Anti-Semitism has been rising the world over, and now it seems to be going mainstream. Witness this ad campaign in New Zealand:
Billboards pitching a new programme for Prime Television have been removed after complaints from the Jewish community.
One billboard in Wakefield St, Wellington, and two in Auckland were removed yesterday after going up on Tuesday.
The billboards were for Madmen: The Glory Years of Advertising, due out at the end of the month, and bore the slogan: “Advertising Agency Seeks: Clients. All business considered, even from Jews.”
The billboards were removed after a complaint from New Zealand Jewish Council chairman Geoff Levy, who was also angry about a two-page advertisement using the same wording in the latest Time magazine.
So let me get this straight. In an ad for a TV series about a time when there was a fair amount of anti-Semitism (as well as probably anti-black and anti-woman prejudice), the marketers thought that it would be a great idea to use the sentence “All business considered, even from Jews.” Time Magazine saw no problem at all running a two-page ad with that sentence. Imagine the controversy if the word “Muslims” had been substituted for “Jews.”
However, the damage had already been done and 26,000 copies of Time would remain on waiting-room tables and in houses for months to come, he said.
We’re actually used to anti-Semitism from Time, right down to letting us know more than 30 years ago that Menachem Begin rhymes with Fagin. But stories like this make me think that anti-Semitism is, indeed, being mainstreamed.
Prime spokesman Tony O’Brien said approval for the campaign, which was to mirror “archaic” 1960s’ attitudes prevalent in the show, had been given by the marketing department, which had made an error of judgment.
All the billboards were immediately removed and an apology would run in the next edition of Time, he said.
“We take full responsibility for this and we have totally apologised to the Jewish community. The campaign crossed the line from being provocative to being offensive.”
Yes, it did, and the most shocking thing is that no one in the Prime marketing department blinked an eye at letting this campaign go through. Because after all, who gives a damn if a few Jews are offended? It’s not like they’re going to go around blowing up embassies or anything. And anyway, why should they take offense? All we’re doing is reproducing an attitude from the sixties.
Riiiight.
There is a double standard involved, but then, there always has been. The Exception Clause reigns supreme.
I looked at that article, and “Fagin” was the least of it. (Nice work digging it up!)
It took the Arab version of Deir Yassin at face value.
Meryl,
I do agree that anti-Semitism is being mainstreamed.
The worst offender of Time is not the magazine itself…it’s the so called “Middle East Blog” that is updated frequenty by correspondents Tim McGirk, Scott Macleod, and Andrew Butters.
Also, Jon Stewart recently had a sketch about AIPAC that was pretty vile.
this is just left wing anti semtism moving into the main stream, expect the discomfort of the jewish comm over the obama canadicy to make even more of it.
My maiden name IS Fagin.
I on occasion, had to remind people that Oliver Twist was a work of FICTION.
Luckily my “crowd” was too ignorant to Dickens was…let alone anything beyond that.
Speaking of “ignorant”, I didn’t proofread before I clicked submit.
Obviously.
Beyond upsetting.
Gives new meaning to the phrase ‘Banality of evil.’
Apologies my ass- heads need to roll.
Never mind Muslims- Substitute the world Maori, Aboriginal or black.
We need consequences for stupid statements and actions, not merely apologies.
A few months ago Imus made a stupid comment about “nappy headed ho’s”
and all hell broke loose, and he lost his job. In normal times, an apology would be acceptable, now with the climate of anti-semitism growing, examples of stupid behavior need to be publicized and people strongly repremanded.
And if someone cries free speech, ask him if he is willing to draw a cartoon of the Muslim prophet Mohammed and put it on a billboard?
Meryl,
I think you’re misreading this. The point of the ad is to draw attention to the casual bigotry of the show’s characters, who (as you say) are from a time when anti-Semitism was commonplace. The joke here is on the establishment, not Jews. Imagine instead that the ad read: “Ad agency seeks secretaries. Single girls preferred. Must have typing, shorthand, nice gams.” Would reasonable people be screaming about sexism?
Jon, yeah, I got that part of it.
What you’re not getting is that using forty-year-old anti-Semitic slogans is still anti-Semitic.
And yes, I’d be screaming about sexism in the above instance as well.
Huh. I’m still a little perplexed. Your reaction seems to rule out dramatic irony at the expense of bigots. You do know the show is a satire, I’m sure.
Who, exactly, is expressing anti-Semitism here apart from fictional characters at whom we are meant to laugh? The billboard makes that fairly explicit by adopting outmoded slogans and presenting them as if they were current. Highlighting the difference between then and now – and putting the viewer in the privileged position of knowing the difference – is precisely what should make the show funny.
Are you actually saying that pointing out anti-Semitism is itself anti-Semitic if it repeats an anti-Semitic slogan (as distinct from anti-Semitism itself)? Cause that’s what it seems like you’re saying.
As for my sexism analogy: I thought it was pretty clear from my example that such a billboard would be making fun of sexism – you know, by appropriating its language in a mode of ironic self-reference. I guess I’ll have to take a different, more hostile view of your Hulk posts from now on.
Oh, come on, Jon. If I were driving past a billboard that said “All business considered, even from Jews,” I don’t think I’d stop to wonder if it was advertising a satiric TV show. I would be offended at the language. And the insult.
Sorry, but the ad was in very poor taste.
Well, you and I – both Jews – have had opposite reactions, so I’m not sure the matter is as clear-cut as you make it. Do you also get annoyed when Jon Stewart cracks wise about Manishevitz? If anything, the ad writers were guilty of underestimating just how mainstream anti-Semitism has become (again), but I don’t think that makes the ad itself anti-Semitic. I certainly understand what you’re saying about poor taste; I’m still a little confused about why you’re offended – unless you don’t believe the ads were part of a satire.
I’m not trying to be a jerk about this, BTW.
I’ve just returned from a visit to Wellington, and I saw the billboards.
I’m afraod Meryl’s point is correct.
Sure, it’s a joke.
Sure, it’s poking fun at attitudes which are supposedly archaic.
Sure, it’s meant ironically.
But the point is it’s aimed at Jews, and that’s the ONLY “archaic” attitude it’s permissible to express, even in “jest”.
Anyone want to imagine what would happen in an ad agency of some guy pitched similar billboards aimed at “happy-go-lucky coloured folk”, or “dumb man-chasing broads”.
Never. Gonna. Happen.
But Jews?
Hey, can’t a guy even make a joke anymore?
Well, apparently not.
With one exception.
And we all know what that exception is.
Meryl’s right on this one.
It’s not aimed at Jews. It’s aimed at TV viewers. And the reason you can get away with that kind of ad and not one, say, reference black people is not because anti-Semitism is the last acceptable prejudice, but because Jews are ironists par excellence – something we should celebrate.
Jon, that’s bullshit.
We should accept insults because we have a good sense of humor?
We should ignore them because they’re not directed at us, they’re directed at the general public?
You’re joking, right?
The reason the ad agency can get away with that ad, and not one against Maoris, is because anti-Semitism is still the only acceptable bigotry. It gets proven time and again. ]
I repeat: Substitute “blacks” or “Muslims” for Jews, and Time would never have published the ad, and the billboards would never have gone up.
And you know that’s true.