"…My attitude to Mendelssohn seems to have changed; certainly not towards him as an artist…for years I have contributed more to his elevation than anyone else. However – let us not forget ourselves too much over this. Jews remain Jews; they take their place at table ten times before it's the Christian's turn. The stones we supply to build their temple of fame, they then use to throw at us. So what I'm saying is. moderation in all things. We must act and work for ourselves too. Above all, let us approach ever closer to the beautiful and true in art."

Rings and wizards or whatever records were left after the dark ages, (see Snorri Sturluson) are heavily altered and purged why not purge the purged.

I suppose humanity should worship Jewish fairytales instead… The torah treats everyone so equally just ask a Palestinian.

(Having grown up with the love of my Polish Jewish grandmother, i would probably suggest she was much more of a Hobbit than a Dwarf. )

I totally understand the argument that some people simply cannot listen to certain pieces of music, that it would cause almost physical pain. Hell, there's a certain Sting song that, every time I hear it, I think of my first college girlfriend and wince, even though that was ages ago, and I'm totally glad I didn't marry her.

But, as Ken said, I don't try to force other people not to play that song.

MONOSTATOS

All feel the joy of love,
Bill and coo, flirt, snuggle,
and kiss,
And I am supposed to avoid love,
Because a black is ugly,
Because a black is ugly.
Have I, then, been given no heart?
I am also fond of girls
I am also fond of girls,
Always to live without a woman
Would truly be the blaze of hell,
Would truly be the blaze of hell,

So, therefore I want, because I am
alive,
. Bill and coo, kiss, be tender.
Dear, good moon, forgive me,
A white took possession of me,
A white took possession of me,
White is beautiful! I must
kiss her;
Moon, hide yourself for this!
Should it vex you too much,
Oh, then close your eyes!
Oh, then close your eyes!
Oh, then close your eyes!

He then is about to rape Pamina when the all-good and seriously dull Sarastro shows up and saves her.

I'm sympathetic to Jag's quote above, as there are some artists whose lives are so repellent that I cannot enjoy their work. (Ezra Pound, for example.) So I make the personal choice not to view/read/listen to their work. Some people who led contemptible lives produced art so great that I am able to enjoy it. That's an entirely idiosyncratic response generated by my view of their particular brand of asshattery and by how good their art is.

If the L.A. Opera wants to make its own personal choice to stop performing Wagner, that's their call, like mine is to listen to it or not. But I don't like a politician — who wields the power to make L.A. Opera's life unpleasant in all sorts of ways — telling them what they ought or ought not perform.

This is an interesting article on Wagner:
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/Wagner.html

and provides some insight to why he remains a sensitive subject for many Jews.

"While it cannot be maintained that Wagner was directly responsible for German national socialism, there is no doubt that he was a powerful symbol in the Nazi era, and his music held a singular importance in the Nazi psyche. Thus, for Jewish survivors of the Nazi horrors, Wagner's music represents a vivid reminder of that regime. "

Even more interesting is Wagner's great grandson:

"As a listener, I consider Tristan und Isolde a masterpiece of 19th century music, but I am at the same time repelled by Wagner's Weltanschauung. I cannot just sit and enjoy his music. I never put on Wagner's music in my home… Richard Wagner's antisemitic writings will always overshadow my life." So says Gottfried Wagner, the composer's great-grandson, who recently visited Israel on a lecture tour. "I cannot separate the operas from his theoretical work. His writings and his music form a unified whole… He always considered himself a philosopher first, and a composer only second," says Gottfried Wagner, who has been disowned by his family and lives under threat from neo-Nazi groups. He spends his professional life writing and lecturing on the antisemitism of Richard Wagner and its consequences on German politics and culture. "