Jack Salzman, Cornel West Struggles in the Promised

Walking the Tightrope \\ 413
society? I have worked with Black nationalists since the late sixties—in Black
united fronts, Black political parties, and Black religious formations—precisely
because they rightly target the most explosive issue and rawest nerve in American
life: white supremacy. Yet I do so as a radical democrat, not as a Black nationalist.
Nationalism of any form, is for me a species of tribalism that warrants moral
rejection. And since all forms of nationalism I know are deeply patriarchal and
homophobic, I have great suspicions of them. Just like organized religion. Yet
some good can come from them, so I selectively work with them.
My dilemma sharpened in the eighties with the presidential campaigns of
Jesse Jackson and the rise of Minister Louis Farrakhan in the eyes of white
America. Since then Black-Jewish relations have worsened. Jackson's "Hymietown"
remark set off waves of Jewish rage. Farrakhan's response to Jewish threats
against Jackson set off even more. And we all became locked into a spiral of accusations
and demonizations. In the Jewish world, Jackson could not say enough to
warrant forgiveness and Farrakhan was dubbed the new Hitler. In the Black
world, Jackson and Farrakhan were viewed as heaven-sent for sustaining forms of
Jewish identity and fund-raising predicated on anti-Semitism in America. The
double standards for Black and white anti-Semitic rhetoric were appalling. Both
worlds grasped only snippets of the truth—namely, that progressive and liberal
forces in general were collapsing in America while the two most progressive and
liberal groups (Blacks and Jews) were involved in a heartfelt yet cathartic
sideshow. The media sensationalized it and projected a polarization more symbolic
than real. Yet even symbols shape reality after much media interference.
With the white media discoveries of Leonard Jeffries and Khalid Abdul
Muhammad, the obsession in the Jewish world with Black anti-Jewish rhetoric
increased. And given the growing influence of Howard Stern and other xenophobic
loose-tongued Jewish talk radio hosts, the concern in the Black world with
Jewish anti-Black rhetoric increased. In short, the paranoia of two of the most
paranoid groups in America was getting out of control—and clashing in ugly
ways. Candid dialogue was badly needed.
Michael Lerner and I saw this need in 1 988 and acted on it. We worked for
five years on our book, Jews and Blacks: Let the Healing Begin (1995). We toured
the country, lectured in over twenty cities—in Black churches, Jewish synagogues,
bookstores, community centers, colleges, high schools. The audiences
were all multiracial. The responses were overwhelming. The spirit of honest conversation,
collective struggle, and racial healing was inspiring. Yet we received no
financial support for our proposed Black-Jewish conference and we were trashed
both by visible neoliberal Jewish intellectuals and vociferous progressive Black
intellectuals. And with the advent of the OJ. verdict and Million Man March, our
efforts for Black-Jewish healing were in shambles. Lerner and I continued to agree
to disagree, even as our agreements and disagreements grew deeper, but as a twosome
we felt more and more isolated.
The sheer viciousness of the intellectual attacks on my work and life from the