People Love Dead Jews

I think after reading her fiction and her nonfiction, some people are clearly Dara Horn people and I am not those people. Not that anything she wrote was wrong. And she was very clear that her opinion is that Jewish writing doesn't need to have a moral or a narrative thread. But there was no there there. It was just a discussion of the antisemitism in the world and a conclusion that the only choice we have is to keep being Jewish. Most Jews in the world already knew both of those pieces before we even knew the ABC's and most non-Jews, unfortunately, won't read it. The essays didn't necessarily fit. Some of them were, in my opinion, uncharitably picky about just how a Holocaust museum exhibit did or didn't hit Horn's specific personal criteria for what made a thoughtful exhibit, or whether a virtuous gentile was unselfish enough while saving hundreds of Jews and at one point Jewish Shakespeare critics who didn't agree with her ten-year-old son's interpretation of Shylock's monologue. It's too bad it didn't live up to its excellent title.

This is a relatively short, insightful look at antisemitism in which the author makes the case that the seeming reverence that people pay to the victims of deadly bigotry is itself an insult.

I was reminded of two supporting experiences:
I was in Cologne a few years ago and a tour guide made a big deal about how there was an archeological dig exposing the Roman-era Jewish part of the city. I did not say, "So the people here humiliated, robbed, and killed most of the Jews in town and now you're excited that you've found where their ancestors lived 1500 years ago?"

I've been to a couple of places in the American West where American Indians perform sacred dances for tourists and then are given a dollar or two to have their pictures taken with these people. While Indians are living on a reservation with a life expectancy of 45 years, we can honor their culture but when they lived where we live now our ancestors had a different response.

[I just thought of another one. A gentile colleague of mine was telling me how beautiful Prague was and how much she enjoyed visiting the old Jewish cemetery there. I'll leave a blank here for you to put in the obvious response:_____.]

It's insightful, and and DOES raise the question, "[why do] people love dead Jews?" I have seen a few reviews of this book – actually, one review posted in two places, Goodreads and Audible, and it comes to the conclusion that "the benign reverence we give to past horrors is itself a profound affront to human dignity." I, however, sum it up with a different quote from the book: "Dead Jews are only worth discussing if they are part of something bigger."
A great part of the richness of Judaism is pointed out by that statement, and the current and past trends to anti-Semitism and the fact that the religion and our people ARE remembered and recognized in our dead. Our book club is planning to read this book as our choice in September, and I am looking forward to it and look forward to discussing it, both with the people in the book club and, perhaps, our Rabbi and Cantor, as well as the woman who responded to me (I won't state her name here, because she is not specifically asked me to or granted permission) when i suggested the book upon reading about it. The view of the world and anti-Semitism and how it remembers any and all Jewish people is both telling and thought-provoking.