Perfection Becomes Jews

This is my column as submitted for November 2, 2007. The editor thought it a bit risqué in places so toned it down. Alas, the lass tampered with perfection:

Another letter from my atheist friend, Pauly Poopydingus, with a notarized permission-to-publish attached. But first an admission of an error that has been haunting me for the past two weeks. In the last issue I spoke of a lecture I attended on the topic: “Did Primo Levi ever forgive the Germans for their treatment of the Jews?” I then used that as a jumping off point to discuss whether contemporary American policies re: tortures of captives, are something for which we will have to ask forgiveness in the future. Some who support the administration's policies in Iraq took offense, as is their right, but one pointed out what I acknowledge is an error in typing, though not in judgment. I wrote, from the perspective of someone who did not suffer the agonies of Auschwitz, “Is it time to forgive the Nazis? Levi asked. I ask if it’s time to forgive ourselves. Maybe in the first case the answer is yes; the Nazis are dead. In the second, only if we want to avert our eyes, like the good Germans.” My mistake was in conflating Germans and Nazis. I intended to ask, as Levi had, “Is it time to forgive the Germans” but instead of “Germans,” I wrote “Nazis.” To the question I intended to ask, “Is it time to forgive the Germans,” I stick with my original emphatic “maybe;” to the question I didn't intend, “Is it time to forgive the Nazis?” I respond with “NO; not now, not ever!”

As to Poopydingus, he writes from the safety of far-off Cincinnati that “Jews should stop being angry with Ann Coulter. She’s an exhibitionist who feeds off of her own self-created self-importance by spewing forth one quotable stupidity after another (Liberals are traitors; Edwards is a “faggot”; 9/11 widows are enjoying their husbands’ deaths—there are others, but those suffice).”

About then I began to wonder where Poopydingus was going with this, but he never disappoints.

“But her latest foray into fatuousness, that America should be a nation of Christians and that while Jews (I imagine she means, Republican Jews) can go to heaven, Christians look forward to the time of ‘perfecting’ Jews into Christianity. That, Josh, is something Jews should embrace, cherish and adore.”

Which led me to ask, “Why should I appreciate Coulter, exactly? Isn’t this just more anti-Semitic assault, like in the bad old days before toleration, diversity and the commonality of man became the guiding principles of liberalism?” Poopydingus continued:

“We live under the patronizing presumption that there’s such a thing as ‘Judeo-Christian civilization.’ Verily I say unto you, old chum, there ain’t no such thing. There are Jews and there are Christians (and Muslims and Hindus and Buddhists and, God bless us, atheists). But in the search for commonality, to avoid conflict, you monotheists have ignored a glaring reality. Here it is, ready for it? Better put on your sunglasses because you’re gonna be blinded by the truth, knocked off your ass, like St Paul on the road to Damascus: If you believed in the divinity of Jesus, you’d be a Christian! If you believed that Muhammad was the last and greatest of God’s prophets, you’d be a Muslim. If a Protestant believed that the Bishop of Rome is infallible in matters of faith and morals he’d really be a Catholic. But none of these things apply. We all think each others religions are bull___ (will they print that?) don’t we? Except me who says they’re all bull___. Of course Coulter spoke as she did! She’s a Christian who believes that all other religions are bull___. Christians have believed this since the dawn of their religion. Wake up, Josh; smell the incense! They only kept Jews around as witnesses to the success of their Truth or to borrow Money. You guys, anxious to be accepted by the majority, fearful that if they ever remember that you deny the divinity of the Christ they worship they’ll have another pogrom, readily plunge headlong into the canard that there’s such a thing as Judeo-Christian civilization. Pshaw! You Jews can be proud of what you’ve done; you don’t need to hide behind a cassock. So she offended you by reminding you of an eternal truth—that Christians think Jews have missed the boat. Well, you think they’ve jumped ship. Relax; re-assert yourself, now that you know what the true believers really think of you.”

It’s obvious that poor ol’ Poopydingus is on the fast track to Gehenna. But he never disappoints.