"socialism of fools"

[Rkmickey at aol.com]

Jim heartfield <jim at heartfield.demon.co.uk> wrote

<<Does anyone have a reference, or better still some context, for German
Socialist August Bebel's comment that "Anti-Semitism is the socialism of
fools" (1893?).>>

I can't put my finger on the source of Bebel's famous quotation, but to put it
in context, he  seems to have been describing a stage of (false) consiousness
which could serve as a point of entry for marxists  to offer their analysis,
winning workers  away from "Chistian socialist" parties, thus helping the
workers to advance from foolishness to wisdom, I would guess.

Here are passages from a couple of books which deal with this: 

"The SPD leaders also rejected the defense of specifically Jewish religious
issues and were far from philo-Semitic.  In 1908 the Central Association of
German Citizens of Jewish Faith (CV) was of the opinion that the SPD would
oppose attempts to curtail Jewish rights, 'But when it is a question of the
threatened reiligious interests of the Jews, the Social Democrats in view of
their principles cannot speak out for them, and the Social Democrats also will
not ignore the fact that they may hope for a rich harvest wherever
antisemitism has ploughed the soil.'"  (Sarah Gordeon,HITLER, GERMANS AND THE
'JEWISH QUESTION', 1984, Princeton U.P., p.38)

   "An examination of Bernstein's writings of the early 1890s reveals, for
example, that he thought of the anti-Semitic movement as a 'connecting link'
between the reactionary parties and socialists, and that he described the
anti-Semitic movement as a 'first stage' on the road to socialism--very much
in the same way as did Engles and Bebel during the same period."  (Jack
Jacobs, ON SOCIALISTS AND 'THE JEWISH QUESTION' AFTER MARX, 1992, New York UP,
p.59)

K. Mickey