JEWISH TEARS

HAVE YOU HEARD THE TERM “LACHROPHILIA”? MAYBE IT’S TIME. BRACE YOURSELF.

Is this doing anything for you?

The German writer Heinrich Heine referred to “the lachrymose history of the Jews,” a commentary on the fact that Jewish history was perceived in literature and popular imagination as continuous tragedy and suffering. Heine died in 1856, so his observation on the history of the Jews was formed long before the cataclysm that most people today think of when we consider Jewish tears.

“Lachrymose,” a fancy term for tearful, is a fairly obscure word.

Here’s an even more obscure — and far creepier — one: lachrophilia.

Lachrophilia refers to an attraction to, or fascination with, tears or the act of crying. It can be an emotional or aesthetic attraction. Consider those 1960s “artworks” of the big, sad-eyed babies or puppies. As far as art goes, that’s an unsettling medium.

But there is another, far creepier form of the term. It is sexual arousal from seeing people cry. It is getting off on the tears of others.

How disordered sexual desires manifest in perverted antisocial behaviors is far from my area of expertise and not something I’ve written (or thought much) about before.

But it is certainly clear to me that sadomasochism has played a role in human cruelty throughout history.

There is no doubt that the relish with which some Nazi perpetrators went about their work suggests they were doing far more than, as some of them deflected at the Nuremberg Trials, “just following orders.” As disgusting as it is to even express this phenomenon, they were clearly getting off on it.

I raise this now because I see history repeating itself. When you look at, listen to, or read anti-Israel (or “pro-Palestinian”) activists today, there is something very specific going on. I have made the case many times that rational empiricism is clearly secondary (at best) to other influences among these voices. I’ve noted the sadism inherent in much of the discourse. Now I think there is something even weirder. It is a sick, perverted obsession with heartbreak.

First, there’s their approach to Palestinians. These activists post on socials, holler in the streets and howl everywhere they go about Israeli “atrocities” and Palestinian martyrdom. Fair enough, I guess. But there is something about the delight they take in it. It’s not normal. In many cases, I’m pretty sure it goes far beyond political activism.

They’re getting off on it.

They seem to fixate on the worst images from Gaza, of injured and dead children, mangled bodies and buildings reduced to rubble.

Handled respectfully, these images could be important motivators for advancing peace, the way the horrors of the First World War were so atrocious that it was prematurely declared The War to End All Wars. That’s not what’s happening.

Look at your “pro-Palestinian” friends’ social media posts. It’s less like political commentary than tragedy porn.

It’s yet another way that people who call themselves “pro-Palestinian” dehumanize Palestinians.

But the way they approach Israelis (and Jews) is, of course, where their words and deeds veer into the truly perverted, brutalizing and degrading.

Imagine the audacity of the very people who invented and perpetuate the concept of “cultural appropriation” using terms like “Holocaust,” “genocide” and “concentration camp” against the people for whom these ghastly terms had to be invented.

Surveys say that people in Europe and North America — especially the young — know precious little about the Holocaust. How reassuring that “pro-Palestinian” activists prove this sad fact wrong. They’ve learned just enough about Jewish history to rip open the intergenerational trauma and pour salt in the wounds.

Imagine such a parallel with any other group of people and their historical experiences. I will not engage in the nauseating examples that it would take to illustrate this in its crudest fashion. I will allow your darkest imaginings to take the experience of another social group, ponder for a moment the worst epochs in that people’s history and then imagine others — self-proclaimed activists for social justice, no less — taking that history and rubbing it in the faces of the victims and their descendants to score political points.

Have you noticed that allegations of perpetrating genocide, ethnic cleansing or behaving like Gestapo are almost never leveled at the most malevolent forces on the planet? No, it is the Jewish state for whom these Holocaust-related terms are reserved.

Conversely, ever notice that Israelis are never accused of behaving like Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Omar al-Bashir or any of the other horrific figures in recent history? Nope. It’s always Hitler, the Nazis, the SS, the Gestapo.

Are they trying to make a point?

No. They’re pouring acid in Jewish wounds like deviant six-year-olds pouring salt on slugs to watch them writhe.

And they’re getting off on it.

That is what anti-Israel and “pro-Palestinian” activists do.

Do all of them do it?

I suppose not. There might be some who maintain a scrap of human decency.

But the entire anti-Israel movement is founded on sadism, of exploiting, abusing, and violating Jewish historical experiences.

Find me a “pro-Palestinian” activist who has never accused Israel of “genocide,” “Nazism,” behaving like Gestapo, of “learning from the master” and maybe I’ll grant you that there are some activists who are not lachrophilic sickos.

I’ll wait.

*

Some people have generously asked me to make it possible to make one-time contributions to support my work, rather than the subscription-based method Substack uses. I have now set up a PayPal link for donations. If you like snappy smackdowns of antisemitism and anti-Zionism and want me to keep it up, any support is deeply appreciated. Click here.