In class there was an album presentation the other day, I’m Your Man by Leonard Cohen. The three students did a lot of research but I was surprised when they addressed First We Take Manhattan, because they claimed nobody knows what it’s about. They said Leonard Cohen doesn’t discuss that. I’ve definitely read interviews where he talks about it being about terrorism and it made sense, “They sentenced me to twenty years of boredom, for trying to change the system from within, I’m coming now, I’m coming to reward them, first we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin.” It’s even in the Wikipedia for the song that Leonard says he wrote it about responding to terrorism. They explained their research indicated it was either about religion, the fashion business or Jews. Seemed to me they found a conspiracy theory on the internet which claimed a lyric featuring “first we take Manhattan, then we take Berlin” is obviously about the Jewish agenda to takeover the world. I wondered how to point out the weirdness of this conclusion or ask why would a Jew sing about that, like that? Then I thought if I express distaste, will they appreciate how stupid this is or just think I’m an anxious Jew who can’t handle hearing the truth. I thought to myself oy vey, (silently of course). I like these students and I think they collected whatever came up from Googling and don’t necessarily know a lot about noxious websites. I didn’t say anything right then and there, thought maybe later, in email. I’m still composing it in my head because as much as I want to walk them through what’s ludicrous I don’t want to humiliate them or embarrass them. Sometimes I think those emotional experiences culminate in growing hatred. There was a film I loved twenty years ago called Max, about Hitler’s earlier artist life starring John Cusack. I don’t think it got good reviews but I found it awesome. It was the first time I came upon any information about Hitler’s artist life and trying to make it that way. The film implied he felt betrayed/ humiliated by the Jewish art dealer he was working with. I understood the writer’s thinking about relating humiliation with being psycho.