY that you described, it seemed like the existing white majority got to decide who was white - not the Irish, not the Italians, not the Jews. Gradually these groups were incorporated into “whiteness,” or at least the Irish and the Italians were.
For Jews there was more ambivalence. But that eventually ended only when *the Blacks* decided that Jews were white. I was particularly struck by how this played out in your description of the early Civil Rights movement - the Jews were participating in it *as Jews*, until Blacks began to view and resent them as *whites* and kicked them out.
None of which turns at all on how *Jews* think of themselves - it is all just imposed on Jews from the outside by larger groups of people who exercise coercive power over them. In this case, the power is exercised to define Jews in ways that suit the definers, instead of according to how Jews choose to define themselves.
All of which gets really interesting when translated over to the Crown Heights pogrom, which pitted Blacks against the chassidim. A mainstream, assimilated, mostly secular Jewish person in the US may be “white,” as far as it goes. It seems a real strain to try to cram people like the chassidim into the frame of American “whiteness.” These are people who don’t speak English, only immigrated to America in the ‘30s and ‘40s, follow a basically incomprehensible religion, dress and behave in alien ways, and have less than zero cultural, financial, or political clout outside of their tiny enclaves in Brooklyn.
And yet, the Blacks of Crown Heights vented their anger at all white people generally, and against Jews specifically, on the chassidim, and the mainstream narrative seems to accept that the Crown Heights pogrom was “anti-White” more than “anti-Jewish.”
There’s a question in here.
If even the chassidim, of all people, are “white people,” regardless of how they view themselves, what does that term even mean anymore? Who falls within its limits and who gets to decide?
Thanks for the series Darryl, great stuff as always!
Do you think the positions / roles that Jewish people tend to gravitate towards within any society (landlord, merchant, banker, etc) lead to the resentment from other cultural subgroups? It seems that the Jewish people tend to end up in the scapegoat position regardless of which society there in.
What do you make of the Kyrie Irving situation back when you started this thing? Used to watch NBA intensely before pandemic/radicalization in 2020 and cut entirely. But I did notice a lot of white liberals calling for the players to denounce him, but it feels like that never happened at all... LeBron - their God - said he wanted him on his own team, basically, a far cry from any condemnation. What does that tell you?
Hello, Mr. Cooper.
I very much appreciate your efforts at compiling a vast array of different viewpoints and sources on this topic for someone as lazy as I to pour over. The history of strife between different groups in America continues to fascinate me. Ethnic politics is a relatively novel concept over here in Sweden. The Nordic countries have traditionally been relatively homogenous, but recent decades have seen an influx of immigrants - from the Balkans in the 90's to the 2015 refugee crisis. To be clear, I do not oppose this. Many of my closest friends are first-or second generation immigrants from the areas mentioned above, all of whom are extremely well adjusted. However, we are also dealing with integration problems reminiscent of those America has faced pertaining to urban decay and increasing segregation of society. The language barrier in particular is a difficult obstacle to overcome, as community leaders in these areas have been revealed to say one thing to the Swedish government and an entirely different thing to the newly arrived. This is, of course, a topic that has very easily utilized as a political battering ram by the more... dubious parts of the political right, even in America. My country is however no hellscape, and I am not worried about a growing minority of muslim immigrants subverting our government and establishing a Scandinavian caliphate or something. My concern is rather that this problem becomes a fixture in Swedish society, much like it has become in America. I understand that your focus is on American politics (as has been made abundantly clear by your coverage of the Russo-Ukrainian war), but what do you think small European countries should do to avoid the pitfalls that the US has struggled with in regards to, as Dr. King would have put it; "making the crooked places straight"?
On a completely unrelated note: when tf you getting back to the Aztecs? I've been waiting an E T E R N I T Y .
What books are you working from about upper class wasps using blacks as a battering ram to break up neighborhoods. Very curious about this due to family connections in places like Detroit and Philadelphia
I like Darryl’s audio.
I am old enough (barely) to remember how terrible the late 70’s were for the larger cities in the US. Darryl mentions (in God’s Socialist) how the commentators of the 1977 World Series openly comment on the fact that the Bronx is on fire again. I actually have a memory of that since my father and I were watching the game (I was 7). Therefore, I also remember the violence of the 80’s as a teenager. Luckily for me, I grew up in rural SC and watched from afar as cities destroyed themselves. And, being a teenager, had no idea what underpinned all this violence and degradation. All this context leads me to ask DC this question(s): what books have you read that try to explain the link between the collapse of the civil rights movements of the late 60’s into chaos and the ensuing violence and institutional collapse (at least in the cities) of the 1970’s? Second, you mention the Third Worldism ideology and the effect it had on the relationship between Blacks and Jews. Do you consider Third Worldism to be connected to or the same as the exporting of Marxism from Western intellectuals to the former European colonies so that the oppressed peoples of the world could throw off the colonial masters? Professor Bruce Gilley was on the Uncancelled History podcast and he referred to this exporting of Western Marxism as the true imperialism. What role does the Third Worldism outlook play in many people, particularly Blacks, in viewing the Jews as nothing more than the new imperialists (whether in the Middle East or the management of so many global businesses)? Maybe I am drawing too many connections here but there seems to be something there. Anyway, thank you for a great series! I needed a bit of a break after reading Stalin’s War and currently reading my 6th book on the Rwandan genocide.
Curtis Yarvin talks about a divide between German and Yiddish speaking Jews in NYC. Did you notice this dynamic come into play when you were researching school integration there?
Any backlash, yet?
I feel like DC gets a little bit too charitable in these articles about the violence and depravity that was unleashed on the white working class by abolishing de facto urban segregation in the North. This was a deliberate policy inflicted on people without any regard for the fallout it caused. The government-enforced integration of cities from the 50s-70s caused incalculable harm- physically, as in the many victims of the now-unleashed criminal black youth element- see Left Behind in Rosedale if you have a strong stomach. But the financial damage, from loss in property value (most Americans' largest asset), police budgets, building new suburbs, costs to jail criminals, the lost time to commutes and car buying, the gutting of city tax revenues, urban decay, etc may never fully be calculated. Look at Detroit today versus Hiroshima today. The ruling class since 1945 has been absolutely arrogant and cruel, and they don't give a damn about who suffers for their utopian projects.
Hi Darryl,
This series absolutely clinches your status as my very favourite podcaster.
My question is:
How is it that you are drawn to the most controversial topics that exist?
(I wonder if you are a Type 9 on the Enneagram... that's not part of the question, feel free to ignore)
This is a heavy burden you have taken on.
My second question:
Are you feeling the weight of these issues and the controversial opinions that they stir up in others or do you thrive on this kind of work? Peterson has spoken about the burden these sorts of controversies have had in his psyche.
I much appreciate your work, my friend
Stay well!
I was in 9th grade when JFK was assassinated (1963) so my high school and college years coincided with the events described in this series. As I read I visualized and recalled so much about where I was and what I was doing when these events took place. Its created a unique opportunity to relive the 60's -70's and remember people, music and events from the times. It was glorious. Thank you.
I am a 60 year old Jew, from New York and then New Jersey. I grew up around very few Protestants. Most of the Christians in my school and neighborhood were Roman Catholic or Greek Orthodox. I’ve lived in Florida, California and Massachusetts over the past 25 years, where I’ve met many more Protestants than from New Jersey. I found there was a fair amount of Anti-semitism growing up. Nothing really problematic, more annoying than anything. I have been fascinated, however, as I’ve grown older, and been around more Protestants, that the attitude toward Jews and Israel, in particular, is far more accepting. My question is, has there been a change with more evangelical influence, or is it just my environments have changed?
In one of the earlier essays you mentioned the blacks being offended that the Jews would challenge them for status for most prolific victim. It seems that in the 50 years since then, that feeling has only increased, from all sides, to the point where one’s elevated status in the modern world is contingent on the depth of one’s victimhood. From your perspective as the researcher, what has to happen or change, both in individual cultures and society as a whole, for this morality of victimhood to be changed or done away with?
I am curious to know if you believe as I do that some groups, if we are going to assign a label let’s say the alt right or “white Nationalist’’ which I’m not sure what that means because I’m white and a nationalist. That some of these groups are amplifying tensions between the blacks and Jews by asserting the Jews were the financiers of slavery and owned the slave ships. I would like to know if this is in fact true and to what degree were they involved.
Darryl, what are you personal take aways from studying for this series? How, if any, has your worldview changed?
One of the threads I detected throughout the story had to do with “whiteness” in America, what it means, and who gets to decide who is white and who isn’t. After the first rounds of immigration to NY that you described, it seemed like the existing white majority got to decide who was white - not the Irish, not the Italians, not the Jews. Gradually these groups were incorporated into “whiteness,” or at least the Irish and the Italians were.
For Jews there was more ambivalence. But that eventually ended only when *the Blacks* decided that Jews were white. I was particularly struck by how this played out in your description of the early Civil Rights movement - the Jews were participating in it *as Jews*, until Blacks began to view and resent them as *whites* and kicked them out.
None of which turns at all on how *Jews* think of themselves - it is all just imposed on Jews from the outside by larger groups of people who exercise coercive power over them. In this case, the power is exercised to define Jews in ways that suit the definers, instead of according to how Jews choose to define themselves.
All of which gets really interesting when translated over to the Crown Heights pogrom, which pitted Blacks against the chassidim. A mainstream, assimilated, mostly secular Jewish person in the US may be “white,” as far as it goes. It seems a real strain to try to cram people like the chassidim into the frame of American “whiteness.” These are people who don’t speak English, only immigrated to America in the ‘30s and ‘40s, follow a basically incomprehensible religion, dress and behave in alien ways, and have less than zero cultural, financial, or political clout outside of their tiny enclaves in Brooklyn.
And yet, the Blacks of Crown Heights vented their anger at all white people generally, and against Jews specifically, on the chassidim, and the mainstream narrative seems to accept that the Crown Heights pogrom was “anti-White” more than “anti-Jewish.”
There’s a question in here.
If even the chassidim, of all people, are “white people,” regardless of how they view themselves, what does that term even mean anymore? Who falls within its limits and who gets to decide?
Thanks for the series Darryl, great stuff as always!
Do you think the positions / roles that Jewish people tend to gravitate towards within any society (landlord, merchant, banker, etc) lead to the resentment from other cultural subgroups? It seems that the Jewish people tend to end up in the scapegoat position regardless of which society there in.
What do you make of the Kyrie Irving situation back when you started this thing? Used to watch NBA intensely before pandemic/radicalization in 2020 and cut entirely. But I did notice a lot of white liberals calling for the players to denounce him, but it feels like that never happened at all... LeBron - their God - said he wanted him on his own team, basically, a far cry from any condemnation. What does that tell you?