Heed the Word Indeed: The Agency of Hate

by Scott Creighton

But I have a new love for that glittering instrument, the human soul. It is a lovely and unique thing in the universe. It is always attacked and never destroyed - because 'Thou mayest.' John Steinbeck

For the record, Kyrie Irving had nothing to apologize for except misquoting Malcolm X.

 

As long as the presentation is powerful, as long as the presenter seems respectable, few take the time these days to check sources. This failing may not be new but it is certainly problematic in this Meta world of sound-bite clout we live in.

Cynthia McKinney, someone I have had a great deal of respect for in the past, tweeted out this link to a man making a video driving in his car (lovely) about the Kyrie Irving situation. In it he threatens the Jewish community that they had better 'leave him alone' or else individuals like him will expose the Jewish role in the Atlantic slave trade and cause still more anger and hostility and division between races in America today. 

Oh good. More race-baiting. 

The man in the video shared by Cynthia is Dell K Brereton a.k.a. "The Real Spiel'. Either he misunderstood the source he referenced in his 'driving while angry' video The Jews Better Leave Kyrie Irving Alone!!! or he is deliberately misrepresenting the conclusions it drew. 

Let's do as Cynthia suggests and 'heed the words' the Real Spiel speaks, shall we?

 

'The Jewish community better slow your roll when it comes to Kyrie Irving'

This is the overall message issued by Spiel in his short 6 minute driving while clout chasing video and ultimately he offers up one specific threat which is ridiculous and one less specific (I guess due to Youtube community guidelines) 'there are MILLIONS of us who have Kyrie's back'

Without harping too much on the less-than-subtle threat of violence that is implied by the 'millions' line, the Spiel gives a specific warning to NBA related Jewish people when he laughingly claims they can go to Ice T and get him to ramp up his Big 3 basketball league into something to compete with the NBA. 

First of all... good luck with that. Not only is the NBA a billion dollar entity unto itself, but it is comprised of billionaire cells who, though they may agree with us that Kyrie has a right to self expression, they will undoubtedly protect their investment viciously, Jewish or not. 

Does the Spiel have any authorization from Ice T to offer his name and business up in this regard? Doubtful. 

Are players going to support this move? Mid-level 3 and d guys gonna give up 4 million dollar a year contracts to join what would be a start-up league that you know will never get any coverage on national broadcast TV meaning there will be virtually no ad revenue therefore no budgets and no 4 million dollar a year contracts for mid-level players. In short... cutting off one's nose to spite one's face. 

How many players will sign up for that? The Spiel will... but he doesn't have any current contracts to offer up now does he?

So is that a persuasive threat? No. So what does that leave him in this video? Oh yeah... 'millions of supporters'

Violence. 

'what you have done is you have created a Jew verses Black issue right now and to the entire Jewish community and anyone listening that will blow up in your face'

Clearly, since the vast majority of Jewish Americans have no interest in the NBA financially (so your threat of a new start-up league is even less imposing), The Spiel's 'blow up in your face' threat targeting 'the entire Jewish community' must be some other sort of threat. It's not hard to figure out.

'When we check the roles of history, YOU PEOPLE are extremely culpable in the oppression of Black people'

'You people'?!? I thought that was racist? Can a white person lump all blacks into the 'you people' troupe without being cancelled immediately? I don't think so.Why? Because unlike what some racists might tell you, all Black people are not alike ergo 'you people' is dismissive of their individuality and humanity. 

Works the same way for Jews Cynthia.

'Let's take a look at the actual history of Jewish people when it comes to slavery'

With 5 minutes left in his video, I doubt The Spiel is going to be able to go into the entire history of Jewish participation in the Atlantic slave trade. 

Instead what we get is one reference to one article critiquing one book. 

And The Spiel gets that wrong.

'Did you know Jewish people owned more slaves than any white person in America?'

Using only the reference given by The Spiel, that statement is factually incorrect. Here is a quote from an article discussing a book that appeared in 1991 (more on that later) which is the source for his claim:

' Martin, in one of his endorsements, made a startling assertion concerning slave ownership by Jews: "Using the research of Jewish historians, the book suggests that based on the 1830 census, Jews actually had a higher per capita slave ownership than for the white population as a whole." The Secret Relationship does in fact approach making that suggestion, and since the claim would appear to be a pivotal one, it is worth examining....

In order to assess such a claim, one must resort to details. Martin's purported actuality is wrong on its face if applied to the "white population" of the United States "as a whole," because in 1830 only a handful of white northerners still owned slaves. Jews were concentrated in the North, and they constituted a very small minority there. Even if the statement is taken as applying only to the states in the American South that had not adopted gradual emancipation laws, it remains badly flawed...

It is also the case that urban slaveholders of whatever background owned fewer slaves on average than rural slaveholders, including those on large plantations.'

Remember, this is the reference given by The Spiel on his own Youtube channel and it does NOT conclude 'Jewish people owned more slaves than any white person in America'

It does conclude that PER CAPITA Jews held more slaves than average white folks did but that is because the vast majority of white folks in America back then were less affluent and did not own slaves at all. It also makes clear that the URBAN based Jewish population owned fewer slaves than were kept on plantations in RURAL areas in the south. 

'There was a professor named Martin who wrote a study and a book about The Jewish Interaction in African Slavery'

The Atlantic article in question written by Winthrop Jordan (1993) makes clear, Professor Tony Martin, of Wellesley College neither wrote a study nor a book on 'The Jewish Interaction in African Slavery'

The professor, Martin, had his African Studies class examine a 1991 book called The Secret Relationship which did address the Jewish interaction in African slavery, but the only book Martin wrote in relation to that topic was one he penned as a response to the onslaught of attacks he suffered as a result of teaching that lesson to his students. It was called 'The Jewish Onslaught: Despatches From the Wellesley Battlefront'

The work The Spiel is basing his claims on, The Secret Relationship, was not written by Martin. It was written by The Nation of Islam.

In the end of the video, The Spiel demands a host of individuals and organizations accompany Kyrie Irving to his sessions with the ADL (which I think is wise if he chooses to go, I would not suggest he comply) and the last institution he suggests go with Kyrie to that meeting, he says slyly, is The Nation of Islam.

Personally if he has to go, I would suggest Louis Farrakhan. Kyrie wont need anyone else.

In the end, since we are 'heeding the words', the article The Spiel refers to is rather reasoned in its conclusion and honest about Jewish involvement in the Atlantic slave trade but it hardly rises to the epic heights The Spiel seems to think it proves:

'The citation names a three-volume work edited by Abraham J. Karp. Upon consulting that work, which actually has five volumes, one learns that the article in question is by Bertram W. Korn. The same article by Korn is listed in The Secret Relationship's "Selected Bibliography," but in another set of volumes, with an incorrect date and no indication that it was reprinted elsewhere several times...

Korn's article contains a great deal of specific information to which The Secret Relationship has been thoroughly faithful. Overall, though, the conclusions Korn drew from his data were very different: he made a strong and persuasive case that:

• there were few Jews in the planting class in the South 
• that Jews had historically been forced into commercial enterprises
• that in the Old South they were typically city dwellers
• that a small number participated in the domestic slave trade
• that they treated their slaves no better or worse than other slaveholders
• that the few Jews in the South without exception endorsed slavery. 

The thrust of Korn's article was that Jews were not much different from other white southerners in their views on race and slavery.' The Atlantic

Without getting into the Protestants, the Roman Catholics and the Dahomey slavers from those days, it is fair too say some individuals from the Jewish faith took part in the Atlantic slave trade right alongside their morally corrupt counterparts.

Were they the driving force behind it? The Spiel's own reference seems to suggest they were not. Of course the subject of the Rothschilds never comes up but we can discuss that perhaps at a later date.

Ultimately, when someone claims 'the Jewish community' needs to take responsibility for those 500 years of slavery, or they demand to know 'what did the Jews do when 350 million Africans were buried in America?' the answer is quite simple... many of them opposed the institution of slavery just as many whites and Africans did as well (Dahomey ring any bells?)

The Jewish people don't owe Black Americans an apology for slavery any more than Kyrie Irving owes the ADL an apology for having an opinion. Don't take my word for it, heed the words of The Spiel's own reference.

In the end this kind of divisiveness only harms both communities and serves the interests of those who seek to divide us continually to make smaller warring tribes out of a united nation. It also demeans the lives of those lost over the years, those 350 million early Americans brought here in chains who struggled and endured so their children's children's children could drive around in nice cars angrily chasing clout over a multimillionaire's plight.

Again, don't take my word for it, heed the words of The Spiel's own reference.

' One aspect of the present issue, however, is utterly clear: by focusing on the importance of the activities of one internationally distributed religious group of Europeans, the Jews, this book ignores diversities in Africa. In addition, by treating Africans as mere objects of trade, it deprives all Africans of their own agency, of their capacity to control or at least deal with their lives and their history, including the activities of powerful men who enslaved other Africans and traded them to Europeans. In effect, it treats millions of African people as a mere undifferentiated blob, a pool of helpless victims totally lacking in the perception, will, and power necessary to resist or to take advantage of economic opportunities. Such a focus radically distorts the historical record.' The Atlantic

Timshel