Summaries and Reviews of Kevin MacDonald's Books on Judaism
- A People that Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy: Summary, Reviews, Ordering information
- Separation and Its Discontents: Toward an Evolutionary Theory of Anti-Semitism: Summary, Reviews, Ordering information
- The Culture of Critique: An Evolutionary Analysis of Jewish Involvement in Twentieth-Century Intellectual and Political Movements: Summary, Reviews, Ordering information
Summary of A People that Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy, with Diaspora Peoples
Lincoln, NE: iUniverse, 2002. Originally published in 1994 by Praeger Publishers.Chapter 1 develops the basic theoretical perspective of the book, including especially the idea of a group evolutionary strategy. Group evolutionary strategies are proposed to be theoretically unconstrained on a variety of dimensions, and the remaining chapters flesh out the specific characteristics of Judaism as a group evolutionary strategy. Group strategies are viewed as experiments in living which can be developed and maintained by purely cultural processes, although a later chapter discusses how variation in evolved systems may predispose individuals to form cohesive, genetically exclusive groups. Of critical importance are within-group social controls and their rationalizing ideology which 1.) effectively limit exogamy; 2.) enforce cultural segregation; 3.) promote within-group charity and economic cooperation; and 4.) structure mating opportunities within the group in a manner which ensures that there will be eugenic and environmental pressures directed at developing phenotypes (especially intelligence, resource acquisition ability, high investment parenting, group allegiance) ideally suited to fulfilling certain ecological niches within human societies or necessary for maintaining group commitment and cohesion.Chapter 2 discusses the evidence from modern studies on population genetic differences between Jews and gentiles. This material is relevant to the hypothesis that Judaism represents a group strategy which is fairly (but not completely) closed to penetration from gentile gene pools. The data indicate that Jews have remained genetically distinct from the groups they have lived among despite having lived among them for centuries. In addition, Jewish populations in very diverse areas have significantly more genetic commonality than is the case between Jews and the gentile populations they have lived among for centuries. This is illustrated in the following figure from Kobyliansky and Micle (1982):
Kobyliansky, E., S. Micle, M. Goldschmidt-Nathan, B. Arensburg, & H. Nathan (1982). Jewish populations of the world: Genetic likeness and differences. Annals of Human Biology 9:1-34.Here is a recent New York Times article on Jewish population genetics. The article is based on a study of genetic distance between Jewish and non-Jewish groups titled, "Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations share a common pool of Y-chromosome biallelic haplotypes," by M. F. Hammer, et al. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences May 9, 2000.This page includes a figure from the Hammer et al. article showing genetic distances between various Jewish and non-Jewish populations.
Chapter 3 discusses some preliminary issues which are important for the general theory that Judaism constitutes an example of a religion that can be viewed as a group evolutionary strategy. There is a pronounced tendency toward idealizing endogamy and condemning exogamy apparent in the writings of the Tanakh. The importance of consanguineous marriages and extended kinship relationships is also very apparent in these writings, especially for understanding the activities of the patriarchs. It is shown that much of the ideology of Judaism as an evolutionary strategy for maintaining genetic and cultural segregation in a Diaspora context is apparent in the writings of Priestly stratum of the Tanakh. There is scholarly agreement that this material was written by Israelite priests during the period of the Babylonian exile. It is proposed, therefore, that Judaism as an experiment in living dates from this period (6th-5th centuries B.C.).
Chapter 4 discusses those aspects of Jewish religious ideology and practice that have facilitated the genetic and cultural separation of Jews and gentiles, and is thus relevant to the hypothesis that Judaism is a self-chosen, genetically fairly closed evolutionary strategy. Of the hundreds of human groups in the ancient world, Judaism was the only one that avoided the powerful tendencies toward cultural and genetic assimilation characteristic of Western societies. Judaism as a group strategy depends on the development of social controls reinforcing group identity and preventing high levels of genetic admixture from surrounding groups. This genetic separation has been facilitated by a variety of cultural practices: religious practices and beliefs, language and mannerisms, physical appearance, customs, occupations, and living in physically separated areas which were administered by Jews according to Jewish civil and criminal law. All of these practices date from very early stages of the diaspora. This chapter surveys these ideologies and behaviors, particularly their role in severely limiting the numbers of gentile converts to Judaism and preventing intermarriage between Jews and gentiles.
Chapter 5 reviews evidence for resource and reproductive competition between Jews and gentiles, as well as for the proposition that anti-Semitism has been strongest among those gentile groups most in competition with Jews. Evidence is reviewed indicating that Jews were commonly utilized as an intermediary group between a ruling elite (and especially alien elites) and the native population. In these situations the elite gentile group actively encouraged and profited from Jewish economic interests to the detriment of other sectors of the native population. After summarizing data on this type of relationship in widely dispersed parts of the world and widely separated points in time, separate sections are then devoted to Jewish/gentile resource and reproductive competition in a wide range of economic activities in Spain prior to the Inquisition, in early modern Poland, and in Europe and America following Jewish Emancipation.
Chapter 6 discusses data indicating the importance of kin- based cooperation and altruism within Judaism, its role in resource competition with gentiles, and its importance in maintaining cohesion within the Jewish community. Data are presented indicating that Jewish economic activities have often been characterized by a high degree of nepotism and within-group charity which is central to conceptualizing Judaism as an evolutionary strategy. Group rather than individual interests have been of primary importance throughout Jewish history, so that, e.g., there were sanctions on individual Jews to ensure that the total resource flow into the group was maximized rather than allow individual Jews to maximize their resource acquisition.
Further, it is shown that within-group charity and altruism have been facilitated by strong social controls within traditional Jewish communities which enforced a high level of within-group altruism. Traditional Jewish communities were also characterized by strong social controls against Jews who cooperated with gentiles against Jewish interests or who patronized gentile businesses or aided gentiles in economic activities. Finally, data are discussed indicating that there were limits on within-group altruism among Jews. Although altruism toward poor Jews was an important aspect of Judaism, there was also discrimination against poorer Jews, especially in times of economic and demographic crises. There was also discrimination between different Jewish groups as recipients of altruistic behavior as a function of genetic distance.
Chapter 7 discusses hypotheses related to the issue of whether Judaism constitutes an ecologically specialized evolutionary strategy. The following five propositions are of interest: (1) Judaism can be characterized in ecological terms as a high investment reproductive strategy which facilitates resource competition by Jews with the gentiles; (2) Success in mastering the vast and complex Jewish religious writings was strongly associated with prestige within the community and was ultimately linked rather directly to control of resources and reproductive success; (3) Jewish religious and social practices fostered the development of high investment patterns of child rearing necessary for successful resource competition and a role in society above that of primary producer; (4) Judaism has been characterized by assortative mating, and cultural and natural selection for intelligence and other traits related to obtaining resources within stratified human societies; Data are reviewed indicating that Jewish populations have a higher average intelligence than their gentile counterparts, as well as a number of other demographic markers indicating that Jews as a group engage in high investment parenting. (5) Jewish groups have been characterized by a set of practices aimed at socializing individuals into identifying strongly with the group and excluding individuals (and their relatives) who depart from group goals'the latter practices ultimately having a eugenic affect on psychological mechanisms predisposing people to forming cohesive, collectivist groups.
Finally, Chapter 8 discusses the origins of Judaism as a group evolutionary strategy. As indicated above, part of the argument in Chapter 1 is that evolutionary group strategies need not be viewed as determined by ecological contingencies or evolutionary theory. Group strategies are viewed as experiments in living which can be developed and maintained by purely cultural processes. Chapter 8 modifies this perspective by suggesting that a threefold combination of historically contingent factors facilitated the development of Judaism as an evolutionary strategy: 1.) a strong predisposition to ethnocentrism characteristic of Middle Eastern cultures generally; It is argued that this predisposition is genetically influenced, but that the tendency toward ethnocentrism has been exacerbated as a result of selective effects resulting from Jewish cultural practices; 2.) unique historical experiences (including especially the sojourn in Egypt recounted in the Biblical books of Genesis and Exodus) which showed that a diaspora strategy could be successful; and 3.) the unique early organization of the Israelite tribes which resulted in a powerful class of priests and Levites whose status depended on their genealogy and whose own individual interests were intimately bound up with the fate of the entire group. These individuals benefited most from the group strategy which ultimately evolved into historical Judaism.
Excerpts from Reviews of A People That Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy
Laurence D. Loeb, Department of Anthropology, University of Utah; "Review Essay: Jewish Origins and Continuity," Jewish Folklore and Ethnology Review, 19(1-2), 36-38, 1997. "Kevin MacDonald is an evolutionary biologist using the Jewish people as a test case to examine certain critical theorems of that approach.... MacDonald's success was due to his cautious, careful assembling of evidence.... Some readers will no doubt be disturbed by the sociobiologically derived jargon. Once acclimated to the style, however, the reader will be richly rewarded with atour-de-force, sifting of a wide range of Jewish scholarship.... Make no mistake. This volume from a barely visible publisher and unlikely to be reviewed in Judaic or social science circles, is a watershed contribution to the understanding of Judaism and Jewish life. I found the data and reasoning compelling despite my general rejection of evolutionary anthropology in explaining complex societies. While I did find myself questioning and confronting many assertions and uses of evidence, this is [a] most worthwhile reading experience."Hans Eysenck, Personality and Individual Differences, 19(1), p. 121, 1995. "This is in fact a potentially very important contribution to the literature on eugenics, and on reproductive strategy. Taking the Jews as his example, MacDonald carefully traces their history in relation to the explicit theory that they have always followed certain practices that amounted to a definite eugenic policy as far as intelligence (mainly verbal intelligence) is concerned. He uses this development to explain the undoubted high intelligence to be found in modern Ashkenazi Jews, and the truly remarkable successes they have scored'Nobel prizes, chess world championships, and much, much more.... MacDonald lays much stress on the r/K reproductive strategies of the Jews, insisting that they pursued a K-type strategy (few offspring, long parental investment), and attempts to explain the Jewish personality along these lines. This, too, is a fascinating endeavour, particularly as this Jewish personality seems to have changed considerably over time'the Masada warriors giving way to the Talmudic scribes.... On the whole this is an entertaining and intriguing account of a thousand-year-old experience involving millions of people, lacking of course the methodological refinements that would be expected in a small-scale experiment in modern times, but contributing nevertheless a possible test of eugenic principles and r/K reproductive strategy. I hope it will be widely read and pondered; it is a creative effort to write history along biological lines, the sort of thing C. D. Darlington pioneered in his Evolution of Man and Society. Psychology could do with more such serious attempts to look at the development of psychological differences between groups in an original and creative manner."
John Hartung, Ethology and Sociobiology, 16, pp. 335-342, 1995. "MacDonald argues that the worldwide, age-old phenomenon of anti-Semitism is not a disease state vectored by myths, but is instead what should be expected given the nature of human intergroup competition and the competitive attributes of Judaism.... "
Hartung's review emphasizes a central theme of my book'that between-group competition is central to understanding historical Judaism. However, he also develops his ideas on the linkages among the history of Judaism as a competitive group, the Holocaust as a reaction to Judaism, and the roles that Christian perceptions of Judaism and the moral capital created by the Holocaust play in legitimizing Israel in its current struggle with the Palestinians and other Arab populations. Hartung's review was considered anti-Semitic by some and resulted in charges of censorship when the publisher, Elsevier, refused to publish
an addendum to the review written by Hartung and intended to calm the passions raised by his review. The main public forum for this controversy was HBES-L, the internet discussion group of the Human Behavior and Evolution Society. The events surrounding Hartung's review were recounted in an article entitled "Publisher Draws Censorship Charge" by Constance Holden inScience 273, p. 177, July 12, 1996. These events were also the subject of an article entitled "Unnatural Selection" by Daniel Zalewski in Lingua Franca, pp. 10-12, November, 1996.
Paul Gottfried, Rothbard Rockwell Report, 10-12, February, 1996. "Though MacDonald ... presents his Jewish subjects as an illustration of genetic strategizing, clearly he is courting controversy by his examples and his method of inquiry. Judaism, as seen by MacDonald, is a body of dietary and social prohibitions aimed at and maintaining Jewish genetic and cultural unity. MacDonald documents this assertion in exhaustive detail.... There is a shocking and brutal honesty shown by MacDonald in approaching his subject."
Harmon Holcomb, Human Ethology Bulletin, 11(2), 14-17, June, 1996. "MacDonald has shown how the detailed patterns of Jewish history provide evidence for a host of evolutionary hypotheses about group strategies that apply to other groups as well. The theoretical pluralism and evidential meticulousness of this volume makes it a case study that repays careful reading."
Richard Lynn, Mankind Quarterly, 37(2), pp. 217-228, 1996. "MacDonald is to be congratulated on a brilliant attempt to develop a scientific theory of Judaism rooted in contemporary evolutionary theory."
Roger D. Masters, Politics and Life Sciences, 15, 355-358, 1996. "Kevin MacDonald is a bold and ambitious scholar. He has already shown the ability to bridge the gaps between disciplines, as in his thoughtful interpretations of theories of personality in social psychology, neurochemistry, and behavior genetics (MacDonald, 1988; [Social and Personality Development: An Evolutionary Synthesis; New York: Plenum] ). This book goes further, undertaking one of the most controversial issues possible: using evolutionary theory to analyze and explain Judaism and its social practices as 'adaptive' strategies."
Timothy Crippen, European Sociobiological Society Newsletter No. 45, pp. 9-14, Sept., 1997. "The book is provocative in at least two senses. First, MacDonald's thesis and supporting evidence are thought-provoking. He carefully mines the rich literature on Jewish history, and he conveys his understanding of these materials with considerable skill. Among the valuable features of the book are MacDonald's extensive coverage of the literature on Jewish customs, laws, demographic patterns, and political struggles; his documentation of patterns of genetic and cultural separatism characteristic of many Jewish communities in relation to various 'host societies'; and his discussion of periodic episodes of virulent anti-Semitism that have influenced the development of 'mainstream Jewish Diaspora Culture'.... In short, MacDonald synthesizes a sizable literature on the history of Judaism and conveys his appreciation of that history with compassion and sympathy. The accomplishment is impressive." (Crippen went on to disagree with aspects of the theoretical basis of the book. I replied to his review in an article entitled "Misconceptions of Judaism," European Sociobiological Society Newsletter #46 [December], 1996, 3-5.)
Louis R. Andrews, pinc: politically incorrect, 1(1), January, 1997. "Overall, MacDonald shows how the power of ethnocentrism and resource competition between virtually non-assimilating groups in the same geographic area has occurred over millennia, yet allowing the minimal interactions necessary for survival and mutual growth. Anti-Semitism is a naturally expected and powerful phenomenon, yet the strength of Jewish ethnocentrism has prevailed until recently. Because of the advent of liberal anti-ethnocentrism, the long-range future for both Judaism and anti-Semitism seems poor. It remains to be seen if one (in any recognizable form) can exist without the other."
pinc: politically incorrect is an online journal. Andrews' entire review may be accessed by clicking on the following link:
Stephen J. Sniegoski, The Last Ditch, Whole No. 19, December 19, 1997. "Whatever its limitations, MacDonald's extremely ambitious work provides much food for thought. Moreover, MacDonald has done far more than produce an intellectual tour de force. Since he moves deep into non-P.C. territory, MacDonald must be credited with displaying a great deal of courage in a less-and-less-free society. Let's hope that much more can be heard from him."
Amazon.com has several reviews.
II. Summary of Separation and Its Discontents: Toward an Evolutionary Theory of Anti-Semitism.
Bloomington, IN: 1stbooks Library, 2004. First published by Praeger, 1998; 325 pages. The 1stbook Library paperback edition includes a new preface that summarizes recent research on psychological mechanisms of ethnic conflict. It also contains a reply to one of my critics, Paul Rubin. My reply to Rubin deals with several conceptual issues important for understanding the history of anti-Jewish attitudes.
This book builds upon my previous work, A People That Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy (MacDonald 1994; hereafter PTSDA). While PTSDA focused on developing a theory of Judaism within an evolutionary framework, the present volume focuses on the phenomenon of anti-Semitism. Judaism and anti-Semitism fairly cry out for an evolutionary interpretation. Anti-Semitism has been a very robust tendency over a very long period of human history and in a wide range of societies with different forms of government, different economic systems, and different dominant religious ideologies. Many anti-Semitic episodes, such as the Iberian inquisitions and the Nazi Holocaust, have been characterized by extraordinary intra-societal violence. Moreover, anti-Semitism has sometimes been characterized by a very overt, self-conscious racialism'a phenomenon that immediately suggests the relevance of evolutionary theory.A principle concern of this work is therefore an evolutionary analysis of ethnic conflict in general. There is at present an incredible urgency for coming to a scientific understanding of ethnic conflict. As I write this, "ethnic cleansing" and the creation of ethnostates have torn apart Yugoslavia, and there are deep-rooted ethnic conflicts in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. Opposition to liberal asylum laws has given rise to violence in Germany, and, closer to home, Los Angeles was recently shaken by large-scale urban violence in which ethnic conflict was a prominent feature.
The basic thesis of this book can be summarized by the proposition that Judaism must be conceptualized as a group strategy characterized by cultural and genetic segregation from gentile societies combined with resource competition and conflicts of interest with segments of gentile societies. This cultural and genetic separatism combined with resource competition and other conflicts of interest tend to result in division and hatred within the society.
Nevertheless, as Leslie White (1966, 3) wrote many years ago in his discussion of the Boasian school of anthropology as a politically inspired cult, "One who follows procedures such as these incurs the risk of being accused of indulging in non-scholarly, personal attacks upon whom he discusses. Such a charge is, in fact, expectable and completely in keeping with the thesis of this essay. We wish to state that no personal attacks are intended."
No personal or ethnic attacks are intended here, either. Nevertheless, the charge that this is an anti-Semitic book is, to use White's phrase, expectable and completely in keeping with the thesis of this essay. A major theme of this volume, found especially in Chapters 6 and 7, is that intellectual defenses of Judaism and of Jewish theories of anti-Semitism have throughout its history played a critical role in maintaining Judaism as a group evolutionary strategy. Parts of the book are an extended discourse on the role of Jewish self-interest, deception, and self-deception in the areas of Jewish historiography, Jewish personal identity, and Jewish conceptualizations of their ingroup and its relations with outgroups. This is therefore first and foremost a book that confidently predicts its own irrelevance to those about whom it is written.
OVERVIEW
Chapter 1 presents a theory of anti-Semitism based on an evolutionary interpretation of social identity theory'a major approach to group conflict in contemporary social psychology. A major conclusion of PTSDA was that in traditional societies, and continuing well into the modern period, Jews have appeared as a highly visible and impermeable group that has segregated itself from the larger society. Moreover, there has often been resource competition and other conflicts of interest between Jews and gentiles. Social identity theory predicts that such conditions will lead to group conflict as well as to a number of psychological processes in which both Jews and gentiles develop negative stereotypes of the other group. These stereotypes need not be based on accurate information, and they typically result in positive evaluations of the ingroup and negative evaluations of the outgroup.
Chapter 2 describes the ideology and practice of anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism has been a very common phenomenon in many societies over prolonged periods of history. Anti-Semitism was widespread in the ancient world, and there is evidence that the priestly redactors of the Tanakh anticipated that anti-Semitism would be a chronic problem in the diaspora. Several theoretically important recurring themes of anti-Semitic writings are explored, including Jewish clannishness and cultural separatism, economic and cultural domination of gentiles, and the issue of loyalty to the other groups in the society.
Chapters 3-5 focus on three critical examples of Western anti-Semitic movements: the development of institutionalized anti-Semitism in the Roman Empire in the 4th century, the Iberian inquisitions, and the phenomenon of National Socialist anti-Semitism in the period 1933-1945 in Germany. The common denominator of these movements is that they involved a powerful sense of gentile group cohesion in opposition to Judaism, and it is argued that each of these movements may be profitably analyzed as a reaction to the presence of Judaism as a highly successful group evolutionary strategy. It is argued on theoretical and empirical grounds that powerful group strategies tend to beget opposing group strategies that in many ways provide a mirror image of the group which they combat.
Chapter 6 discusses various Jewish strategies for limiting anti-Semitism during different historical eras. Jewish groups have developed a highly flexible array of strategies in order to minimize the effects of anti-Semitism. Here I emphasize the strategies of crypsis during periods of persecution and community controls emanating from within the Jewish community proscribing Jewish behavior likely to lead to anti-Semitism. I also describe attempts to obtain favorable policies toward Jews by influencing the political process via lobbying and by payments to, personal relationships with, and performing indispensable services for gentile political leaders or elites. I also discuss various image-management strategies, including recruiting gentiles to support Jewish causes as well as controlling the public image of Judaism via censorship of defamatory materials and the dissemination of scholarly material supporting Jewish interests.
Chapter 7 discusses the long history of rationalizations of Judaism, particularly in the areas of historiography, religious apologia, and the development of Jewish theories of Judaism. Examples are provided indicating that Jewish religious and secular ideologies are highly malleable and are thus able to serve immediate needs for developing a positive conceptualization of the Jewish ingroup. These ideologies function to promote group allegiance among Jews as well as to present a positive image of Judaism to gentiles.
Many of the rationalizations of Judaism mentioned in Chapter 7 appear to involve deception and/or self-deception, and these themes are continued in Chapter 8. Jewish self-deception touches on a variety of issues, including personal identity, the causes and extent of anti-Semitism, the characteristics of Jews (e.g., economic success), and the role of Jews in the political and cultural process in traditional and contemporary societies. I argue that Jews, and especially those who strongly identify as Jews, would be relatively prone to self-deception by ignoring or rationalizing negative information about themselves and their ingroup.
Finally, the concluding chapter discusses whether Judaism has ceased to be an evolutionary strategy because of the current levels of intermarriage among some groups of diaspora Jews. Briefly, I argue that reports of the demise of Judaism'the "ever-dying people"'are greatly exaggerated.
Reviews of SEPARATION AND ITS DISCONTENTS: Toward an Evolutionary Theory of Anti-Semitism
Stephen K. Sanderson, Human Ethology Bulletin 13(4), 20-23, 1998. "I am certainly no expert on anti-Semitism, but my knowledge of the evolutionary biology of ethnicity and of the evidence presented by MacDonald suggests to me that a great deal of what he says rings true. Perhaps the most crucial things that have to be explained are that Jews have evoked anti-Semitic reactions almost everywhere they have gone, and that the nature of these reactions has been remarkably similar in diverse times and places. Theoretically, what intrigues me most about MacDonald's work on Judaism is his suggestion that not only the Jews, but Near Eastern peoples in general, have been biologically predisposed to be higher than average on collectivist and ethnocentric personality traits.... [Sanderson has reservations about my theoretical discussion of cultural group selection, but] this criticism of MacDonald should not be allowed to detract too much from what really is a remarkable, and remarkably courageous effort. MacDonald's books on Judaism have been an exceptional intellectual experience for me, and I eagerly look forward to reading his third book on Judaism."Aurelío José Figueredo, Politics and Life Sciences, 18, 136-138, 1999. The question of [MacDonald's] anti-Semitism is not an easy one to answer because it may be framed to refer to the author's intent which is not easy to determine. Having heard MacDonald hold forth on this subject on various occasions, my subjective impression is that his expressed affective response to Judaism is one of almost glowing admiration. Other than that, I cannot read minds. Objectively speaking, I can only judge whether the content of the book is inherently anti-Semitic, and my understanding of this theory is that it is not. MacDonald is very careful not to accuse Judaism of any particularly heinous or unusually pernicious practices in interethnic competition. He credits Jewish people with exactly the same instincts for survival and reproduction as the rest of the human race. The only reason he expects a strong negative response to Judaism on the part of rival ethnic groups is the relative success of that strategy in achieving what are otherwise universal human aspirations.
What might offend some of his readers is the matter-of-fact description of anti-Semitism as a set of evolved countermeasures to this otherwise highly successful strategy. There is no more a tone of moral outrage here than in his treatment of the competitive strategies (not all of them pleasant) historically associated with Judaism itself. MacDonald's tone is equally calm and descriptive throughout . He genuinely appears to be trying to figure out why people do the things they do to each other, for good or ill, and proceeds as if emotionalism might get in the way....
[MacDonald] does not see Judaism as a monolithic entity, but instead as a collection of diverse adaptive strategies that are often at odds with each other. MacDonald recognizes that individuals may adhere or not to group norms based on self-interest, and posits a specific psychological mechanism for making this computation in both Jews and non-Jews. Thus, for Judaism to work as a group strategy, it must recruit the cooperation of individuals by manipulating this monitoring mechanism such that the interests of each group member are sufficiently confluent with those of the group.
In summary, although this book raises many troubling issues for both Jews and Gentiles, it is definitely worth reading because it is important for all of us to take a good hard look at ourselves. It is not pleasant to have one's elaborate self-serving self-deceptions closely scrutinized, especially by others, but it is arguably necessary to our continued coexistence and survival on this planet.
Richard Lynn, Patterns of Prejudice (London), 33, 90-91, 1999. "MacDonald's book represents a major paradigm shift in the application of psychological theory to the understanding of antisemitism.... [MacDonald's thesis] is essentially that ethnocentrism is a fundamental component of the human psyche, and one that has become biologically programmed because it has conferred survival advantages during the course of human evolution. He presents a persuasive case for a new understanding not only of antisemitism but of the wider problems of ethnic and racial conflict."
Christopher Badcock: Personality and Individual Differences, 28, 200, 2000."The author argues that powerful group strategies tend to generate opposing ones that in many respects are their mirror images. Chapter 6 discusses Jewish responses to anti-Semitism, and Chapter 7 deals with reactive aspects of Jewish culture to anti-Jewish rhetoric. Here MacDonald is perhaps at his most interesting, particularly when discussing deception and self-deception as evolutionary strategies for groups.... Whatever one may think of this undertaking, there seems no doubting that the evolutionary paradigm is building on its successes in biology and rapidly becoming the basis of normal discourse in the humanities and the social sciences. Whether it will succeed in giving better insights into topics like anti-Semitism than its predecessors remains to be seen, but the trend seems unstoppable, and where MacDonald has boldly gone, many more are likely to follow."
REVIEWS OF THE CULTURE OF CRITIQUE Salter's entire review is here:
"The Marx of the Anti-Semites" by John Derbyshire: The American Conservative, March 10, 2003My Reply:
"Is MacDonald a Scholar?" Frank K. Salter: Human Ethology Bulletin, September, 2000.
Excerpts:
Apart from the political sensitivity of the subject, much of the problem facing MacDonald is that his knowledge is often too far ahead of his detractors to allow easy communication; there are not enough shared premises for constructive dialog. Unfortunately the knowledge gap is closing slowly because some of his most hostile critics, including colleagues who make serious ad hominem accusations, have not bothered to read MacDonald's books....On a personal note, it is overdue that John Tooby and Steven Pinker applied their professional skills seriously to critique MacDonald's work in the appropriate scientific forums. This now seems obligatory as a matter of professional duty given the severity of their attack on a colleague who has refrained from ad hominems throughout this sorry event. Still, it is now too late to reverse the harm done to both MacDonald's and probably HBES's reputation by what can only be judged reckless, unscholarly, and plain uncivil slurs. For these they should apologize....
MacDonald presents his readers with a broad and detailed scholarship that can usually be challenged only through matching his assiduous attention to many specialist literatures. I have made no attempt here to critique his theories beyond noting their mainstream documentation, but some of his most visible opponents have done even less, while adding personal and very public attacks to their criticisms. Unfortunately for those who rebel at his empirical claims, these are mostly not MacDonald's assertions but the expert opinions of leaders in various scholarly and scientific fields. Certainly, whether his theories are ultimately viable or not, MacDonald is a scholar of considerable analytical power and scope....
[F]or me what is most impressive, and this is the achievement of Culture of Critique, MacDonald has shown theoretical and methodological pathways linking the micro-level analysis of human behaviour with the macro-level dynamics of contemporary culture. He has done so on a narrow front, in a monumental case study of social relations affecting one people's struggle to survive and prosper, but that is a big start.
Kevin Hannan, Nationalities Papers, 28(4) (November 2000), 741-742. [MacDonald's] iconoclastic evaluation of psychoanalysis, Marxism, multiculturalism, and certain schools of thought in the social sciences will not generate great enthusiasm for his work in academe, yet this book is well written and has much to offer the reader interested in ethnicity and ethnic conflict.
A Race Apart. Paul Gottfried:Chronicles,June 2000, 27-29: Kevin MacDonald's study of the Jewish people in sociobiological perspective will not likely help his career, for reasons having nothing to do with the author's scholarship or his accumulation of pertinent evidence. While treating his subjects respectfully, attributing to Ashkenazic Jews a mean I.Q. one standard deviation higher than that of white gentiles, he commits the indiscretion of describing Jewish behavioral characteristics noted as well by anti-Semites: for example, an aggressive demeanor toward the core cultures of host peoples in combination with the practice of ritually and socially prescribed separation from gentiles, which he ascribes to a form of collective consciousness that may be inborn as well as culturally acquired. MacDonald presents this consciousness as endemic to a group that has worked strenuously to preserve its genotypal identity....
Click here for more of the review and two rounds of exchange between Gottfried and me:
The Jewish Question Once Again. Hugh Perry: The Occidental Quarterly: Volume I, Number 2
Published by Praeger of Westport, Connecticut, MacDonald's books, A People that Shall Dwell Alone (1994), Separation and Its Discontents (1998) and The Culture of Critique (1998) bring a high degree of intellectual sophistication and scholarship to the Jewish question. The author launches no emotional jihads. In fact, until the end of the last volume there is little hint of where he feels the data he has amassed should lead the reader.
Essentially, MacDonald believes that Judaism is a 'group evolutionary strategy.' It has emphasized several qualities such as 'separation, altruism and community control' that have enabled Jews to endure throughout the centuries when other ancient peoples have long since disappeared. In addition, MacDonald sees Jewry as having 'emphasized eugenic practices and cultural practices that foster a specific set of phenotypic traits (especially intelligence, high' investment parenting and allegiance to the group) that are advantageous in stratified human societies. By specializing in these traits, Jews have been able to compete successfully with gentile members of many societies for positions in which literacy and intelligence are important.' As time has gone by 'Jews have become specialized for occupational niches at the upper levels of the human energy pyramid.' They are the 'consumers of energy produced by lower -- status gentile members of society, laboring in the areas of primary production.'
However, MacDonald's thesis goes much further. It is not simply a case of the Jews doing better than gentiles in certain basic skills and thereby enabling themselves to the fruits of their labor. The Jews also pursue a policy of criticizing gentile social assumptions and stability and seek to undermine the group homogeneity of gentile societies. 'To a considerable extent,' MacDonald writes, 'the fons et origo of the social policies and cultural shifts that have resulted in the dangerous situation now rapidly developing in the United States has been the Jewish dominated intellectual and political movements...' The Jewish strategy has gone so far that today it is 'questionable' whether in the immediate future 'Western individualist societies are able to defend the legitimate interests of the European-derived peoples.'
MacDonald ably demonstrates the prominent role that Jews have played in those intellectual movements of the twentieth century that have effectively destroyed Western gentile cultures' self perception. This critique has been launched on two fronts. Through Freudianism, Marxism, and the Old and New Lefts it has made war against the religious, moral, aesthetic, and behavioral norms of gentile groups. Second, in their role as originators and popularizers of the Boasian view of anthropology and the Frankfort School of Social Research, Jews have sought to discredit all gentile group allegiances as either illusory (Franz Boas) or mentally deranged (Frankfort School). To a large extent many of the conclusions of all the above critiques form the ruling ideology of contemporary America and Europe....
In MacDonald's description of Judaic influences the picture is of conflict between Jews and non-Jews. Missing is the simple fact that for many gentiles there is no such conflict and has not been one for centuries. As just quoted, Oliver maintained that the decline of the white world is to be found in 'its own fatuity and degeneracy.'
The entire review can be found at:
Click on: The Occidental Quarterly: Volume I, Number 2
Review by Dwight D. Murphy, a retired law professor formerly at the University of Wichita.This is one of the more important books of our time, and deserves to be studied seriously by every student of modern life and by everyone who cares about whether Western civilization continues its slide into oblivion.
Kevin MacDonald, professor of psychology at California State University, Long Beach, examines honestly, dispassionately and courageously the role that ethnically-conscious Jews have played during the past century in the many movements that have made up what I and others have called "the alienation of the intellectual" (against the mainstream of Western society). MacDonald doesn't speak of "alienation," but instead of a "culture of critique," which is the same thing.
So great has that Jewish involvement been that it constitutes a fact of major significance in understanding the alienation and its power. In Chapter 11 of my book Understanding the Modern Predicament, I examined several causes of the alienation. The discussion there is certainly incomplete without adding the details of MacDonald's study. The role of Jews in cultural alienation should be added as a major, and often central, ingredient.
At the same time, it is important to notice that MacDonald is giving a conscientious rendering of only one part of a much larger phenomenon. His book in itself shows no awareness that the "intelligentsia" has been alienated against the "bourgeoisie" for thousands of years -- for many centuries on behalf of aristocratic values and then, beginning in the early eighteenth century, on behalf of whatever allies it could recruit in an ideological war against the man of industry and commerce, and indeed against the entire way of life of an "individualist" society. What MacDonald says informs us that a great many Jews, pursuing ethnically-conscious aims, have been part of that more recent phase of the alienation (although he speaks only to the twentieth century and does not include the eighteenth and nineteenth). But, we must add: so have a great many non-Jews. The alienation, and the ideological seeking of allies seriatum in all disaffected or unassimilated groups, has been a much larger movement than one of "evolutionary strategy on the part of Jews." It has encompassed the entire Left and the anti-bourgeois Right, including fascism and Nazism and their progenitors, and has claimed many fathers, gentile and Jew alike. (See Benda's famous The Treason of the Intellectuals, where he tells of the flaming anti-bourgeois thinking of the nineteenth century in Europe.)
The entire review can be seen at:
Review by "Stanley Hornbeck" appearing in American Renaissance as archived on the American Renaissance website. This review is a good example of the reception my books have received from pro-European ethnic activists. Another such review, by Ian Buckley, in Spearhead, a UK publication:http://www.kevinmacdonald.net/reviews.html
This is a review in Polish: Amazon.com has quite a few reviews, both pro and con, and Barnes & Noble has a few.
On the positive side, from Amazon.com, is the following unsigned review:
Reviewer: A reader from Suwanee, GA United States:
MacDonald's work is an indispensable rosetta stone for understanding five of the key intellectual and political movements of the 20th century: communism, Boasian anthropology, psychoanalysis, Critical Theory and radical immigration reform. One cannot easily dismiss MacDonald's conclusion that the leaders of the last century's most socially destructive movements were people with a deep sense of their Jewish identity because so much of his evidence is furnished by Jewish thinkers and participants of the very movements under discussion. The quotations are deftly woven into the well-reasoned central thesis of the work, namely, that the movements, intrinsically hostile to European gentile culture, were developed and then energetically advanced by charismatic, secular Jewish authoritarian figures and their followers as an ethnic advancement strategy. Men such as Franz Boas, Sigmund Freud, T.W. Adorno and others founded universalistic sounding ideological systems based on the thinnest veneer of science for the purpose of radically transforming gentile culture. The great Jewish minds were more than willing to sacrifice objectivity, science and the search for universal knowledge in the name of identifying and removing what they believed to be the root causes of anti-Semitism.
The criticisms of Western culture advanced by Freud and the Frankfurt School emphasized that the West was dangerously neurotic because of sexual repression, extant authoritarian social structures such as the two parent family, Christianity and, more generally, anything which might provide European gentiles with a sense of ethnic consciousness and identity (e.g., nationalism in whatever form). As MacDonald notes, the very institutions and cultural practices attacked as being pathogenic and the root causes of anti-Semitism were widely practiced by the Jews themselves. By redefining strong traditional gentile practices as pathogenic, the Jews were able to give themselves a decisive advantage in the struggle to advance to the highest social positions. At the same time, they preserved Judaism as a distinct and unassimilated group in pursuit of its own advancement. From communism to the 1965 Immigration Reform Act, these predominantly Jewish movements have insisted that gentiles make radical and even suicidal social reforms in response to their interminable critiques. At the same time, Judaism has avoided practicing what it preaches. Can anyone imagine a white European professor at a prestigious private university traveling around telling other whites that they should only marry and breed with other whites? That professor would be stripped of tenure and bounced out in a gale of denunciations by his school. Yet this is precisely what Deborah Lipstadt, professor of Jewish studies at Emory, has done for years. She along with a number of Jews has argued against intermarrying with gentiles in order to keep Judaism pure. Does she mean racially pure? (MacDonald provides a juicy quote from a 19th Reform rabbi who argued that Judaism must be kept "racially" pure. The Likud Party incorporated the word "purification" into their party's position on the Arab problem.)
MacDonald analyzes one of the foundational texts of modern sociology, The Authoritarian Personality, and shows that throughout, the primarily Jewish researchers draw all sorts of conclusions from their subjects without any apparent objective norm. Whenever interviewees express a strong sense of love and admiration for their parents, the researchers conclude that they are hiding repressed feelings of anger and frustration. Conversely, children of broken homes who express ambivalent feelings about their parents are described as "healthy" and "honest". How are these conclusions drawn? The examples provided by MacDonald are informative in that they reveal a total departure from Western culture's insistence on reason and science being the guides in the advancement of knowledge. Even today when the methods and conclusions of these ideologies have been adequately debunked by those working in the social sciences, they still carry authority in the popular mind thanks to the tireless mendacity of such figures as Stephen Jay Gould. Advances in the fields of the social sciences and psychology have been set back by decades by the dogmatic shams concocted by certain Jewish ethnic activists. Even now, whites and blacks alike have cast aside high investment childrearing in a two-parent family (hotbed for gentile neuroses) to pursue lifestyles destructive of individual and communal good in response to the recommends of 20th century patriarchs.
For those who would dismiss MacDonald's thesis, it's interesting to reflect on the current ethnic makeup of the neoconservatives surrounding Bush and who run such influential opinion journals as The Weekly Standard. In launching the recent war of aggression against Iraq, the Bush administration and its coterie of (heavily Jewish) scribblers at National Review and The Weekly Standard defended the indefensible by couching their reasons in universalistic moralisms. Consistent with the pattern of Jewish behavior described by MacDonald, they keep close ties to their own kind, influencing the intellectual and political vision of extreme right wing Likudniks back in Israel (think of Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, et. al.). Likewise, they've systematically redefined America and her relationship to the world (shades of the anti-restrictionists discussed in Chp. 7 all over again) in order to present our republic as an international long run defender of democracy. This anti-historical interpretation conveniently serves the interests of Israel while leaving Americans to shoulder the long term and short term consequences. In the vein of David Frum and Jonah Goldberg, they've slurred and denounced critics of neoconservative policy as anti-Semites regardless of whether it is warranted or not. From the far left to the far right, everyone who has questioned the motives of the recent war has been tried, condemned and sentenced to the loony fringe. Likewise, they have adopted white boys like Wm. Bennett and Fred Barnes to serve as shabbas goyim in their campaign to turn America into a militaristic empire. These behavior patterns are entirely consistent with those covered by MacDonald in his examination of the Big Five Kosher Ideologies in C of C. The times have changed, but the players who are working against the interests and well-being of European-Americans have only grown more powerful. People should recognize that the duel for the soul of the West is an ethnic competition between two groups with very different histories, cultures, and desires.
Review by Caryl JohnstonThe Sword in the Mouth
March 27, 2005
Commentaries on Literature About the Jews(3)
Kevin MacDonald:The Culture of Critique: An Evolutionary Analysis of Jewish Involvement in Twentieth-Century Intellectual and Political Movements, Published by Praeger in 1994; reissued by 1st books in 2002.
Kevin MacDonald contends that "intellectual activity in the service of evolutionary goals has been a characteristic of Judaism dating from the ancient world," and the third volume of his trilogy on the Jews argues the case by examining several intellectual movements in which Jews played a dominant role: Anthropology as developed by Franz Boas and his school; Psychoanalysis developed by Sigmund Freud; and the Frankfurt School of Social Research (also known as the Congress for Cultural Freedom) developed by Theodore Adorno, and Max Horkeimer, with Erich Fromm, Hannah Arendt, and others.
Framing these social and intellectual movements is the larger question of the Jewish critique of gentile culture and the enormous investment of Jewish lobbying groups and influence of public opinion to favor large-scale immigration of non-European groups into the USA and other Western societies. Concerning the general "culture of critique," the embrace of Marxism by large numbers of Jews and the over-representation of Jews in Russian Bolshevism is examined. This topic has been more recently taken up by Yuri Slezkine in his recent book, The Jewish Century [Princeton, 2004]
An article in today's Philadelphia Inquirer reminds us that the question of Jewish ethnicity remains of vital importance to many Jews. Describing the adoption by many Jewish couples of Asian infants - mostly girls, and mostly Chinese - the article mentions that, for many Jews, the practice forces them to confront 'what a Jewish kid looks like.' The author of a book on the widepread practice of Asian adoptions remarked that such children may face prejudice within the Jewish community itself -- "We should expect it," he said, "It would be foolish of us not to acknowledge that race is an issue in our culture."
Kevin MacDonald is an evolutionary psychologist at the University of California, Long Beach, and he became interested in Judaism as a "collective evolutionary strategy" that merited study. His first book, A People That Shall Dwell Alone: Judaism as a Group Evolutionary Strategy was an evolutionary study of Judaism, and the second, Separation and Its Discontents: Toward an Evolutionary Theory of anti-Semitism presented an evolutionary theory of anti-Semitism. The third and final volume under review here presents the several 20th century intellectual movements, spearheaded by people who strongly identified themselves as Jews, as another variant of the evolutionary strategy, as many of them, either overtly or covertly, saw these movements as serving Jewish interests. Their intellectual advocacy was couched in a language of moral universalism that disguised moral particularism -- i.e., a way to serve particular interests of Jews. Thus the study of such movements becomes inevitably involved with issues of deception or self-deception.
The Culture of Critique is a portent of what I suspect will become a passionate debate in the next phase of intellectual history -- that of coming to grips with "how the Western world has become Judaized." Knowledge of this fact is certainly nothing new, although any expressions that this development may not be altogether positive are considered de trop. Paul Johnson's History of the Jews, a book entirely favorable to its subject, speaks of this "Judaization" in the realm of finance. Johnson remarks that
"It was the unconscious collective instinct of the Jews to depersonalize finance and to rationalize the general economic process... The Jews could do this because while intensely conservative (as a rule) within their own narrow and isolated world, they had no share in or emotional commitment to society as a whole, and so could watch its old traditions, methods and institutions being demolished without a pang -- could, indeed, play a leading role in the process of destruction. They were thus natural capitalist entrepreneurs." (Italics mine.)
Kevin MacDonald picks up the note, but plays a less complimentary tune. Where Paul Johnson sees anti-Semitism as the perverse habit of Christianity, MacDonald sees it as arising primarily from conflicts of interest and loyalty. He points to the inevitable double standard of Jewish rationalism, when it condemned racial bias in gentile society while overlooking its own. In Weimar Germany anti-Semitism was fueled by the perception that Jews attempted to undermine gentile social cohesion while remaining highly committed to a cohesive group themselves. To acknowledge this social tension is not to jutify the Nazi persecution of the Jews. It is only to begin to take a step towards understanding it.
Leftist ideologies, couched in the language of moral universalism, appealed to Jews because it was a way of minimizing Jew-gentile differences while allowing the Jews to preserve their group identity. Thus radical movements became a form of "crypto-Judaism" -- For "Jews can remain Jews because being a Jew is no longer important." The Jewish dominance of the Left, especially the Old Left, may have been a factor in causing it to be less effective in the recruitment of the gentile working class. In any case, the Left in the USA appears to be a scattered and a spent force, and the Jewish Old Left has metamorphosed - metastatized - into the neoconservative New Right. The spent force of progressivist thought in the US has continued to sink deeper into the mire of atomism that caused it to be rejected by many Americans. Abortion, same sex marriage, and feminism are all destructive of the social bonds of gentile society. "Radical individualism among gentiles," as MacDonald comments, "is an excellent prescription for the continuation of Judaism as a cohesive group." That is because the high-investment parenting and strong group cohesion of Jews are relatively unaffected by such atomizing and disintegrating forces that are tearing America apart. It is no wonder that "white America" pulled back in revulsion, no wonder they voted for George Bush, even against their interests. But "white America" rejected such an atomized leftism only to embrace a fundamentalist and Zionized Christianity. Truly, this was a diabolic exchange!
The Culture of Critique is written in the sober language of social science. But it is perhaps a harbinger of things to come. The Holocaust Cult prevents the open discussion of Jewish ethnocentrism while it memorializes the failed ideology of German racialism. Sooner or later people will demand that these monuments to Hitler be pulled down, and that Jews likewise repudiate the racialist element in their own faith.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A "culture of critique" analysis needs to be done of feminism, that daughter of Marxism -- "recycled class war adjusted for gender," as Henry Makow puts it. In its sheer destructive power, feminism has been more effective in American society even than ideologies of class or race war. Doublethink, deception and double standards have characterized the modern feminist movement ever since Betty Friedan compared the lot of the American housewife to that of a concentration camp victim. I don't know if anyone has ever done a study of the proportion of Jewish women in the feminist movement, especially its leaders. That study might prove to be very revealing. In my view feminism is mainly a masked critique of the patriarchalist and anti-womanist disposition of Judaism. For Jewish women to have criticized it would have been too threatening - and even, with the strong tendency of Jews to close ranks and eschew ethnic self-criticism -- it would have been unthinkable. Hence the critique of the "patriarchy" was displaced to gentile society.
In any case, feminism has led to the 'economization' of womanhood -- that is, to the subjugation of the feminine to impersonal economic forces. This has resulted in a marked decline of mothering and parenting skills and commitments in gentile society, as well as a spiritual loss of womanhood as a potential reservoir of moral influence. American society is no less "male- dominated" than it was in 1950. If anything it is more so, even though many women have achieved high incomes and professional standing. Had those tendencies been allowed to develop naturally, which in the pre-radical feminist age they showed every sign of doing, women might have been less inclined to reject the inner dignity and reticence which so often inspired the moral power of their female forebears.
No comments:
Post a Comment