The Kanye Precedent

It’s been the perfect storm of spiraling hate. A celebrity rapper making raw, anti-Semitic verbal attacks for more than two weeks. Tapping into every age-old trope about Jewish power, control, and greed, Kanye (Ye) West has creatively intertwined Louis Farrakhan with the Elders of Zion. And he’s not done.

Sure, there’s never been a shortage of celebrity anti-Semites, from Coco Chanel to Mel Gibson. And sadly, much of what Kanye has said is fairly mainstream in the rap industry. Jay-Z, Ice Cube, and Snoop Dogg have all said similar things.

But this was an unstoppable barrage of hate. And he’s been going after his own managers.

What it all led to was unprecedented: brands and celebrities began responding to him as though anti-Semitism was a form of racism. Which of course it is, but Jews have never had the luxury of an equitable, social justicey response to hate.

Until now.

First, French fashion house Balenciaga cut ties. Then his talent agency, Creative Artists Agency, announced that they are no longer representing him. Then MRC studio executives announced that they would not proceed with the distribution of their recently completed documentary about him, with a scorching statement: “Kanye is a producer and sampler of music. Last week he sampled and remixed a classic tune that has charted for over 3,000 years—the lie that Jews are evil and conspire to control the world for their own gain.”

Then Adidas, GAP, Universal Music—the list is now quite long. And the response has been across the political spectrum.

Not extremists on either end of course. Congresswomen Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib have yet to comment on the Kanye affair, and the Goyim Defense League made it well known that white supremacists agree with the black rapper with a “Kanye is right about the Jews” banner on the Los Angeles freeway. To emphasize the point, a bunch of supremacists offered the drivers below a Nazi salute.

But Kanye managed to bring together moderates on both sides—quite a feat.

Indeed, the response is setting a historical precedent: this is how companies and celebrities should respond to every anti-Semite with power and influence, just as they would to every racist.

Not surprisingly, Kanye, Candace Owens, and others have tried to spin the backlash as confirmation of their beliefs: See, those Jews *do* in fact have space laser-type power to control the media, political, and financial worlds. As Yair Rosenberg put it: “Anti-Jewish bigotry is a self-sustaining cycle. The anti-Semite claims that Jews control everything. Then, if they are penalized for their bigotry, they point to that as proof.”

But even the counter-backlash has been limited. So far, we don’t see much evidence of it beyond Kanye’s and Candace’s fans, but that’s not to say that even that won’t lead to violence.

The interesting question: Could the Kanye Precedent have a further-reaching positive effect? Could it begin to dilute the now well-entrenched anti-Zionism on campuses or the anti-Semitic-laden ethnic studies curriculum? Could talk about “Jewish privilege” in any context now be met with, at the very least, silence?

Will the Democratic Party finally begin to treat Omar and Tlaib as the racist bigots that they are? Will both parties now begin to call out any politician for anti-Semitism just as they would for racism? Will both parties begin to attack the extremism within their own parties just as they attack the extremism in the other party? Will the partisan media follow suit?

One can hope. What’s clear: it’s now going to be fair game to Kanye whoever deserves it.

This is not “cancelling.” Cancel culture blossomed from leftist dogma: the idea that you can’t say anything that doesn’t follow the leftist orthodoxy. But hate speech is not a difference of opinion. Hate speech inexorably leads to violence, as both Jews and blacks know all too well. Hate speech may indeed be “protected” by the First Amendment—but that doesn’t mean it’s ok.

I do want to personally thank Kanye for one other thing. He called British TV host Piers Morgan a “Karen” for arguing with him. And with that, Kanye used his power and influence to turn my much maligned name—which in Hebrew means “glorious dignity”—into a compliment. Kanye: I owe you.

Karen Lehrman Bloch is editor in chief of White Rose Magazine.