About 30 activists turned out to protest the talk by Gilad Atzmon at Bookmarks bookshop, significantly outnumbering those who actually went in to the meeting. Several of these had attended for the express purpose of denouncing Atzmon and his views, and it is clear that very few attended in order to listen to and learn from him. Numbers of attendees were further restricted by the (unannounced) decision to make the meeting ticket only, thus preventing even some SWP members from attending. Of course, none of the pickets was allowed to attend.
Although some of the audience took our leaflets, and a few engaged in debate with us, the SWP’s leadership treated us with arrogant contempt, refusing even to acknowledge, let alone touch, the leaflets; and, in some cases, aggressively pushing us aside without even asking us to move.
Despite earlier attacks by the SWP that, by calling the picket, we were “lining up with the AWL”, they, and other sectarians and Zionist apologists were totally absent, and the protesters were all clearly opposed to Israel and its Zionist practices. We were further admonished that “reasonable people” like Hilary Rose and Moshé Machover opposed the picket. In fact, Hilary turned up and stood with us in the protest, while Moshé, who was unable to come, sent the SWP a letter strongly supporting and endorsing the picket.
It’s clear that the SWP had no idea of the extent and depth of revulsion at Atzmon’s ideas, and the anger at them for giving him a platform. They have been given something to think about.
After the picket, most of us went for a drink, and were later joined by sympathisers who had attended the meeting. We learned from them that Atzmon had not been received well, that no-one had spoken in his defence, and that several SWP members were apparently in dismay at the views they heard, and the damage they have done to the party’s image. Our shouts, and the many speeches through the megaphone, were heard clearly throughout the meeting.
Apparently, Atzmon devoted a large part of his talk to discussing the highly controversial theories of Otto Weininger (who, as Atzmon himself admitted, was Hitler’s favourite Jew), who, in his work Sex and Character, characterised the Jew as “feminine, and thus profoundly irreligious, without true individuality (soul), and without a sense of good and evil...” Weininger claimed the decay of modern (ie early twentieth century) times was due to feminine, and thus Jewish, influences [1].
Atzmon also propounded his own highly sexist theory of gender, before giving a rambling account of his own views, and expressing his bemusement at the picket. In the ensuing discussion, he was roundly denounced by several speakers; John Rose of the SWP reportedly made a particularly powerful and effective response.
Members of the SWP who did not know at the beginning of the meeting, certainly realised by the end what an error they had made. However, we must still marvel at their stupidity in even inviting Atzmon in the first place, as well as expressing our anger at the contempt we faced from some SWP leaders, notablty their national secretary Martin Smith, who refused (unlike most of his comrades) to exchange even one civil word with us.
All in all, we are pleased with our efforts, which in a short time mobilised a large and vocal protest, and which confronted the SWP with a reality they wished to ignore – that they cannot hold a meeting with a racist and expect it to pass quietly, and that you cannot defend Palestinian rights if you accept the Zionist paradigm which identifies all Jews with Zionism.
Report by Roland Rance, Jews Against Zionism