UPDATE: 25/6/13 - Google cache as well as UnderCover Kitt's blog are now gone for the time being., so links below this update may not work. However, to get an idea of the despicable people behind and involved with OCAP, you can see these posts HERE,HERE,HEREHERE, and HERE
UPDATE: 25/6/13 5:15 pm Good news, everyone!GenuineWitty has archived Undercover Kitty's posts, so you can view the OCAP expose. Here is PART 1PART 2 and PART 3
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OCAP and John Clarke are affiliated with an number of groups including the New Socialists who John Clarke described as OCAP’s “Sein Feinn”, plus the Communist Party of Canada, No One Is Illegal Toronto and other groups such as the Federation of Metro Tenants Associations.
More of Part 1 HERE (UPDATE: UndercoverKitty's blog was taken down by Wordpress under mysterious circumstances. The link to the cached version of Part 1 is HERE)
John Ronald Clarke, who likes the humble title of OCAP organiser, but is their defacto leader and owner. Born May 16, 1954. (Some reports claim he was born on May 26) John emigrated to Canada from England as a sponsored immigrant by his sister. He worked from 1976 to 1982 at the London Westinghouse Plant (Ontario)when he was laid off. His labor union which he was quite active in, hated him would not support him. He subsequently formed the Union of Unemployed Workers and in 1989 created the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty. John Clarke was a worker factory, laid off in 1982. After losing his job, he helped form a union of the unemployed. In 1990, this organization helped out in the campaign that led to the formation of OCAP. In the autumn of 1990, the founding conference of OCAP took place. After some debate, it set a course for the organization that committed it to mobilizing poor and homeless people to fight back through militant, direct action
Part 2 is HERE (UPDATE: UndercoverKitty's blog was taken down by Wordpress under mysterious circumstances. The link to the cached version of Part 2 is HERE)
As is now well-known, Ezra Levant apologized for his anti-Gypsy rant last Monday, both on-air during his Sun TV show The Source, and in print in Sun News publications.
Though they failed in their efforts to abort it before it debuted, and detesting it as they do, Canada's political left still keeps a keen eye on the Sun News Network and in particular, it's most flamboyant personality, Ezra Levant.
Levant's ability to combine rhetorical dexterity with showmanship has, on practically a weekly basis, forced attention to a variety of issues that have embarrassed Canada's left-leaning political cliques. Those include included the waste and corruption and deception by many of the leaders of the Idle No More movement, which Labor leaders and NDP and Liberal politicians had hoped to exploit as means of embarrassing Stephen Harper and his Conservative government.
Levant also ridiculed, belittled and exposed the hypocrisy of left-wing sacred cows David Suzuki and the Occupy Movement among many others.
So it was with virtual glee that the Toronto Star's editorial board and the likes of far-left media outlets such as rabble.ca and The Vancouver Observer seized on a monologue by Sun TV's Ezra Levant in which he injudiciously and unfairly characterized Gypsies as a people with a primarily criminal culture. Delighted in their outrage, immediately came calls from the left for his prosecution for Hate Crimes.
Levant's motives for apologizing, six months after-the-fact were questioned by both his detractors on the left and supporters on the right. Sun News' application for a CRTC Common Carry license and the possibility that Hate Speech charges would be pursed by Ontario's Attorney General were among the speculative reasons.
But regardless of why, Levant's words were well-crafted, sounded sincere, and explicitly retracted his earlier statements about Gypsies.
Yet desperate to silence Canadian TV's Grand Inquisitor of left-wing hypocrisy and deceit, calls for his criminal prosecution have not abated despite Levant's apology last Monday.
Which in a way, proves many of the points Levant makes when he preaches his gospel of absolute free speech and thunders about the hypocrisy and double standards of a Canadian left who would have others live by rules that they hold themselves above.
In November 2010 the National Post and later other media outlets did extensive coverage on an anti-Semitic thesis produced at the University of Toronto's Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE). The Department of Sociology and Equity Studies produced a number of theses with anti-Semitic themes, the most well-publicized of which was by a Jenny Peto wherein she accused the Jewish community of conducting Holocaust education to further the aims of "Israeli apartheid." She also, in contradiction to any credible empirical evidence, defamed the Jewish community by claiming it was dominated by "racist" ideologies.
The thesis was condemned for its anti-Semitism in the Ontario Legislature by members of both the Progressive Conservative and governing Liberal parties, including then Citizenship Minister Eric Hoskins.
Unlike Levant, who apologized for slurring an entire people, Peto doubled down, making the claim that it was she who was owed an apology after her anti-Semitic, academically inept polemic was brought to light.
Peto was roundly and vociferously condemned by conservative and pro-Israel commentators, and there were calls for an investigation into the teaching practices and deficient standards at the radical, biased, politicized Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. University of British Columbia Professor Emeritus of Sociology Werner Cohn noted that Peto's and another anti-Semitic thesis which shared OISE instructor Sheryl Nestel as a thesis adviser "consist of hate propaganda, possibly in violation of the Criminal Code of Canada," but no one among those so called "right-wing" voices actually called for criminal prosecution or Human Rights Commission proceedings against them.
And what about the left side of the political spectrum? One would expect those people who are so enthusiastic about the use of state apparatuses to penalize Hate Speech would have wanted them used in such a blatant case of Jew-hate.
But this was not so in the case of Peto and OISE. Hate Speech in the service of "progressive" causes, like the destruction of Israel and defaming Canada's Christian conservatives, is not only tolerated but vigorously, if somewhat preposterously defended by the far left.
For the hypocritical would be-censors on the left, Hate Speech is only Hate Speech when it is uttered by conservatives and those they disdain.
The Toronto Star's Haroon Siddiqui produced a diatribe about Stephen Harper's alleged "inconsistencies on hate laws." There are a number of valid reasons why those laws should not be employed against Levant. But if Siddiqui and his fellow travelers are genuinely concerned about inconsistencies in the application of unjust laws that seek to censor opinion, they would best look to their own hypocrisy first.
"Queer against Israeli Apartheid"
Gay-murdering Hamas doesn't bother them
Mocked, derided and self-discrediting, it's no surprise that the so-called Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) hate-fest is drawing almost no attention, even on campuses throughout Canada this year.
Even most of the usual cast of Munchhausen Jews, those who are only Jews for the purpose of demonizing Israel and getting attention for themselves among the far-left - in those cases where they are not fake Jews - seem to have lost heart at the prospect of being ridiculed again.
Of course the hard core are still there, but the depths the hate-fest organizers have had to plummet to in order to find "headliners" show how low they have sunk.
In Toronto, the flagship city of the assembly of IAW imbeciles, its premier event, (naturally taking place at OISE) has trotted out tired tedious hatemongers like the 3rd-rate hack filmmaker and York University instructor John Greyson. I was an executive at a major Hollywood production company, and if I'd ever suggested Greyson as a director for a project, I would have been laughed out of the room (or would have been in the unlikely case that anyone there had actually heard of him.)
Joining him is some nobody named Trish Salah and the notorious embarrassment Jenny Peto, whose facile, anti-Semitic Master's thesis single-handedly called the University of Toronto's academic standards into disrepute.
The slow-minded trio will be appearing in a program, named by people too stupid to recognize its unintentional irony, called Coming Out Against Apartheid: Queer Solidarity Activism. There they will be heaping scorn on the only Gay-positive country in the middle east, while metaphorically getting on their knees and sucking and swallowing the murderous homophobia of the Islamic enemies Israel is fighting.
Clarifying the real purpose of the hate-fest, Canada's Citizenship and Immigration Minister, Jason Kenney, has just issued the following statement:
“Everyone in this country has the right to freely and publicly express their views. That being said, I share the concerns of other Canadians about the reckless and overheated rhetoric associated with anti-Israel activities on many Canadian university campuses, and the toxic manner in which these activities are often carried out.
“There is no better example than the so-called ‘Israel Apartheid Week’ (IAW). Its organizers and participants have a regrettable history of promoting and holding events in ways that disregard the security and rights of Jewish faculty and students, censor other points of view, and limit academic discourse.
“The disproportionate vitriol directed against the democratic State of Israel during ‘Israel Apartheid Week’ stands in stark and ironic contrast to the silence of IAW organizers on the ongoing atrocities committed by the Syrian regime against its own citizens, and on the rampant brutalities and denial of rights in non-democratic countries in the Middle East, and elsewhere in the world.
“In free societies such as Canada’s and Israel’s, it is absolutely legitimate to debate and criticize government policies and practices. Indeed, Israel supports the right of free expression more than any other country in its part of the world. But with the freedom to criticize comes the responsibility to guard against hateful and intolerant rhetoric.
“Operating under the guise of academic freedom, Israel Apartheid Week is a misleading attempt to delegitimize and demonize the only true liberal democracy in the Middle East. IAW’s organizers choose to promote inflammatory propaganda over civil and enlightening debate. Their approach is at odds with the Canadian values of tolerance and mutual respect, and prevents meaningful dialogue from taking place.
“As Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism, I encourage Canadians to speak out against all forms of discrimination, intolerance and anti-Semitism.”
Histrionic fury was the union response to Bill C-377, the Private Member's Bill calling for transparency in Union spending in Canada. Unions are exempt from taxes and despite the spurious claims of union bosses, very few of the rank-and-file membership are ever told how much and on what their dues money is spent.
More often than not, it's not through the unions but the media that Public Service union members learn of the bizarrely radical causes upon which union bosses bestow money culled from workers' compulsory dues payments.
As a former public service union member, I was never told how my dues money was spent and had I known then what I know now, I would have been outraged.
Delegations to Cuba and Venezuela to support the kind of socialism enforced by dictators like Castro and Chavez and envisioned by the union bosses, money to aid radical groups enabling Palestinian terrorists, and funding for fanatical domestic groups that engage in political violence and intimidation are all funded by Canadian Public Service unions.
It's hardly a surprise that unions and their subservient political party, the NDP, fought tooth-and-nail against legislation that would let the average union member see how their money was being misappropriated.
The relationship between the unions, the NDP and violent radicals is easy to trace.
The Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE), the largest public sector union, is one of the principle funders of the violent anti-Capitalist group, the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP).
On the CUPE website, a joint press release between the union and that violent organization that actively promotes "class warfare" makes increased cooperation between the groups clear. The statement quotes OCAP's hysterical, foul-mouthed spokesperson Liisa Schofield who, as it happens, is intimately involved with the notorious author of an anti-Jewish thesis. Schofield is the same-sex partner of Jenny Peto, whose Masters Thesis for the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education was condemned in the Ontario Legislature for its anti-Semitism.
The fanatical anti-Israel activist Peto is also one of the founders of a group devoted to opposing efforts by Toronto mayor Rob Ford to rein in the city's out-of-control spending.
The relationship between these radical groups, all of which have ties to the New Democratic Party, is being extolled by that political party's think-tank, The Broadbent Institute.
He wrote for the Broadbent Institute that the cooperation between CUPE and OCAP "has been a genuine example of a community-labour alliance that transcends conventional collective bargaining. By creating an authentic and activist solidarity between poor people and trade unionists it offers a refreshing alternative to business style unionism."
What that would seem to indicate is that The New Democratic Party wants to play a stronger role in an emerging type of hateful activism. That activism seeks to set classes against each other, to destroy a Jewish homeland in the middle east, to encourage the decline of western liberal democracies, and to eliminate the average person's rights to economic self-determination in favor of authoritarian state-control.
If these hateful fanatics get their wish, it may be good for predatory public union bosses, for radical activists salivating for violent revolution, and for the New Democratic Party, but it would most certainly be bad for everyone else.
UPDATE: In related news, Toronto's CUPE workers are sitting around watching porn on the public dime and committing other forms of fraud that are draining public resources
I was walking through the crowd at last night’s anti Jewish National Fund rally (as an observer) quietly filming the crowd when I heard someone behind me make claims that I’m a racist, sexist homophobe. My first reaction was to think “oh yeah, I’m at an old-left rally- it was bound to happen. This is what they do when they disagree with someone- start throwing around unfounded hate. Using anti-oppression as a weapon is the old-left’s ultimate form of oppression…
She then looked at me and accused me of being homophobic. Unfortunately for her, she made a big mistake.
Greg refers to me in his post as a conservative - I tend to think of myself as a centrist with libertarian leanings and I`m pretty liberal about certain things, but why split hairs.. (RK)
As dusk darkened the skies and the streetlights began to replace the sunshine, an unsavory group of about eighty hysterics gathered beside the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation's headquarters on Front Street in Toronto to screech at and harass the benefactors of a Jewish charity.
As fashionable women in evening gowns and their dapper escorts filed into the Toronto Convention Centre for the Jewish National Fund's Negev Dinner, the contrast with the slatternly assemblage across the street could not be more stark.
This poor, exploited person is a regular sight
at protests featuring the Socialist Action group
"Two, four, six eight, Israel is a racist state!" along with screams of "you are a racist!" greeted the confused patrons of an organization that funds environmental projects in Israel.
Angry Muslims in checkered keffeyehs made up most of the spiteful horde of demonstrators, along with a few stocky lesbians, and some wrinkled crones from the group of bizarre, Jewish anti-Israel 9-11 conspiracy theorists that calls itself Independent Jewish Voices (IJV). For just a bit of extra weirdness, they had support from a handful of the wretched psychiatric hospital outpatients who make up the anti-capitalist group Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP).
Just a few days earlier, the same motley collection of anti-Israel extremists had gathered outside the Israeli Consul General's office, but tonight's demonstration made their motives abundantly clear. In Toronto, the anti-Israel crowd isn't just interested in hating Israel, they are equally motivated by hate for Jews.
How else to explain why they would try to demonize as "apartheid" the least racist state in the Middle East, the only one in that region where all citizens regardless of race and religion are able to vote, participate in government, and live side-by-side? How else to explain that they advocate for Palestinian national self-determination, and have no problem with that of any other group except the Jews, the only group whose national aspirations they characterize as "racist?"
That would happen when Hamas stops bombing Israeli civilians
FROM Gaza
Most revealing of all about their hatred and bigotry is that they no longer chose politically relevant locations, like Israeli government offices, but have now moved on to target ordinary Canadian Jews who support planting trees in the Holy Land.
While the Muslim hatred of Israel and Jews is obvious, some interesting aspects of the rationale for the non-Muslim cranks came to light. In the case of the lesbians, these types of demonstrations' apparent primary purpose is to provide a social channel for them. There are many attractive, charming, engaging lesbians. The ones in the anti-Israel groups are not they. These are tremendously ugly, unpleasant women, and given that lesbians comprise a small minority of the population, there are few venues for these bottom-rung lesbians to socialize with others like them. Radical organizations that condemn "lookism" and engage in anti-western, anti-Israel activities are among the few such opportunities they have.
Hate Thesis author with OCAP types
Among the lesbians at tonight's demonstration was the notorious Jenny Peto, whose anti-Semitic Master's thesis was so inept, shrill and hateful, it embarrassed the University of Toronto to the point of calling their academic standards into question. Her presence and that of the psychologically damaged IJV members showed the familiar and saddening tactic of how some pathetic, desperate Jews are exploited as a front for anti-Semitism. Another was a very odd woman; a Canadian Union of Public Employees activist who is a stalwart of these events, and previously had stalked Sun TV host Michael Coren as he asked questions at a pro-Omar Khadr demonstration.
Other participants who are fixtures at these events were the fanatic, frumpy Wilfred Laurier Sociology Assistant Professor, Mary Jo Nadeau and clownish OCAP spokesman Marque Brill.
One atypical happening that occurred during the evening was that a lone, short young man came into the crowd to angrily confront them. He did not seem to have anything to do with the Jewish National Fund event being harassed, but was clearly enraged and came over to speak his piece. He was immediately surrounded by the radicals who got into his face and exchanged shoves with him before he was ejected from the area by police.
This single supporter of Israel was so infuriated he made some heated remarks, but still one has to admire the courage of this solitary soul who took on the hostile group like a young Jewish Joe Peschi.
As fury rages across the street, these cops sensibly
flirt with a pair of attractive women who found the
protesters laughable
What is gratifying about the events that unfolded tonight was to observe how counterproductive it was for the message the fanatics were trying to convey. This is a completely typical byproduct of such hateful gatherings. Standing on the street, passersby who had nothing to do with the gathering first voiced confusion as to what it was all about. Arabic-accented chants of "From Turtle Island to Palestine, occupation is a crime!" did nothing to help clarify the cause of their fury.
Hate-filled screams from the neurotic, angry old women of Independent Jewish Voices, the ferocious, butch lesbians who are denizens of politicized Ontario Institute for Studies in Education programs and swarthy, veiled and keffiyeh covered Muslims who looked like they had been brought in by Central Casting to try out for a movie as terrorist extras didn't endear them to the general public. "F**king idiots" was a fairly typical response and this was from people who cared nothing about either side in the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
The cretinous look of the protesters and their vicious invective was enough to self-inflict damage to their cause. One other episode worth noting happened when a spiteful-looking woman, about 60, wrinkled face and wearing jeans and an anorak - a regular I recognized from these protests - one of The Independent Jewish Voices type, came over to the side of the street where the Convention Centre stands. Through the floor-to-ceiling windows, one could see the people headed to the Negev dinner filing on to an escalator. There were some very beautiful women among them and everyone attending the JNF dinner was dressed rather elegantly.
This bitter woman from the protest group walked back and forth a bit, silently watching the people going to a pleasant evening with delicious food. Her loathing and envy were palpable as she saw the hated Zionists having a fine time while she was left on the outside. What probably hurt her the most as she rejoined her cronies across the street was the realization that standing out there in the cold, all she and her cohorts were doing was reaffirming their own hate to each other while persuading no one else.
Near the onset of the protest, Greg of GenuineWitty encountered, for the first time ever he said, Jenny Peto, the author of an anti-Semitic thesis condemned in Ontario`s Legislature by Minister of Citizenship Eric Hoskins, among other politicians and notable academics, like Irving Abella and Werner Cohn.
In their encounter, she employs the same rigid logic she used in her fatuous essay
UPDATE: Greg of GenuiteWitty shot this video of the pro-Israel protester who confronted the pro-Hamas throng
The Toronto Stop the Cuts network, an anti-austerity, union front group co-founded by the author of a notorious anti-Semitic OISE thesis, is planning a last-ditch stand against Toronto`s upcoming budget vote on January 17.
Judging by the people committed to participating on the group`s facebook page, it looks like the protest will be a convention of the most undesirable characters Toronto has to offer.
In addition to Jenny Peto, you`ll be able to find James Clark, of the Iranian dictatorship advocacy group The Canadian Peace Alliance, May Lui, the hilarious OISE grad who said that a long wait-time at a hardware store made her a victim of sexual oppression, Jesse Zimmerman, the aggressive, hysterical fanatic that tried to accost best-selling author and journalist Michael Coren during and after a public speech, Sea Hitler stooge Lyn Adamson, Ryerson Prof Alan Sears, who hopes the anti-Israel movement is the gateway drug to the fall of international Capitalism, and a mish-mash of self-interested CUPE officials, OISE staff and depraved Marxist half-wits.
This fight against Ford is the vanguard of the coming battle of public service unions against taxpayers.
"The biggest myth about labor unions is that unions are for workers. Unions are for unions, just as corporations are for corporations and politicians are for politicians." -Thomas Sowell
Ford has kept his promise of not raising taxes beyond the rate of inflation (in fact he did better by not raising it at all in his first year in office). He put money back in taxpayers' pockets by eliminating the vehicle registration tax.
Taxes skyrocketed under Ford's predecessor David Miller and the amalgamation of the City of Toronto, which was supposed to streamline services and increase efficiency, saw the city's employment roll grow by 7000 people. That's where the tax increases have gone under Miller and that's what the unions are going all-out to preserve at the expense of the average citizen.
The unions are using every tactic they have at their disposal, including their financing of the incoherent Occupy Toronto protest that cost Toronto's taxpayers $714,000 according to the anti-Ford newspaper The Toronto Star.
They pour money extracted from union dues into the neo-Marxist propaganda outlet rabble.ca, where making an anti-union comment gets a person banned from their user forums.
They finance the violent, fanatical group OCAP (Ontario Coalition Against Poverty) that, like Occupy Toronto, exploits the homeless and mentally ill to advance their agenda, which they see as being the beginnings of "class warfare."
The unions and their proxies are trying to frame Toronto's budget battle as one of cuts to essential services. Make no mistake, they are concerned with reductions, but only to the overflowing union coffers, not to the quality of the lives of the average citizen whose taxes they want to spike higher.
That is the real, ugly face of the anti-Ford movement in Toronto. They act in service, not of fairness, but the advancement of an agenda that serves only themselves. In the world they strive for, public policy is not driven by democratic representatives that are elected by every citizen, but a politburo that will impose its will on the less enlightened masses whom they claim to represent despite its lack of consent.
The neo-Marxist, lunatic media outlet rabble.ca produced this poorly-made, hyperbolic 'class warfare' video hoping to mobilize the crazies against Ford:
Remember Jenny Peto, the author of an anti-Jewish thesis that alleged Holocaust education programs are part of an evil Zionist conspiracy and, without a shred of empirical evidence, claimed that mainstream Jews are racists?
Well that "scholar" was awarded an MA by the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education's vapid Sociology and Equity Studies in Education program for her bigoted screed. Her entire primary research consisted of visiting two websites. And speaking of websites, Ms Peto is the owner of the website that she hopes will take down Toronto mayor Rob Ford.
So where better to hold a seminar on how to do that then at her alma mater, the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education; and why is OISE hosting such an event you may ask?
I wouldn't be surprised, given the standards at that institution, that a undergraduate degree would be bestowed on anyone who attends until lunch time. I think there's an OISE credit course in successfully eating lunch (Lunch Equity Studies) . OISE is demonstrating less, if any, concern about education than it aspires to be the hub of neo-Marxist radicalism in Canada while enticing activist students with the promise of easy degrees.
Someone remind me why tax dollars are going into that poisonous hole?
The author of an anti-Semitic Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) thesis that claimed Holocaust education programs were part of a Zionist conspiracy to perpetuate Jewish victimhood has been exposed as a key individual behind the Toronto "Stop the Cuts" actions aimed at hampering Mayor Rob Ford's attempts to restore fiscal responsibility at City Hall.
Jenny Peto, whose Masters' Thesis for the discredited Sociology and Equity Studies in Education program at OISE alleged that the mainstream Jewish community "is dominated by racist...ideologies," was revealed by an anonymous reader of Eye on a Crazy Planet to be the registrant of http://www.torontostopthecuts.com/, the website that is the central information repository for the anti-Ford activists. Peto's thesis, titled, "The Victimhood of the Powerful: White Jews, Zionism and the Racism of Hegemonic Holocaust Education" was condemned in Ontario's Legislature by both the Minister for Citizenship and Opposition MPP's as being a "hateful and poorly researched...piece of garbage."
Understanding who is behind the radicals who want to prevent Ford from managing the city's fiscal crisis is instructive in unravelling some of their motives.
A number of vociferous anti-Israel and anti-Semitic organizations and individuals still harbour a grudge against Ford for his efforts to keep the group Queers Against Israeli Apartheid out of Toronto's Pride parade and his attempt to prevent anti-Semitic al Quds Day activities held by the Canadian Shia Muslim Organization (CASMO) from taking place on City property.
Until now the individuals organizing the anti-Ford actions remained mostly in the shadows, but the media contact number for Stop The Cuts is the same as that for the violent, union-financed activist group OCAP. One of OCAP's spokespeople is Liisa Schofield, whom anti-Semitic author Peto refers to in her thesis' acknowledgments as her "partner."
Regarding Ms. Peto's involvement in the anti-austerity campaign, Adrienne Batra, Rob Ford's Press Secretary, said on behalf of the Mayor's Office, "It's not surprising that someone who is clearly misinformed on so many issues would be participating in spreading this type of hysteria. The Ford administration is going through a thoughtful process on how to fix our City's finances, something that will, ironically, even help out those involved with this [torontostopthecuts.com] website."
A well-known ploy of Canadian radical organizations is to form a number of groups with different names but essentially the same memberships in order to create the false appearance that they have more support than their maniacal sectarian positions can muster. It's not unusual for them to have demonstrations where there are more groups "endorsing" the activity than actual attendees.
That ploy is at use again in Toronto's current radical advocacy to prevent needed fiscal restraint and cutbacks to special interests whose endowments are paid by tax dollars of average citizens who would be disgusted by their activities.
Enter the usual suspects, led by the odious Queers Against Israeli Apartheid. However, in this case, it is in a rare instance where they have not publicized their other affiliation, because they may finally have realized the disdain they invoke through it.
When the fanatical intellectual pygmies of Queers Against Israeli Apartheid were told by Toronto Mayor Rob Ford last spring that Toronto's Pride Festival funding was in danger if they participated, they grudgingly withdrew. The anti-Israel bigots attempted to couch their retreat from the largest Gay Pride festival in the world as a strategic challenge to the mayor, but fooled no one. Had Pride's funds been yanked because of them, Queers Against Israeli Apartheid knew they would be reviled in a community whose approbation they critically require. Unable to restrain themselves and keep their word, a pathetic display they mounted at the Dyke March under a different guise threatened to cause a re-examination of whether Pride would receive funds. Fortunately for Pride, it escaped that danger by an unshaven leg hair.
Yet as everyone knows, Hell hath no fury like an irrational, taste-challenged, non-gender normative, sexual minority scorned. Now that the radical left is trying to mount a challenge to the proposed round of cuts that the Mayor is examining to try to bring the city's huge deficit under control, the movement to try to vilify Rob Ford is being led by none other than the same mindless zealots who have sided with tyrannies against the middle east's only democracy. They appear to bear a burning grudge against the Mayor who stymied them.
Voters in the provincial riding of Davenport might be interested to learn that their NDP candidate Jonah Schien also is among those who signed on to the anti-Ford petition filled with Marxist-sounding claptrap that wants more of your tax funds to be diverted to paying for services to illegal aliens among a host of other fatuous proposals.
Idiots of the world, Unite! You
have nothing to lose but your dignity...
and that boat's already sailed anyway
Whether these characters are desperate for a cause to give meaning to their lives or desperate for attention, the hatemongers and stooges of QuAIA are a boon to their opponents by bringing instant discredit to any cause of which they are a part.
With the media ganging up on him, Rob Ford's popularity has taken a slight dip recently, but that's likely to turn around soon thanks to the coalition of buffoons shrilly trying to demonize him.
The Ontario Institute for Studies in Education is a wonderful centre for self-esteem. Its tax-supported programs are living proof that lack of intelligence need not be an impediment to getting an advanced university degree.
Fortunately for prospective employers, these degrees are offered in easily identifiable programs with fatuous-sounding names like Sociology and Equity Studies in Education. (SESE). That program achieved its greatest fame for having produced an anti-Semitic thesis in 2010, which broke ground for being the first student paper to be denounced by both the governing party and Opposition in the Ontario Legislature.
Now Sheryl Nestel, the same academic advisor to a pair of poorly researched, bigoted polemics that caused the controversy last year, has a new protege who has created a vapid anti-Israel screed to remind the public of the wasteful spending we throw into certain areas of academia.
In "The Appeal of Israel: Whiteness, Anti-Semitism, and the Roots of Diaspora Zionism in Canada," its author, Corey Balsam, who was awarded a Master's Degree on its basis, cites marginal academics and pseudo-academics such as Abigail Bakan, a board member of Mohamed Elmasry's anti-Semitic Canadian Charger website, anti-Israel fanatic Yves Engler, the deranged anti-Capitalist website Znet, and in his acknowledgments, thanks notorious 9-11 conspiracy theorist Diana Ralph.
Filled with anti-Semitic tone ("the elite British Jew Baron Walter Rothchild"), half-baked efforts at psychoanalysis ("In Freudian terms, the end of a Jewish state is perceived as akin to castration and therefore something to be resisted at all costs"), and obsessively focussed on circumcision and Jewish body types, Balsam's thesis is a reminder of Judy Rebick's admission that radical activists often are acting out from their own personal psychological and emotional problems. That was clearly the case of the two previous anti-Israel theses for SESE guided by Nestel, both of which had lengthy introductions in which the authors described their childhood traumas and how it led them to their present-day activism.
Another question that arises in the case of individuals like Mr. Balsam is, are they too stupid to understand the material they reference or are they intentionally deceitful about it? A case in point is his assertion that "Under the leadership of Vladimir (Ze'ev) Jabotinsky (1880-1940), the revisionist movement took a much more right-wing, even fascist, approach to the achievement of Zionist goals."
Balsam cites Jabotinsky's famous "Iron Wall" article as proof of Zionism's "fascist" approach. But what fascist would write (in the same article, but which Balsam omitted):
"this does not mean that there cannot be any agreement with the Palestine Arabs. What is impossible is a voluntary agreement. As long as the Arabs feel that there is the least hope of getting rid of us, they will refuse to give up this hope in return for either kind words or for bread and butter, because they are not a rabble, but a living people. And when a living people yields in matters of such a vital character it is only when there is no longer any hope of getting rid of us, because they can make no breach in the iron wall. Not till then will they drop their extremist leaders, whose watchword is "Never!" And the leadership will pass to the moderate groups, who will approach us with a proposal that we should both agree to mutual concessions. Then we may expect them to discuss honestly practical questions, such as a guarantee against Arab displacement, or equal rights for Arab citizen, or Arab national integrity. And when that happens,I am convinced that we Jews will be found ready to give them satisfactory guarantees, so that both peoples can live together in peace, like good neighbours."
The "Iron Wall" that Jabotinsky alludes to is an enforced creation of a democratic Jewish state, and as he says in the essay:
"What need, otherwise, of the Balfour Declaration? Or of the Mandate? Their value to us is that outside Power has undertaken to create in the country such conditions of administration and security that if the native population should desire to hinder our work, they will find it impossible. And we are all of us, without any exception, demanding day after day that this outside Power, should carry out this task vigorously and with determination.In this matter there is no difference between our "militarists" and our "vegetarians". Except that the first prefer that the iron wall should consist of Jewish soldiers, and the others are content that they should be British."
Say what one will about the British during the Palestinian Mandate, but their behavior was honorable and no intelligent, honest person could possibly describe it as "fascist." One need not look far for other ludicrously misleading statements from Balsam, such as "many Canadian Jews, particularly workers in the garment industry, “rejected Zionism as unfeasible, in favor of class solidarity, or out of loyalty to a project of internationalist struggle for progressive social change." Balsam doesn't even seem able to follow his own arguments from one paragraph to the next, because only a few pages earlier, he wrote, " Labour Zionism became the dominant Zionist ideology in the 1930s and remained so into the nascent years of Israeli statehood." Perhaps Balsam is unaware that the Garment industry was heavily unionized and formed the core of the Zionist Labour Movement in Canada in the 1930's.
Of course, intelligence and honesty are not hallmarks of OISE's SESE program, which seems exclusively devoted to demonization of western capitalist democracies, fanatical hatred of Israel and the promulgation of hare-brained racist theories hiding behind the veneer of "Equity Studies." The program promotes values that are the polar opposite of what fair-minded democracies have been striving towards. As we as a society aspire to treat everyone on their own merits as an individual, SESE continues to proselytize an ideology that views everyone less as an individual than a representative of a racial group. An ample illustration is another Master's Thesis recently guided by Nestel that asserts that Western feminists opposed to female genital mutilation are motivated by racism and their obsession with genetalia. It is an approach that can lead nowhere but continued racism, and the University of Toronto would be well advised to reconsider the continued existence of a program such as SESE which remains an embarrassment to the university's reputation.
UPDATE: Werner Cohn's analysis elucidates the total absence of scholarship in Balsam's thesis
John Clarke's violent activist group, the Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) doesn't think they should have to be limited by normal democratic institutions. A group of them invaded Toronto's City Hall during the final stages of budget deliberations and assaulted police and attempted to assault City Councillors. As OCAP's Liisa Schofield expressed “If you want to tell us to stand in a queue and wait and speak politely, that’s bogus. We have the right to come in here. ... We’re going to refuse to allow these cuts to happen in the city.”
How much Jew hate can you fit into a room at one time?
A group of radicals at Simon Fraser University may provide the answer when Omar "F*ck Canada Day" Chabban and Jenny "Hate Thesis" Peto compete with each other to see who is the biggest Israel hater on February 12.
The academic supervisor of the OISE Hate Thesis gave an interview to the radical leftist website rabble.ca that was published today. In it, Sheryl Nestel makes the predictable accusation that criticism of the paper that alleges a Jewish conspiracy to "obscure Jewish privilege, deny Jewish racism and promote the interests of the Israeli nation-state" is part of a larger "neo-con" conspiracy.
Ms Nestel told rabble:
"The National Postis Canada's premier neo-conservative newspaper and it's pretty clear that neo-con politics demand unconditional support of Israel as a key ally in the "Clash of Civilizations." I think the attack on OISE is simply an attack on progressive academia and on burgeoning student activism against Israeli human rights violations."
The larger issue that escapes Ms Nestel's analysis is the right of the public to be aware of and have input into issues that directly affect them.
One may legitimately ask, 'how does a radicalized program in some obscure area of study affect me?" The answer is: more than you may think.
The University of Toronto, of which the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education's Sociology and Equity Studies in Education is a part is, in large measure, publicly funded.
Its graduates go on to teach and influence generations of impressionable students in high schools and universities throughout Canada.
Universities are supposed to foster critical thought; the ability to hold, balance and reason among many competing ideas and ideologies. Sociology and Equity Studies in Education department at OISE appears to foster a very narrow approach to the acceptance of ideas.
Ms Nestel's mentoring, which is typical of the overall philosophy of her program, has recently produced theses which allege the collective accountability of Jews, a Jewish conspiracy to manipulate Holocaust education in order to allay Jewish racism, and most recently, one that alleges western feminists who oppose female circumcision are motivated by racism and genital obsession.
Is there no public interest in questioning whether Canadian students should be taught and influenced by teachers who advance those types of ideas? Or if we should be collectively funding a program that blindly accepts such assertions without providing alternatives from more mainstream perspectives?
In her interview, Ms Nestel stated:
The scholarship of all the students and faculty of the Department of Sociology and Equity Studies has been deemed to be tainted because much of it is seen as somehow less than "objective."
..The demonization of work that has contributed in innumerable ways to efforts to eliminate gender, racial and class inequality in Canada is ignorant and unconscionable.
While asserting her "academic freedom," to which she of course has a right, Ms Nestel ignores some other democratic principles. What of the right of the public as a whole to intellectual freedom? Is it "ignorant and unconscionable" for the public to express concern about how their children may be influenced and how public funds are being spent and to what end?
The failure to recognize those larger issues says a great deal about academic freedom and the level of intellectual discourse at OISE.
OISE Hate Thesis author Jenny Peto resurfaced last night at an anti-Israel event at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education. Well, not actually at OISE. It was originally scheduled to be there but was relocated at the last minute to a location a block away. One can speculate at the reasons, but the possibility that OISE is not entirely thrilled about the prospect of continued association with Ms Peto does seem a plausible explanation.
I was only able to attend the last hour of the event, but was there in time to hear all of Peto's speech and the question and answer period after, in which she referred to her brother as a "right-wing fanatical, racist, Zionist."
There were two things that Ms Peto's speech made me aware of. One was that I would be a rich man if I had ten dollars for every time she uttered the term "right-wing." The other is that the Hate Thesis polemicist seems to be chanelling another proponent of Jewish conspiracy theories.
Among the most famous uses of Canada's Hate Speech laws was the case of notorious Holocaust denier and Hitler-admirer, Ernst Zundel. A German-born landed immigrant who spent most of his life in Canada, Zundel was prosecuted, convicted and jailed in Canada and later Germany for publishing false claims that the Holocaust was exaggerated and part of a Jewish conspiracy to manipulate the non-Jewish world.
Take away the part about the Holocaust being exaggerated and the Hitler stuff but leave the rest and there is a striking similarity between Zundel and OISE Hate Thesis author Jenny Peto, who alleges a Jewish conspiracy to "obscure Jewish privilege, deny Jewish racism and promote the interests of the Israeli nation-state."
As Zundel faced his legal battles with Canada's judicial system and Human Rights tribunals, he put forward the free speech argument that his ideas were being suppressed because they were unpopular. Despite the falsehood of his allegations against Jews and his despicable motives, he had a point about free speech with which the Supreme Court of Canada eventually agreed.
Throughout the course of his campaign, Zundel astutely tried to frame the argument in terms of the right to free speech. He claimed he was articulating an opinion, and, though controversial, what right did a democratic government have to suppress it and jail him for its public expression?
OISE's Jenny Peto, in her tradition of spreading The Big Lie and twisting data (on those rare occasions she actually uses data) to reach bizarre, illogical conclusions, is now trying to frame criticism of her Hate Thesis in a similar context as Zundel cast his.
The convergence of Peto's and Zundel's respective writings reflects radical leftists' trend over the last dozen years of using language about Israel and Zionism which is virtually indistinguishable from that used by neo-Nazis. But in the matter of free speech, Ms Peto has, not for the first time, failed to piece relevant information together for a coherent argument.
The government of Canada, as well as others within the Jewish community were indeed trying to suppress and prevent the publication of Zundel's paranoid bigotry and made him a criminal in the process.
No one is trying to criminalize Ms Peto for what she said or to suppress her work. The situation is the exact opposite. Those who are concerned about the state of affairs at U of T's OISE are doing their utmost to publicize Ms. Peto's thesis in order to demonstrate the seriousness of the problem. While Ms Peto's hateful thesis, which lacked first-hand sources, showed inept scholarship, had factual errors, and substituted personal angst and opinion for fact was indeed the best example, in fact, the original article used by The National Post did not refer exclusively to Peto's thesis, but also included another to demonstrate the extent of the bias at OISE.
Jenny Peto is now trying to make her case one of Academic Freedom and is narcissistically framing the debate around her. That's bait-and-switch on her part. Peto has said that the controversy "is about who I am as a pro-Palestinian activist and what I have to say."
It isn't. The controversy really isn't about Jenny Peto at all. It's about a University of Toronto program that has become so overtly politicized that it accepts incompetent scholarship as long as it is critical of Israel and Zionism.
As Ms Peto basks in her notoriety and tries to mislead anyone who will listen into thinking criticism of her thesis is an attack on "academic freedom," people should remember what the issue really is about. There are plenty of theses in universities denouncing Israel's treatment of Palestinians. No responsible person is suggesting these papers cannot exist in academia.
The issue at hand, that Ms Peto wants people to forget, is that the controversy is about incompetent scholarship and bias masquerading as social justice and academic achievement at OISE. The principal culprit is not Ms Peto, but the instructors who gave academic imprimatur to her substandard work. The question that remains is, what is the University of Toronto planning to do about it?
Her work was a Master's thesis for the Ontario Institute of Studies in Education at the University of Toronto that alleges mainstream Holocaust education programs are part of an evil Zionist conspiracy to, in her words, "obscure Jewish privilege, deny Jewish racism and promote the interests of the Israeli nation-state."
On the surface that sounds pretty idiotic. She doesn't further her credibility with bizarre contentions like:
"Having shown that Ashkenazi Jews are now privileged white people, I will then work to expose some of the tactics that are used to perpetuate the idea that Jews are inherently and forever victimized." (pg.8)
Many people aside from me, including Professor Werner Cohn and Robyn Urback at Maclean's have commented at length about how OISE's acceptance of Ms. Peto's incompetent scholarship, which used no primary sources, was replete with factual errors, absurd speculation and personal reflection unrelated to the subject, made a mockery of of the concept of academic rigour. So much so, that it called the credibility of OISE as a faculty into question.
Ms Peto and Sheryl Nestel, the academic supervisor for her polemic, have kept a relatively low profile since the public exposure of its existence, with the exception of a love note Ms Peto sent to me via the National Post.
Until now. Yesterday, the University of Toronto's student newspaper, The Varsity, published an interview with Ms Peto and Nestel where they are back on the big conspiracy bandwagon.
As Robyn Urback described it today, "her paper was attacked simply because she was purporting unpopular ideas. “I think that this is about who I am as a pro-Palestinian activist and what I have to say,” she said, “which is very critical of Israel, very critical of mainstream pro-Israel institutions in Canada, and critical of what I see as an abuse of Holocaust memory to justify Israeli apartheid.” In other words, all of that talk of misleading claims and spreading hate was really just a guise for mainstream intolerance of pro-Palestinian ideas."
As far as I'm concerned, this all brings together an interesting thread that comes from a variety of media sources. Perhaps it is not so strange that there is such a close link between conspiracy theorists and anti-Semitism. Part of the whole anti-Semitic proposition is a "world-wide conspiracy" of Jews.
Ms. Peto denies she can be an anti-Semite. But how else can one characterize statements from her thesis like, ""Worldwide, the organized Jewish community works tirelessly to support the racist Israeli state and in doing so, aligns itself with oppressive forces in their own countries." and "a mainstream Jewish community that is dominated by racist and Zionist ideologies"
Ms Peto's usual refrain is that she can't possibly be anti-Semitic because she is a Jew and a descendant of a Holocaust survivor. That assertion is, of itself, demonstrative of her lack of insight. Anti-Semitism is an ideology and prejudice, being a Jew is a matter of birth. Being of a particular ethnic group does not preclude the ability to hold any idea. But then, her inability to understand such a basic concept may be reflective of uncritical acceptance of the racialist theories taught amongst the pseudo-academic psychobabble of OISE's Sociology and Equity Studies in Education program.
But there is a common thread between Peto, Nestel, and a world where Egyptians accuse sharks of, and Saudi Arabia arrests a vulture for being an Israeli spy. It's also no coincidence that conspiracy theorists like 9-11 oddballs Joshua Blakeney and Michael Keefer have aligned themselves with Peto's cause.
This all reflects a paranoid, incompetent mindset that seeks to blame their own failings on others. It suggests a lacks of the introspective ability to question themselves and their own failings, and is so obsessed with attributing blame to an enemy that they create it where it doesn't exist.
Of course, it's so much easier to blame the "Zionists" or the "neo-Cons" than to look at yourself. It wasn't so long ago that it was all "the blacks' fault."
Incompetent scholarship endorsed by a major university that receives public funds is a serious problem. It doesn't require a conspiracy to explain why there is public criticism of something so detrimental to the University of Toronto's reputation. It does require a conspiracy for the people responsible to try to excuse themselves.
The University of Toronto, of which OISE is a faculty, has defended the thesis on the basis of academic freedom. That is a valid point about contentious ideas, which should be aired in universities. But the main issue regarding the hate thesis is the question of whether that particular thesis, which was riddled with factual errors and substandard scholarship, being accepted as the basis of an awarded Masters degree, indicates an fanatical institutional bias at OISE's Sociology and Equity Studies in Education program that places anti-Zionist ideology above scholarship.
In the Jewish Chronicle Online, British academic Geoffrey Alderman wrote a scathing critique of the Hate Thesis, discussing how it fails to achieve the minimum academic standards that should be required of something forming the basis of a post-graduate degree.
In reply, Professor Paul Franks, at the University of Toronto's Centre for Jewish Studies, wrote a letter in which he states how the significance of a University of Toronto MA degree "varies widely. In many instances it serves as a minimal introduction to the world of post-graduate study."
He further states that "Ms Peto's thesis is a glorified term paper, judged adequate by two faculty members."
Professor Franks' defense of the University of Toronto's behaviour in this matter raises more questions than it answers.
His letter implies that the academic standards at OISE fall well below that of the other faculties at U of T.
However to have that variance and low standards in some programs denigrates the university as a whole and seems to imply that an OISE degree isn't worth much.
How does the University of Toronto feel about the fact that prospective employers and other institutions have to evaluate a University of Toronto degree based on the individual faculty? Will they even bother? And how do graduates of U of T feel about this attitude towards their achievement, or in the case of OISE, potential lack thereof?
These are questions that the University of Toronto has still failed to adequately address.
"To understand birthright-bashing Jews such as Peto and company, you have to understand the leftist contribution to modern anti-Semitism, a contribution that would be anathema to the grandparents of any living Jew, including Peto’s. That is the bogus notion that Zionism produces anti-Semitism; rather than the truth, which is that Zionism is a response to anti-Semitism.
The Left is a conduit for the self-pitying Arabist narrative, and that is what the credulous Peto has internalized. If you have been brainwashed to believe that Zionism causes anti-Semitism and Zionism is oppressive, then you may even believe anti-Semitism is justified if it hastens Israel’s redemption (read: dissolution).
Of course, Peto herself is a sideshow in the educational scheme of things. The larger issue surrounding Peto’s unworthy thesis is the obvious flight from integrity in her degree-bestowing institution. An embarrassed OISE administration is spinning Peto’s rant as “academic freedom.” But academic freedom is only credible when bounded by academic standards, here demonstrably absent."
UPDATE: An analysis that details the failure of the University of Toronto to maintain academic standards by accepting Peto's opinion piece as a "thesis."
It looks like conspiracy theorists love each other regardless of the conspiracy.
Jenny Peto, who produced the anti-Jewish thesis titled “The Victimhood of the Powerful: White Jews, Zionism and the Racism of Hegemonic Holocaust Education.” as part of a post graduate degree program at the University of Toronto's Ontario Institute for Studies in Education (OISE) proposed an unusual conspiracy theory. She alleges a Jewish/Zionist conspiracy in Holocaust education programs that teaches Jews " that their whiteness can only be maintained through racism, both in supporting Israel and also perpetuating or, at minimum, benefiting from racism and imperialism in their home countries" and of the Jewish community in general being racists who benefit from "white privilege."
And now, to rushing to her support, we see none other than 9-11 conspiracy theorists Joshua Blakeney and Michael Keefer!
Because, as we all know, opposition to Peto's bigoted conspiracy screed must be part of the evil government conspiracy to suppress the truth!
Two things that Keefer thinks you should notbelieve are: "the story that George W. Bush actually won the 2004 presidential election, and hence has some right to the office he continues to occupy. The other is the no less fraudulent story that the terrorist crimes of September 11, 2001 were perpetrated by a gang of Islamist fanatics led by a bearded Saudi in an Afghan cave—rather than being organized (and subsequently covered up) by civilian and military officials at the highest levels of the Bush regime. "
In a letter to Dalton McGuinty, the first two paragraphs of which are Michael Keefer trying to establish the credibility of Michael Keefer, or as he puts it, a "recitation of ‘street-creds,’ he launches into his own screed about how Israel really, really is an "apartheid" state.
If Premier McGuinty wants to get a real indication of Keefer's "street cred," all he need do is google "Michael Keefer 9-11"
"Street Cred" Keefer missed the point that the main objection to Peto's thesis had very little to her mendacious use of "apartheid" towards Israel and was an objection to her preposterous, bigoted conspiracy theory about Holocaust education. But an even greater objection was the bias exhibited in the Sociology and Equity Studies in Education program at OISE in accepting an error-riddled thesis absent of scholarship as the basis of a post-graduate degree simply because it conformed to their radical ideological outlook.
For a bit of fun, watch Blakeney "confront" a CBC reporter about the "9-11 cover-up" and at one point say how filmmaker Michael Moore is complicit in the conspiracy. Wowza!
UPDATE: More weird support for Peto, in a manner of speaking, comes from Doctor Bonnie Burstow. Doctor Burstow is one of those PhDs who evidently likes to be called "doctor" and teaches at (surprise!) OISE. She wrote the following letter to The Toronto Star:
I would not deny that there are problems with this thesis. It is based on little research, minimizes/distorts anti-Semitism, is circular, holds Jews to a unique standard, and there is anti-Semitism in this.
Nonetheless, this young scholar is hardly a bigot and she asks compelling questions. Given that less scholarly theses pass, why was thesis singled out as unworthy? I can only answer because it critiques Israel. I make the following observations:
Currently there are two Jewish voices on Israel: a) dominating the scene, right-wing Jewish organizations that attempt to silence critiques of Israel by calling them anti-Semitic; b) Jews whose white guilt overwhelms their analysis.
We need another voice respecting that: anti-Semitism is pervasive; Israel is oppressive; academic freedom is precious; and the media are part of the problem.
Dr. Bonnie Burstow, Toronto
You might be surprised at Doctor Burstow's contention that "there is anti-Semitism in this. Nonetheless, this young scholar is hardly a bigot." Well, that's OISE for you. Not a place to expect reason or logic.
It might also come as a surprise to people who are actually familiar with the debate about Israeli policy and the Israel/Palestine/Arab conflict to learn there are only "two Jewish voices on Israel: a) dominating the scene, right-wing Jewish organizations that attempt to silence critiques of Israel by calling them anti-Semitic; b) Jews whose white guilt overwhelms their analysis."
The major part of the problem that Doctor Bustow fails to acknowledge is that idiocy is masquerading as scholarship in some OISE programs.
"The Victimhood of the Powerful: White Jews, Zionism and the Racism of Hegemonic Holocaust Education," is Jenny Peto's infamous thesis in which she claims to "show how Jewish victimhood is instrumentalized in ways that obscure Jewish privilege, deny Jewish racism and promote the interests of the Israeli nation-state."
What's really behind it?
On the very first page, she wrote, "In the first grade, after having been told that I could not play the lead in our school play because I was a girl, I decided that god was either sexist or nonexistent. Either way, I wanted to have nothing to do with him."
If only little Grade 1 Jenny had known people in show business, they could have told her that rejection is part of the trade. You have to learn how to deal with it, get over it, and move on the the next audition. One of the reasons so many actors turn to Scientology is that it teaches confidence and how to overcome rejection.
Imagine how much happier a person she would be if Jenny's influences had been Scientologists such as John Travolta and not a Maoist fanatic like Norman Finkelstein. Say what you will about Scientology, they haven't been responsible for a single suicide bomber, let alone the 10 million murders of the Cultural Revolution.
Would having been cast as a male in a school play been enough to have turned Jenny from the path she chose? It doesn't look like it.
Because being a girl didn't keep Jenny from playing male roles for long. As this picture shows, by Grade 5 Jenny is taking what appears to be a male role in a play. It was in 1992 and was put on by Associated Hebrew Schools, one of "the sexist, gender-normative and heterosexist educational institutions [she] was forced to attend."
Guess who the cute little thespian, 2nd from the left, is
But sadly, during those four years since Grade 1, it seems irreparable damage had been done.
Or maybe not!
Jenny wrote: "Despite all of my rebellion against the oppressive beliefs of my parents, teachers and religious leaders, the one aspect of my upbringing and education that I never questioned was Zionism – loyalty to the Israeli nation-state. In fact, Zionism fit within my childhood understanding of anti-oppression politics.."
Coily oppressing Q*bert with its racist,
hegemonic purple snake privilege
What a coincidence! Zionism fit within my childhood understanding of anti-oppression politics too! Wait. No it didn't. My mistake. I have to confess that as a child, I didn't spend much time considering anti-oppression politics. But I did manage to get the high score on a Q*bert machine once, if that counts. (Q*bert was frequently oppressed by Coily, a springy snake.) On the other side, I didn't give a lot of thought to Zionism either, unless watching The Ten Commandments on TV is an act of imperialist, colonialist, repressive Zionism.
But the hegemonic influence of Zionism was able to stay within Jenny Peto's psyche until a watershed event occurred, which she describes as follows:
Ancient oppressor with early Zionist propaganda
"I was having dinner with a friend who I thought was Lebanese – I later learned that his family were Palestinian refugees living in Lebanon. His brother, who had just arrived in Toronto from the United Arab Emirates joined us. He was wearing a necklace with Handala on it. I recognized it as Naj Al-Ali’s famous cartoon of a Palestinian child holding a rock behind his back and immediately demanded to know why he had a terrorist on his necklace. We then got into an argument about Israel and Palestine that lasted several hours. I pride myself on being able to win most arguments, but in this case I could not beat him – he had facts and history, but all I had was rhetoric and sound-bites."
All she had "was rhetoric and sound bites."
Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose.
Intriguing, and leaving aside the narcissism of "I pride myself on being able to win most arguments," the most interesting and revealing part of the journey into Jenny Peto's rebirth as a Jew who wants to see the end of modern Israel comes from two of her statements:
"It is also significant that I had long seen the organized Jewish community as extremely oppressive. As someone who had experienced violence and oppression within my own Jewish community, it was not very difficult for me to accept that Jews could be oppressors and by extension, that the so-called ‘Jewish state’ could itself be oppressive and violent."
and
"I was already an outcast in the Jewish community, and estranged from my family for being atheist, queer, gender-queer, feminist and generally outspoken in a highly normative, Orthodox setting. I had less to lose in terms of family and community than many anti-Zionist Jews."
If what Jenny Peto says about her childhood experiences are true, then it is sad and she deserves pity.
But it was hardly the fault of the "mainstream" or "organized Jewish community" nor is it the fault of Israel for trying to survive as a democratic state among totalitarian countries bent on its destruction.
Peto's "thesis" reads like a cry of anguish and revenge against personal circumstances that caused her to suffer in her youth. She comes across as someone trying to strike back at the values and beliefs of those who caused her pain.
That's a tragedy. The greater tragedy is that the Sociology and Equity Studies in Education Department at OISE appears to consider an unsubstantiated cry of anguish to be something that should be awarded a post-graduate degree.
UPDATE: The National Post published the following letter from Jenny Peto's brother, David, which sheds even more light on the unfortunate situation:
It is not my desire to get involved with the details of my sister Jenny Peto's thesis, which has recently generated tremendous controversy. There are people far more qualified than I to debate the merits of the thesis, or lack thereof. There is, however, one point that I would like to contest. My sister dedicated her thesis to our late grandmother, Jolan Peto. She asserted that if our grandmother "were alive today, she would be right there with me protesting against Israeli apartheid."
Our grandmother was the youngest teacher at the Jewish orphanage in Budapest during the Second World War. She, along with my grandfather, saved countless children from death at the hands of the Nazis. After the war, she saw firsthand the brutality and baseness of the communist regime that came into power. She, along with our grandfather and father escaped to Canada, and celebrated the day of their arrival each and every year. Freedom was not an abstract idea to her; it was alive and tangible for her.
Our grandmother was a soft-spoken woman, but she had an iron will. She taught us to abhor hatred, and to strive for excellence in everything we did. She was a woman of endless patience and generosity, and boundless love. She was uncompromising in her dedication to truth and honesty, and was also an ardent supporter of the state of Israel. My sister is simply wrong; our grandmother would have been entirely opposed to her anti-Israel protests.
Our grandmother had a tremendous impact on my life, and her memory continues to be a source of strength and inspiration to my family. My daughter is named after her, and we pray that she will emulate her namesake. I cannot in good conscience allow my sister to misappropriate publicly our grandmother's memory to suit her political ideology.
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