Conversation with Dr. Norman Finkelstein on “I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get to It!”: Independent Political Analyst (1)

Author(s): Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Publication (Outlet/Website): In-Sight: Independent Interview-Based Journal

Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2023/08/22

Abstract

Dr. Norman Finkelstein remains one of the foremost experts and independent scholars on the Israeli occupation and the crimes against the Palestinians. He expanded some research into more academic freedom issues in the newest text.His most recent book is I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get To It!: Heretical Thoughts on Identity Politics, Cancel Culture, and Academic Freedom (2022). Finkelstein discusses: I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get To It!; Ibram X. Kendi; Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg; Tariq Ali; pronouns; cancellation; virtue signalling and virtue. 

Keywords: academic freedom, Ibram X. Kendi, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Noam Chomsky, Norman Finkelstein, Norman X. Finkelstein, Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, Robin DiAngelo, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Tariq Ali, virtue, virtue signalling, Woke Left.

Conversation with Dr. Norman Finkelstein on “I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get to It!”: Independent Political Analyst (1)

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: Okay, we are now recording. This is an interview with Dr. Norman Finkelstein on his new text, I’ll Burn That Bridge When I Get There (sic). 

Dr. Norman Finkelstein: No, “When I Get To It!”

Jacobsen: When I Get To It! I apologize. 

Finkelstein: No problem. 

Jacobsen: So, first things first, your original name was Norman Gary Finkelstein. 

Finkelstein: That is correct.

Jacobsen: Since writing this critique of Woke Left sociopolitical commentaries, as per the cover page, your name has changed to “Norman X. Finkelstein”. Why the change? Is this part of the normal acidic humour playing of Ibram X. Kendi?

Finkelstein: Well, my name hasn’t changed at all, except for the cover of the book. If you look at the title page and everywhere else, it is Norman Finkelstein. The cover of the book is supposed to be garish and humorous. So, I thought I would do what all these Woke people do, which is try to create a brand for themselves. So, I am kind of mocking it. The current brand, as you know, is: at every possible juncture, opportunity, and occasion, insert an “X”. We have “Latin X”. We have “Ibram X. Kendi.” We have X this and X that. The whole Wokeness phenomenon is, in my opinion, mostly branding. They are buzzwords, slogans, devoid of any intellectual or political content. So, on the cover of the book, I was mocking that. 

Jacobsen: At the current moment, I am working in a stable. For those who know your work very well, you were mentored by (Prof.) Noam Chomsky. My ears are perking up about the story in the text about Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg when he asked, “Are you in Chomsky’s stable?”, when you told him that you hold him in highest esteem. You never heard from him again. 

Finkelstein: That is correct.

Jacobsen: There are numerous stories. Tariq Ali said the book is about settling scores. I don’t know. To me, it is more providing personal examples plus the regular incisive scholarship. Do you have sort of further responses to the critique or criticism of Tariq Ali that is the book is sort of meandering more than direct?

Finkelstein: Okay, I guess, I’m not quite capturing your question. So, if you can repeat it, I’ll be able better to engage it. 

Jacobsen: Sure. So, you give personal stories within the text. As I work in a stable, my eyes perked up about Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, when he asked you, “Are you in Chomsky’s stable?” You stated that you hold him in the highest esteem. You never heard from him again. There are numerous stories like this within the text, where people completely distance themselves from you or cut themselves off from you, or cancel you. Tariq Ali said the book is about settling scores. I don’t know. To me, it is simply more about providing personal examples plus regular incisive scholarship. Do you think this criticism of Tariq Ali is appropriate, or there is a more nuanced take to sort of respond to that?

Finkelstein: The book consists of 8 chapters. Then there are separate conclusions to what I call Part I and Part II. Those 8 chapters, chapter 2 is an intensive examination of Kimberlé Crenshaw. Chapter 3 is Ta-Nehisi Coates. Chapter 4 is Robin DiAngelo. Chapter 5, which runs to 100 pages, is Ibram X. Kendi. Chapter 6 is Barack Obama. And then there are two chapters on academic freedom. So, apart from chapter 1, which is a personal overview and introduction to the rest of the book. Apart from chapter 1, there is no personal score-settling at all. It is analyses, analysis of texts, trying to look for the logic, looking for the reasoning, looking for the evidence, for various claims made by Kimberlé Crenshaw, Ta-Nehisi Coates, Ibram X. Kendi, Robin DiAngelo. There’s no score-settling at all. It has nothing to do with score-settling. It is an analysis of texts. So, I think my reasonable inference is Tariq Ali read about 10 pages of the book and then discarded it. 

Jacobsen: You note how in the current culture the party line can shift rapidly. This can create a basis for a sense of pervasive unease. How does this rapid shifting back-and-forth of the forbidden, the verboten, or not, make everyone vulnerable to cancellation?

Finkelstein: Because in the current climate, you can never really know if something you say is going to offend some person, and then you get hauled, for example, if you work in a company. Or if you work in a university, you get hauled to human resources. You are diagnosed as in desperate need of some sort of counselling therapy sessions. I know, when I teach, I am always wondering, “If I say that, am I going to be crossing some red line of some person?” Yesterday, just yesterday, an absolutely nice student, an absolutely nice student, came up to me at the end of class. I understood some students, a small number but still a small number, are wearing masks. One of the students was wearing a mask. I was unable to judge from this person’s physiognomy, which is the fancy word for face. I was unable to judge whether this person was a male or a female. The person had very long hair. The person, I should say, was also Vietnamese. Very long hair, almost like you would say, “Native American, Geronimo” style, and I thought his person was a female. Although, I was always not sure. I was not sure. The person came up to me at the end of class, very nice person, absolutely the nicest person, and said, “You referred to me in class a Mrs., but my pronoun is he. And I’m only bringing this to your attention because it may cause confusion among other students”. So, the person was not being accusatory at all, but just trying to be clarifying. And then, I just got so confused. I’m trying to think, “Is this person – so to speak – just a guy? And I couldn’t tell because the person had the mask on. Or was this person a trans person?” And in any case, I just got seized by confusion. I don’t know what’s going on. I am beginning to worry, “Did I make a mistake here? Did I make a mistake there?” It is just crazy. I’m trying to teach a class on international law. I have 36 students. And I am very proud of the fact that within approximately 3 weeks – even though, I am on the verge of 70 years old – that I make it a point to learn every student’s name. I want to learn every student’s name. I am at the point where I know every student’s name. It tells me my memory is still functioning, alright? Now, on top of learning every student’s name, I have a new burden. I have to learn everybody’s pronouns of which, you know, there approximately, now, 100. I think this is complete lunacy. Period, full stop. Pronouns simply designate your biological sex, that’s all I am interested in because there are certain aspects of public life where you need to know a person’s biological sex. What bathroom they use, what locker room they use, what sports team they are on, so, biological sex plays a public role. As to your world of social identification, you see yourself as a woman. You see yourself as a man. You see yourself as this, that, and the other. That’s your business. I’m not interested. The classroom is not a dating app. I’m there to teach. And I find this whole thing completely – this pronoun thing – insane. Now, I recognize that this person was acting in completely good faith, wasn’t trying to terrorize me, as there was another student who did try to terrorize me and it didn’t work. One student who wanted me to publicly apologize in class each time I misidentified this person’s pronouns. Sorry! The Stalin Era is over. We’re not having purge trials and confession. I’m very pleased that I know your name. Now, don’t start terrorizing me with your pronouns, because I don’t give a darn what your pronouns are, I’m here to teach. 

Jacobsen: You did state in the text that you would tell someone your pronouns if they tell you their net worth. 

Finkelstein: That’s correct. Because I am a little tired of these privileged people trying to show off to me how politically correct they are, and how progressive they are, and how regressive you are, and how regressive I am. Privileged people have nothing better to do with their time than to sit around contemplating their pronouns. Privileged people telling me how privileged I am. Because I am white and male. I don’t need people from Martha’s Vineyard lecturing me on privilege, on my privilege. 

Jacobsen: You had an incident on a television show that you’ve been on for 30 years. Where, I believe, a one-sentence statement came back as a retort from a woman, “Your days of white male privilege are over”.

Finkelstein: The person said, “The days of white male privilege are over”.

Jacobsen: Why the direct-to-banning reaction rather than something more mild, even if there was a disagreement with the behaviour or the statement?

Finkelstein: You should ask that person. 

Jacobsen: You call this culture a “dictatorship of virtue signalling”. 

Finkelstein: That’s what it is.

Jacobsen: Why is the focus on virtue signalling rather than virtue? Isn’t virtue its own signal?

Finkelstein: In order to gain respect for your political commitments, for your mode of behaviour, respect is earned by sacrifice, we respect Martin Luther King because he was not one to talk the talk. He was willing to walk the walk. He was willing to walk it straight into knowingly, his grave. That’s what we respect. Not just your avowed values, or your willingness to sacrifice for those values, that’s why we respect Ghandi. That’s why we respect Socrates. There’s no sacrifice involved in scolding other people about their pronouns. Where is the sacrifice? This whole Woke culture doesn’t require, of all these Woke people, any sacrifice whatsoever. We respect people like Paul Robeson because he was the most renowned black figure in the world as a concert performer, as an athlete, as an intellectual. He sacrificed all of that to the point of his whole career, his whole professional life, being destroyed. He sacrificed that for his principles. What sacrifice do these Woke people make? What price do they pay? That’s why it is virtue signalling. It’s not virtue. Because you pay no price for it. You just carry on. You perform for the cameras, displaying your virtue. All I see is people making a mint from the purported virtue. I see Ibram X. Kendi getting $10,000,000 from the former CEO of Twitter, Jack Dorsey. I see all these Black Lives Matter people like Patrice Cullors going on real estate buying sprees because they came up with this hashtag, #BlackLivesMatter, enriching themselves, cutting the contracts with Netflix, or book contracts enriching themselves from their purported virtue. I don’t see sacrifice. I see enrichment. I see entrepreneurship. I see a band of crooks.

Jacobsen: This focus on identity seems to be a convenient shift. You note some of this in the text about the Democratic Party. Away from class warfare, in the sense of a focus on class consciousness along with identities, for any kind of political movement, it sort of deflects from real economic hardships people are having and any sort of mobilization on a socioeconomic, class base.

Finkelstein: It’s not just the shift. The identity politics is used as a juggernaut to instrumentalize, in order to destroy a class politics. That’s not just theoretical. It was the Angel Davis, the Kimberlé Crenshaws, the Ta-Nehisi Coates. It was all of them attacking Bernie Sanders during the most important class-based mobilization in the last century, since the 1930s. It’s them attacking Bernie Sanders for “being weak” on the black question, for not being with it like Amazon. So, Kimberlé Crenshaw says all the action is happening among the big corporations, like Amazon having a Black Lives Matter banner on its website. That, to her, is where all the action is, and Bernie is just this old Jewish schmuck talking about class struggle. It’s designed – it’s designed – to wreck and destroy a real class base, mass movement, which, unlike identity politics, does threaten the powers that be. 

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