It’s deja vu all over again on Martha’s Vineyard where Harvard emeritus Professor Alan Dershowitz is giving a repeat performance from the summer of 2018. In case you’ve forgotten, he made national news back then complaining that his work with former President Donald Trump had made him a pariah among the social set.
Here’s part of what I said in my July 2018 commentary titled Don’t Cry for Alan Dershowitz: "My take on shunning, the political divide, invites to Martha’s Vineyard dinner parties, and Harvard professor Alan Dershowitz. Before you say it, yes there are many other more serious issues to discuss, but this drama keeps unfolding right in my backyards — I live in Cambridge and I spend as much time as possible on Martha’s Vineyard. Dershowitz complained that … he was being shunned and disinvited from dinner parties on Martha’s Vineyard because he championed 'Trump’s civil liberties.' The avalanche of reaction to what many called whining stirred up long-held personal antipathy, and recently rising political distaste for Dershowitz."
Fast forward to 2022 and Dershowitz is an even more vigorous defender of the former president, though he claims he only votes for liberal Democrats, including Hillary Clinton. No matter. Plenty of Vineyarders are open about scratching him from the dinner party lists where he once was an honored guest. His response? To up the manufactured controversy ante from his 2018 whines of shunning to his 2022 bloviating about being canceled by people he describes as anti-free speech. That’s why the bellicose barrister has threatened to sue the Chilmark Free Library for taking him off a list of this summer’s scheduled speakers.
Chilmark librarian Ebba Hierta explained — as she did in 2018 — that the library space seats 40, too small for his sure-to-be overflow crowd. But, this time, the controversy prompted hate mail from someone identifying as a member of the Proud Boys, the far-right domestic terrorist group. Hierta says she was so frightened that she installed burglar bars on her home windows.
Hushed and whispered past criticisms of Dershowitz are now loud and public. Uber producer, writer, and comedian Larry David of the popular TV show,” Curb Your Enthusiasm” sharply dismissed him at a popular gathering spot. And the back-and-forth opinions about professor Dershowitz in the Martha’s Vineyard Times newspaper got so heated on one story, news editor George Brennan announced he was shutting off the comments.
Finally, I will point out that author-professor Dershowitz’ latest hyperventilated cancel culture pronouncements seemed perfectly timed to the release of his latest book. Just as his provocative statements in 2018 were published just before the release of his book, “The Case Against Impeaching Trump."
So, everything old is new again in this latest episode of Alan Dershowitz: I’ve Been Criticized and Canceled. The aggrieved professor told the New Yorker magazine’s Isaac Chotiner that he’d been besieged with calls this summer from people wanting to hear him speak, telling the columnist, “The audiences are being deprived of my voice as the result of a deliberate cancellation decision.”
He may yet find his place on a stage somewhere on the island, but I don’t see him getting him any closer to an invite for the clambake.
