The Tree of Life Massacre: Murder of the Good for Being Good

Our hearts go out to the victims of the massacre at the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh, and to the friends and families of those murdered or wounded. There are no words to express the depths of our sorrow.

Anti-Semitism is evil. It is tribalism of the lowest kind. Pretenses and fantasies to the contrary notwithstanding (e.g., “They’re committing genocide to my people”), anti-Semitism is hatred of Jews for being successful, thoughtful, inventive, creative, productive, prosperous. To kill people for possessing these qualities is to kill the good for being good. That is as evil as evil gets.

The sub-animal who committed this massacre deserves worse than any punishment he’ll receive. Apart from that, however, he should be given no attention of any kind—ever. His name should never be mentioned (except when legal proceedings require it). His picture should never be shown. He should be discarded and forgotten, like dung scraped off a shoe.

In addition to our thoughts being with the victims and their families and friends, our hats are off to the first responders and police (four of whom were wounded) who rushed to the scene and stopped the vile creature from shooting more people. These are heroes.

Shalom.

About Craig Biddle

Craig is cofounder and editor of The Objective Standard, cofounder and director of education at Objective Standard Institute, and executive director of Prometheus Foundation. He is the author of Loving Life: The Morality of Self-Interest and the Facts that Support It; Rational Egoism: The Morality for Human Flourishing; and the forthcoming Moral Truths Your Parents, Preachers, and Teachers Don’t Want You to Know. He is currently working on his fourth book, “Thinking in Principles.”

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