Anti-Semitism, as distinguished from other examples of human violence, has taken on an independent life of its own, as demonstrated by the regularity of its recurrence on almost every occasion of socio-economic stress throughout history, and by the fact that it has far outlasted all other examples of group persecution.
The Public Broadcasting System recently validated this fact in its series entitled, "The Longest Hatred." By now, the sheer historic mass and absolute predictability of Anti-Semitism has become so much a matter of second nature to most of the world's population, as to surpass in its impact even the much-touted virtues ascribed to Judaism itself.
It is ironic that Anti-Semitism has worked so perversely to thwart the goals of its proponents, by providing the extrinsic pressure necessary to keep the Jews together, thereby blocking their more natural tendency to diffuse and vanish into the universal society around them. The vaunted clannishness of Jews, then, is merely an example of the same sort of involuntary camaraderie that is imposed on the occupants of a lifeboat.
Setting aside the undeniable delight derived from thumbing their noses at their tormentors by surviving the most determined efforts to annihilate them, and stripped of all its folklore, the persistence of the Jews is based largely on the need to fulfill what has always been de facto their primary sociologic mission - that of replenishing the supply of victims for the next Holocaust. Their secondary mission is far more utilitarian, if somewhat bizarre. Through centuries of practice, the Jewish community has developed an unrivaled expertise in establishing support mechanisms to rescue the remnants of the victims it unwittingly provides.
As described in chickens, the Pecking Order decrees that the bird at the top of the order shall have preferred access to food and other amenities that are important to chickens, with violent consequences assured for those who do not acknowledge this primacy. Only after the dominant chicken has eaten, is the second-in-command allowed to do so. This social structure is maintained by the regular reassertion of the fact that the second-in-command can defeat all the others in combat except the leader; and so on down the ladder. At the bottom of the order the weakest chicken is designated, not only to be denied food until all the others have finished eating, but to serve in a sacrificial ritual in which it is pecked to death by the rest of the flock.
This lethal process is initiated by the leader who who begins by pecking at the base of the victim's tail feathers until blood is drawn. This triggers an explosion of mass violence on the part of the rest of the flock, which does not subside until the chosen victim lies dead and eviscerated. Only then does the flock resume its normal tranquil activity, seemingly reassured by this validation of the integrity of their social structure. The final act in the sacrificial ritual occurs with the selection of a new weakling, which then awaits its own fate until the time when it again becomes necessary to reaffirm the supremacy of the order.
Despite the fact that man professes to be "created in the image of God", and to dwell on a plane only "slightly lower than the angels", I find it more than a little disconcerting to realize that millions of humans react to the stimuli of yarmulkes or Stars of David, in exactly the same manner as chickens react to bloody tail feathers. Because Holocausts are simply the reassertion of the Pecking Order in humans, it appears that not only among lowly chickens does might make right!
Additional examples of this deeply ingrained impulse toward mass violence can be found in the combat-to-the-death of Roman gladiators, at every boxing match, at the "moment of truth" in the bull ring when the animal is finally put out of its misery, and every time a football player lies injured and motionless on the turf. At each of these climactic moments a tense hush envelops the spectators, one that can only be described as a strange mixture of compassion with unspoken gratification. It is only after this reaction ends and play is resumed that expressions of concern for the victim again become appropriate.
