Anti-Semitic violence targets interchangeable defenseless victims rather than specific people

Evidence

It is the blindness and lack of purpose of anti-Semitism which lends a measure of truth to the explanation that it is an outlet. Anger is discharged on defenseless victims. And since the victims are interchangeable according to circumstancesgypsies, Jews, Protestants, Catholics, and so onany one of them may take the place of the murderers, with the same blind lust for blood, should they be invested with the title of the norm. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1419

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies the Frankfurt School’s claim that anti-Semitism is not about the actual victims but about the structural position of a defenseless, norm-excluded other.
• XREF: connects to: Anti-Semitic violence targets detached madmen symbolizing the Jews’ outside perspective. — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School: Its History,…, 1282; Anti-Semitic victims are interchangeable outlets for objectless anger; Antisemitism explains victim selection, not the crime’s nature — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 703 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Antisemitism explains victim selection, not the crime’s nature #expands (0.86) — Zygmunt Bauman, Modernity and the Holocaust, 703
• Perceived Jewish weakness itself was seen as a key driver of anti-Semitic violence. #expands (0.80) — Rolf Wiggershaus, The Frankfurt School, 1512
• Collective violence requires dehumanizing victims into abstract categories #expands (0.72)