To the Editor:

I suppose it is an illiberal and bigoted act to protest about an article before one has read a single word of it, and before one has an informed idea of the content of the article. . . .But I find I belong to the postwar generation of Jews, which has . . . a strange lack of the good humor and genial indifference I think we had before the war.

The sentence I find grating on my nerves is from your newspaper ad for the October COMMENTARY. It reads: “A prominent non-Jewish public relations authority gives some friendly—but critical—advice to the Jews.” My immediate reaction is to tell our kindly, well-meaning, Gentile friend to take his friendly (“but critical”) advice and to go to hell with it. And to tell the civilized, liberal editors of COMMENTARY that Jews today are not particularly interested in explaining, apologizing, justifying, or turning cartwheels as a way of begging for “tolerance.” We no longer have the remotest illusion that any change in manners or behavior will alter whatever history has in store for us.

If every Jew were to become a shining archangel in virtue, it would be dismissed as just another Jewish maneuver to humiliate and ridicule the Gentiles.

I have been to Europe during the war, and I know what Jews look like after they come back from Poland, and I know quite accurately what they have seen. Whatever behavior it is that causes our Gentile friend to shudder and wince and write articles of advice, at any rate he didn’t have his skull smashed in, nor was he shoved into any furnaces. Such “rudeness” as that, such “boorishness” and “lack of tact” doesn’t come from any Jew on the face of the earth. It comes from the other side of the fence—from the camp of our cultured superior Gentile friend who is so generous with his advice.

Harold Leidner
New York City

To the Editor:

I read the anonymous article “I Wish They Wouldn’t Do That,” in the October Commentary with a good deal of interest and some amusement. It is not really “a Gentile view of Jewish public relations.” It is in fact the view of a certain segment of the Jewish group, which is loud and vociferous in its outcry against any action that may set the Jews apart from their fellow citizens. . . .

There are too many nice, intelligent people who accept intellectually the need for good relations with Jews, but who never translate such acceptance into emotion and feeling. Consequently, they do nothing about it. They may use the right words and phrases. But that’s where it all stops. . . .The writer of the article is very much concerned about proper restraint and dignity. . . .But his citations of illustrative cases and the morals he draws from the action taken seem to point to a desire on his part not to face realistically the ugly manifestations of anti-Semitism in the press or among the so-called statesmen of our time. Why shouldn’t this issue be fought directly and openly as un-American and anti-democratic? Where are the “Christian friends” to come forward and join their Jewish neighbors in this fight against O’Donnellism and Bevinism? Yes, there are plenty of Christian sympathizers and well-wishers, but they must be prodded into action.

It is unfortunate that there should be need in this country for a special presentation of the war record of the Jews. The same applies to a special presentation of the war record of Negroes and of American Japanese. The facts are necessary to counteract the calumnies and vilification of rabble-rousers and the uninformed. . . .

The writer also pleads for the Jews in each community to take the initiative in promoting good relations by inviting their non-Jewish neighbors, friends, and fellow-citizens generally to partake of their joys, their amusements, their aesthetic and intellectual interests. This is not a practical possibility on a large scale even in the small suburban communities new New York City, where residents form, more or less, a cultural group of similar interests. It is certainly wishful thinking so far as the country at large is concerned.

But why is the responsibility placed on the Jews? In the last part of the article, the writer accepts a good many of the stock charges against Jews as if they were universally true. Of course, he relates individual instances. But individual instances are part of the usual stock in trade. Where is the responsibility of the majority—the non-Jews—for this whole matter of good public-relations? . . .

“America is basically a decent country,” the anonymous author writes. Thank God for that. But where does he find the evidence that “it is today a more decent and thoughtful country—as far as “minorities’ are concerned—than before the war”? I wish it were. I write this from the deep South, and I wonder whether Hitler has taught Americans any lesson. Is the writer of the article aware of what is happening to the Japanese and the Mexicans on the Pacific Coast? What about the state of the Union in Minneapolis and Chicago? Or the South’s attitudes toward Negroes and foreigners?

Wake up and face the realities, Mr. Anonymous! We have made progress, but we are still far from the goal. And don’t expect so much of the Jews. They carry a pretty heavy burden right now. Start unloading some of this burden on the shoulders of your non-Jewish contemporaries. It is their problem as much as ours.

It is an American problem. Let us all work together and try to solve it in the American way—by mutual forbearance, co-operation, and respect for each other’s points of view, so that each group may contribute its best to the America we cherish.

Edward M. Kahn
Atlanta Jewish Community Council
Atlanta, Georgia

To the Editor:

While I am sure that a useful syllabus of Do’s and Don’ts could be written for almost any group of people, one may doubt whether anti-Semitism would decrease materially if Jews acted more according to the syllabus. The following true episode will illustrate what I mean:

During the war, the son of our landlady was drafted in spite of his being somewhat hard of hearing. When we asked one day how he was getting along, she gave us this report: “Apparently he is doing fine. However, he happened to be put into a Brooklyn regiment which is almost entirely Jewish, mostly very nice boys, to be sure, but for my son it is kind of difficult. You know how those Jews are: they all whisper.”

Hans Zeisel
New York City

To the Editor:

As a public-relations counselor and a Gentile, I should like to protest the technical incompetenance of the article entitled “I Wish They Wouldn’t Do That!—A Gentile View of Jewish Public Relations.”

The anonymous public-relations counselor who wrote the piece applies criteria and techniques to the problems of a scattered and differentiated people which he has found salable to, and possibly workable for, his individual and corporate clients. In doing so, he reveals his own inflexibility in adapting techniques to novel situations and problems.

The future of the Jewish people, as a people distinguished by one of a number of related patterns of culture, depends upon a great many factors, both American and worldwide in background. To the extent to which we are able in the United States and in the United Nations to maintain a healthily expanding economy, with expanding opportunities for the peoples of the world, anti-Jewish discrimination is not likely to increase. In fact, both discrimination and the Jews (as such) are likely to disappear. Many Jews have recognized this situation, whether or not they may wish to face the probable eventual assimilation of the Jews, and they have therefore given invaluable aid to pro-democratic projects and movements. In saying this, I do not wish to give the impression that that is the only reason why Jews have engaged in pro-democratic activities, but it is a factor lacking in non-minority groups.

The “public-relations” activities of Jews and Jewish organizations—like those of other individuals and organizations—are important chiefly as facilitating or impeding long-term tendencies over which individuals have little or no control, and of which they have little knowledge or even consciousness. And in these “public-relations” activities, a loosely-knit people can reap the full advantages of a broad tactic that an individual client must use with caution.

I refer to the “break of pace” or “variety of strategies” approach. Because Jews can establish that they do not have integrated leadership, they can handle a slur variously—with facts and reasonableness, with the returning of good for evil, with indifference, and with a good sock in the jaw. All of these methods work both in the short run and the long run—for a people.

Just as Irish bombings and hangings won for them admiration for the plucky but outnumbered underdog, I am sure that the activities of Jewish extremists in Palestine have raised the whole Jewish people in the esteem of many people who had previously been indifferent or even contemptuous. In this connection, we should remember that our public-school textbooks glorify the names and deeds of those terrorists and saboteurs who made life difficult for British soldiers in the American Colonies in 1775-1783.

Probably the worst piece of advice Anonymous offers is his call for “consolidated leadership.” Fortunately, such an eventuality is impossible, but it would certainly offer a bright and shining mark for anti-Jewish agitators. A great deal of the most effective anti-intolerance educational work in this country has sought to establish upon the basis of available facts and experience the following points: 1. The Jews are a scattered people, divided among themselves. 2. The Jews represent a wide range of racial types. 3. Jews should be liked or disliked upon the same criteria as members of other groups—their personal qualities. 4. Myths of a Jewish super-state organization are worse than myths; they are the creations of sick and vicious minds.

In my estimation, Jews need to continue to use many of the tactics of interpretation and defense and offense that they have used in the past, and to add or to emphasize new or little used ones.

Americans and the other fellow-countrymen of Jews admire both humor and a show of force, diplomatic statesmanship and hard-driving salesmanship, demonstrations of willingness to work together and pride in deviant backgrounds. All this should be kept in mind.

In a brief letter, I cannot undertake to answer Anonymous’s many inaccuracies. But I believe that such counsel as Anonymous offers is not only misguiding, it is dangerous.

Alfred Mcclung Lee
Chairman, Department of Sociology
and Anthropology
Wayne University

To the Editor:

Looking at the Jewish problem realistically, I’m inclined to agree in principle with the anonymous Gentile writer of “I Wish They Wouldn’t Do that!”

Perhaps the Jews in this country are carrying a chip on their shoulders and exhibiting a persecution complex. . . .

Perhaps too much is being said about the “Jewish problem.” Perhaps the other Americans already have accepted the Jews as fellow-Americans and the present policy is tending to set the Jews off as separate and apart from the rest of the nation. . . .

Continued denunciation, we have found in the newspaper business, becomes old and uninteresting. That could easily be the end result if agitators are allowed to continue to exaggerate minor incidents. All Jews should read the article and ponder its import.

Louis Levand
Publisher, The Wichita Beacon
Wichita, Kansas

To the Editor:

The anonymous writer. . .is to be highly commended for writing, and Commentary for publishing, his frank criticisms of Jewish public-relations. . . .We frequently do not realize that there are many Gentiles who would like to co-operate with us toward improvement of race relations. On account of our experiences during our history, and particularly during the last thirteen years, we have become very sensitive toward any criticism from the outside, which is psychologically understandable. . . .But if we learn the point of view of others, it will help us to recognize our own faults—and we certainly are not without them.

Henry Salfeld
New York City

To the Editor:

. . . .It must be hard for a Christian who owns the earth to realize how strong is the temptation for a peace-loving Jew to pretend it didn’t happen when an anti-Semite “shoots off his mouth”—and what good will it do to protest anyway? But he must know how important it is for our souls to stand up and smite back as hard as we can. Let not our good friend believe that doing so makes anti-Semites. They are made in more subtle and far less rational ways. I want to be friends with Christians; I have some good Christian friends. But I don’t know any who ask or expect us to be “dignified” when we’re hurt. My friends think there are times when we ought to fight back, like anyone else, get as mad as they get, and not worry primarily about “policy”. . . .

Fannie S. Coarn
New York City

To the Editor:

. . . .Mr. .Anonymous talks like many of our well-meaning friends who have suddenly acquired broad viewpoints, or shall I say brotherly viewpoints?. . . .Where were they during all the Hitlerian murder of the Jews?. . .

And now Mr. Anonymous talks of the nice ties. . . .

Sol Paul Fink
New York City

To the Editor:

I wish to express my thanks to the anonymous author for the value I have found in his discussion of Jewish public relations. His suggestions and constructive criticism are most welcome to me, and I think they will be welcome to many thousands of other Jews who, like myself, are proud of their heritage, fully aware of their problems (which are difficult to solve), and still consider themselves Americans, first and foremost.

William R. Sidenberg
New York City

To the Editor:

. . . .I question. . . .COMMENTARY’S wisdom in accepting such an article. . . .Our own dignity and maturity require that we try to solve our internal difficulties ourselves. And our history unmistakably demonstrates that it has ever been a sorry day for us when we brought our conflicts to others for adjudication. . . .

Rabbi Samuel Sobel
Honolulu, T. H.

To the Editor:

. . . .I know that Anonymous is talking about what he thinks constitutes good public-relations. Washing dirty linen in public as some Jewish organizations have taken to doing lately is apparently not good public-relations. But let him not forget: on the effective policies and functioning of these Jewish organizations depend the lives and survival of another half million Jews. Only democratic discussion on all levels can insure this effective functioning.

Henry Loeblowitz Lennard
Yiddish Scientific Institute
New York City

To the Editor:

. . . .Here is some sound and sensible advice, which we need badly. .Too often we act like irresponsible adolescents. . .. .If we could only learn to meet this age-old problem of anti-Semitism with quiet dignity and poise!

Charles I. Cooper
The Minneapolis Federation for Jewish Service
Minneapolis, Minnesota

To the Editor:

I have read with interest the two articles on Jewish “public relations”—the one by “Anonymous,” and the reply by Mr. Ralph E. Samuel.

I must say it seems to me that “Anonymous” has the better of it. Mr. Samuel practically admits all the points Anonymous makes and only counters by reciting some of the more distressing examples of the prejudice itself.

Such racial and religious prejudice is, in my view, a social disease, and one deeply imbedded in the tissues of society. It has manifested itself in all times and places, and against all sorts of groups. Two of its manifestations are concepts such as “the Master Race” and “the Chosen People.” Personally, I always get a whiff of it when I am called a “Gentile.”

In the long run, I feel that we will get at the real causes and cures only through the anthropoligists and other social scientists. Thus, I applaud the point of view expressed in your article printed in the December Commentary, “Can We Fight Prejudice Scientifically?” Except that we can never “fight” it, any more than we can “fight” darkness. We get rid of darkness by turning on the light.

Pending more light, however, it does seem to me we can make progress by openly naming and identifying the disease, its symptoms and its dangers—just as we are doing with cancer, for example.

Here I think the right kind of public-relations techniques can help, and the program at present in preparation by the Advertising Council is designed to do this.

James W. Young
Chairman, The Advertising Council
New York City