In her vote-chasing message to the Jewish community, the foreign secretary has reinforced age-old stereotypes
Bigots are often so blind to their bigotry that they don’t realise they are bigoted. Take what prime minister in waiting and foreign secretary Liz Truss put out to the Jewish community – a message she clearly believed to be supportive and vote-winning but was in fact reinforcing the most damaging tropes about Jews. “So many Jewish values are Conservative values and British values too, for example seeing the importance of family and always taking steps to protect the family unit; and the value of hard work and self-starting and setting up your own business.” She added that “the British Jewish community is incredibly proud of this country and so are Conservatives”, and that she was determined to protect the community from “woke civil service culture that strays into antisemitism”.
So that’s us Jews neatly classified. Conservative, business-minded, industrious, patriotic and anti-woke. Just like black people are great runners, Asian people are brilliant mathematicians and Yorkshire folk such as our Liz are careful with money … which takes us back to the Jews.
Simon Hattenstone is a features writer for the Guardian
