A controversy about nothingAs the blog that strives to be the official home of Gregg sycophantism on the internet, it's only right that I comment on the Easterbrook antisemitism brouhaha that has run rampant through bloggerland today. I agree entirely with Ryan Booth. This issue has been frightfully overblown. Gregg Easterbrook, who criticized Spider-Man as being too violent in one of his Tuesday Morning Quarterback columns, was simply trying state that Jewish executives might have more incentive than your average money grabbing film studio to lessen the World's desensitizing to the disgusting acts of violence which Kill Bill is full of. What does Jewishness have to do with this (asks Hei Lun)? Gregg says that recent European history as well as the daily events of the Middle East may make Jews extra-attentive to humanities sensitivity to gross violence. While this might border on blaming the victim ("she really shouldn't have worn that dress if she didn't want to get laid") it isn't exactly untrue. Jews might be a lot better off in the Middle East if the rest of the neighborhood weren't so inclined to violence. But that brings us back to the real point of Gregg's blog entry (aside from the major Tarantino rant), his belief that excessive violence in movies does real harm to audiences. I definitely don't agree with his premise, but it's not anti-semitic to believe Israel might be safer if people weren't so violent... but that is exactly why this has become an Uncle Leo moment. UPDATE - Jessica Harbour adds: "Frankly, [Gregg's blog entry] didn't set off my anti-Semitic detector at all. In Christianity Today, maybe; in the context of the New Republic, which is constantly discussing the role and responsibilities of post-Holocaust Jews, it didn't. Easterbrook has been arguing for years that the violence in mainstream Hollywood films promotes violence in those who watch it; it seems to me that he somewhat clumsily refocused his argument to bring the question of post-Holocaust Judaism and morality in." |
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