Adorno claimed some anti-Semitic accusations had a real basis in Jewish traits

Evidence

One aspect of this topic reappeared in Adorno when he took the view, on looking through the interviews for the project dealing with workers (see p. 367), that not all accusations against the Jews were deluded; rather, some of them had a basis in particular Jewish traits which were either genuine grounds for complaint or at least liable to provoke hostile reactions. He suggested that they produce, as a complement to the handbook of the techniques of fascist agitators, another handbook `which lists these traits, explains them and contains suggestions how to overcome them’. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1549

Categorization

• QUESTION: A striking admission: Adorno conceding partial validity to some anti-Jewish accusations deserves deeper unpacking of what exactly he meant and what evidence the worker interviews provided.
• DEEPTHINKING: Adorno’s willingness to grant partial validity to anti-Semitic accusations challenges the clean distinction between rational criticism and paranoid projection, a genuinely thorny point in critical theory’s account of prejudice.
• XREF: connects to: Horkheimer and Adorno saw Jewish weakness as the most dangerous anti-Semitic mechanism — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 1512; Adorno believed the anti-Semite’s psyche displays the cause of anti-Semitism. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 1840; For Adorno, antisemitism casts Jews as embodying modernity’s repressed other side

Broader Connections

• For Adorno, antisemitism casts Jews as embodying modernity’s repressed other side #expands (0.85)