Of course that antiSemite is privileged and wealthy. The whole social justice thing is phony. It’s a power grab. She’s disgusting. Thanks for outing her privileged background. Kind of like Claudine Gay who went to fancy prep school.
Once upon a time, I wouldn't have believed that people would pay thousands of dollars to be yelled at by a huckster peddling fake anti-racism. But I've seen that behavior in real life. A surprising number of people want to wallow in feeling vicariously guilty, and think that wallowing is a powerful weapon against racism (even if they never do anything concrete). It's bizarre.
Quite the “modest proposal”, there, Ben. Ms Rao is an example of a comment I made the other day about using DEI as a weapon against others.
Your comment “not be able to trace your ancestry because they were all murdered in death camps” reminded me of something. In 1977, I think it was, in the aftermath of the impact of “Roots”, the Washington Post (it might’ve been the Washington Star) ran a pair of articles, one by Alex Haley (author of “Roots”), and one by a Jewish writer, whose name, sadly, I have forgotten (I didn’t think I would be referring to it four decades later). Both columns described the efforts of their authors to trace their heritage. Ironically, Haley was able to trace his ancestry all the way back to Africa because his ancestors had been “property“ and there were receipts and bills of lading and shipping documents and all that. The other writer was unable to trace his family any farther back than the port in Poland that they immigrated from. Any records (or relatives) had been destroyed, one way or another, during the war.
I myself have almost no knowledge of my ancestors before my family left Europe (early 1900s, before the war). In addition, for whatever reason, my family rarely talked about the holocaust, or whether there were any family members that didn’t make it out. My only real memory was the lady in the bakery down the street from my grandparents’ who had a number tattooed on her arm. My Dad‘s uncle (around 1970) found a member of his family who had survived and was then living in Minsk. That’s about it.
(By the way, Ben, there is apparently a branch of my father’s family that settled in Manchester; my father had the opportunity to visit them in the late 60s. I recall a conversation on the phone; there’s nothing like a combined British and Yiddish accent.) 🤔😉😊
Here's something people might like to try for 2024 -
Ignore people who don't have your best interests at heart.
Stop talking about them, don't follow them, don't read their work and never, ever, promote a link to them or any news site that mentions them. If someone mentions them say "Who?" and then say you don't want to hear about such weirdos
Pretty soon they will disappear. Why? Because the internet is all about mentions and clicks.
If you don't get them you aren't going to get reported on.
Also, within about 300 yards from my house there are 4 houses of worship, have a guess which is the only one that has bollards on the footpath out the front? I’ll give you a clue it starts with Sy and ends with ue
Bravo for an excellent analysis. There is a parallel, I think, to the issues that I've raised in my recent opinion pieces (IN THE CENTER LANE) about the moral failures of the far left as they relate to the crisis in the Middle East. Shall we call this phenomenon "anti-antisemitism antisemitism'? With one hand, they proclaim their humanity, but with the other, their actions fuel antisemitism. The hypocrisy of it all! I'm sharing your opinion piece.
That Rao, what a hateful, hypocritical con artist! And those white women who sign up to pay for self abasement, wtf? This ideology is clearly a cult and those dinners are exhibit A.
Curious to hear what the Banter thinks of this platform's reluctance to de-monetize Nazis, and their obvious (and ongoing) obfuscation of how they will prevent misinformation (particularly Holocaust denialism) to spread on Substack? If you don't take that threat seriously, I will (A) never provide a dime in subscriber $$ and (B) probably unsubscribe from the free posts as well. Incidentally, this post is beneath you guys. Spoiled brats are annoying but this is hardly evidence of our society's downfall. Nazis, actual nazis, making money on Substack, however, is. Take care.
Ugh, this grifter reminds me of Kshama Sawant, another con artist of first generation Indian heritage who hides her privilege in her bio (my family was filled with doctors and engineers but I had nothing to do with them). Sawant's husband is a Microsoft engineer, she came to the states working in privileged occupations before getting into politics as a radical socialist. As a Seattle City Council member, she has led protests to block highway arterials during rush hour, endangering the lives of many as this blocked access to the city's hospitals and ERs which are inexplicably all located in one neighborhood (First Hill), she made most property crime legal so long as the criminal could claim they needed the money -- even armed robbery. Anyone under 18 can get away with most any crime without charges being filed. And the drug encampments have essentially destroyed a once prominent downtown. She also wanted to penalize employers for employing people (the head tax controversy). And for what? To stick it to the white people. She burned the city to the ground and then exited politics saying she accomplished her goals. Meanwhile white suburban moms roll around blasting gangster hip hop from their minivans, lip synching and posting to socials to claim their bonafides. Weird Al scored two hit singles "owning" whites on their uncoolness (White n' Nerdy and Amish Paradise), and the Kardashians have built their brands by sleeping with black NBA players and rappers. And then there's Ben Cohen who can boast how "not white" he is, yet is less likely to be racially targeted by police on the sidewalk or shot dead during a traffic stop, his house won't be undervalued by home appraisers, he can get away with pub brawls with his pals and won't be tried, sentenced and executed on site, and should he decide to do a mass shooting, will be offered water and food in the squad car after his arrest. I'm a democrat through and through, but when you wonder why the MAGA base gets so easily riled up, it's not hard to find the tinder or the matches.
I’ve seen your comments on here before and many of your responses are cogent and researched. Why lower yourself this time? That dig at Ben Cohen is unfair. Oversimplifying the issue by blaming the victim of the same is wholly disingenuous. He has written many times over how he, by no fault of his own, passes between cultural worlds—not because of his choices, but because of the views of the group who is judging him at any given time. He is calling out a fake. Accusing him of identity politics makes yourself just as guilty of the crime.
I love Ben, even when I disagree with him. I've taken literal punches from him and survived (he's an excellent boxing instructor). The point I was trying (perhaps not successfully) to make was the fact that he, Bob and Justin often rally against "whites" as if this race was a giant, homogenous group from which they are detached. "Whites" used as a slur *tying back to the original post). Technically, no white people (outside of perhaps albinos) are actually white, but "splotchy pinkish privilege" doesn't have the same rallying cry potential for extremists. I'm caucasian by race, but in no way identify with fellow caucasians of different political or religious or cultural beliefs or identities. I personally believe "Jewish" is an ethnicity and a religion more than a race. The Census seems to agree as "Jewish" is not one of the given races from which respondents can identify. But claiming Jewish identity as a race provides people being prosecuted or targeted for their religious beliefs and ethnic heritage to claim the "racism" rallying cry which seems to carry more heft in politics than pure "hate speech" or "hate crimes". Hitler's use of the term "master race" was a synthesis of racial, ethnic, and religious selection. When you zoom way out from this conflict, the same issues are playing out here that have been playing out long before the arrival of the human species. Limited land and resources, and a fight for dominance among the species. Humans could have evolved into a caretaker species, ensuring all forms of life thrived within a balanced ecosystem, but greed appears to be universal and soon we will extinguish our ability to survive on this rock, likely taking most other living things with us. And the Earth will roll on. Billions of years will pass in a blink and then new species will likely arise. And if not, Earth becomes just another deserted rock spinning around this particular sun.
Thank you for the response, Kels. It definitely gets muddled when we consider the labels. It isn’t a matter of semantics—it is a matter of who belongs to what group. Racism is a type of tribalism and perhaps needs to be defined more broadly in the debate. What strikes me as troubling is when anyone from the left (or right, for that matter) decides to take up the mantle of oppression based on checking boxes. The bottom line is that tribalism is both a survival tactic and a curse. We need people we trust to help us survive—that’s been the mantra of socialists—and building a sense of community requires maintaining that community for all members. However, deciding what defines your team who benefits from your contribution often comes with deciding who does not. When tribalism is taken to an extreme, we get hate crimes, oppression and, as we have seen in many historical and even current examples, genocide. “Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. These acts fall into five categories: Killing members of the group. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group.” The crux of the issue is in the definition of the group, be it national, ethnic, racial, or religious. I don’t think that Ben’s POV as a Jew whose skin happens to be pinkish/peachish ought to be silenced when you frame the argument for what it is: This woman is co-opting oppression from one aspect (skin color) while reaping the benefits of economic privilege by birthright. Her actions are born of hate, and while we cannot say whether or not she has suffered slurs for the color of her skin (I imagine she has), she has not experienced the same type of hatred worldwide as Jews have. It’s different. There is no reward for who has suffered the most. Yet her actions are reprehensible and rife with their own version of oppression through the mechanism of guilt. It’s borderline sociopathic and does not solve anything. I think Ben is right to call her out just like anyone else would be, no matter what group we purport to belong to.
I think it got lost in the chain that I originally applauded (and still do), Ben's takedown of that con artist. I can't imagine any of her berating brunches ending with the white clients agreeing to give up their wealth and worldly possessions and quit their jobs to work in service to disadvantaged minorities and advocate tirelessly for reparations. Suffering through such a session alleviates some guilt and gives the client "I'm not the problem" bragging rights to discuss at their next brunch at The Ivy. As a non-passable trans person, I know what it's like to be hunted in public, to have my very existence in a restaurant or Target or sidewalk festival be mocked, scorned, and yelled at. Every time an unregulated person comes up to vent disgust in my face, I wonder if they will gun me down or knife me the same way a Tacoma bagel shop owner was gunned down in New Orleans at New Years. Ben taught me some invaluable fighting skills so I at least have a chance in a fight without weapons. I also have the privilege of throwing on baggy clothes and masking my femininity simply to navigate grocery stores and a trip to the mall with my kid. It seems we're past the point of return in society, where everyone is more tribal and angrier than ever -- thanks to AI and echo chambers making it easier to shape your own worldview and block out everything else. If Biden wins this fall, we can all remain in the fight day by day, but if Trump wins, society is going to quickly collapse and those wars we see "elsewhere" on the planet will be right here. We always thought the oceans kept us immune from invasion, and so Russia, China, and the US GOP simply got us to fight to the death amongst ourselves.
What I find most egregious is that LGBTQ individuals have been part of our world’s populations throughout the history of humanity. Gender fluidity has been present, as well. A great number of people are completely ignorant of these facts.
Much like how abortion wasn't a big deal for conservatives until the GOP needed a wedge issue post-Nixon, the LGBTQ community is an easy target in the era of social media. Instead of asking "why do Conservatives hate us?", our community need to call them on the BS by flipping the script: "why are you so OBSESSED with us?" And there's where the truth lies. Conservatives don't hate gay and trans people, they hate themselves. They hide who they are and conform, and therefore resent anyone coloring outside the lines and living their lives in authentic, colorful fulfillment. Abortion isn't to save children, it's to punish women for having sex. Look at PornHub data, most gay and trans content is consumed in the Bible Belt. Look at how many right wing religious and political activists eventually get caught engaging in the sex (or porn) they want to have. Let's place all the Church-related molestation and sex scandals in one column, and the one in a million case against an actual uncloseted gay or trans person. Most Conservatives spend more time obsessing over LBGTQ life than most LGBTQ people do. While my estrogen patches work their magic, I still have a house to run, business to run, kid to raise, and music to collect and write/podcast about... obsessively.
Rao is only one of many who has monetized this. Let's not forget. Robin Di Angelo whose seminars for corporations are similar to the dinners you describe.
Honestly if you have the money to spend $2500 to have this grifter tell you how raciest you are for 90 minutes you’d be much better off just going to the ATM taking out 50 $50 notes and just hand them out to the first 50 homeless people you see
Of course that antiSemite is privileged and wealthy. The whole social justice thing is phony. It’s a power grab. She’s disgusting. Thanks for outing her privileged background. Kind of like Claudine Gay who went to fancy prep school.
Once upon a time, I wouldn't have believed that people would pay thousands of dollars to be yelled at by a huckster peddling fake anti-racism. But I've seen that behavior in real life. A surprising number of people want to wallow in feeling vicariously guilty, and think that wallowing is a powerful weapon against racism (even if they never do anything concrete). It's bizarre.
Do you remember est? 🤔😉😊
Quite the “modest proposal”, there, Ben. Ms Rao is an example of a comment I made the other day about using DEI as a weapon against others.
Your comment “not be able to trace your ancestry because they were all murdered in death camps” reminded me of something. In 1977, I think it was, in the aftermath of the impact of “Roots”, the Washington Post (it might’ve been the Washington Star) ran a pair of articles, one by Alex Haley (author of “Roots”), and one by a Jewish writer, whose name, sadly, I have forgotten (I didn’t think I would be referring to it four decades later). Both columns described the efforts of their authors to trace their heritage. Ironically, Haley was able to trace his ancestry all the way back to Africa because his ancestors had been “property“ and there were receipts and bills of lading and shipping documents and all that. The other writer was unable to trace his family any farther back than the port in Poland that they immigrated from. Any records (or relatives) had been destroyed, one way or another, during the war.
I myself have almost no knowledge of my ancestors before my family left Europe (early 1900s, before the war). In addition, for whatever reason, my family rarely talked about the holocaust, or whether there were any family members that didn’t make it out. My only real memory was the lady in the bakery down the street from my grandparents’ who had a number tattooed on her arm. My Dad‘s uncle (around 1970) found a member of his family who had survived and was then living in Minsk. That’s about it.
(By the way, Ben, there is apparently a branch of my father’s family that settled in Manchester; my father had the opportunity to visit them in the late 60s. I recall a conversation on the phone; there’s nothing like a combined British and Yiddish accent.) 🤔😉😊
Here's something people might like to try for 2024 -
Ignore people who don't have your best interests at heart.
Stop talking about them, don't follow them, don't read their work and never, ever, promote a link to them or any news site that mentions them. If someone mentions them say "Who?" and then say you don't want to hear about such weirdos
Pretty soon they will disappear. Why? Because the internet is all about mentions and clicks.
If you don't get them you aren't going to get reported on.
Try it.
Nobody actually pays the $2500 surely?
Also, within about 300 yards from my house there are 4 houses of worship, have a guess which is the only one that has bollards on the footpath out the front? I’ll give you a clue it starts with Sy and ends with ue
An absolutely fantastic read. Thank you.
Ah yes, “emotional truth”. More popularly known as “talking shite.”
Excellent proposal.
Bravo for an excellent analysis. There is a parallel, I think, to the issues that I've raised in my recent opinion pieces (IN THE CENTER LANE) about the moral failures of the far left as they relate to the crisis in the Middle East. Shall we call this phenomenon "anti-antisemitism antisemitism'? With one hand, they proclaim their humanity, but with the other, their actions fuel antisemitism. The hypocrisy of it all! I'm sharing your opinion piece.
Brilliant take-down of this charlatan. I would start a GoFund me to make a dinner with Holocaust survivors and their kin happen.
That Rao, what a hateful, hypocritical con artist! And those white women who sign up to pay for self abasement, wtf? This ideology is clearly a cult and those dinners are exhibit A.
Curious to hear what the Banter thinks of this platform's reluctance to de-monetize Nazis, and their obvious (and ongoing) obfuscation of how they will prevent misinformation (particularly Holocaust denialism) to spread on Substack? If you don't take that threat seriously, I will (A) never provide a dime in subscriber $$ and (B) probably unsubscribe from the free posts as well. Incidentally, this post is beneath you guys. Spoiled brats are annoying but this is hardly evidence of our society's downfall. Nazis, actual nazis, making money on Substack, however, is. Take care.
Ugh, this grifter reminds me of Kshama Sawant, another con artist of first generation Indian heritage who hides her privilege in her bio (my family was filled with doctors and engineers but I had nothing to do with them). Sawant's husband is a Microsoft engineer, she came to the states working in privileged occupations before getting into politics as a radical socialist. As a Seattle City Council member, she has led protests to block highway arterials during rush hour, endangering the lives of many as this blocked access to the city's hospitals and ERs which are inexplicably all located in one neighborhood (First Hill), she made most property crime legal so long as the criminal could claim they needed the money -- even armed robbery. Anyone under 18 can get away with most any crime without charges being filed. And the drug encampments have essentially destroyed a once prominent downtown. She also wanted to penalize employers for employing people (the head tax controversy). And for what? To stick it to the white people. She burned the city to the ground and then exited politics saying she accomplished her goals. Meanwhile white suburban moms roll around blasting gangster hip hop from their minivans, lip synching and posting to socials to claim their bonafides. Weird Al scored two hit singles "owning" whites on their uncoolness (White n' Nerdy and Amish Paradise), and the Kardashians have built their brands by sleeping with black NBA players and rappers. And then there's Ben Cohen who can boast how "not white" he is, yet is less likely to be racially targeted by police on the sidewalk or shot dead during a traffic stop, his house won't be undervalued by home appraisers, he can get away with pub brawls with his pals and won't be tried, sentenced and executed on site, and should he decide to do a mass shooting, will be offered water and food in the squad car after his arrest. I'm a democrat through and through, but when you wonder why the MAGA base gets so easily riled up, it's not hard to find the tinder or the matches.
I’ve seen your comments on here before and many of your responses are cogent and researched. Why lower yourself this time? That dig at Ben Cohen is unfair. Oversimplifying the issue by blaming the victim of the same is wholly disingenuous. He has written many times over how he, by no fault of his own, passes between cultural worlds—not because of his choices, but because of the views of the group who is judging him at any given time. He is calling out a fake. Accusing him of identity politics makes yourself just as guilty of the crime.
I love Ben, even when I disagree with him. I've taken literal punches from him and survived (he's an excellent boxing instructor). The point I was trying (perhaps not successfully) to make was the fact that he, Bob and Justin often rally against "whites" as if this race was a giant, homogenous group from which they are detached. "Whites" used as a slur *tying back to the original post). Technically, no white people (outside of perhaps albinos) are actually white, but "splotchy pinkish privilege" doesn't have the same rallying cry potential for extremists. I'm caucasian by race, but in no way identify with fellow caucasians of different political or religious or cultural beliefs or identities. I personally believe "Jewish" is an ethnicity and a religion more than a race. The Census seems to agree as "Jewish" is not one of the given races from which respondents can identify. But claiming Jewish identity as a race provides people being prosecuted or targeted for their religious beliefs and ethnic heritage to claim the "racism" rallying cry which seems to carry more heft in politics than pure "hate speech" or "hate crimes". Hitler's use of the term "master race" was a synthesis of racial, ethnic, and religious selection. When you zoom way out from this conflict, the same issues are playing out here that have been playing out long before the arrival of the human species. Limited land and resources, and a fight for dominance among the species. Humans could have evolved into a caretaker species, ensuring all forms of life thrived within a balanced ecosystem, but greed appears to be universal and soon we will extinguish our ability to survive on this rock, likely taking most other living things with us. And the Earth will roll on. Billions of years will pass in a blink and then new species will likely arise. And if not, Earth becomes just another deserted rock spinning around this particular sun.
Thank you for the response, Kels. It definitely gets muddled when we consider the labels. It isn’t a matter of semantics—it is a matter of who belongs to what group. Racism is a type of tribalism and perhaps needs to be defined more broadly in the debate. What strikes me as troubling is when anyone from the left (or right, for that matter) decides to take up the mantle of oppression based on checking boxes. The bottom line is that tribalism is both a survival tactic and a curse. We need people we trust to help us survive—that’s been the mantra of socialists—and building a sense of community requires maintaining that community for all members. However, deciding what defines your team who benefits from your contribution often comes with deciding who does not. When tribalism is taken to an extreme, we get hate crimes, oppression and, as we have seen in many historical and even current examples, genocide. “Genocide is an internationally recognized crime where acts are committed with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial, or religious group. These acts fall into five categories: Killing members of the group. Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group.” The crux of the issue is in the definition of the group, be it national, ethnic, racial, or religious. I don’t think that Ben’s POV as a Jew whose skin happens to be pinkish/peachish ought to be silenced when you frame the argument for what it is: This woman is co-opting oppression from one aspect (skin color) while reaping the benefits of economic privilege by birthright. Her actions are born of hate, and while we cannot say whether or not she has suffered slurs for the color of her skin (I imagine she has), she has not experienced the same type of hatred worldwide as Jews have. It’s different. There is no reward for who has suffered the most. Yet her actions are reprehensible and rife with their own version of oppression through the mechanism of guilt. It’s borderline sociopathic and does not solve anything. I think Ben is right to call her out just like anyone else would be, no matter what group we purport to belong to.
I think it got lost in the chain that I originally applauded (and still do), Ben's takedown of that con artist. I can't imagine any of her berating brunches ending with the white clients agreeing to give up their wealth and worldly possessions and quit their jobs to work in service to disadvantaged minorities and advocate tirelessly for reparations. Suffering through such a session alleviates some guilt and gives the client "I'm not the problem" bragging rights to discuss at their next brunch at The Ivy. As a non-passable trans person, I know what it's like to be hunted in public, to have my very existence in a restaurant or Target or sidewalk festival be mocked, scorned, and yelled at. Every time an unregulated person comes up to vent disgust in my face, I wonder if they will gun me down or knife me the same way a Tacoma bagel shop owner was gunned down in New Orleans at New Years. Ben taught me some invaluable fighting skills so I at least have a chance in a fight without weapons. I also have the privilege of throwing on baggy clothes and masking my femininity simply to navigate grocery stores and a trip to the mall with my kid. It seems we're past the point of return in society, where everyone is more tribal and angrier than ever -- thanks to AI and echo chambers making it easier to shape your own worldview and block out everything else. If Biden wins this fall, we can all remain in the fight day by day, but if Trump wins, society is going to quickly collapse and those wars we see "elsewhere" on the planet will be right here. We always thought the oceans kept us immune from invasion, and so Russia, China, and the US GOP simply got us to fight to the death amongst ourselves.
What I find most egregious is that LGBTQ individuals have been part of our world’s populations throughout the history of humanity. Gender fluidity has been present, as well. A great number of people are completely ignorant of these facts.
Much like how abortion wasn't a big deal for conservatives until the GOP needed a wedge issue post-Nixon, the LGBTQ community is an easy target in the era of social media. Instead of asking "why do Conservatives hate us?", our community need to call them on the BS by flipping the script: "why are you so OBSESSED with us?" And there's where the truth lies. Conservatives don't hate gay and trans people, they hate themselves. They hide who they are and conform, and therefore resent anyone coloring outside the lines and living their lives in authentic, colorful fulfillment. Abortion isn't to save children, it's to punish women for having sex. Look at PornHub data, most gay and trans content is consumed in the Bible Belt. Look at how many right wing religious and political activists eventually get caught engaging in the sex (or porn) they want to have. Let's place all the Church-related molestation and sex scandals in one column, and the one in a million case against an actual uncloseted gay or trans person. Most Conservatives spend more time obsessing over LBGTQ life than most LGBTQ people do. While my estrogen patches work their magic, I still have a house to run, business to run, kid to raise, and music to collect and write/podcast about... obsessively.
And she's a 'good friend of the Banter'.... Really?
Please explain why.
Rao is only one of many who has monetized this. Let's not forget. Robin Di Angelo whose seminars for corporations are similar to the dinners you describe.
Honestly if you have the money to spend $2500 to have this grifter tell you how raciest you are for 90 minutes you’d be much better off just going to the ATM taking out 50 $50 notes and just hand them out to the first 50 homeless people you see