I understand this, and I speak for myself, not wanting to cultivate racism used as a tool for political control in my own country. I have no tolerance for hatred.
You find insult with someone’s sincere, specific concern, but the overbroad bogeymen and “international bankers” phrase used by confidence tricksters like Trump are received more positively. That is what I find curious.
[quote=“Israel_B, post:162, topic:88859, full:true”]
The bigots were there before, they are there today and they will be there tomorrow. [/quote]
Of course. The point is that, thanks to this campaign and the GOP, their legitimacy in American society and politics is on the rise after 60 years of being relegated to the fringes. Not only will they not go away after today, but they’ve been emboldened to demand that their noxious ideas are accepted by both the duopoly’s party of the right and by the broken mainstream media.
As a result, physical violence against Jews and other minorities from white nationalists and other right-wing populists following this election now has the potential to become as large a threat in America as violence from radical Islamists. The situation here on either count isn’t as dire as it is in Europe, where it’s bigotry everywhere you look, but it’s cause for concern.
It’s perceived as unconcerning when they come for Muslims, I suppose.
Well, they’re the “bad guys”! /s
Let’s just say it’s very jarring to get e-mail forwards of anti-Muslim articles from sites like VDare from Jewish acquaintances. Strange bedfellows.
Any moderately educated geneticist will tell you there are genetic markers, though, which do separate the largest existing group of Jews from everyone else. And other markers which are literally labeled as having Jewish roots (certain haplogroups).
It’s the only major world religion that actually based automatic membership on genetic inheritance (from back in a time when they didn’t have the means to actually measure it scientifically).
This is a subtle form of blaming the victim. It’s not @bibliophile20’s fault; admitting to being Jewish online is not a justification for being doxxed.
On a thread about anti-Jewish campaign messages? You might want to up your estimate a bit, dude.
But according to “David Schneider’s test”, if non-Jews say Jews aren’t a race, it proves they are antisemitic.
That’s due to semantic confusion between the concepts of “ethnicity” (a group being descended from the same ancestry and having cultural ties) and “race” (surface categorization based on phenotype features). Most people use them interchangeably, and default to using “race” when they should be using “ethnicity,” which is what Schneider did.
@anon67050589 explained already below about the haplogroups but that doesnt make us a “race” or ethnic group in any traditional sense. Then again we’ve always had the term am yisroel which describes us better anyway. We are a “nation” in the pre-nation-state sense which is why I can daven with so many “race” types but we are all Jews.
Your Rav was onto somtehing there. I would never go as far as be a mench in the street but a yid at home. There is no hard and fast rule of engagement with the world but we have requirements we have to balance between our community and the outside world.
And this is part of why I enjoy Chasidus so much, it gives me tools to use in both worlds.
I dont agree with you there. The motives, thought systems and behaviors of the hard right/left, white nationalists, etc. of the US are in no way similar to the complete system which governs Islamists or even “regular” Arabs who choose to spit at me as soon as they see I’m a Jew.
I dont see the actual risk level in the US reaching the proportions you describe.
Thanks for pointing that out. As I mentioned above, it simply is more of what makes us am yisroel.
Sure but we are more than a religion.
As often as we’ve discussed here, do you think that was my intent or unintentional motive there?
At the time I typed it, it seemed about right.
It does have the potential to rise if Jews continue to downplay the anti-Semitic appeals of right-wing populists (like, y’know, the current GOP candidate who has a 35% chance of becoming President) because they think the latter group hates Muslims more than they hate Jews. Heck, I’ve heard religious Jews praising the likes of Marine Le Pen and Pim Fortuyn on that basis (hint: these are not friends of observant Jews).
Radical Islam is certainly something for both Orthodox Jews like yourself and liberal atheists like me to be concerned about. I choose to address it and right-wing populism as two aspects of bigoted conservative authoritarianism. But if your fear of Muslims prompts you to keep your head buried in the sand over the growing influence of right-wing authoritarianism in the industrialised West, don’t be surprised if you get bitten in the arse you leave sticking up in the air.
Pim : P
And he was assassinated in 2002 and his party (LPF) did survive him only by 5 years or so. But I fear your argument is still true with spiritual successors like Geert Wilders and the PVV.
Yes but he didn’t mention his son in law who is Jewish. Doesn’t that prove his anti- semitism?
Thing about Trump, is he is such a target rich environment I don’t know why anyone feels the need to embellish his awfulness.
Corrected. Thanks. And yes, I’ve also heard religious Jews praising Wilders on the same basis. It’s disconcerting.
“Soros being a predatory individual has nothing to do with his ancestry, nor is he particular special in it, but we shouldn’t pretend he’s a good guy just because he supports pro-free trade centrist Dems over pro-free trade crazy Repubs.”
Soros is a curious case. Those who are familiar with his back story might recognise that he is a special case. Many Jewish people might have a problem with choices he has made in the past.
Trump’s SIL being Jewish neither proves nor disproves his antisemitism, since it’s tangential, especially with an ethically incoherent moral failure like Trump. Trump is a target rich environment, like there was that time he released a political ad that touched on a number of antisemitic tropes after the campaign expressed pride in embracing “Willie Horton” style ads.
He has black friends, too. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t stereotype black people.
I am concerned about the appeal that Trump holds for racists of all stripes, including anti-semites, and for Christian religious bigots, including those who hate Jews.
And he clearly does indulge in stereotyping, although supposedly in the case of Jews it’s a relatively positive stereotype (this is common in the Italian-American community where I live, incidentally - they have a thing about Jewish lawyers being the best). This concerns me too - stereotypes are often harmful.
But this thing where people tie themselves into knots finding secret messages in his speeches, literally convincing themselves he hates his own daughter and grandchildren?
That seems very, very crazy to me. Like, seek professional help level crazy.
Sorry if that offends, but I feel like somebody needed to say it, honestly. I make no claim to sanity myself.
Welp, we all know them feels from time to time.
