The Hate Rally That Has No Place In Pennsylvania Is About To Start In Pennsylvania

Like Greta Thunberg, I don’t like to hear officials mouthing “empty words”. Here’s a recent example of an expression that is all too common in my view: “something bad has no place here”. A governor whose own house was torched by a pro-Hamas Jew-hater says “Hate and antisemitism have no place in our Commonwealth”:

Why are empty words like this problematic? The first step in any 12-step program is admitting that you have a problem. Mx. Shapiro here denies that Pennsylvania and his/her/zir/their fellow Democrats contain any Jew-haters (“hate has no place”). Failure to admit that the problem exists will inevitably lead to a failure to take effective action.

Admittedly, it is unclear what effective action American elected officials could take, other than halting immigration from countries where Jew-hatred is the norm. A negative obsession with the world’s one majority-Jewish country seems to be a path to electoral success in the U.S. now, just as it has been a path to obtaining and holding high office at the United Nations (“António Guterres has posted about Gaza and the Palestinians 262 times since October 7, 2023. Eleven other major crises, combined: 185.” (X, October 26, 2026)). If they were willing to sacrifice some votes, Democrats could simply expel progressives from their party, I guess.

Where is today’s place for hate in Pennsylvania? Rittenhouse Square, Filthadelphia, according to the organizers. It’s not officially a “Jew-hate” rally, but rather hate for “Zionists”, except that the only businesses being boycotted are those owned by Jews (at least one of whom was apparently born in raised in the Philadelphia suburbs). Businesses owned by non-Jews who’ve expressed support for Israel’s existence aren’t being targeted. They’re going to “roll” in 5 minutes, fortunately not in violation of the sacred “I don’t roll on Shabbos” rule.

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