German panel on anti-semitism fails to include jews

It reminds me if this item from last year: http://blogs.seattletimes.com/today/2014/03/whites-unwelcome-at-college-diversity-happy-hour/

You think!?

The last time a panel in Germany got together to discuss the problem with – aw, screw it. @SpunkyTWS covered it.

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You fail at analogies.

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The problem was they went door to door knocking and shouting “It’s the government, we’re looking for Jews!”. Understandably all the Jews went and hid.

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In a perfect world you would not need a member of the affected minority to have an effective working group, just the most qualified panellists. In a perfect world you also wouldn’t need an anti-Semitism panel.
It is a matter of respect to at least have a representative present though.
OTOH had the panel wanted to release a controversial opinion it would be far easier if they had a few Jews on leashes to deflect criticism.

Better analogy:

Congressional Birth Control Hearing Involves Exactly Zero People Who Have a Uterus

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Also:
Anti-extremist/terrorist summit in Washington exclude extremists and terrorists from participation:

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What’s wrong with just using rel='nofollow' ?

Thanks to this oversight, now they’ll never know what Jews think of antisemitism.

Excuse my ignorance, but isn’t the purpose of using Donotlink is to deny FOX a link to an article describing cultural insensitivity?

I understand that this group may not have any sympathy for the FOX News crowd but shouldn’t this be a subject that they should be given credit for, in a encourage the good sense?

Disclaimer: NO, I’m not a FOX cheerleader.

What wonderful news! I’m going to Germany and France next month on business. Probably I won’t be wearing my kippah or tzitzit in a visible way.

Exactly.

I’m in “like” limbo right now, so consider this a manual version.

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Oddly, you’re likely to be treated better in Germany than France. They will be noticeably uncomfortable, no question, but the country has done a lot to make sure they don’t allow themselves to forget, so any indication that you’re Jewish will have them walking on very courteous eggshells. It’s actually fascinating (in a macabre way).

In a business context, since I’m outside the US or the State of Israel, I tend to keep my tzitzit tucked in anyway and only cover my head at work when I duck out for afternoon prayer or when making a blessing. I don’t like putting people who might be uncomfortable, or here in Japan unfamiliar, with my religious customs in a position where it distracts from the work. Whereas I wouldn’t be entirely surprised if you are right, my German coworkers who are hosting this conference have already gone out of their way to make sure my dietary needs will be accommodated so for the above reason I probably won’t go any further there while in the office than I do here.

I’m still thinking about my time outside the office and how I’ll manage shabbat in Paris, but probably I’m going to stay incognito.

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Depends on where in Germany, from my experience. Geographically they are a very different people, North and South. Not unlike some of the regionalization of attitude we have in the US of A.

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DISCLAIMER #1: For rather obvious historical reasons, the actual Jewish population in Germany and Austria (where I live) is very low (slightly above 1% in Germany, about 0,2% in Austria). So as a non-Jew my experience of anti-semitism here is limited to things I have heard other non-Jewish people say in the presence of other non-Jewish people. I’m not trying to “mansplain” (“goysplain”?) anything, I’m just making some educated guesses based on what I do know.
DISCLAIMER #2: I’m extrapolating from my personal knowledge of Austria here. The further north you go in Germany, the less it might apply.
In Austria and Germany, I’d expect you to experience several different phenomena (some of them antisemitism, others different things that might be mistaken for it):

  1. The prejudice that Jews are “well-connected” and “powerful” and tend to have a disproportionate amount of friends in high places. Also, the idea held by right-wingers that political correctness prohibits “just saying what we think” about Jews.

  2. Disagreement with Israel’s policies. It’s probably a majority opinion around here that Palestine’s occupation is wrong and illegal, that settlements in the occupied territories are a crime, and that war crimes have been committed by Israel. Some use that as an excuse/cover for their antisemitism, with others it’s an honestly held political opinion.
    Note that this doesn’t mean that Hamas is seen as anything but a bunch of terrorists, so the question of whether they committed war crimes, too, does not enter the picture. Just be aware that if you claim to have voted for Bush (if you’re an American citizen) or Netanyahu (if you’re an Israeli citizen), you’re basically presenting people with a choice between “awkward silence” or “heated political discussion”.

  3. Some awkwardness (“Don’t mention the war”). Most people will try their best to avoid seeming anti-semitic or intolerant in any way. The more you emphasize being Jewish, the harder they’ll try to avoid offending you. Consciously trying to avoid offending someone sometimes has unintended, and not entirely pleasant, side effects.

  4. A different kind of awkwardness bred by curiosity. Jews are a much talked-about minority around here (again for obvious historical reasons), but unless they live near a synagogue, the average Austrian or German might not meet a practicing Jew in person.

  5. Low tolerance towards public display of religion, especially compared to the US. For example, wearing a kippah while not actually visiting a synagogue would basically put you in the same category as a catholic monk.
    In traditionally Catholic Austria, the religious rules say that no one is supposed to eat any meat at this time of the year (Lent), and yet I do not have a single person among my friends who keeps that rule. And only about half of them are atheists.
    There won’t be any active hate over this, but expect some prejudice. People who stick to religious clothing or diet rules are considered “extremely religious”, no matter whether they are Jews, Muslims, Christians, or Buddhists. We all expect “extremely religious” people to be old-fashioned in their world view. “Extremely religious” people are expected to be homophobic and misogynist, and of course none of them would ever admit to having sex before marriage. Best to avoid talking about some subjects when those religious nuts are around, you know? :wink:

  6. Some idiots probably can’t tell Jewish religious customs apart from Muslim religious customs. They’ll apply their anti-islamic prejudice to you, which I fear is currently a much bigger problem than anti-semitism.

  7. The muslim first & second generation immigrants. I don’t know enough about them. Rumor has it they are extremely anti-semitic, but that might just be part of the anti-islamic prejudice that I mentioned earlier.

Now that I’ve enumerated seven different bad things that might happen to you I have to balance the impression again:
On the whole, I don’t think that anti-semitism in Austria & Germany is at a level where it seriously concerns visitors to the country. I’ve heard people unthinkingly regurgitate some old prejudices, but it’s all pretty benign compared to what I’ve heard about Muslims, and both countries are still safe places for Muslims to be.
Don’t fall for the media hyperbole. Remember that the no-go areas in Paris were a Fox invention.

Being left out of relevant panels happens to us atheists, too, at > 20% of the population. Most recently, the president of Austria invited representatives of all major religions to issue a common statement on the Charlie Hebdo massacre, where atheist caricaturists and Jewish store owners were targeted specifically (and Christians and Muslims were caught in the crossfire). But while the Churches still enjoy some unfair privileges, we atheists are far from being persecuted in any way. So I wouldn’t consider this “panel” incident to be a very serious alarm signal. Also consider that anti-semitism has been discussed a lot among non-Jews in Germany (due to lack of a sufficiently large remaining Jewish population), so the thought of having yet another discussion about it without a Jewish representative is not as absurd as it might seem to Americans (while still being a bad idea in the case of an official panel…).

So, don’t worry and enjoy your stay in continental Europe. A lot has changed in the past 70 years.

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Yep, that’s a good analogy as well.