In the latest addition to our Radical Reads series, we invited Michael Richmond to talk to us about David Baddiel’s ridiculous book, Jews Don’t Count.
Radical Reads is our new Patreon-only series where we discuss political texts – both old and new – that have either influenced the WCH project, or texts that we generally think that people involved in radical and working-class movements should be engaging with, discussing, and using to inform their activism.
However, today’s episode is going to be a little different from the other ones we’ve done so far, for one main reason: the book we’re going to be talking about today is really bad. Namely, David Baddiel’s 2021 book, Jews Don’t Count. While this book is extremely bad, what it gets wrong serves as a great jumping off point for talking about the relationships between racism, antisemitism, whiteness, and Jewishness, among other things.
To do this, we invited author, Michael Richmond, himself a Jewish communist and anti-racist activist, to talk about (and make fun of) Baddiel’s book for about an hour and a half covering every aspect of his shallow understanding of racism and antisemitism, and why Baddiel should probably get new friends.
Episode
- E98: Radical Reads – ‘Jews Don’t Count’ by David Baddiel – Available now exclusively for our Patreon supporters
Listen to a preview of the episode below:
E98: [TEASER] Radical Reads – ‘Jews Don’t Count’ by David Baddiel – Working Class History
More information
- Read Michael’s excellent book (co-authored with Alex Charnley), Fractured: Race, Class, Gender and the Hatred of Identity Politics
- A number of Michael’s articles can be found here and here. Some which are particularly relevant to this discussion are:
- Timeline of people’s history stories about radical Jewish history
- At one point in the discussion, we discuss Baddiel’s use of blackface on his TV show, Fantasy Football League, to mock Black footballer, Jason Lee. We reproduce the image below, under fair use, to give listeners an idea of what this looked like
Glossary
- ADL: the Anti-Defamation League, a US NGO founded to combat antisemitism. Avidly Zionist, the ADL recently lost its status on Wikipedia as a reliable source on Israel-Palestine, in part due to its labelling of pro-Palestine protesters as de facto antisemitic
- BF: the British Fascists, the first UK group to self-identify as fascists. The bulk of this group would eventually merge into the party that would eventually become the BUF
- Board of Deputies: otherwise known as the Board of Deputies of British Jews, which is the largest Jewish community organisation in Britain
- BUF: the British Union of Fascists. The main fascist party in Britain before World War II
- CST: Community Security Trust, a charity whose aim is to protect Jews in Britain, both through conducting research on antisemitism and providing physical security at Jewish communal buildings
- Giles Coren: Jewish journalist frequently embroiled in controversies around racism (including a fake twitter account in which he pretended to be a Polish plumber writing in broken English). He is also known for mocking the death of 33-year-old left-wing journalist, Dawn Foster
- Hadley Freeman: a former Guardian journalist. Most recently wrote for the disgraced Jewish Chronicle until it was exposed for using fabricated stories in September 2024
- Howard Jacobson: Jewish novelist who recently claimed that media reporting of Israeli atrocities in Gaza was a modern form of antisemitic ‘blood libel’ (where Jews historically have been falsely accused of murdering Christians for religious rituals)
- Philosemitism: an appreciation of Jews rooted in antisemitic stereotypes (e.g. ‘Jews are good with money’, or stereotypes about ‘Jewish intelligence’ etc). Philosemitism today often manifests in non-Jews using their support for Israel as their claim to be a ‘friend to the Jewish people’
- Wiley: a British rapper who, in 2020, was banned from Twitter after posting a series of antisemitic tweets
Acknowledgements
- Thanks to our patreon supporters for making this podcast possible. Special thanks to Jazz Hands, Jamison D. Saltsman, Fernando López Ojeda, Jeremy Cusimano, and Nick Williams.
- The episode image of David Baddiel at Soho Theatre, 2020. Credit: Raph PH (with additional design by WCH). CC 2.0.
- Edited by Tyler Hill
- Our theme tune is Montaigne’s version of the classic labour movement anthem, ‘Bread and Roses’, performed by Montaigne and Nick Harriott, and mixed by Wave Racer. Download the song here, with all proceeds going to Medical Aid for Palestinians. More from Montaigne: website, Instagram, YouTube
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