Professor Shelley is Professor Emeritus at Vanderbilt Law School. In 1997, she and Professor Daniel Farber wrote a book entitled: beyond reason, critiques critical race theory. Perhaps their most controversial argument is that critical race theory denies the existence of such a thing as objective merit, attributes all group differences to racism, and relies on anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. was implicitly anti-Semitic in that it failed to explain the success of American Jews.
Professor Shelley (who, by the way, is a political liberal) writes: A Short Follow-up, DEI and Anti-Semitism: Breeding in the Bones. Here is the summary:
Last October, progressive Jews were shocked by the graphic anti-Semitism exhibited by their former allies on the political left. Some progressives, especially on university campuses, celebrated after Hamas terrorists tortured, raped, and killed more than 1,200 Israeli civilians and took about 200 hostages. . They chanted the Palestinian mantra „From the River to the Sea“ and tried to wipe Israel (and the Jews) off the face of the earth. The number of anti-Semitic incidents on campus, both by students and faculty, skyrocketed. A Stanford University lecturer forcibly took Jewish students to the back of the classroom and labeled them „colonizers.“ Jewish students barricaded themselves in the Cooper Union library, and Jewish students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) were told by faculty to avoid the university's main lobby for their own safety. Many college presidents who had previously sent campus-wide emails condemning the murder of George Floyd, Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the Roe v. Wade decision, and countless other world events are suddenly found the principle and argued that it was inappropriate for the university. They took sides or made weak statements about how complex the situation in the Middle East is. This double standard continued even as some universities invoked free speech principles to respond to student calls for the genocide of Jews, but when the speech in question was directed at other groups. This principle was grossly ignored. Most campus DEI (diversity, equity, and inclusion) offices, especially at the most elite universities, said nothing about the burgeoning anti-Semitism.
This essay explains why no one should have been shocked or even mildly surprised by the progressive response to the genocide. Progressive or “woke” culture is, at its core, an imperative, as exemplified by critical race theory, anti-racism like Ibram X. Kendi, and the giants of DEI, especially on college campuses. and necessarily anti-Semitic. It is no surprise that these related movements publicly exposed their anti-Semitism. Anti-Semitism has grown into their very bones.