Noam Note
(In the time since I started writing this, the sheer magnitude of the Chomsky backlash has surprised me; from this degree of separation, Chomsky has been something of a different experience.)
My only real sentiment against Chomsky has long been that people wield his name like some sort of saint in a religion that nobody actually follows, the author of sacred scriptures beloved but never read.
The truth is, I never really thought poorly of him; it was just never worth the effort to go read that much in order to explain to libertarians who didn't do their reading why they should stop preaching Chomsky.
In its way, Noam Chomsky's alleged correspondence with Jeffrey Epstein is the strangest affirmation; while Chomsky will be considered a leftist¹ in the late trafficker's association, he was frequently used by others as a moral wag to encourage liberals to move their thought rightward. And even that aspect comes up in the 2019 email forwarding Chomsky's advice to an attorney:
I've watched the horrible way you are being treated in the press and public. It's painful to say, but I think the best way to proceed is to ignore it. I've had plenty of experience, though of course not on this scale. A google search will bring up tons of hysterical accusations of all sorts, even groups devoted to vilifying me. I pay no attention unless I'm approached for comment on a specific matter. It's a nuisance, but it's the best way. The same conclusions from experiences of others, in some cases close friends.
What the vultures dearly want is a public response, which provides a public opening for an onslaught of venomous attacks, many from just publicity seekers or cranks of all sorts -- which are impossible to answer (how do you prove that you are not a neo-Nazi who wants to kill the jews, or a rapist, or whatever charge comes along?) That's particularly true now with the hysteria that has developed about the abuse of women, which has reached the point that even questioning a charge is a crime worse than murder. For virtually everyone who sees any of this, the reaction will be, "where there's smoke there's fire, maybe raging fire" (whatever the facts, which few will even think of investigating).
In general, it's best I think not to react unless directly questioned, particularly in the current mood -- which, I presume, will fade away, even if not in time to prevent much torture and distress.
Hard to say, but it's the best advice I can think of.
Noam.
The attorney, Matthew Hiltzik, wrote, "I think that is wise".
To answer Chomsky, though: You don't prove the negative, but attack the basis of the claim; he already knows that. The problem with such a strategy, of course, is when the basis of the claim has some aspect of merit. Thus, for some people the argument is that you can't call someone a neo-Nazi just for entertaining some aspect of Nazism as legitimate; the counterargument, there, is to not create or advocate safe space for harm.
And perhaps that is a matter of perspective that looks different if you're one who has used Chomsky as some scold that people aren't being nice enough to rightist bigots.
To not be seen in any credible negative light about neo-Nazis, the easiest thing to do is not make excuses for Nazis, Nazi sympathies, or Nazi-adjacent argument. It's like an obscure episode when Tucker Carlson called Gavin Newsom a Nazi because the city of San Francisco would not take extraordinary action against skin color and suspected ethnicity. That is, Newsom earned a Nazi accusation by
not persecuting people.
That was so long ago that Carlson said so from a host desk at MSNBC. To answer Chomsky, that was one of the easiest rebuffs of a Nazi accusation, ever; sometimes, it's easy to make the point that you're not a Nazi. And if we wonder why Chomsky worries about such things, well, think of how profane the implication would have sounded if we weren't reading his advice to a trafficker. What excuses would people make for his perspective on "the hysteria that has developed about abuse of women"?
Think about the idea that age and frailty are Chomsky's only excuse; he was ninety when he wrote that. But it's also not so much a question of smoke, fire, and "whatever the facts, which few will even think of investigating"; we see what the facts were.
If we wish to excuse Chomsky, or mitigate the implication, we must also account for the fact that his advice came over eleven years after the Acosta deal, and might well be a marker describing just how awful the plea agreement was. To answer Chomsky, what people find when they investigate the facts is that it was already a raging fire before he said that.
Because Chomsky's sympathy seems either oblivious or contemptuous toward the fact that Epstein had acknowledged trafficking minors. The best excuse Chomsky has is the damage done by the Acosta deal; the deal shut down enough investigations and suppressed enough of the fire that there's just no way Noam could have known.
As such, Chomsky's sympathy toward Epstein either has no idea, or else it does—"the horrible way you are being treated", "even if not in time to prevent much torture and distress".
And of Chomsky himself, it is not necessarily a question of smoke and fire, but, rather, this is the world we live in, and we need to accept both that people can think this way, and the prospect that it might very well have significant influence in daily life at large. Plenty of seemingly smart people are caught up in this in seemingly stupid ways.
But as much as we
come back↑ to the idea of the "Acosta effect", that people didn't get clear because they didn't know how bad the situation really was, the counterpoint is what they say along the way. And, sure, maybe because of the Acosta effect people didn't ever stop to think that their emails to an unrepentant convicted sex trafficker might someday become public information.
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Notes:
¹ Meanwhile, I am actually struck by the number of leftists among the social media bloc reminding that Chomsky was always so awful. Now that I think about it, I really shouldn't be so surprised. Chomsky is not much influence in my own outlook, and most of my intersections with his name are other people's excuses. It feels like it's probably kind of a weird experience.
