Dennis Prager

Dennis Mark Prager (/ˈpreɪɡər/; born August 2, 1948)[1] is an American conservative radio talk show host and writer. His initial political work concerned Soviet Jews who were unable to emigrate. He gradually began offering more and broader commentary on politics. His views generally align with social conservatism. He founded PragerU, an American non-profit organization that creates videos on various political, economic, and philosophical topics from a conservative perspective.

Dennis Prager
Prager in 2018
Born (1948-08-02) August 2, 1948
Brooklyn, New York, U.S.
Alma materBrooklyn College
Occupation
  • Radio host
  • Political commentator
  • Founder of PragerU
  • Author
Political partyRepublican
Spouse(s)Janice Prager (m. 1981–1986)
Francine Stone (m. 1988–2005)
Susan Reed (m. 2008)
Websitewww.dennisprager.com
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Early life and education

Dennis Prager was born in Brooklyn to Hilda Prager (née Friedfeld; 1919–2009) and her husband, Max Prager (1918–2014). Prager and his siblings were raised in a Modern Orthodox Jewish home. He attended the Yeshiva of Flatbush in Brooklyn, New York, where he befriended Joseph Telushkin. He went to Brooklyn College and graduated with a major in history and Middle Eastern Studies. Over the next few years he took courses at the Columbia University School of International and Public Affairs and at the University of Leeds; he then left academia without finishing a graduate degree. After he left graduate school, Prager left Modern Orthodoxy but maintained many traditional Jewish practices; he remained religious.[1]

Career launch
Prager speaking at the California Capitol Building in 2008.

In 1969, while he was studying in England, he was recruited by a Jewish group to travel to the Soviet Union to interview Jews about their life there. When he returned the next year, he was in demand as a speaker on repression of Soviet Jews; he earned enough from lectures to travel, and visited around sixty countries.[2][3] He became the national spokesman for the Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry.[4]

The start of Prager's career overlapped with a growing tendency among American Jews, who had been staunchly liberal, to move toward the center and some to the right, driven in part by the influx of Jews from the Soviet Union.[5] In 1975, Prager and Telushkin published an introduction to Judaism intended for nonobservant Jews: The Nine Questions People Ask About Judaism, which became a bestseller. Among the questions addressed in the text were: how does Judaism differ from Christianity, and can one doubt the existence of God and still be a good Jew, and how do you account for unethical but religious Jews?[1][6]

Prager supported Jimmy Carter in the 1976 US presidential election.[7] Prager ran the Brandeis-Bardin Institute from 1976 to 1983; Telushkin worked with him there.[1] It was Prager's first salaried job.[2] He soon earned a reputation as a moral critic focused on attacking secularism and narcissism, each of which he said was destroying society; some people called him a Jewish Billy Graham.[2]

A higher profile

In 1982, KABC (AM) in Los Angeles hired Prager to host Religion on the Line, its talk show on religion, every Sunday night,[3] which got top ratings[8] and eventually led to a weekday talk show.[9][10] He and Telushkin published another book in 1983, Why the Jews? The Reason for Antisemitism.[1]

According to a review in Commentary, the book depicts anti-Semitism as a "sinister form of flattery"; the authors wrote that hatred of Jews arises from resentment over Jews' acceptance of the doctrine that they are God's chosen people, charged with bringing a moral message to the world.[11] The book describes Jews as both a nation (stateless for a long time) and followers of a religion and says that this identity is essential to Judaism; the book says that calls for Jews to culturally assimilate as well as opposition to Zionism are both forms of antisemitism.[11][12] The book describes secular Jews as people who have lost their way, and who generally fall into the error of applying Judaism's mission to reform the world in ways that tend to be leftist, totalitarian, and destructive.[11][12]

He also wrote a syndicated column for newspapers across the country. In 1985, Prager launched his own quarterly journal, Ultimate Issues,[3] which was renamed to The Prager Perspective[10] in 1996.[1]

In 1986, he divorced and underwent a year of therapy, which the Encyclopedia of Judaism says contributed to his 1999 book Happiness is a Serious Problem.[1] In 1990, he wrote an essay called "Judaism, Homosexuality and Civilization" that argued against normalizing homosexuality in the Jewish community[13] and placed sexual sins on a continuum from premarital sex, celibacy, adultery, homosexuality, bestiality, and incest; he argued that confining sex to heterosexual marriage desexualized religion, which was a great achievement of ancient Jewish tradition that was worth fighting to retain.[14]

By 1992, he was remarried.[13] By that time he was, according to the Los Angeles Jewish Journal, a "fixture on local radio" and "a Jewish St. George battling the forces of secularity on behalf of simple 'goodness'", and generally socially conservative, with some exceptions; he supported a woman's legal access to abortion (although he said it was usually immoral), and supported and justified sex between non-married consenting men and women.[13] In 1992, he became involved with the Stephen S. Wise Temple and gave talks there,[1] and got a weekday night talk show on KABC.[15]

In 1994, Prager also did an hour each weekday, via satellite on WABC, KABC's sister station in New York, before doing his KABC show locally.[16]

In 1994–1995, Multimedia Entertainment syndicated a Prager television show.[17][18] Prager said "I am ambivalent about television as a medium for deep, intelligent programming, but I am not at all ambivalent about this show. This is an incredible opportunity to reach a mass audience with my belief system."[19] In 1995, he moved the studio audience on-stage with him where they could interact with him more directly.[20]

Political views

In 1994 the Anti-Defamation League published a report on antisemitism in the Christian right movement; Prager, who aligned with the social and political conservatism of the Christian right, attacked the ADL and its report.[21] In 1995 he urged conservative Jews to be open to working with conservative Christians, like the Christian Coalition.[22] In 1995 he named Jacob Petuchowski, Eliezer Berkovits, Harold Kushner, C.S. Lewis, Richard John Neuhaus, Michael Novak, and George Gilder as the people who had influenced his theology the most.[23]

In 1995 Prager criticized the Illinois Supreme Court decision in the Baby Richard case that removed a child from his adoptive parents.[24] With KABC he held a "Rally for Baby Richard",[25] where he got support from actors Priscilla Presley, Tom Selleck, and John McCook.[9]

In 1996 Prager testified in Congress in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act. Prager testified that "the acceptance of homosexuality as the equal of heterosexual marital love signifies the decline of Western civilization."[26] Prager worked with Bob Dole's campaign in the 1996 presidential election; when polls prior to the election showed that the Dole campaign did not have much Jewish support, Prager said this was because "American Jews are ignorant regarding the anti Israel aspects of the current Democrat Party."[27]

Since 1999, he has hosted a nationally syndicated talk show on the socially and politically conservative Christian radio station KRLA in Los Angeles.[1] KRLA is part of the Salem Media Group that carries other conservative hosts, including James Dobson, Randall Terry, Janet Parshall, Sebastian Gorka and Larry Elder; it is a key voice of the Christian right that seeks to change American politics as well as the way that individual people live.[28][29]

In 2003, he considered running for the US Senate against Barbara Boxer in the 2004 election.[30]

In 2006, Prager criticized Keith Ellison, the first Muslim elected to Congress, for announcing that he would use the Quran for the reenactment of his swearing in ceremony.[31] Prager wrote: "Insofar as a member of Congress taking an oath to serve America and uphold its values is concerned, America is interested in only one book, the Bible. If you are incapable of taking an oath on that book, don't serve in Congress." In response, former New York City Mayor Ed Koch called for Prager to end his service on the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Council.[32]

In 2009 Prager joined other Salem Radio Network hosts to oppose the Affordable Care Act.[33] In 2014, while same-sex marriage in the United States was in process of being legalized, he wrote that if that were to happen, then "there is no plausible argument for denying polygamous relationships, or brothers and sisters, or parents and adult children, the right to marry."[34][35] In 2014, he also said that the "heterosexual AIDS" crisis was something "entirely manufactured by the Left".[35]

Prager endorsed Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election, but said that Trump was his "17th choice out of 17 candidates". He clarified that he "was not a Trump supporter, when there was a choice" but added, "There is no choice now."[36] Prager had previously said that Trump was "unfit to be a presidential candidate, let alone president".[37] Conor Friedersdorf of The Atlantic described how Trump's adultery, character assassination of others, embrace of torture, bad behavior, whining, and use of profanity violate values and principles that Prager has upheld as essential to civil life and noted that Prager had said that endorsing Trump was in line with his principles because "[w]e hold that defeating Hillary Clinton, the Democrats, and the Left is also a principle. And that it is the greater principle". Friedersdorf wrote, "[I]f that's all principle means now, we haven't much need for public moralists to write weekly columns with appeals to Judeo-Christian ethics and the importance of good character. Just pick the political party you like best and let the ends justify the means on its behalf."[38]

In 2017, Prager was invited to be a guest conductor for the volunteer orchestra of Santa Monica, California, as part of a fundraising concert at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. Some of the orchestra members protested the invitation, which they considered promoting bigotry. The orchestra leader had invited Prager because he admired him, as Prager often discussed and promoted classical music on his shows and had guest-conducted a few times in the past, and because he thought Prager's presence might help raise more money.[35][34] Guido Lamell, music director of the Santa Monica Symphony, in spite of the controversy surrounding Prager's presence, called Prager "a great man, leader and friend".[39]

In February 2020, he told a caller: "Of course you should never call anybody the n-word, that's despicable," but complained about the word itself being considered unacceptable.[40][41] In April 2020, Prager said of social distancing measures during the coronavirus pandemic, "The lockdown is the greatest mistake in the history of humanity."[42][43]

PragerU
Main article: PragerU

In 2009, Prager and his producer Allen Estrin started a website called PragerU, which creates five-minute videos on various topics from a conservative perspective.[44][45] According to Prager, he created the site to challenge the "unhealthy effect intellectually and morally" of the American higher education system.[46] BuzzFeed described PragerU as "one of the biggest, most influential and yet least understood forces in online media." As of 2018 it spent around 40% of its annual $10 million budget on marketing; each video is produced according to a consistent style. Videos cover topics such as "racism, sexism, income inequality, gun ownership, Islam, immigration, Israel, police brutality" and speech on college campuses. BuzzFeed wrote that "the biggest reason PragerU has escaped national attention is that it mostly doesn't do Trump," or engage with the political news cycle.[37] Some of its videos had restricted viewer access by YouTube in 2017.[47]

Published works

Prager's columns are handled by Creators Syndicate. He has been published in The Wall Street Journal, the Los Angeles Times and Commentary. His weekly syndicated column appears on such online websites as Townhall,[48] National Review Online, Jewish World Review and elsewhere. He also writes a bi-weekly column for The Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles.

In 2018, he published a commentary on the Book of Exodus; this was followed by another commentary on the Book of Genesis in 2019. Both were published by the Salem Media Group.[6]

  • The Nine Questions People Ask About Judaism (with Joseph Telushkin) (1986) ISBN 0-671-62261-7
  • Think a Second Time (44 Essays on 44 Subjects) (1996) ISBN 0-06-098709-X
  • Happiness Is a Serious Problem: A Human Nature Repair Manual[10] (1999) ISBN 0-06-098735-9
  • Why the Jews? The Reason for Antisemitism (with Joseph Telushkin) (2003) ISBN 0-7432-4620-9
  • Still the Best Hope: Why the World Needs American Values to Triumph (2012) ISBN 0-06198512-0
  • The Ten Commandments: Still the Best Moral Code (2015) ISBN 978-1621574170
  • The Ten Commandments: Still the Best Path to Follow (2015) (for children) ISBN 9781511317092
  • The Rational Bible: Exodus (2018) ISBN 9781621577720
  • The Rational Bible: Genesis (2019) ISBN 9781621578987

Filmography

See also

References
  1. Karesh, Sara E.; Hurvitz, Mitchell M. (2006). Encyclopedia of Judaism. Facts On File. pp. 402–403. ISBN 978-0-8160-6982-8.
  2. Baker, Bob (August 5, 1979). "Self-Worship and Secularism Called Greatest Enemies of Today's Society". Los Angeles Times.
  3. "RADIO : The Prager Prism : Dennis Prager has eight hours a week to talk on the radio about 'the great issues of life'; so, what makes him so important?". Los Angeles Times. November 17, 1991. Archived from the original on January 29, 2020.
  4. "Kallah participants to hear Dennis Prager". The Jewish Press [Omaha, Neb]. December 11, 1981.
  5. Friedman, Murray (2003). "The Changing Jewish Political Profile". American Jewish History. 91 (3/4): 423–438. doi:10.1353/ajh.2005.0008. JSTOR 23887289. S2CID 153461672.
  6. Kirsch, Jonathan (May 16, 2018). "A Rational View of the Torah". Jewish Journal. Retrieved July 13, 2018.
  7. Oppenheimer, Mark (March–April 2018). "Inside the right-wing YouTube empire that's quietly turning millennials into conservatives". Mother Jones.
  8. "Commercial-Free Religious Broadcasts--a Fading Signal : Media: While there were about 30 programs airing regularly in the L.A. Area, that number has now dwindled to two". Los Angeles Times. April 14, 1990. Archived from the original on November 4, 2017.
  9. "The day you have a child is the day you become vulnerable. That's why we're here" (PDF).
  10. "Mr. Morality". Los Angeles Times. February 4, 1998. Archived from the original on January 30, 2020.
  11. Charen, Mona (October 1, 1983). "Review: Why the Jews? The Reason for Anti-Semitism, by Dennis Prager and Joseph Telushkin". Commentary Magazine.
  12. Boyd, Malcolm (August 28, 1983). "Anti-Zionism vs. Anti-Semitism: the Dejudaization of Jew-hatred". Los Angeles Times.
  13. Margolis, David (December 1992). "Dennis Prager: A Profile The man behind the golden voice". Los Angeles Jewish Journal.
  14. Balch, David L. (2007). Homosexuality, Science, and the "Plain Sense" of Scripture. Wipf and Stock Publishers. pp. 292–293. ISBN 9781556355387.
  15. KABC Changes
  16. "R&R Street Talk: Rumbles" (PDF).
  17. "The Dennis Prager Show". TV Guide. 1994.
  18. "Toasting a new talker" (PDF).
  19. Richmond, Ray (November 11, 1994). "No freaks: Dennis Prager's talk show is all about values". Chicago Tribune.
  20. Snow, Shauna (January 17, 1995). "'Sunset' settlement: ... television". Los Angeles Times. The Arts.
  21. Dershowitz, Alan M. (2000). The Vanishing American Jew: In Search of Jewish Identity for the Next Century. Little, Brown. pp. 158–159. ISBN 9780446930505.
  22. Barnes, Fred (November 1995). "The Orthodox alliance". The American Enterprise. 6 (6): 70.
  23. Kessler, E J (November 24, 1995). "The Lord's Prager: Talking to 'Our Jew on the West Coast'". Forward. p. 1.
  24. "Prager on Baby Richard". May 22, 1995.
  25. "Robby DeBoer Papers".
  26. Stoll, Ira (May 24, 1996). "The Stoll Report: News From the Nation's Capital". The Forward.
  27. Stoll, Ira (November 1, 1996). "Donkeys Jockey for Credit As Clinton Victory Looms". The Forward.
  28. Piore, Adam (December 2005). "A Higher Frequency". Mother Jones.
  29. Stoltzfus, Mandy (May 8, 2006). "Conservative Spotlight: Chuck DeFeo". Human Events. "Our nationally syndicated hosts — Bill Bennett, Mike Gallagher, Dennis Prager, Michael Medved and Hugh Hewitt — reach millions of Americans every week. I come to work every day thinking about how we can move those folks online to Townhall.com so they can voice their opinion through blogging, pod-casting and interacting with other conservatives." DeFeo is excited about the opportunities he has using Townhall.com and Salem's radio to reach members of the conservative movement and involve them in policy battles and political campaigns.
  30. Pershing, Ben (February 3, 2003). "Radio Days in California?; As GOP Searches for A Senate Candidate, Two Syndicated Talk Hosts Are Mentioned". Roll Call.
  31. Marty, Robin (November 28, 2006). "Dennis Prager - Hateful and Wrong – Updated". Minnesota Monitor. Archived from the original on January 9, 2007. Retrieved December 4, 2006.
  32. "Koch Calls for Pundit's Ouster from Shoah Council". The Jewish Daily Forward. December 8, 2006.
  33. Gilgoff, Dan (September 8, 2009). "More Christian Conservatives Against Healthcare Reform". US News & World Report.
  34. Garcia-Navarro, Lulu (August 13, 2017). "Santa Monica Symphony Orchestra Confronts Controversy Over Right-Wing Guest Conductor". NPR.org. Retrieved August 27, 2017.
  35. Deb, Sopan (August 7, 2017). "Santa Monica Symphony Roiled by Conservative Guest Conductor". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 27, 2017.
  36. Carter, Evan (September 8, 2016). "Q&A: Dennis Prager off the air". The Collegian.
  37. Bernstein, Joseph. "How PragerU Is Winning The Right-Wing Culture War Without Donald Trump". BuzzFeed. Retrieved March 12, 2018.
  38. Friedersdorf, Conor (September 7, 2016). "Dennis Prager Puts Defeating Clinton Ahead of All His Other Principles". The Atlantic. Retrieved August 27, 2017.
  39. Schultz, Rick (August 17, 2017). "Dennis Prager draws classical newbies, and a musicians' boycott, at Disney Hall concert". Los Angeles Times. Retrieved November 12, 2019.
  40. "Dennis Prager says it's 'idiotic' he can't use the N-word". The Daily Dot. February 14, 2020. Retrieved March 10, 2020.
  41. "It's 'idiotic you can't say the N-word,' says radio host Dennis Prager, soon to speak at Calgary conference | CBC News".
  42. "Conservative Pundit's Hot Take on Coronavirus Lockdown Gets the Slapdown It Deserves". April 29, 2020.
  43. "PragerU Mocked for Tweet on Lockdowns". Mediaite. April 29, 2020. Retrieved April 29, 2020.
  44. "Facebook apologises to right-wing site". August 20, 2018. Retrieved May 26, 2019.
  45. Bray, Hiawatha. "Youtube restricts access to Alan Dershowitz video". The Boston Globe. Retrieved August 8, 2017. The videos are mini-lectures on topics from feminism to religion to foreign policy, presented from a conservative point of view.
  46. Hallowell, Billy (August 29, 2012). "Radio Host Dennis Prager Has a New Online 'College' to Combat Liberal Bias and Teach Judeo-Christian Values". TheBlaze. Archived from the original on June 20, 2018. Retrieved January 12, 2020.
  47. Gardner, Eriq (January 2, 2018). "Conservative Video Producer Suing Google Over "Censorship" Pushes for Injunction". The Hollywood Reporter.
  48. "Dennis Prager Warns Conservatives About Defeating Themselves". NewsMax, Brian Freeman | 18 Oct 2016
  49. For goodness sake II. World cat. OCLC 370275688.
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