Ha'aretz is reporting that some Jewish UK students are boycotting a standardized test over the inclusion of Shakespeare, whom they claim was an anti-Semite.

Someone slap these kids upside the head. Please.

First of all, there is a good chance that Shakespeare never even met a Jew, as Jews weren’t allowed to live in England while Shakespeare was alive (unless you count those that claim the British Royal Family are descendents of King David – God Forbid).

Second, as I read the Merchant of Venice I see a completely different picture. I see the way the goyim used to treat the Jews, and how one Jew, finding himself being cheated, goes to extreme measures and stands up for himself and for what is right, and ultimately finds himself suffering from the anti-Semitism that was prevalent in the time and place of the culture portrayed.

If the following isn’t the best portrayal of a demand for human, equal and fair treatment for Jews, then I don’t know what is.

I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is?

Are these the words of an anti-Semite?