Austin Franco told a prospective employer he wouldn’t work for them because they were Jewish. When the remark became public, he didn’t apologize. He defended it.
Cornell University condemned the 19-year-old student’s remark, but Franco says he has faced no disciplinary action. He appeared on Piers Morgan‘s show, where he defended himself and called Israel “a genocidal country.” Supporters rallied around him, and online fundraisers brought in tens of thousands of dollars.
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Not long ago, publicly saying you wouldn’t work for someone because they were Jewish would have been socially disqualifying. Franco didn’t seem embarrassed by it. If anything, he seemed convinced he was right.
That matters because shame, for all its faults, serves a social purpose. Some things are supposed to embarrass us. A society needs ways of signaling that certain behavior falls outside what decent people do. That only works, however, when the person who crosses the line believes he has done something wrong.
Most people want to think of themselves as good and fair. When our behavior clashes with that image, we find a way to explain it. A person doesn’t have to tell himself, “I’m prejudiced against Jews.” He can tell himself he’s fighting oppression, opposing colonialism, or standing with victims. Now the prejudice doesn’t feel like prejudice. It feels like principle.
Antisemitism isn’t new. But openly expressing it once carried a social cost. Now, in some circles, it can bring approval, attention, and even money, as long as it’s framed as a political or moral cause.
Franco was denounced, but he was also embraced. If saying something once considered disgraceful brings applause from your own side, it’s easier to conclude that you haven’t crossed a moral line.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict provides a rationale. Criticizing Israel isn’t antisemitic. Neither is caring about Palestinian suffering nor opposing the actions of the Israeli government. But none of that explains refusing to work for an individual because he’s Jewish. Franco demonstrated the problem on Piers Morgan. Asked about telling a prospective employer he wouldn’t work for a Jew, he repeatedly turned to Israel. The actions of a foreign government had become his explanation for how he treated an American Jew.
We would see the problem if someone refused to work for a Muslim American because of something Iran had done, or treated a Chinese American differently because of the Chinese government. Jews shouldn’t have to answer for the Israeli government before they’re entitled to equal treatment.
Campus politics has played a role. Students are often encouraged to understand conflicts by sorting people into categories of powerful and powerless, privileged and marginalized, oppressor and oppressed. Sometimes those categories illuminate injustice. Sometimes they become substitutes for thinking about individuals.
Jews complicate that framework. They have endured centuries of persecution and mass murder, yet American Jews may also be perceived as white, successful, or privileged. Israel, meanwhile, is the stronger party in its conflict with the Palestinians. Reduce the conflict to powerful versus powerless, and Israel becomes the oppressor. It isn’t a huge psychological leap from there to treating Jews themselves as representatives of that power.
Social media adds fuel. Say something provocative and thousands may condemn you, but another group may cheer. Enough applause can change your sense of what’s normal. A position that once seemed extreme can start to feel reasonable when your online world tells you you’re brave for expressing it.
But “the algorithm made me do it” shouldn’t become the modern version of “the devil made me do it.” Social media can reward prejudice. It doesn’t relieve people of responsibility for embracing it.
Institutions matter, too. Cornell condemned Franco’s remarks. Franco says he remains enrolled and has faced no disciplinary action. There may be legitimate reasons for that, including university rules and free-expression concerns. But students notice what happens afterward.
America spent decades making open antisemitism socially unacceptable. It never disappeared, but expressing it openly carried a cost. That cost matters. When prejudice can be defended as a political or moral cause, shame can turn into pride.
The most dangerous bigot isn’t the one who knows he’s a bigot. It’s the one who has convinced himself that his bigotry makes him a good person.