"Jews totally run Hollywood"

[Polerius]

The title of this OP was taken from a column by Joel Stein in the LA Times (http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-stein19-2008dec19,0,4676183.column)

I was reminded of this column by the recent Rick Sanchez fiasco, and mainly by comments in the couple of related threads here on the SDMB that categorically stated that saying that Jews control the media is anti-semitic.

And yet, here is Joel Stein:

I have never been so upset by a poll in my life. Only 22% of Americans now believe "the movie and television industries are pretty much run by Jews," down from nearly 50% in 1964. The Anti-Defamation League, which released the poll results last month, sees in these numbers a victory against stereotyping. Actually, it just shows how dumb America has gotten. Jews totally run Hollywood.

How deeply Jewish is Hollywood? When the studio chiefs took out a full-page ad in the Los Angeles Times a few weeks ago to demand that the Screen Actors Guild settle its contract, the open letter was signed by: News Corp. President Peter Chernin (Jewish), Paramount Pictures Chairman Brad Grey (Jewish), Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert Iger (Jewish), Sony Pictures Chairman Michael Lynton (surprise, Dutch Jew), Warner Bros. Chairman Barry Meyer (Jewish), CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves (so Jewish his great uncle was the first prime minister of Israel), MGM Chairman Harry Sloan (Jewish) and NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker (mega-Jewish). If either of the Weinstein brothers had signed, this group would have not only the power to shut down all film production but to form a minyan with enough Fiji water on hand to fill a mikvah.
...
The Jews are so dominant, I had to scour the trades to come up with six Gentiles in high positions at entertainment companies. When I called them to talk about their incredible advancement, five of them refused to talk to me, apparently out of fear of insulting Jews. The sixth, AMC President Charlie Collier, turned out to be Jewish.

As a proud Jew, I want America to know about our accomplishment. Yes, we control Hollywood.

Some questions:
* Is he wrong?

* Is he correct, but it's only OK to say it in public if you are Jewish?

* Are the facts correct, but do not translate to "Jews control Hollywood/the media"?

* Are the facts correct, and translate to "Jews control Hollywood/the media", but it's not good to say so in public because that would provide fodder for anti-semites and crazy bigots of various kinds?

[IvoryTowerDenizen]

I believe the sentiment is wrong regardless of the facts. Some Jewish people may run Hollywood, but Jews as a unit, a single entity do not.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

There are successful Jews in Hollywood. That does not mean that "the Jews" run Hollywood. There is no cabal or conspiracy.

[Alessan]

I have only one response to claims like the one in the OP:

You're welcome.

Hollywood is one of the Jewish people's greatest achievements. Why should we be ashamed to take credit?

[John Mace]

Hurray for Hollywood!

Mr. Stein caught himself in a semantic, Semitic trap. "The Jews" refers to Jews collectively. And when you assign the accomplishments of a few individuals to the group as a whole, well you're just being an idiot. Why should some schmoe in Hoboken get any credit for what a handful of Jewish Media Moguls did?

Hollywood is one of the Jewish people's greatest achievements. Why should we be ashamed to take credit?
Because 99.9% of "the Jewish people" had bubkes to do with Hollywood.

[Simplicio]

Well, there's two ways to read "The Jews control Hollywood". One is simply that a lot of higher up execs in Hollywood are Jewish, which seems pretty undeniably true.

The other is that there's some sort of organized group called "the Jews" whose members are at least somewhat formally organized to control Hollywood and protect each others interests. Sanchez's comments seemed to at least suggest this latter case, which most poeple find offensive due to the association with "Elders of Zion" type conspiracy theories.

In reality, I think a mixture of nepotism, "good old boy" networks and shared social connections tend to make a lot of industries dominated by one immigrant or social group. Jews in Hollywood tends to get more notice then, say, Greeks in shipping or Vietnamese in nail salons as Hollywood is a lot more prominant.

[Captain Amazing]

There's a good book, Neil Gabler's "An Empire of their Own: How the Jews Invented Hollywood", which looks at the early Hollywood studio moguls, who were almost entirely Jewish, and how their background as first and second generation Jewish immigrants led to the shaping of Hollywood.

[Todderbob]

Hurray for Hollywood!

Mr. Stein caught himself in a semantic, Semitic trap. "The Jews" refers to Jews collectively. And when you assign the accomplishments of a few individuals to the group as a whole, well you're just being an idiot. Why should some schmoe in Hoboken get any credit for what a handful of Jewish Media Moguls did?

Hollywood is one of the Jewish people's greatest achievements. Why should we be ashamed to take credit?
Because 99.9% of "the Jewish people" had bubkes to do with Hollywood.

Bupkis.

[John Mace]

Hurray for Hollywood!

Mr. Stein caught himself in a semantic, Semitic trap. "The Jews" refers to Jews collectively. And when you assign the accomplishments of a few individuals to the group as a whole, well you're just being an idiot. Why should some schmoe in Hoboken get any credit for what a handful of Jewish Media Moguls did?


Because 99.9% of "the Jewish people" had bubkes to do with Hollywood.

Bupkis.

Bubkes is perfectly acceptable. In fact, I think it is the most correct spelling (there are other ways to spell it besides bupkis and bubkes).

[Koxinga]

Up until very recently, did white people control Washington? As opposed to women, did men control, um, everything? If it's not wrong to make those observations, why is it wrong to make a similar observation regarding Jews and Hollywood?

[Polerius]

There are successful Jews in Hollywood. That does not mean that "the Jews" run Hollywood. There is no cabal or conspiracy.

Well, there's two ways to read "The Jews control Hollywood". One is simply that a lot of higher up execs in Hollywood are Jewish, which seems pretty undeniably true.

The other is that there's some sort of organized group called "the Jews" whose members are at least somewhat formally organized to control Hollywood and protect each others interests.
Even in the absence of a cabal or formally organized group to control Hollywood, does the fact that most if not all studios are run by a certain ethnic minority have an impact on the types of movies made?

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)

Besides the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, are there any aspects of Jewish identity & culture that come through in the types of movies that are made and the types of movies that are not made? For example, if Jews, statistically are more secular and more liberal than the population at large, does that translate into what gets put into film form?

To summarize, even in the absence of a cabal, or concerted effort to "run things", the fact that most studios are headed by people from a single ethnic minority could have an impact that would be similar to the case when there was a concerted effort to run things.

[Polerius]

Up until very recently, did white people control Washington? As opposed to women, did men control, um, everything? If it's not wrong to make those observations, why is it wrong to make a similar observation regarding Jews and Hollywood?
If some feminists in the 70s said that men control everything, that doesn't mean that men have a secret cabal that is unified and secretly plots to keep women out and control the world.

But, it is a fact that, if men are in all positions of power (which they were in the past), that affects the types of laws passed, the type of research that gets done, etc.

So, even if "men" as a group did not plot to achieve certain goals, some of those goals were achieved nonetheless, simply by the fact that men were in the key spots in society.

[Alessan]

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)


In my experience, Hollywood tends to stay away from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict like the plague. I can think of maybe four mainstream movies dealing with the subject since 1960 (for the record: Exodus, The Little Drummer Girl, Munich and Don't Mess with the Zohan, none of which portrayed a black and white conflict).

[Simplicio]

There are successful Jews in Hollywood. That does not mean that "the Jews" run Hollywood. There is no cabal or conspiracy.

Well, there's two ways to read "The Jews control Hollywood". One is simply that a lot of higher up execs in Hollywood are Jewish, which seems pretty undeniably true.

The other is that there's some sort of organized group called "the Jews" whose members are at least somewhat formally organized to control Hollywood and protect each others interests.
Even in the absence of a cabal or formally organized group to control Hollywood, does the fact that most if not all studios are run by a certain ethnic minority have an impact on the types of movies made?

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)

Besides the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, are there any aspects of Jewish identity & culture that come through in the types of movies that are made and the types of movies that are not made? For example, if Jews, statistically are more secular and more liberal than the population at large, does that translate into what gets put into film form?

To summarize, even in the absence of a cabal, or concerted effort to "run things", the fact that most studios are headed by people from a single ethnic minority could have an impact that would be similar to the case when there was a concerted effort to run things.

There's probably some of this, though I'm sure Jewish studio execs are aware that they're selling to a gentile audience who would find more then the occasional movies about Jewish themes boring.

I'd actually say the most obvious example of the similar backgrounds of studio execs isn't particularly the prominence of a Jewish perspective as the prominence of a New York perspective. Almost all of the studio execs aren't just Jewish, they're Jews of European ancestry from particular parts of New York City, which is part of the reason New York City is the only city in the world in many US movies.

[BrainGlutton]

* Is he correct, but it's only OK to say it in public if you are Jewish?

Of course. That is exactly the difference between bigotry and gloating. ;)

[BrainGlutton]

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)


In my experience, Hollywood tends to stay away from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict like the plague. I can think of maybe four mainstream movies dealing with the subject since 1960 (for the record: Exodus, The Little Drummer Girl, Munich and Don't Mess with the Zohan, none of which portrayed a black and white conflict).

That never struck me before, but you're right. And it's really astonishing, given the field Israel-Palestine offers for dramatic stories. Curious omission. Could be because the Jewish movie moguls are walking on tiptoe. Could be that the whole thing is too divisive in America to dwell on (making movies about Apartheid South Africa was all right, everybody this side of the pond agreed who the bad guys were). Could be both.

[begbert2]

In my experience, Hollywood tends to stay away from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict like the plague. I can think of maybe four mainstream movies dealing with the subject since 1960 (for the record: Exodus, The Little Drummer Girl, Munich and Don't Mess with the Zohan, none of which portrayed a black and white conflict).

That never struck me before, but you're right. And it's really astonishing, given the field Israel-Palestine offers for dramatic stories. Curious omission. Could be because the Jewish movie moguls are walking on tiptoe. Could be that that the whole thing is too divisive in America to dwell on (making movies about Apartheid South Africa was all right, everybody this side of the pond agreed who the bad guys were). Could be both.Moviemakers love nazis. Black and white is a lovely color scheme.

[Raygun99]

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)

Hollywood makes few, if any, films about Israel or Palestine in general (and no, You Don't Mess With the Zohan doesn't count) and for a very simple reason - no one in North America would watch them.

[Koxinga]

So, even if "men" as a group did not plot to achieve certain goals, some of those goals were achieved nonetheless, simply by the fact that men were in the key spots in society.

Would it be acceptable to assert that even if Jews as a group do not plot to (say) project a certain worldview in the media, some of these projections are made nonetheless, simply by the fact that Jews are in the key spots in the industry?

Or would that be a tad controversial? ;)

[BrainGlutton]

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)

Hollywood makes few, if any, films about Israel or Palestine in general (and no, You Don't Mess With the Zohan doesn't count) and for a very simple reason - no one in North America would watch them.

Oh, no. In fact, it would be fantastically easy to make such a movie so that some segments of the population would not think of missing it, and other segments would picket the theaters.

[Raygun99]

It's just not a topic that people want to spend their entertainment dollars and time on. Think about all the Iraq War films that flop. It's a depressing topic, and few depressing movies do well.

[Jackmannii]

Even in the absence of a cabal or formally organized group to control Hollywood, does the fact that most if not all studios are run by a certain ethnic minority have an impact on the types of movies made?I think you'll have a very hard time making this case.

What overwhelmingly influences the types of movies that are made is the same factor that determines what any business churns out - the potential for making money. Themes that make for popular movies often conflict with beliefs held by liberals (which a majority of Jews have historically been). For instance, Gone With The Wind and many other films portray a romanticized view of the Old South leading up to and during the Civil War. Lots of movies (the Dirty Harry series are examples) glorify violent cops and downplay civil rights concerns, views that are popular among a large segment of the movie-viewing public. These are not themes you'd expect to especially resonate among Jews. Hollywood has been responsible for numerous movies in recent years that show corporations and banks as evil. Wall Street and its successor have been hits. Since Them Jews run big business, banking and Wall Street (at least in the minds of many), wouldn't the movie moguls want to soft-pedal this stuff? It's not happening.

As to the Mideast conflict, probably the endless nature of it is seen as turning off the public, there's huge potential for offending various segments of the population and many "message" films have bombed in recent years. It's not surprising that the studios haven't produced "Gaza: The Sequel".

Lastly, I'm really pissed off that I run Hollywood and yet can't even get a measly discount on theater tickets.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

There are successful Jews in Hollywood. That does not mean that "the Jews" run Hollywood. There is no cabal or conspiracy.

Well, there's two ways to read "The Jews control Hollywood". One is simply that a lot of higher up execs in Hollywood are Jewish, which seems pretty undeniably true.

The other is that there's some sort of organized group called "the Jews" whose members are at least somewhat formally organized to control Hollywood and protect each others interests.
Even in the absence of a cabal or formally organized group to control Hollywood, does the fact that most if not all studios are run by a certain ethnic minority have an impact on the types of movies made?
I guess that would explain why we get saturated with Christmas movies and Christmas themes on television every year.
As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)
I think the reason you don't see this has more to do with economics than ideology (though I guess I can concede that Jewish studio heads probably aren't very eager to make Jew-bashing movies). The most significant motivator in Hollywood is the Bottom Line. Movies about the plight of Palestinians don't make money. Why make a movie like that when you can make 40 times the gross with a 3D cartoon about talking animals? That's where the money is.
Besides the Israeli/Palestinian conflict, are there any aspects of Jewish identity & culture that come through in the types of movies that are made and the types of movies that are not made? For example, if Jews, statistically are more secular and more liberal than the population at large, does that translate into what gets put into film form?
Hollywood tends to avoid taking hard political or religious stances as a rule because it divides audiences and hurts the Bottom Line. To the degree that Hollywood portrays religion, Christian themes (however squishy and generalized they tend to be) dominate by a wide margin. I do not see very many movies or TV shows pushing "secularism."
To summarize, even in the absence of a cabal, or concerted effort to "run things", the fact that most studios are headed by people from a single ethnic minority could have an impact that would be similar to the case when there was a concerted effort to run things.
No, because the Bottom Line is the great equalizer. The positions of the studio heads are dependent on profit. They are slaves to it. Regardless of what they may feel religiously or politically, their product has to serve their audiences, and American audiences like talking animals and superheroes.

[suranyi]

Even in the absence of a cabal or formally organized group to control Hollywood, does the fact that most if not all studios are run by a certain ethnic minority have an impact on the types of movies made?
I guess that would explain why we get saturated with Christmas movies and Christmas themes on television every year.

I think the reason you don't see this has more to do with economics than ideology (though I guess I can concede that Jewish studio heads probably aren't very eager to make Jew-bashing movies). The most significant motivator in Hollywood is the Bottom Line. Movies about the plight of Palestinians don't make money. Why make a movie like that when you can make 40 times the gross with a 3D cartoon about talking animals? That's where the money is.

Hollywood tends to avoid taking hard political or religious stances as a rule because it divides audiences and hurts the Bottom Line. To the degree that Hollywood portrays religion, Christian themes (however squishy and generalized they tend to be) dominate by a wide margin. I do not see very many movies or TV shows pushing "secularism."
To summarize, even in the absence of a cabal, or concerted effort to "run things", the fact that most studios are headed by people from a single ethnic minority could have an impact that would be similar to the case when there was a concerted effort to run things.
No, because the Bottom Line is the great equalizer. The positions of the studio heads are dependent on profit. They are slaves to it. Regardless of what they may feel religiously or politically, their product has to serve their audiences, and American audiences like talking animals and superheroes.

In fact, until the 1970s, there were hardly any Jewish characters in the movies, despite the huge number of Jews in the industry. So it makes no sense to ask if they were portrayed well or badly. They pretty much didn't exist at all.

[Stoid]

* Is he wrong?


Nope.


As my best friend (Jewish) and I were sitting in my living room in Hollywood last night discussing the whole thing and laughing our asses off at how stupid and wonderful it is that Sanchez got his ass handed to him for telling the truth.

[Magiver]

semantic Semitic trap dibs on the band name.

[Polerius]

* Is he wrong?


Nope.


As my best friend (Jewish) and I were sitting in my living room in Hollywood last night discussing the whole thing and laughing our asses off at how stupid and wonderful it is that Sanchez got his ass handed to him for telling the truth.
Care to explain why it's "wonderful" that someone lost their job for telling the truth?

Or was Sanchez such an idiot that whatever reason was used to fire him was justified?
(I never watched his show)

[Diogenes the Cynic]

He wasn't fired for telling the truth. He was fired for damaging his own on-air marketability with a ridiculous antisemitic rant.

[Voyager]

In fact, until the 1970s, there were hardly any Jewish characters in the movies, despite the huge number of Jews in the industry. So it makes no sense to ask if they were portrayed well or badly. They pretty much didn't exist at all.

Very true. Consider the Dick van Dyke show. Here we have a comedy writer's room, patterned after Your Show of Shows, with token Morey Amsterdam. He was at least Jewish in one show, where he got bar mitzvahed. It was kind of like shows a few years ago that noted that some character was gay, to the surprise of no one.

And despite the massive amounts of anti-Semitism before WW II, Hollywood only did a movie on it (Gentlemen's Agreement) after the war when no one could object vocally.

[Polerius]

Lastly, I'm really pissed off that I run Hollywood and yet can't even get a measly discount on theater tickets.
:)

Humor aside, when men ruled society (i.e. were in all the top spots), the fact that some poor shmoe in a small town in Iowa, in response to a feminist telling him that men run everything, could truthfully say that he isn't seeing any personal benefit from the fact that men run everything, doesn't mean that men were not running everything. The feminist's statement was true and women did see adverse repercussions from that fact, even if not every man benefited from it.

[Polerius]

He wasn't fired for telling the truth. He was fired for damaging his own on-air marketability with a ridiculous antisemitic rant.
I mostly agree with you. It's just that, for Stoid and his/her friend, Sanchez was "fired for telling the truth" and they found that "wonderful", and I was wondering why they thought it was wonderful.

[Ellis Aponte Jr.]

I am often kept up at night by the disturbing thought that Southern Californians run Hollywood.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

Good question.

Actually, I don't really know whether Sanchez has antisemitism in his heart, but his rant touched on stereotypes that are better left alone, and his marketability was going to be damaged regardless of what he actually intended.

[Polerius]

No, because the Bottom Line is the great equalizer. The positions of the studio heads are dependent on profit. They are slaves to it. Regardless of what they may feel religiously or politically, their product has to serve their audiences, and American audiences like talking animals and superheroes.

In fact, until the 1970s, there were hardly any Jewish characters in the movies, despite the huge number of Jews in the industry. So it makes no sense to ask if they were portrayed well or badly. They pretty much didn't exist at all.
Even if they focus on the bottom line, and even if they couldn't put themselves in movies due to antisemitism, did the selection of movies made still reflect what they wanted to make?

e.g. The US was at war with both Japan and Germany during WWII, and yet, there are tons more movies with Nazis than with the Japanese. Even after all these years, Hollywood is still making movies with Nazis in them (I believe the latest one was Inglourious Basterds). I can't remember the last movie I saw about WWII and the Japanese. One reason could be that Nazis make for better movie villains, or that the scale of the Holocaust makes anything the Japanese did pale in comparison, but another reason could be that the studio heads & producers wanted to make sure everyone knew what horrible things the Nazis did, since it was the Nazis and not the Japanese who killed millions of Jews.

[Captain Midnight]

About 95% of the mainstream media on television and film is ran by Jews.

News Corp. President Peter Chernin (Jewish)

Paramount Pictures Chairman Brad Grey (Jewish)

Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Robert Iger (Jewish)

Sony Pictures Chairman Michael Lynton (Dutch Jew)

Warner Bros. Chairman Barry Meyer (Jewish)

CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves (so Jewish his great uncle was the first prime minister of Israel),

MGM Chairman Harry Sloan (Jewish)

NBC Universal Chief Executive Jeff Zucker (mega-Jewish)

Gerald Levin, CEO and Director of AOL Time Warner

Edgar Bronfman, Sr., Chairman of Seagram Company Ltd

Edgar Bronfman, Jr, President and CEO of Seagram Company Ltd and head of Universal Studios

Sumner Redstone, Chairman and CEO of Viacom, Inc

Dennis Dammerman, Vice Chairman of General Electric

Peter Chernin, President and Co-COO of News Corporation Limited

George W. Bodenheimer ESPN

Viacom Sumner Redstone (born Murray Rothstien)

Speilberg, Katzenberg and Geffen DREAMWORKS SKG (every Hollywood studio in Hollywood is ran by Jews, and has been since the inception of the motion picture industry. (Goldwyn-Mayer for example)

ABC - Leonard Goldenson

NBC - David Sarnoff and then his son, Robert Sarnoff

CBS - William Paley (dead) and then Laurence Tisch

This is really amazing considering that Jews only make up about 14 million people Worldwide, with 7million living in the United States. Blacks make up over 6 times the population of Jews. Why and how did this small minority of people get a stranglehold of this?

Because there are so many Jews in the MSM, every night we hear only their side of the news concerning Israel and the Middle East. The propaganda that they spew about Muslims and Arabs being evil while they are innocent victims of persecution. Anyone who disagrees with them are labled anti-semites, bigots and whatever. If someone points out that the Israeli Defence Force slaughters and napalms Palestinian victims, they would be tarred and feathered, even if the truth was in their hands.

Isreali war atrocities in pictures. Not safe for work or for anyone who cannot watch the site of dead babies, killed by American tax dollars. I just hate seeing dead babies on my dime. Now do you understand WTF 9/11 was about?
http://giwersworld.org/israel/more-pics/

Here is a picture of the cowardly IDF dropping napalm on a school. A children's school. The one place where a child should be safe. Look down the webpage to "Hello!"
http://sawr.wordpress.com/

Caption: In less than three weeks, Israel has slaughtered at least 1200 Palestinians in Gaza, injuring 5000 others. Schools, hospitals and UN compounds have been shelled with white phosphorous, a substance many times more deadly than napalm.

An ongoing, months-long blockade has only resulted in the systematic starvation and impoverishment of the Gazan population, one living in captivity with no hope of escape, and no access to basic human necessities such as food, medical supplies and electricity.

The Jewish MSM hates the internet, because we don't have to buy into the lie and we can believe what we want and see both sides of the coin and get a good idea of who is right and who isn't. Joe Lieberman, Jewish Senator from Connecticut wants a plan to be able to shut down the internet in times of "national crisis". (by invading Iran for example and the mosterious fallout from that.)

[Polerius]

Actually, I don't really know whether Sanchez has antisemitism in his heart, but his rant touched on stereotypes that are better left alone, and his marketability was going to be damaged regardless of what he actually intended.
Agreed.

[Diogenes the Cynic]

I think you nailed it with the Nazis simply being more cinematic villains and the Holocaust being an unavoidably compelling subject to do movies about, but there were also big budget movies about the Japanese and the Pacific theater - The Sands of Iwo Jima, Tora! Tora! Tora!. Even more recently, we've had Pearl Habor, Flags of Our Fathers, Letters from Iwo Jima and HBO's The Pacific series.

[Der Trihs]

In fact, until the 1970s, there were hardly any Jewish characters in the movies, despite the huge number of Jews in the industry. So it makes no sense to ask if they were portrayed well or badly. They pretty much didn't exist at all.
Even if they focus on the bottom line, and even if they couldn't put themselves in movies due to antisemitism, did the selection of movies made still reflect what they wanted to make?

e.g. The US was at war with both Japan and Germany during WWII, and yet, there are tons more movies with Nazis than with the Japanese. Even after all these years, Hollywood is still making movies with Nazis in them (I believe the latest one was Inglourious Basterds). I can't remember the last movie I saw about WWII and the Japanese. One reason could be that Nazis make for better movie villains, or that the scale of the Holocaust makes anything the Japanese did pale in comparison, but another reason could be that the studio heads & producers wanted to make sure everyone knew what horrible things the Nazis did, since it was the Nazis and not the Japanese who killed millions of Jews.It probably has something to do with the fact that it's easier in California to round up a whole bunch of people who can pass for German than it is to round up large numbers of people who can pass for Japanese. There is also the theory that blames racism; the idea that most Americans never got as outraged over Japanese atrocities because we considered them inferior in the first place and so didn't expect any better; they were inadvertently playing into our stereotypes.

[newcomer]

nm

[Stoid]

He wasn't fired for telling the truth. He was fired for damaging his own on-air marketability with a ridiculous antisemitic rant.
I mostly agree with you. It's just that, for Stoid and his/her friend, Sanchez was "fired for telling the truth" and they found that "wonderful", and I was wondering why they thought it was wonderful.

He didn't rant against Jews! PUHleeze...

It's wonderful because he sucks.

[Nava]

In my experience, Hollywood tends to stay away from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict like the plague.

...Could be that the whole thing is too divisive in America to dwell on (making movies about Apartheid South Africa was all right, everybody this side of the pond agreed who the bad guys were)...

And there were how many of those while Apartheid was in place? Or even after?

[cckerberos]

It probably has something to do with the fact that it's easier in California to round up a whole bunch of people who can pass for German than it is to round up large numbers of people who can pass for Japanese. There is also the theory that blames racism; the idea that most Americans never got as outraged over Japanese atrocities because we considered them inferior in the first place and so didn't expect any better; they were inadvertently playing into our stereotypes.
The Nazis are also viewed as a group distinct from Germans as a whole, so you can get away without pulling any punches. Even in movies made during the war there would be "good German" characters. The same kind of mental compartmentalization doesn't exist for the Japanese, making it harder to go after wartime Japanese without seeming to appear racist against modern day Japan.

[Alessan]

The Nazis are also viewed as a group distinct from Germans as a whole, so you can get away without pulling any punches. Even in movies made during the war there would be "good German" characters. The same kind of mental compartmentalization doesn't exist for the Japanese, making it harder to go after wartime Japanese without seeming to appear racist against modern day Japan.

Note that the approach applied to Americans only. The U.S. was fighting the Nazis; the British and Russians were fighting the Germans.

[Koxinga]

The Nazis are also viewed as a group distinct from Germans as a whole, so you can get away without pulling any punches. Even in movies made during the war there would be "good German" characters.

Probably necessary also considering a good bit of the American audience were themselves ethnic Germans and grew up listening to their parents still speaking the German language at home.

[Jackmannii]

Humor aside, when men ruled society (i.e. were in all the top spots), the fact that some poor shmoe in a small town in Iowa, in response to a feminist telling him that men run everything, could truthfully say that he isn't seeing any personal benefit from the fact that men run everything, doesn't mean that men were not running everything. The feminist's statement was true and women did see adverse repercussions from that fact, even if not every man benefited from it.So, since The Juwes run Hollywood and give us Marmaduke, Piranha 3D and Hot Tub Time Machine, it's evidence of a plot against Christians and Muslims.

Okay. :):eek::)Why and how did this small minority of people get a stranglehold of this?
Reminder to self...must use powers wisely...

[dzero]

I hesitate getting into this since I don't want to waste a lot of time defending my position.

Any ethic group is going to have biases, both positive biases as well as negative. That is not to say that every member of the group will subscribe to those biases and even when one such member does, it does not mean they will subscribe to the same degree. The extent and homogeneity of such biases will depend on a variety of factors including the extent to which the group sees itself as an identifiable and cohesive entity.

If we assume that Jews in the US see themselves as such an entity, and from personal observation I would be inclined to believe that they do, then I think it is likely that they do in fact subscribe to certain preferences and biases that are not shared with other groups or the population in general.

To the extent that this is also true, then in a situation where such a group does in fact dominate an industry, those biases will be reflected in the choices that they make.

Realizing that several caveats have been issued along the way, I don't think the logic of this line of reasoning can be questioned. Practically speaking what that means is that while the logic may not be infallible for every single and conceivable example, it should in general be capable of providing some amount of guidance.

As an example, I would suggest reviewing how Jews tend to be portrayed in television and movies. This has been touched upon in a few posts but has mainly been ignored. For characters who are either explicitly or by fairly explicit implication identified as Jewish, are the portrayals predominantly positive or negative? My sense is that they are overwhelmingly positive. That isn't to say that many times positive characters don't have negative traits. They have to. It simply isn't realistic otherwise and would too obviously smack of bias. But the overall portrayal seems to be extremely positive.

[Jackmannii]

I hesitate getting into this since I don't want to waste a lot of time defending my position.We understand. You have more important things to do.I would suggest reviewing how Jews tend to be portrayed in television and movies. This has been touched upon in a few posts but has mainly been ignored. For characters who are either explicitly or by fairly explicit implication identified as Jewish, are the portrayals predominantly positive or negative? My sense is that they are overwhelmingly positive. That isn't to say that many times positive characters don't have negative traits. They have to. It simply isn't realistic otherwise and would too obviously smack of bias. But the overall portrayal seems to be extremely positive.Do I sense disappointment? You might feel better knowing about a couple of negative examples that come to mind. There's the Bernie Bernbaum character in the Coen Brothers' Miller's Crossing, a truly loathsome and unlikable figure. Eli Wallach's character in Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps is not exactly a sympathetic character either. And you don't have to look too hard to find (http://www.jewishfederations.org/page.aspx?ID=975) complaints (http://www.jewishjournal.com/cover_story/article/negative_depictions_of_jews_raise_the_age-old_question_20100126) from Jewish groups about Hollywood portrayals of Jews* (I don't have any particular gripes on this subject myself).

It may well be that there are fewer vile or unlikable Jewish characters than, say, Christian ones. In addition to this reflecting proportional numbers, it seems to be the case that minority characters in general are less likely to be portrayed in movies as nasty and/or evil. I don't think the logic of this line of reasoning can be questioned.Have you considered making this your sig? :dubious:


*my favorite is the dust-up over Woody Allen's rabbi in Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex, who appeared on a game show called "What's Your Perversion?" and was shown tied to a chair being whipped by a beautiful blonde, while watching his wife eat pork.

[dzero]

I hesitate getting into this since I don't want to waste a lot of time defending my position.We understand. You have more important things to do.Do I sense disappointment? You might feel better knowing about a couple of negative examples that come to mind. There's the Bernie Bernbaum character in the Coen Brothers' Miller's Crossing, a truly loathsome and unlikable figure. Eli Wallach's character in Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps is not exactly a sympathetic character either. And you don't have to look too hard to find (http://www.jewishfederations.org/page.aspx?ID=975) complaints (http://www.jewishjournal.com/cover_story/article/negative_depictions_of_jews_raise_the_age-old_question_20100126) from Jewish groups about Hollywood portrayals of Jews* (I don't have any particular gripes on this subject myself).

It may well be that there are fewer vile or unlikable Jewish characters than, say, Christian ones. In addition to this reflecting proportional numbers, it seems to be the case that minority characters in general are less likely to be portrayed in movies as nasty and/or evil. I don't think the logic of this line of reasoning can be questioned.Have you considered making this your sig? :dubious:


*my favorite is the dust-up over Woody Allen's rabbi in Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex, who appeared on a game show called "What's Your Perversion?" and was shown tied to a chair being whipped by a beautiful blonde, while watching his wife eat pork.
As I said, several caveats were issued. If you think those were meant insincerely or you think I'm a closet antisemite, those are your issues to deal with, I already have plenty of my own.

[Jackmannii]

Speaking of dealing with (your) issues, there's the one where you announce that your logic is inescapable and then ignore evidence that runs counter to it.

You didn't even cite anecdotes in the first place, just your feelings.

Of course, if you don't care about presenting a convincing argument, it doesn't matter.

[dzero]

Speaking of dealing with (your) issues, there's the one where you announce that your logic is inescapable and then ignore evidence that runs counter to it.

You didn't even cite anecdotes in the first place, just your feelings.

Of course, if you don't care about presenting a convincing argument, it doesn't matter.
The argument consists of a series of implications. I thought that was obvious. As such it does not have the power of peer-reviewed empirical data. However it can still be useful. Hence my comment about it providing guidance.

I did not provide anecdotes since anecdotes do not improve the veracity of the implications. There's also the fact that I do not keep a ledger of such things.

I believe that within the caveats I mention the logic is valid. If you have a criticism that discounts this claim, feel free to make it.

[Malthus]

As an extreme example, are there any movies by the big studios that portray Jewish people in a negative light and the Palestinians in a positive light? (I'm not saying that there should be such movies, just that there have to be some people who believe the Palestinians are in the right and would like to make a movie about it, but face getting their project greenlighted by a major studio)

Hollywood makes few, if any, films about Israel or Palestine in general (and no, You Don't Mess With the Zohan doesn't count) and for a very simple reason - no one in North America would watch them.

There are certainly non-Hollywood movies that deal with Arab-Israeli themes to come out recently. For example, Waltz with Bashir , made in Israel, was nominated for a whole slew of film awards - and won many.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waltz_with_Bashir

Another Israeli film released even more recently was Lebanon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebanon_(2009_film)

The problem is ... these films are not money-makers. Waltz With Bashir, while winning piles of awards, earned the princely sum of - $10 million worldwide. So yes, North Americans are not rushing out to see them.

[Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor]

I believe the sentiment is wrong regardless of the facts. Some Jewish people may run Hollywood, but Jews as a unit, a single entity do not.

"Jew Unit"--Israeli Band Name?

[Koxinga]

If there's any bias at work, I'd think of it as "like them or hate them, but oh those Jews!" -- the rather annoying presumption that everyone instantly recognizes and enjoys every arcane aspect of Jewish culture, usually in the form of self mockery. Most of everything I know about Jewish life I've picked up from entertainers "poking fun at themselves." It's like listening to a coworker constantly babble on about the crazy hijinks of her family members, none of whom have you met or really have an interest in meeting, quite frankly.

[Odesio]

Note that the approach applied to Americans only. The U.S. was fighting the Nazis; the British and Russians were fighting the Germans.

I don't know if U.S. servicemen made the distinction. In Up Front Bill Maudlin mentions that he keeps hearing about how the Americans are at war with the Nazis and not the German people. He scoffs at this saying that other than a few specialist SS divisions he hasn't seen a Nazi. He's been fighting Germans.

[Ají de Gallina]

Note that the approach applied to Americans only. The U.S. was fighting the Nazis; the British and Russians were fighting the Germans.

I don't know if U.S. servicemen made the distinction. In Up Front Bill Maudlin mentions that he keeps hearing about how the Americans are at war with the Nazis and not the German people. He scoffs at this saying that other than a few specialist SS divisions he hasn't seen a Nazi. He's been fighting Germans.

In the Brazilian documentary "Senta a Pua", which talks about Brazilian fighter unit in Italy in WW2, a couple of the soldiers made the difference that those on the Wehrmacht were soldiers and decent, but the SS units were devoid of military morals

[Koxinga]

I believe the sentiment is wrong regardless of the facts. Some Jewish people may run Hollywood, but Jews as a unit, a single entity do not.

"Jew Unit"--Israeli Band Name?

Would extended mixes of their greatest hits go into an album entitled: "Jew Unit: Uncut"?

Come on, you had to see that coming a mile away.

[Spoke]

"Jews run the media" canards aside, don't the numbers suggest some discriminatory hiring practices?

[ralph124c]

Question: DO eyetalyun -Americuns run the Mob?

[Punoqllads]

"Jews run the media" canards aside, don't the numbers suggest some discriminatory hiring practices?Arguably about the same amount that the disproportionate number of African-Americans in sports teams implies discriminatory hiring practices.

[Latro]

"Jews run the media" canards aside, don't the numbers suggest some discriminatory hiring practices?Arguably about the same amount that the disproportionate number of African-Americans in sports teams implies discriminatory hiring practices.

I suspect that nepotism would play a much higher role in hiring for a movie than hiring for sports.

[monstro]

Jews must have some special Hollywood mogul genes. Wonder why no one has brought that up yet?

[Leaking Boot]

I'm very surprised that no one has thrown the handsome and insane Mr Gibson into the mix yet.

So who runs Bollywood? Methodists?

[hajario]

Let's say that a group of Jews really do control the media to the near exclusion of all others and that the State of Israel is totally evil. Why, Captain Midnight, am I to blame?

[Jackmannii]

"Jews run the media" canards aside, don't the numbers suggest some discriminatory hiring practices?We have laws dealing with that sort of thing. If you think there's been discrimination, you should file a complaint.

But be vewy vewy careful. :eek:

[Todderbob]

"Jews run the media" canards aside, don't the numbers suggest some discriminatory hiring practices?Unless you know the numbers of qualified applicants, and their nationalities, and a few other variables (like specific employment costs, do many Gentiles have to relocate and therefore require a larger hiring fee?) it doesn't suggest anything more than Jews are good at making people forget their stress for an hour or so at a time.

Which is a great talent to have, it saved a Persian princes for 1001 Arabian nights, I guess we Jews figure if we make you unclean masses (Gentiles) laugh enough, you'll stop trying to enslave and/or kill all of us.

[Spoke]

"Jews run the media" canards aside, don't the numbers suggest some discriminatory hiring practices?We have laws dealing with that sort of thing. If you think there's been discrimination, you should file a complaint.

Well, I'm just a simple country lawyer, but yes, you're right, there are laws. And what I am saying is that these numbers suggest that the industry is ripe for litigation.

Employment discrimination is subtle and difficult to prove, but one method of proving it is with statistical evidence. And those statistics look overwhelming. Todderbob is quite right that you'd need to know more particulars about hiring practices in the industry and circumstances in particular cases. That's what depositions are for. If I were a disappointed but well-qualified jobseeker (or an attorney who represented one), I'd seriously think about pursuing a claim.

[Koxinga]

But you'll never work in this town again.

[Jackmannii]

are[/B] laws. And what I am saying is that these numbers suggest that the industry is ripe for litigation.What numbers?

Can you give us totals for numbers of jobs and applicants in the industry, broken down by ethnic parameters?

[astorian]

In fact, until the 1970s, there were hardly any Jewish characters in the movies, despite the huge number of Jews in the industry. So it makes no sense to ask if they were portrayed well or badly. They pretty much didn't exist at all.

Very true. Consider the Dick van Dyke show. Here we have a comedy writer's room, patterned after Your Show of Shows, with token Morey Amsterdam. He was at least Jewish in one show, where he got bar mitzvahed. It was kind of like shows a few years ago that noted that some character was gay, to the surprise of no one.

And despite the massive amounts of anti-Semitism before WW II, Hollywood only did a movie on it (Gentlemen's Agreement) after the war when no one could object vocally.


Interestingly, Gentleman's Agreement was produced by Darryl Zanuck, one of the only studio chiefs in his day who WASN'T Jewish!


There’s no question that, in Hollywood’s so-called Golden Age, Jewish studio chiefs gave the Catholic Church the best press it’s even gotten! The idealized Catholic priests played by guys like Spencer Tracy, Bing Crosby and Pat O’Brien usually appeared in movies that were green-lighted by Jack Warner, Sam Goldwyn, Louis B. Mayer or Harry Cohn.

[Siam Sam]

Well, someone has to run Hollywood. I just always thought it was a bunch of white men smoking big cigars.

[Spoke]

are[/B] laws. And what I am saying is that these numbers suggest that the industry is ripe for litigation.What numbers?

The numbers in the OP.

Can you give us totals for numbers of jobs and applicants in the industry, broken down by ethnic parameters?

No; that's what discovery is for. But the CEO numbers suggest a pattern that a plaintiff's lawyer would find very encouraging.

[Malthus]

What numbers?

The numbers in the OP.

Can you give us totals for numbers of jobs and applicants in the industry, broken down by ethnic parameters?

No; that's what discovery is for. But the CEO numbers suggest a pattern that a plaintiff's lawyer would find very encouraging.

Just curious - Has anyone ever succeeded in suing an entire industry for having a disproportunate number of a certain ethnicity represented in it?

[Jackmannii]

What numbers?

The numbers in the OP.

Can you give us totals for numbers of jobs and applicants in the industry, broken down by ethnic parameters?

No; that's what discovery is for.Ah, so you have no idea, but are depending on a list in the OP whose comprehensiveness and significance are unclear, but you just know that it "suggests" discrimination.

It would not surprise me if some "motivated" person came up with a list of leaders/executives in interior design and breathlessly announced that they were all homosexual, and that this dominance was part of a sinister plan to introduce the Gay Agenda into American homes and turn our children gay. Or that at least it proves discrimination.

Interestingly, if you Google "list Jews run Hollywood" you come up with an array of Concerned Citizens who throw up their hands in horror over what their lists show. They include radioislam.org, rense.com (a hotbed of rabid anti-Semitism) and the charmingly named jewwatch.com.

Nice company to keep.

[Spoke]

Ah, so you have no idea, but are depending on a list in the OP whose comprehensiveness and significance are unclear, but you just know that it "suggests" discrimination.

Stein says he could only find six (five as it turned out) non-Jews in high positions in the trade.

It would not surprise me if some "motivated" person came up with a list of leaders/executives in interior design and breathlessly announced that they were all homosexual, and that this dominance was part of a sinister plan to introduce the Gay Agenda into American homes and turn our children gay. Or that at least it proves discrimination.

Yes, of course. Joel Stein is a noted anti-Semite. :rolleyes:

[Spoke]

And just to be clear, I am not suggesting anything more sinister than a good-old-boy network. But the numbers certainly do suggest such a network.

And of such stuff successful discrimination suits are made.

[Fotheringay-Phipps]

Do Jews Really Control the Media? (http://www.slate.com/id/2270045/)

Worth a read, for some perspective.

[Todderbob]

Ah, so you have no idea, but are depending on a list in the OP whose comprehensiveness and significance are unclear, but you just know that it "suggests" discrimination.

Stein says he could only find six (five as it turned out) non-Jews in high positions in the trade.

Well, if he says it, it must be true. How hard did he look? How many positions are "high"? CEO? CFO? Producer? Director?

[Jackmannii]

It would not surprise me if some "motivated" person came up with a list of leaders/executives in interior design and breathlessly announced that they were all homosexual, and that this dominance was part of a sinister plan to introduce the Gay Agenda into American homes and turn our children gay. Or that at least it proves discrimination.

Yes, of course. Joel Stein is a noted anti-Semite. :rolleyes:A predictable response. I love the assumption that "Jews Control Hollywood" must be true and the list solid gold evidence because a Jewish guy wrote a column about it. After all, he's in the Brotherhood, knows the secret handshake and sits in the secret cabals and everything!

Except Stein's column does zero to document exactly what constitutes power to decide what appears in Hollywood films or demonstrate that The Juwes At The Top are manipulating films to promote an Agenda or make Jewish characters in movies seem sympathetic* (how many times have you seen the horns and tail in a Hollywood feature film - now really?). I didn't see Stein making these arguments, but bigots like the ones I referred to do.

If I had those folks on my team I'd feel kinda crawly.

*or as one of our not-a-bigot posters suggested, projecting a positive aura for such characters but being very careful to give them a minor defect or two, so they don't look too good and raise suspicions among the sheeple. :)

[Spoke]

Except Stein's column does zero to document exactly what constitutes power to decide what appears in Hollywood films or demonstrate that The Juwes At The Top are manipulating films to promote an Agenda or make Jewish characters in movies seem sympathetic* (how many times have you seen the horns and tail in a Hollywood feature film - now really?). I didn't see Stein making these arguments, but bigots like the ones I referred to do.

You seem to have conjured up an army of evil phantoms to fight because I never said or suggested any of those things.

I simply said that the numbers suggest a good-old-boy network, which may be putting these companies at risk of a discrimination suit.

Good luck with your phantoms. I hope you win!

[Jackmannii]

You seem to have conjured up an army of evil phantoms to fight because I never said or suggested any of those things.I didn't say you did. I pointed out your lack of evidence for a discrimination case, which you base on a list of executives published in a newspaper column and seem to feel compelling based on the ethnicity of the writer.

The fact remains that a number of people (including some posters here) see this as proof of Jews Running Hollywood To Benefit The Jewish Agenda. It would be nice to hear that you don't buy into this garbage.

[Spoke]

The fact remains that a number of people (including some posters here) see this as proof of Jews Running Hollywood To Benefit The Jewish Agenda. It would be nice to hear that you don't buy into this garbage.

Of course I don't. "Jews" as a group don't do anything. Well, except for the quilting bees.

It would also be nice to hear you admit there is a Jewish good-old-boys club in Hollywood.

[Koxinga]

I guess we Jews figure if we make you unclean masses (Gentiles) laugh enough, you'll stop trying to enslave and/or kill all of us.

It'd be nice also for some acknowlegement of the irrational hysteria on the Jewish side here as well. In twenty-first century America, y'all really think all Gentiles have any predisposition whatsoever to enslave and/or kill all Jews? You may have been joking, but it sure sounds like you're joking through gritted teeth there.

Good advice to any angsty goth teenager may apply here as well: Relax. The world doesn't care about you, or is even aware of your existence, nearly as much as you think it is.

[BigT]

My only observation is that Jewish people seem to be overly represented in Hollywood, to the point I was surprised to find out how rare they are in real life. I mean, yes, they are rare here near the former KKK capital, but I figured that was made up for in other places.

I also admit that Jews are the only minority for which I have never in real life seen someone be racist toward. I think if Sanchez had said that Jews, while a minority, seem to be much better accepted as of late, I think he'd have been fine.

I mean, the Mel Gibson was the first time I'd heard of modern antisemitism that wasn't some extremely fringe group or wasn't making fun of the concept.

[Jackmannii]

The fact remains that a number of people (including some posters here) see this as proof of Jews Running Hollywood To Benefit The Jewish Agenda. It would be nice to hear that you don't buy into this garbage.

Of course I don't. "Jews" as a group don't do anything.Except for the "disloyal" ones you've railed against in past threads (i.e. the Secret Cabal in Washington plotting to pervert foreign policy whose existence is unconfirmed but about whom we must be vewy vewy careful, and Israel Lobby no-goodniks who are responsible for American bridges collapsing). But hey, it's good that you reject some nuttiness. It would also be nice to hear you admit there is a Jewish good-old-boys club in Hollywood.Show me evidence rather than innuendo and I'll be happy to.

[Spoke]

Except for the "disloyal" ones you've railed against in past threads (i.e. the Secret Cabal in Washington plotting to pervert foreign policy whose existence is unconfirmed but about whom we must be vewy vewy careful, and Israel Lobby no-goodniks who are responsible for American bridges collapsing). But hey, it's good that you reject some nuttiness.

I will exercise restraint of which you seem incapable, and simply say that your statement is false, and a weird distortion of anything I have ever actually said. Rather than engaging the discussion at hand, you are engaging in your usual argument by smear. You are a sad little man.

[tomndebb]

Except for the "disloyal" ones you've railed against in past threads (i.e. the Secret Cabal in Washington plotting to pervert foreign policy whose existence is unconfirmed but about whom we must be vewy vewy careful, and Israel Lobby no-goodniks who are responsible for American bridges collapsing). But hey, it's good that you reject some nuttiness.I don't know where this came from, but it is not a response to anything posted in this thread and looks very much like a veiled personal insult.

Back off.

[ /Moderating ]

[Malthus]

My only observation is that Jewish people seem to be overly represented in Hollywood, to the point I was surprised to find out how rare they are in real life. I mean, yes, they are rare here near the former KKK capital, but I figured that was made up for in other places.

I also admit that Jews are the only minority for which I have never in real life seen someone be racist toward. I think if Sanchez had said that Jews, while a minority, seem to be much better accepted as of late, I think he'd have been fine.

I mean, the Mel Gibson was the first time I'd heard of modern antisemitism that wasn't some extremely fringe group or wasn't making fun of the concept.

In North America, hatred of Jews is a fringe opinion, barely on the public radar, and only brought there by things happening in other parts of the world or by rants like Gibson's.

This change came about in my parent's lifetime - when they were growing up, there was still official anti-Jewish discriminatin firmly in place.

My grandfather actually had a small hand in reducing that. He was, in his day, a famous amateur swimmer, and a good one - at a time (the 1920s) when Jews were not widely thought of as athletes.

In those days, in Toronto, swimming competitions, even national ones paid for by public money, were all run by private athletic clubs - none of which admitted Jews. The clubs extended this rule to cover the races they ran, and so Jews could not compete. Part of the stated reason for this, to assauge those who might have thought this a trifle medieval, was that Jews were not natural athletes. My grandfather thought this vastly unfair and was determined to put a spoke in this.

So he decided to sneak into a race. The race was a long-distance swim - around the Toronto Islands - and gramps waited until everyone else had started and the official's backs were turned before jumping in himself. In spite of that handicap, he easily won, and made the front page of the paper with a news story entitled "JEWBOY WINS RACE". :D This prompted a rule change and Jews, at least *some* of whom were recognized to be athletes, were allowed to compete.

In my parent's generation, rules like restrictive covenants forbidding the sale of houses to Jews were lifted, but educational discrimination remained. My mother's brother was a doctor, and in his day the requirements for getting into medical school were significantly more difficult if one was a Jew (in that you needed more "firsts"). The reason was that, like in this thread, there was a general feeling that there were "too many Jewish doctors" - that they "dominated medicine", and thus that discrimination was necessary to address this. The inevitable result was that only the best, most qualified Jews, the ones with the highest marks, became doctors, which had the effect of re-enforcing the notion (also widespread) that Jews just naturally made better doctors.

[cuberdon]

It probably has something to do with the fact that it's easier in California to round up a whole bunch of people who can pass for German than it is to round up large numbers of people who can pass for Japanese. There is also the theory that blames racism; the idea that most Americans never got as outraged over Japanese atrocities because we considered them inferior in the first place and so didn't expect any better; they were inadvertently playing into our stereotypes.

It isn't *that* hard. The state is 12.7% Asian as of 2009.

cite: http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/06000.html

[Beware of Doug]

I'd actually say the most obvious example of the similar backgrounds of studio execs isn't particularly the prominence of a Jewish perspective as the prominence of a New York perspective. Almost all of the studio execs aren't just Jewish, they're Jews of European ancestry from particular parts of New York City, which is part of the reason New York City is the only city in the world in many US movies.I agree. I also believe that in the US, our popular concepts of "Jews" and "New Yorkers" overlap more than we want to admit.

Saying that "New Yorkers run this or that" is not nearly so incendiary. In fact it has a kind of inevitability to it. As you suggest - what if Jews were so prominent because so many of them were New Yorkers?

[Beware of Doug]

This observation originally struck me during the recent Rick Sanchez-Jon Stewart flap. No one much remarked on it, but I think it might even be harder for people to get their minds around - whether they're bigots focused on conspiracies and cabals, OR openminded folks who think it's natural for New York to be the birthplace of ideas and the people who create them.

[BrainGlutton]

It would not surprise me if some "motivated" person came up with a list of leaders/executives in interior design and breathlessly announced that they were all homosexual, and that this dominance was part of a sinister plan to introduce the Gay Agenda into American homes and turn our children gay. Or that at least it proves discrimination.

Boy, that takes you back! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homintern)

[BrainGlutton]

...Could be that the whole thing is too divisive in America to dwell on (making movies about Apartheid South Africa was all right, everybody this side of the pond agreed who the bad guys were)...

And there were how many of those while Apartheid was in place? Or even after?

Actually, I was thinking of stuff like Lethal Weapon 2 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lethal_Weapon_2) (1989), indicating a Hollywood period-culture where it was perfectly acceptable to treat white South Africans (those in government, at least) as one-dimensional stock villains. Nobody in Hollywood ever would have thought of using Israelis or Palestinians in that way.

[Malthus]

And there were how many of those while Apartheid was in place? Or even after?

Actually, I was thinking of stuff like Lethal Weapon 2 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lethal_Weapon_2) (1989), indicating a Hollywood period-culture where it was perfectly acceptable to treat white South Africans (those in government, at least) as one-dimensional stock villains. Nobody in Hollywood ever would have thought of using Israelis or Palestinians in that way.

In entertainment generally, Israelis *are* stock characters - they could be good or evil, but in either event, are portrayed as badass heavies. It is their bad-assness, as it were, that is their definingly useful (for dramatic purposes) characteristic.

Obligatory TV tropes link: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/BadassIsraeli

Palistinans tend to have less presence, being subsumed in the general category of "Arab" for entertainment purposes.

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/MiddleEasternCoalition

[Jackmannii]

It would not surprise me if some "motivated" person came up with a list of leaders/executives in interior design and breathlessly announced that they were all homosexual, and that this dominance was part of a sinister plan to introduce the Gay Agenda into American homes and turn our children gay. Or that at least it proves discrimination.Boy, that takes you back! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homintern)Hmmm....I was listening to my Ipod on shuffle yesterday and practically the first tune to come up was this one (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ThUeXb6FOKs).

Coincidence? I think not.

[The Flying Dutchman]

It would also be nice to hear you admit there is a Jewish good-old-boys club in Hollywood.

Is Roman Polanski in the club ?

[The Flying Dutchman]

xxx

[Beware of Doug]

ooo

Seeing as nobody wants to touch the New York theory, perhaps someone will feel empowered to speak out on (Jewish playwright-screenwriter) David Mamet's positing his fellow-ethnics as ideal for the picture business due to supposedly high incidence of Asperger's syndrome (http://books.google.com/books?id=RPzHYNLwUk8C&printsec=frontcover&dq=bambi+vs+godzilla&hl=en&ei=XaKvTNeqDoK8lQexlcmMBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=asperger's&f=false)?

[Spoke]

I also believe that in the US, our popular concepts of "Jews" and "New Yorkers" overlap more than we want to admit.

OK, I'll bite.

I disagree with this. I think most people think of New York as an ethnic mish-mash, and not as a peculiarly Jewish place.

I have noticed a tendency of some folks to perceive any criticism of New York as coded anti-Semitism, though, which I put down to hyper-sensitivity.

[Koxinga]

II also believe that in the US, our popular concepts of "Jews" and "New Yorkers" overlap more than we want to admit.

OK, I'll bite.

I disagree with this. I think most people think of New York as an ethnic mish-mash, and not as a peculiarly Jewish place.

I think it comes down to whether someone has direct experience with New York. If Joe Shmoe in Idaho only knows NY from movies and TV, which in turn are made by primarily Jewish writers and producers, and they in turn stick primarily to "writing what they know" -- there's no conspiracy at work to depict NY as a giant Jewish enclave, but the net result may be the same.

[Jackmannii]

I have noticed a tendency of some folks to perceive any criticism of New York as coded anti-Semitism, though, which I put down to hyper-sensitivity. I think it comes down to whether someone has direct experience with New York. If...primarily Jewish writers and producers...stick primarily to "writing what they know" -- there's no conspiracy at work to depict NY as a giant Jewish enclave, but the net result may be the same.I haven't noticed either of these things occurring (maybe I'm not sensitive enough).

Could we see some concrete examples?

[Koxinga]

I think it comes down to whether someone has direct experience with New York. If...primarily Jewish writers and producers...stick primarily to "writing what they know" -- there's no conspiracy at work to depict NY as a giant Jewish enclave, but the net result may be the same.I haven't noticed either of these things occurring (maybe I'm not sensitive enough).

Could we see some concrete examples?

Examples of movies or shows set in New York where a main character is Jewish and/or Jewish culture features in the plot somehow? Surely you're joking.

[Spoke]

I haven't noticed either of these things occurring (maybe I'm not sensitive enough).

Believe me, you're sensitive enough.

[Jackmannii]

I haven't noticed either of these things occurring (maybe I'm not sensitive enough).

Could we see some concrete examples?

Examples of movies or shows set in New York where a main character is Jewish and/or Jewish culture features in the plot somehow? Surely you're joking.And the "net result" is that New York is depicted as a "giant Jewish enclave"?

What movies do you believe do this? TV shows?

Did you resent "The Godfather" movies for portraying New York (or Las Vegas) as a "giant Italian enclave"? Were "Southie" and "The Departed" the result of efforts to portray Boston as a "giant Irish enclave"?


I see spoke once again has nothing factual to contribute.

[DSeid]

Of course I don't. "Jews" as a group don't do anything. Well, except for the quilting bees.
What? We should quilt WASPs?

I am fairly sure that Jews are over-represented in the medical profession and among Nobel Prize winners too. Have that lawyer look into that statistical data and sue the medical schools and the Nobel Prize committee for discrimination too. Ah, but the lawyers are all Jewish. Dayum. That must be why no one has brought the case.

[Siam Sam]

I

OK, I'll bite.

I disagree with this. I think most people think of New York as an ethnic mish-mash, and not as a peculiarly Jewish place.

I think it comes down to whether someone has direct experience with New York. If Joe Shmoe in Idaho only knows NY from movies and TV, which in turn are made by primarily Jewish writers and producers, and they in turn stick primarily to "writing what they know" -- there's no conspiracy at work to depict NY as a giant Jewish enclave, but the net result may be the same.

I think that's true. Although I've read all about how much of a multi-ethnic city New York is and always has been, thanks to the likes of Woody Allen and others, I too tend to think of New York as a "Jewish city" regardless of stories like The Godfather and others. The Jewish aspect just seems to get more play, at least as far as I've noticed. The same with the wife, who is possibly Woody's biggest Thai fan. In fact, she's fascinated with the different aspects of New York -- watch a lot of Godfathers type productions and you start thinking of it as an Italian city. Watch or read another type and it's all Irish there etc. It's as if there were lots of different NYCs existing in parallel universes. But if I'm not under the influence of any particular ethnic style of story, the wife and I both think of NYC as a Jewish city despite reason telling us otherwise. I keep promising her someday we'll go take a look at the place ourselves, but we never seem to get around to it.

Hell, google "New York Jew" and you get a lot of hits, including an entry in the Urban Dictionary (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=New%20york%20jew). Google "New York Italian" or "New York Irish" and you do get more hits, but the term seems to be mostly followed by "restaurants" or "pubs" rather than referring to the people themselve, for whatever that's worth.

[DSeid]

I haven't noticed either of these things occurring (maybe I'm not sensitive enough).

Could we see some concrete examples?

Examples of movies or shows set in New York where a main character is Jewish and/or Jewish culture features in the plot somehow? Surely you're joking.More than 23% of the New York Metropolitan area is Jewish. And roughly one out of three (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/16/nyregion/city-milestone-number-of-jews-is-below-million.html?pagewanted=all) White New Yorkers is Jewish.

Are you saying that it is inaccurate to have a few shows that are set in New York have a main character and/or have something culturally Jewish feature in the plot somehow?

[Koxinga]

Examples of movies or shows set in New York where a main character is Jewish and/or Jewish culture features in the plot somehow? Surely you're joking.More than 23% of the New York Metropolitan area is Jewish. And roughly one out of three (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/16/nyregion/city-milestone-number-of-jews-is-below-million.html?pagewanted=all) White New Yorkers is Jewish.

Are you saying that it is inaccurate to have a few shows that are set in New York have a main character and/or have something culturally Jewish feature in the plot somehow?

Well first, I kind of wonder why feathers are getting so ruffled when I mention that NYC is *portrayed* as a large Jewish enclave, when to all objective appearance it *is* a large Jewish enclave. On my mobile, else I'd confirm it, but isn't nyc supposed to hold the largest Jewish community outside of Israel.

But the point is that outside of Mob movies, the only time an ethnic identity is introduced in a mainstream movie or show for purposes of plot tension or comic relief, it's Jewish; with even black characters being a distant second.

[Siam Sam]

Well first, I kind of wonder why feathers are getting so ruffled when I mention that NYC is *portrayed* as a large Jewish enclave, when to all objective appearance it *is* a large Jewish enclave. On my mobile, else I'd confirm it, but isn't nyc supposed to hold the largest Jewish community outside of Israel.

Wikipedia's Demographics of New York City (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_New_York_City) confirms NYC to be the largest Jewish community outside of Israel. But it says the 2000 census shows the Italians are the largest single ethnic group there. And the Puerto Rican community is the largest outside of Puerto Rico.

But the point is that outside of Mob movies, the only time an ethnic identity is introduced in a mainstream movie or show for purposes of plot tension or comic relief, it's Jewish; with even black characters being a distant second.

I have seen a lot of ethnic comedies and other non-Mob stories centering on Irish, Puerto Rican and other families, but they just can't seem to shake the notion of Jewishness out of my head.

[DSeid]

Well what was your point, about how the city is portrayed?

As far as ethnic identification "only" being Jewish ... huh? Over-represented relative to population size in the country? Maybe. Only? Even as a bit of hyperbole that is too hyperbolic.

As far as the op goes: Jews are indeed over-represented relative to their share of the American population in the media business at all levels. And among Nobel Prize winners. And ... the list can go on. As has been illustrated by some posts in this thread, some have a problem with that, and see it as a threat or a result of a conspiricy of some sort.

What kinds of projects do these media honcho Jews greenlight? Apparently the ones that sell well; that's how they became the heads of the studios.

[Spoke]

According to Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_lawyer#United_States), 22% of the lawyers in the top US firms are Jewish. So yeah, Jewish lawyers are overrepresented in the ranks as compared with the general population, but not so much that you couldn't put it down to Jewish cultural emphasis on achievement. (I assume you weren't suggesting genetic superiority as the explanation for the phenomenon?)

On the other hand, the overwhelming numbers in the entertainment industry suggest that something more than cultural emphasis on achievement is going on.

Look, everybody knows that connections matter in finding a job. And the numbers suggest to me that a good-old-boy network may be at play in Hollywood. And that's exactly the sort of thing that leads to successful discrimination lawsuits.

[Beware of Doug]

Well what was your point, about how the city is portrayed?

As far as ethnic identification "only" being Jewish ... huh? Over-represented relative to population size in the country? Maybe. Only? Even as a bit of hyperbole that is too hyperbolic.Maybe the real deal is that New York itself is overrepresented in movies. Sure, it's big and exciting with many things to see and do, but couldn't many stories set there be set somewhere else? And if not...why not?

As far as the op goes: Jews are indeed over-represented relative to their share of the American population in the media business at all levels. And among Nobel Prize winners. And ... the list can go on. As has been illustrated by some posts in this thread, some have a problem with that, and see it as a threat or a result of a conspiricy of some sort.I admit to a sort of - problem's the wrong word - unease with the situation of a few big cities being winner-take-all in the cultural and/or intellectual competition. Even though I don't believe in conspiracies. (At least not conscious ones, and usually not ethnic ones, BTW.)

It's as if a glass ceiling has developed on culture, and to break through it, you usually do need to walk the walk and talk the talk of New York or LA (whatever you think that implies). There is a lot more going on in this creative and diverse nation for us to have to "type" our culture this way, as if we were in some pre-electronic or even pre-media era where if you didn't know people you never got to know people.

[DSeid]

According to Wiki (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_lawyer#United_States), 22% of the lawyers in the top US firms are Jewish. So yeah, Jewish lawyers are overrepresented in the ranks as compared with the general population, but not so much that you couldn't put it down to Jewish cultural emphasis on achievement. (I assume you weren't suggesting genetic superiority as the explanation for the phenomenon?)

On the other hand, the overwhelming numbers in the entertainment industry suggest that something more than cultural emphasis on achievement is going on.

Look, everybody knows that connections matter in finding a job. And the numbers suggest to me that a good-old-boy network may be at play in Hollywood. And that's exactly the sort of thing that leads to successful discrimination lawsuits.I think you mean good-old-boychick network bubbeleh.

You do not succeed in running a movie studio because of who you know. You succeed because you figure out what the people want to buy, even before they know its what they want to buy. You succeed because you get the better creative talent.

No, I am not suggesting anything genetic. I am suggesting that it has to with more than a culture of achievement. After all Jews don't achieve across the board. There are other cultural factors that have led to achievement in some very particular venues, probably two factors most of all, both a result of this: for many many hundreds of years Jews have been the outsider, the "other" in any society in which they have resided. An educated literate outsider group spread across cultures and communicating with each other.

Being an outsider group gives you a different perspective, drives you to prove yourself sure, and coupled with a history of persecution, drives you to try to gain security and both acceptence and respect. But that different perspective brings a willingness to try different ideas. And is in the context of a religion that highlights its myths that have its heros arguing with God himself. When your culture isn't completely part of the box, it is easier to think outside of it.

Being spread out among the world's cultures and traveling between them, having nothing but knowledge and the ideas picked up from around the world as a meaningful asset, results in a culture that tends to recombine those ideas into new ones. What is in that box can be used for something slightly different in this box if we just tweak it a little, and maybe mix it up with something from this other box too. New York in particular was home to Jews coming from around the world all stuck together in small neighborhoods and exchanging ideas and perspectives and ambition.

Hollywood was one of those ideas. More than any other group in America, Jews created Hollywood, because of the cultural willingness to gamble a little on an idea, a drive to prove oneself, a strong heritage of creative thought, and a tradition of having enough chutzpah to believe that we could. Those traditions are less strong than they once were and are less unique than they once were. But they have run deep.

No we don't "run" Hollywood. But the mindset of the first few generations of American Jews both created it and were a great fit for providing that which America wanted to hear and to see. And apparently the world as well.

[Spoke]

You do not succeed in running a movie studio because of who you know.

Think back to the days when corporate boards tended to be lily white, male, and Protestant. Couldn't the same defense of the status quo have been made then?

"Hey, I didn't get where I am because I am white/male/Protestant! I got here because I know how to run the business!" Look at our bottom line!

That's really no argument at all. We know you can run the business; what we don't know is whether someone else could have run it as well or better had they been given the chance.

The way discrimination often happens is at the lower levels, via networking. It may not even be conscious discrimination. What often happens is that the corporate higher-ups tend to use their connections to find a job for their cousin/nephew/buddy's-kid. Now maybe that cousin/nephew/buddy's-kid does a bang up job and winds up running the company some day. And maybe they are a big success. But that person got their chance in the business because of the good-old-boy network.

[Evil Captor]

Well, given that we accepted that white men were discriminating against women and blacks without there having to be any organized conspiracy of white men to do so, why should we not accept that the Jews who dominate the media are discriminating against gentiles, not out of any organized conspiracy, but just taking care of their own ... just as white men once did?

[Spoke]

Well, given that we accepted that white men were discriminating against women and blacks without there having to be any organized conspiracy of white men to do so, why should we not accept that the Jews who dominate the media are discriminating against gentiles, not out of any organized conspiracy, but just taking care of their own ... just as white men once did?

That's pretty much what I said, isn't it? :) I said I didn't think it wasn't anything more sinister than a good-old-boy network.

Jackmannii reeeeeally wants me to be a conspiracy theorist, though.

[Koxinga]

No, I am not suggesting anything genetic. I am suggesting that it has to with more than a culture of achievement. After all Jews don't achieve across the board. There are other cultural factors that have led to achievement in some very particular venues, probably two factors most of all, both a result of this: for many many hundreds of years Jews have been the outsider, the "other" in any society in which they have resided. An educated literate outsider group spread across cultures and communicating with each other.

Being an outsider group gives you a different perspective, drives you to prove yourself sure, and coupled with a history of persecution, drives you to try to gain security and both acceptence and respect. But that different perspective brings a willingness to try different ideas. And is in the context of a religion that highlights its myths that have its heros arguing with God himself. When your culture isn't completely part of the box, it is easier to think outside of it.

Being spread out among the world's cultures and traveling between them, having nothing but knowledge and the ideas picked up from around the world as a meaningful asset, results in a culture that tends to recombine those ideas into new ones. What is in that box can be used for something slightly different in this box if we just tweak it a little, and maybe mix it up with something from this other box too. New York in particular was home to Jews coming from around the world all stuck together in small neighborhoods and exchanging ideas and perspectives and ambition.

Moreover, if we wanted to explain why corporate boards a generation or two back were composed exclusively of visionary white Anglo Saxon Protestant males, we could also weave a self-congratulatory tale of how the hardworking visionary WASPs of ages past (John D. Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, and so on) had certain cultural traits (e.g., the Protestant work ethic) that brought them to create all of these titans of industry . . .

. . . and because of this legacy, it's natural that today's corporate boards should be composed exclusively of WASP men.

But I suspect that somehow might not go over so well, eh?

[DSeid]

Except that those lily white boards had explicit anti-minority policies. OTOH White Protestant males are given a chance, have owned companies, have run them, have submitted scripts. They are still the majority of the producers, the directors, the leading men.

Oh but sure, have it your way. If not for subtle taking care-of-their-own clannishness and good-ole-boydom there would not be so many Jews in charge of Hollywood studios, not so many Jewish Nobel Prize winning scientists, and, I am sure, many more White Protestant NBA stars.

[Koxinga]

Hey, you were the one weaving the mythology. It sounds a bit like "How dare you suggest that Jews dominate media -- but if they do, you should recognize that it's because of the Unique Jewish Experience (tm)"

[Spoke]

OK, DSeid, and you stick with that Jewish supremacist mindset of yours. Because that's not bigoted at all.

[DSeid]

Mythology is my post in the old person thread. This is not mythology in any sense of the word, even if it is a speculation to some degree.

Accepted as factual: Jews are over-represented relative to their numbers in the highest levels of intellectual and creative fields, (including Nobel Prize winners (http://www.simpletoremember.com/articles/a/jewish-nobel-prize-winners/)* - 37% of US winners and 22% worldwide, US National Medal of Science winners - 38%, (http://www.jinfo.org/Medal_of_Science.html), and the Japanese Kyoto Prize (http://www.jinfo.org/Kyoto.html) - 25%) ranging from physics, to chemistry, to economics, to medicine, to art, to comedy, to movie making. In terms of the last one, they are not just the heads of studios and over-represented as writers, but disproportionate to their numbers the Academy Award winning directors (http://www.adherents.com/movies/Oscar_directors.html), roughly 37% of the best director awards have gone to a director with some Jewish cultural tie from its inception to 2004 anyway. 40% of the American Film Institute's best movies of all time (http://www.adherents.com/movies/FilmAFI100.html) had directors with Jewish cultural ties as well.

Call my being willing to acknowledge those as facts as having a "Jewish supremacist mindset" if you need to, or "bigoted" if it pleases you, but they are what drove this op. Those Jews achieving things.

So the question is why? Why over the course of nearly a century so many Jews in positions of high achievement particularly in the space of dealing with new ideas?

Conspiracy? Well no one here has trotted that out, anyway. But it has been an accusation made often historically and currently in other venues. And one that many in this country and around the world still believe even if most are not so dumb as to state it outright.

Clannishness? Well that has been a common accusation made, and is why so many Jews want to downplay the accomplishments of others who share their cultural heritage. We fear the consequences of that conclusion. It gets really ugly really fast. Sometimes really really ugly.

Genetically intellectually superior? I really don't think so. Really.

Something intrinsic to the cultural heritage? Uh, yeah, that's my belief. And my speculation as to what aspects of the cultural heritage have been key are what you have dismissed as mythology. Or bigoted supremicist thinking.**

Oy.

*Not just science, over-represented as winners in literature and as winners of the Nobel Peace Prize as well.

**Oh spoke, if you are going to call me a bigot then don't pussyfoot around with it. Pit me and I'll be glad to discuss it with you further.

[Spoke]

**Oh spoke, if you are going to call me a bigot then don't pussyfoot around with it. Pit me and I'll be glad to discuss it with you further.
Actually, DSeid, I want to apologize for that last crack. Sincerely. I don't think you are a bigot.

All the veiled accusations of bigotry flying around this thread have me a little trigger-happy, I suppose.

[Boyo Jim]

I think you nailed it with the Nazis simply being more cinematic villains and the Holocaust being an unavoidably compelling subject to do movies about, but there were also big budget movies about the Japanese and the Pacific theater - The Sands of Iwo Jima, Tora! Tora! Tora!. Even more recently, we've had Pearl Habor, Flags of Our Fathers, Letters from Iwo Jima and HBO's The Pacific series.

Hell in the Pacific (1968) was one of the early and interesting films that didn't trat the Jampanes as evil monsters.

And as far as WWII European vs Asian movies, I dunno. Bridge on the River Kwai stands out. More recently Wind Talkers, The Thin Red Line, Empire of the Sun (one of my all-time favorite war movies), The Great Raid, Australia, ...

[Beware of Doug]

Here's an experiment...This Washington Post piece is about "New York Smug" (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/2010/05/new_york_smug.html), but the thing to check out is the comments. They summarize pretty well what people don't like about New Yorkers. How much of that, I wonder, might have slopped over onto people's attitudes toward Jews?

Similarly, discussions about why New York (http://www.theatlantic.com/special-report/the-future-of-the-city/archive/2010/05/the-tyranny-of-new-york/56581/) - and New Yorkers (http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/05/against-gotham/56737/) - might get more attention than cities and people elsewhere.

[DSeid]

**Oh spoke, if you are going to call me a bigot then don't pussyfoot around with it. Pit me and I'll be glad to discuss it with you further.
Actually, DSeid, I want to apologize for that last crack. Sincerely. I don't think you are a bigot.

All the veiled accusations of bigotry flying around this thread have me a little trigger-happy, I suppose.Apology accepted and appreciated.


Interestingly enough some of this thread illustrates the real points of the linked article:Foxman said. "It means they think Jews

meet at Canter's Deli on Friday mornings to decide what's best for the Jews." Foxman's argument made me rethink: I have to eat at Canter's more often.

"That's a very dangerous phrase, 'Jews control Hollywood.' What is true is that there are a lot of Jews in Hollywood," he said. Instead of "control," Foxman would prefer people say that many executives in the industry "happen to be Jewish," as in "all eight major film studios are run by men who happen to be Jewish."

But Foxman said he is proud of the accomplishments of American Jews. "I think Jews are disproportionately represented in the creative industry. They're disproportionate as lawyers and probably medicine here as well," he said. He argues that this does not mean that Jews make pro-Jewish movies any more than they do pro-Jewish surgery.Stein hasn't, by his own admission, had to endure any anti-Semitism, he is, as he puts it, "maybe ... naive" And he is. Just read CM's rant to get a sense that some really do think that there is some narrative that "the Jewish MSM" wants to put forth and controls. He is playing with, mocking, the concern that some who have experienced anti-Semitism firsthand have over that "Jews control the media (and the banks)" canard. And again, that is naive.

Foxman (of the Anti-Defamation League), OTOH, is disingenuous. No those media heads do not just happen to be Jewish. You don't get 35-40% of the highest honors and achievements in all those areas dealing with new ideas, creating them and managing them, coming out of members of a group that is only 2% of your population as something that "just happens". And it isn't just from a "culture of achievement" because many other cultural groups share that to a point that puts Jews to shame. And you don't win Nobel prizes and Kyoto prize and Academy Awards and make the movies held to be the world's best because of clannishness.

But he is afraid. Afraid that being proud of a culture that has produced so many so agile in coming up with the paradigm shifting ideas and/or managing those ideas and trading in them will evoke a backlash. And the Jewish control of the media canard is one spouted off by many Jew hating organizations from the Nazis to still today. He's lived through anti-Semitism and knows how ugly it was, including in America. I am afraid too. I'm younger than him and even I have been called "kike" and "Jewboy" to my face. My dad had to use an Italian name to go on sales leads and was one of the American soldiers to liberate a concentration camp. We aren't all as smug as Mr. Stein. The threat is still too real to mock the concern of it.

But no. It does not "just happen". A culture created those who achieved in that way. That culture is fading and those aspects of it that were uncommon are now more commonplace. Jews spread across societies used to be the transmitters of new ideas across cultures; now the internet brings us all to the same virtual spaces. (Ironically, the group accused so often to be excessively insular, thrived because of its cultural diversity.) The fairly unique "Jewish Experience" trademark has expired, I think.

[Spoke]

Foxman (of the Anti-Defamation League), OTOH, is disingenuous. No those media heads do not just happen to be Jewish. You don't get 35-40% of the highest honors and achievements in all those areas dealing with new ideas, creating them and managing them, coming out of members of a group that is only 2% of your population as something that "just happens". And it isn't just from a "culture of achievement" because many other cultural groups share that to a point that puts Jews to shame. And you don't win Nobel prizes and Kyoto prize and Academy Awards and make the movies held to be the world's best because of clannishness.

Well now I'm confused again. If it's not coincidence, and it's not a "culture of achievement," and it's not good-old-boyism (which you are calling "clannishness," I guess) then what, in your opinion, accounts for the numbers?

[DSeid]

See post #112.

Cultural factors of which "a culture of achievement" is only a very small part.

Think of it this way - a major part of America's success has been its inventiveness and its inventiveness has emerged to no small degree as a result of the ideas of many cultures that have bumped into each other and created new things. Jewish culture has been doing that as a matter of course for centuries, with food, with music, with language, with everything. Making do with what is around and changing it in the process. Mixing what it had - a cultural tradition of questioning established answers, of not even letting God get away with "because I said so" (religious truths are not so much revealed in the Jewish tradition so much as debated and argued out ... to absurd degrees sometimes) - with good ideas from all the many cultures that Jews have resided in, and sometimes been kicked out of with no ability to take anything with them except ideas and knowledge. And then adapting those ideas to a new land using the ideas that could be found there to make it work. What did Jews have historically? Bupkiss. Land? Kicked off it regularly. Money? Confiscated by those in charge. Left behind when Cossacks came. The only thing you could for sure take with you at a moments notice was ideas. But being spread out and kicked out so much, as a people Jews came into contact with many of them and shared them amongst themselves, from ideas of the Islamic lands to the West to points along the Silk Road. Is it a wonder that the culture emphasized a facility in dealing with new and different ideas and emphasized their value more than land, more than gold? Jews were knowledge workers long before the concept existed. Hence a tendency for those of that tradition to excel in areas that involve dealing with, trading in, and creating new ideas - be they in the sciences, the arts, the media, or whatever.

Again, this is now not so special. The world is now full of knowledge workers who all have access to the whole world of ideas. But that is a very recent development.

[Siam Sam]

For some reason, this from Woody Allen's Annie Hall now keeps popping into my mind:

"ALVY: Wh- How am I a paran-? Well, I pick up on those kind o' things. You know, I was having lunch with some guys from NBC, so I said ... uh, 'Did you eat yet or what?' and Tom Christie said, 'No, didchoo?' Not, did you, didchoo eat? Jew? No, not did you eat, but Jew eat? Jew. You get it? Jew eat?"

[Chen019]

[

So the question is why? Why over the course of nearly a century so many Jews in positions of high achievement particularly in the space of dealing with new ideas?

Clannishness? Well that has been a common accusation made, and is why so many Jews want to downplay the accomplishments of others who share their cultural heritage. We fear the consequences of that conclusion. It gets really ugly really fast. Sometimes really really ugly.

Genetically intellectually superior? I really don't think so. Really.

Something intrinsic to the cultural heritage? Uh, yeah, that's my belief. And my speculation as to what aspects of the cultural heritage have been key are what you have dismissed as mythology.

What about all of the above to some extent? Ashkenazi jews as a group do have a high average level of cognitive ability according to psychometric tests. There is an interesting explanation given for this, which is that because they were restricted to intellectually demanding jobs for almost 1,000 years in Europe, they underwent selection for high cognitive ability. This would explain some of the overrepresentation in academic & professional achievements.

http://homepage.mac.com/harpend/.Public/AshkenaziIQ.jbiosocsci.pdf

[dzero]

[

So the question is why? Why over the course of nearly a century so many Jews in positions of high achievement particularly in the space of dealing with new ideas?

Clannishness? Well that has been a common accusation made, and is why so many Jews want to downplay the accomplishments of others who share their cultural heritage. We fear the consequences of that conclusion. It gets really ugly really fast. Sometimes really really ugly.

Genetically intellectually superior? I really don't think so. Really.

Something intrinsic to the cultural heritage? Uh, yeah, that's my belief. And my speculation as to what aspects of the cultural heritage have been key are what you have dismissed as mythology.

What about all of the above to some extent? Ashkenazi jews as a group do have a high average level of cognitive ability according to psychometric tests. There is an interesting explanation given for this, which is that because they were restricted to intellectually demanding jobs for almost 1,000 years in Europe, they underwent selection for high cognitive ability. This would explain some of the overrepresentation in academic & professional achievements.

http://homepage.mac.com/harpend/.Public/AshkenaziIQ.jbiosocsci.pdf
That's pretty interesting. I've always thought that natural selection could occur within relatively short time frames - short from an evolutionary perspective. For example I'm convinced that the relatively high incidence of OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder) among Caucasoids is partly the result of the Black Death having wiped out a third of the population of Europe.

[DSeid]

What about all of the above to some extent? Ashkenazi jews as a group do have a high average level of cognitive ability according to psychometric tests. There is an interesting explanation given for this, which is that because they were restricted to intellectually demanding jobs for almost 1,000 years in Europe, they underwent selection for high cognitive ability. This would explain some of the overrepresentation in academic & professional achievements.

http://homepage.mac.com/harpend/.Public/AshkenaziIQ.jbiosocsci.pdf
That is one interesting paper. The summary of how the Ashkenazi population migrated and how their role in the broader societies developed is in and of itself fascinating and well covered. I cannot state that the rest of the hypothesis is impossible and they do present a strong argument. I'd be interested in hearing some expert presenting the argument against their hypothesis as well ... I fear my interpretation may be slanted against accepting it.

[DSeid]

Chen, play out a scenario with me.

What if that hypothesis IS true? Honestly I do not want to be in a circumstance in which the answer I have to give to the question of why so many Jews in positions of influence in our society is that one. Spoke apologized for his/her earlier comment but boy, if just supposing a cultural factor triggered that as a knee jerk response ... can you imagine how it would play among others if the answer given after full analysis really was that statistically Ashkenazi Jews are hereditarily smarter than average especially in verbal and math areas, and thus more likely to produce more of the leaders in the spaces of ideas? That circumstance would evoke resentment especially if true.

Just as a what if. Can you see making that argument, even if, or maybe especially if, it turns out to be one well supported, would do anything other than evoke Jew-hatred, and a reactive rallying around the concept that, no, it is all good-ole-boy Jews looking out for each other and/or Jewish conspiracy as preferred things to believe? Human nature being what it is, do you think that if, hypothetically, the facts strongly argued against it, that such would at all make such beliefs at all less pervasive? Or more pervasive?

[Spoke]

DSeid, you keep reverting to the words "clannishness" and "conspiracy" as if to suggest bigotry against Jews.

Just to be clear, good-old-boy networks are not a phenomenon exclusive to Jews. When white protestants are in positions of power, they will tend to hire white protestants. When black people are in positions of power, they will tend to hire other black people. (Witness the several successful reverse discrimination cases in city and county governments in the Atlanta area.) I suspect successful networking accounts for the number of South Asians who are running hotels and convenience stores these days. (I assume you wouldn't argue that South Asians are culturally or genetically predisposed to being good at owning 7-11s?)

So I don't mean to imply that there is anything sinister going on in Hollywood...at least not intentionally so. But the problem is that networking within one particular group can lead to exclusion of qualified candidates from other groups. And it also creates the potential for successful employment discrimination lawsuits (which was my initial observation in this thread).

I think you should steer a wide berth around genetic explanations. That way lies madness. Jews, of all people, should know that.

[Beware of Doug]

...I don't mean to imply that there is anything sinister going on in Hollywood...at least not intentionally so. But the problem is that networking within one particular group can lead to exclusion of qualified candidates from other groups.It's hard for me (anyway) to imagine a field of nonethnic*, nonreligious achievement where Jews are known to congregate, yet contains zero (or just token numbers of) non-Jews. They're always there in some significant percentage. You didn't have to show your dick at the door of the Brill Building (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brill_Building). Nobody boycotted 20th Century-Fox after Darryl Zanuck took over. Even "The" New York Intellectuals (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_Intellectuals) had their Edmund Wilsons and Dwight MacDonalds.

The question ought to be: Is there an outcome making it harder for an equally able and well connected non-Jew to find a position equivalent to the same person who's a Jew? And I would ask the same question about New Yorkers and Southern Californians, if only as a control.

* Another question that might be asked: At what point is a field of work or culture "ethnic"? As opposed to, say, regional or multiethnic?

[DSeid]

DSeid, you keep reverting to the words "clannishness" and "conspiracy" as if to suggest bigotry against Jews....I think you fail to appreciate the utility the explanations you innocently suggest have had to anti-Semites through the ages. And how Jewish successes trigger Jew hatred.

Whatever the explanation Askenazi Jews have tended to reach positions of power and influence and, in particular academic success, in every society in which they've been given an opportunity to do so. At the risk of incurring Godwin's wrath I submit that by the 1920' (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Jews#Freedom_and_repression_.281815.E2.80.931930s.29)s the Jewish population of Germany was small, less than 1%, but highly accomplished. Yeah, they were barred from becoming judges and the like, but they had served in WW1 in a higher percent than any other ethnic or religious group of their countrymen, were leaders in business, many professions, culture, and major figures in politics, "such as foreign minister and vice chancellor in the Weimar Republic. The Weimar constitution was the work of a German Jew, Hugo Preuss, who later became minister of the interior." And of course there were German Jews who were intellectual forces in the Communist movement as well ... Marx ring a bell?

Historically as the rest of those societies have seen this minority group succeed segments of the population, especially those who have not been succeeded so much, begin to resent them and gravitiate to neferious explanations for the success of that minority population. They suspect that this minority has too much power and is using it in some disloyal way, perhaps even in the service of some plan for their own ... after all they aren't really "us". Invariably through history the accusations include that Jews succeed because they stick together so much, look out for each other. The themes go back to Rome (http://library.flawlesslogic.com/jtr_01.htm):In 59 BC the Roman statesman Cicero criticized Jewish "clannishness" and "influence in the assemblies." In the second century AD Celsus, one of Rome's great medical writers, wrote that Jews "pride themselves in possessing superior wisdom and disdain for the company of other men." Philostratus, an ancient Greek author, believed that Jews "have long since risen against humanity itself. They are men who have devised a misanthropic life, who share neither food nor drink with others." (Cf. Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice, I, iii.) The great Roman historian Tacitus (A.D. 56-120) declared that "the Jews are extremely loyal toward one another, and are always ready to show compassion [for their fellow Jews], but toward other people they feel only hate and enmity" (Morais, 46).

Centuries later Voltaire's criticism of Jews, in his Essai sur le Moeurs, repeated many of the same charges: "The Jewish nation dares to display an irreconcilable hatred toward all nations, and revolts against all masters; always superstitious, always greedy for the well-being enjoyed by others, always barbarous -- cringing in misfortune and insolent in prosperity."So understand the response to an accusation that Jewish success is due to Jews sticking together in historic context. You may be making an innocent suggestion, but it is a suggestion with a bloody pedigreed. And one that is of little explanatory power. Jews are successful in Hollywood but not especially successful in Hollywood; not all that more than they are in a wide variety of other areas that are in the space of managing ideas - science, economics, literature, journalism, political consultants, advisors, chess masters, and on and on. If "good-ole-boy networking" can explain that then you need to tell me how. If statistical analysis showing over-representation is provisional evidence of discrimination, then be prepared to use it against the Nobel Prize Committee and the Film Academy and ....


I think you should steer a wide berth around genetic explanations. That way lies madness. Jews, of all people, should know that.Oh I'd like to and I am not promoting that explanation. I prefer the one I have suggested.

But I still ask you the hypothetical - what if you read that paper and became convinced that the authors' hypothesis is correct? What would be your response, in your gut?

You see those of us Jews who are historically aware have reason to be paranoid: the world has been out to get us. And we see that in every path the potential for madness lies. No matter what we do.

[bizzwire]

I have a suggestion that may be a little less sinister. Before there was Hollywood, there was Vaudeville and Burlesque and a thriving Jewish/Yiddish theater, especially in New York. A distant relative of mine was a principal in the Friars club (originally a small group of theater owners, it grew to a club for those in the New York entertainment world; Actors, singers, comedians, etc...)

Among his memorabilia are several clippings from "The Epistle," the Friars' newsletter. Dating from the teens and 20's, there were several comments and articles about the new phenomenon of "talking pictures" that were being made out in California, and how several of the members were going out there or had just returned from checking it out (we're talking Al Jolson, Georgie Jessel, George M Cohan, etc...)

So, you start with a New York entertainment industry in which Jews are well-represented. Now throw into the mix a new technology/ medium through which said entertainment can be recorded, distributed and *sold* to many more people than one can fit into a music hall. Is it really so surprising that the early-adopters of this new medium were Jews? And, considering their success, is it really so startling that they're still there?

[Punoqllads]

That is one interesting paper. The summary of how the Ashkenazi population migrated and how their role in the broader societies developed is in and of itself fascinating and well covered. I cannot state that the rest of the hypothesis is impossible and they do present a strong argument. I'd be interested in hearing some expert presenting the argument against their hypothesis as well ... I fear my interpretation may be slanted against accepting it.
I'm not terribly impressed with the paper at first inspection. It makes some contradictory statements -- first it says that high IQ would indicate a higher chance for economic success, then it says that in a study across different economic background, even Jews from very poor families had higher IQs. The paper states that higher economic success would lead to higher reproductive success, but gives no evidence that that is the case.

From my experience in working with students (as a volunteer tutor, not as a teacher) I feel that inherent ability is only one part of the equation for success, and that parental involvement is at least as important, if not more important. A naturally talented student can easily become lackadaisical about their work without motivation from home, while a student of about average or even below average ability can develop good study habits to achieve academic success, given enough parental (sometimes grand-parental) prodding.

Also, there is another very plausible suggestion that some others in this thread have stated, where, regardless of what industry you're in, you can have a significant advantage over others applying for jobs in a company if you know someone in that company. Even if that person has no role in deciding whether or not you get hired, they can make sure that your resume gets looked at by the right department, for instance, whereas submitting your resume to an ordinary recruiter might not result in the right hiring managers seeing it, much less them giving you an initial callback.

Finally, let me note that it's not uncommon for children to fantasize about going into particular industries, and for those childhood fantasies to significantly influence their eventual careers. Often, those fantasies originate from careers of people around you. If on every visit to Uncle Morty (manager of various Vaudeville talents) you see him surrounded by exciting, beautiful people, maybe you'd fantasize about being a media magnate when you grow up, something that might not occur to too many kids who grow up surrounded by blue-collar workers.

[Jackmannii]

I suspect successful networking accounts for the number of South Asians who are running hotels and convenience stores these days. It's true! I have a list of prominent 7-11 owners, and they're all Asian.

We need to sic some lawyers on this pronto.

[Spoke]

I suspect successful networking accounts for the number of South Asians who are running hotels and convenience stores these days. It's true! I have a list of prominent 7-11 owners, and they're all Asian.

We need to sic some lawyers on this pronto.

Simmer down, Uncle Leo.

[Spoke]

Movie studios are large, publicly-traded companies. Their hiring decisions are justly subject to federal anti-discrimination law.

On the other hand, convenience stores tend to be family-run operations, either proprietorships or closely-held companies. The people working behind the counter are often owners. Federal anti-discrimination suits generally aren't going to touch that situation.

[Jackmannii]

Movie studios are large, publicly-traded companies. Their hiring decisions are justly subject to federal anti-discrimination law.

On the other hand, convenience stores tend to be family-run operations, either proprietorships or closely-held companies. The people working behind the counter are often owners. Federal anti-discrimination suits generally aren't going to touch that situation.In reality, lots of convenience stores are either corporate-owned and operated or are franchise operations and not owned by the people who run them (7-11 is one prominent example of a heavily franchised operation, moving towards all-franchise stores in coming years). And yes, they are subject to federal anti-discrimination laws.

I hope this doesn't put a damper on your Asian-networking-clannishness-convenience-store-takeover theory.

[Spoke]

You realize that you can be a mom-and-pop proprietorship or closely-held business and still operate a franchise of a nationally-branded company? You just enter into a franchise agreement with the national company-- but you still own the store.

You'd better go do a little more google research, Jackmanii, before you hold forth again.

[DSeid]

Not that this has anything to do with anything, but a small business, mom and pop, franchised, or not, can be sued for employment discrimination just as much as a publicly traded movie studio can.

You're really going to keep on the schtick that Jews being over-represented as the heads of movie studios, as writers, as directors, and probably as producers, is probable cause for an employment discrimination? That really strikes you as the likely reason? Really?

Against whom anyway? The industry as a whole? The individual studios that have Jewish heads for having Jewish heads?

And will you also bring similar suits against the University of Chicago if you find out that a large percent of their Department of Economics is now and historically has been Jewish? (Yes, I am making that up. I have no idea if it is true. And don't care. You get the point.)

punoqllads, I will not take up the torch of defending the papers conclusions. No one yet though has answered my hypothetical. Assume the authors are incorrect but pretend for the sake of the question that they are not, or that at least the argument was strong enough to convince you it was very likely true. How would you react to that? How would various segments of the non-Jewish population react to having that used as an explanation if the evidence for its being true was, in our imagined pretend hypothetical, incontrovertible?

I imagine it would increase Jew hatred and increase the calls to limit the power of Jews in society. Oh those crafty Jews - watch out for them.

[Argent Towers]

Whatever the role of Jews may be in Hollywood, the talent on the creative side right now mostly seems to be Gentile.

James Cameron, Christopher Nolan, David Fincher, Ridley Scott, Michael Bay, Wes Anderson - none of them are Jewish.

Those names came right off the top of my head. For Jewish directors other than Steven Spielberg I actually have to think about it. Hmm...Jerry Bruckheimer. Oliver Stone (half Jewish and I don't believe he identifies himself as Jewish.) Judd Apatow. Can't think of any others.

[Spoke]

Not that this has anything to do with anything, but a small business, mom and pop, franchised, or not, can be sued for employment discrimination just as much as a publicly traded movie studio can.

Not for being owned by a particular ethnicity.

[Spoke]

You're really going to keep on the schtick that Jews being over-represented as the heads of movie studios, as writers, as directors, and probably as producers, is probable cause for an employment discrimination? That really strikes you as the likely reason? Really?

Against whom anyway? The industry as a whole? The individual studios that have Jewish heads for having Jewish heads?

And will you also bring similar suits against the University of Chicago if you find out that a large percent of their Department of Economics is now and historically has been Jewish? (Yes, I am making that up. I have no idea if it is true. And don't care. You get the point.)

I went over all this before. You keep pretending that this is just a case of Jews being "overrepresented." This goes well beyond being merely overrepresented. Jews in the legal profession are overrepresented, comprising 20% in the big firms compared with 1% of the population.

The numbers in the entertainment industry, on the other hand, look absolutely overwhelming. Overwhelming to the point that it looks like prima facie statistical evidence of discrimination would be pretty easy to establish.

[dzero]

I imagine it would increase Jew hatred and increase the calls to limit the power of Jews in society. Oh those crafty Jews - watch out for them.
My views are atypical so I don't know how most people would react, but I wouldn't have a problem with it and I suspect that even if a lot of people wouldn't admit it, those same people would probably have a higher estimation of a Jewish person's ability just based on their ethnicity.

On the issue of the heads of all the major studios being Jewish, I don't think that can be written off as being mere coincidence. I don't remember enough about statistics to do the calculations, and probably wouldn't bother even if I did, but as the sample size grows, I think the odds increase exponentially. Is it still possible? Sure. But then so is getting hit by a meteorite.

[DSeid]

I went over all this before. You keep pretending that this is just a case of Jews being "overrepresented." This goes well beyond being merely overrepresented. Jews in the legal profession are overrepresented, comprising 20% in the big firms compared with 1% of the population.

The numbers in the entertainment industry, on the other hand, look absolutely overwhelming. Overwhelming to the point that it looks like prima facie statistical evidence of discrimination would be pretty easy to establish.Really. "Overwhelming"?

What the Hell are you talking about? Please show me any evidence that the number of Jews in the industry as a whole are overwhelmingly Jewish. Sorry, showing that the heads of the majors are, at this point in time, mostly Jewish does not do that. To show that you need to show that a vast majority of the entire management team and production staff are Jewish. And I really do not think that such is the case.

Heck, since you do not sue an industry, I'll take evidence that even one major's administrative and production staff is "overwhelmingly" Jewish as a point for your position. Without even that, man you are just making shit up.

[Jackmannii]

Not that this has anything to do with anything, but a small business, mom and pop, franchised, or not, can be sued for employment discrimination just as much as a publicly traded movie studio can.

Not for being owned by a particular ethnicity.Ah, but you stated that you suspect that good old boys' "networking" by Asians (akin to the "good old boys' networking you claim is responsible for Jews holding major studio executive jobs) is behind supposed Asian dominance of convenience story ownership, and thus discriminatory. How this would happen in spoke-world is a bit hard to fathom, of course. Are Asians "networking" to get to buy favorable locations and freeze out non-Asians? Is 7-11 preferentially awarding franchises to Asians (remember, 7-11 is a Japanese corporation, ooooh)? If this kind of stuff was actually going on there'd certainly be scope for anti-discrimination lawsuits.

In non-spoke world, most people view Asians owning/running convenience stores as an example of recent immigrants getting ahead in the world by finding an employment niche that they are comfortable with. It takes an entirely different mind-set to cop a resentment to the fact that they've been successful in this endeavor and to insinuate that there's something unfair/illegal about it.

[DSeid]

Again, while I'd love to just deny that there is any basis at all to any stereotypes, positive or negative in nature (because once you accept one, even a positive one, like "Jews tend to be smart", you set up the conditions to accept negative ones as well, like "Jews are money-grubbing"), some facts cannot be denied: Jews are over-represented in certain fields, including the top levels of Hollywood. But that is a far cry from the untruth that Hollywood "overwhelmingly" employs Jews, and the assertion that the relatively large numbers of Jews in the business of Hollywood, both historically and to the current day, is evidence of discrimination against non-Jews, is humorously ironic (http://www.jewishcurrents.org/2004-jan-dekro-bush.htm), as one of the factors that historically concentrated Jews into more cutting edge and experimental emerging industries was that anti-Semitism blocked their entrance into many established business areas:... the genteel anti-Semitism of corporate America in the first half of the 20th century and beyond ... which forced Jews into experimental zones of American economic life. In 1936, when Fortune magazine examined the role of Jews in business, they were conspicuously absent as owners, directors or chief executive officers in coal, rubber, chemicals, shipbuilding, railroads, bus companies, aviation, utilities, telephone and telegraph, engineering and construction, heavy machinery, lumber or dairy products. Where were the Jews?

Well, we might not have the Hollywood film - America's most striking contribution, along with jazz, to world culture — were it not for Samuel Goldwyn, Cecil B. DeMille, Adolf Zukor, Louis Mayer and Marcus Loew. It was David Sarnoff, founder of NBC, who transformed radio technology into a mass medium. Julius Rosenwald invented mail-order shopping through his creation of the Sears, Roebuck catalogue. Felix Warburg and his father-in-law Jacob Schiff were two of a handful of major financiers of North America's industrial development, providing capital for Westinghouse, AT&T, the railroads, and much more. William Levitt invented mass-production building techniques that provided suburban homes at affordable prices for thousands of American families after World War II. Louis Blaustein responded to the spread of automobiles by inventing high-test gasoline and, with his son Jacob, Amoco. Muriel Siebert became the first woman member of the New York Stock Exchange in 1967 and promptly expanded popular access to stock ownership by launching one of the first discount brokerage houses. Michigan's A. Alfred Taubman almost single-handedly invented the shopping mall ...Like the Asian immigrants who see that a convenience store is a path to financial security that is open to them and take it, ploughing what they make into their children's educations and pressuring those children to become professionals whether they want to or not. And yes sometimes it is easiest to go where the stereotype says you should go.

That same cite interestingly also has the following to say:The great majority of notable American Jewish activists have been secular or cultural Jews whose creativity and life-force bridged the Jewish and American worlds. Their Torah was mentshlikhkayt (human decency), their idea of worship was to exercise chutzpah, and their God was Liberation. Abbie Hoffman best summarized the essential Jewish content of their activism by writing in his book, Soon To Be a Major Motion Picture, that "Jews have to make a big choice very quickly in life whether to go for the money or to go for broke. Wiseguys who go around saying things like `Workers of the world unite' or . . . `E=mc2' obviously choose to go for broke. It's the greatest Jewish tradition."

[Spoke]

In non-spoke world, most people view Asians owning/running convenience stores as an example of recent immigrants getting ahead in the world by finding an employment niche that they are comfortable with. It takes an entirely different mind-set to cop a resentment to the fact that they've been successful in this endeavor and to insinuate that there's something unfair/illegal about it.

So who's resentful?

This is a different animal. Nobody is preventing me from starting my own franchise. So the predominance of South Asians in the industry does me no harm. More power to them!

On the other hand, if I want to pursue a career in Hollywood, it looks like there may be some roadblocks to success.

[DSeid]

On the other hand, if I want to pursue a career in Hollywood, it looks like there may be some roadblocks to success.Yes. You'd need talent.

I keed.

[Spoke]

Dude, just give me a camera and watch me make magic! ;)

I thought of a possible control group. Is the British film industry dominated by Jewish executives the way the US film industry is? If not, that would tend to argue against the whole special aptitude/experience/brainpower explanation. If the explanation is special aptitude (for whatever reason) the Jews should rise to the top of the industry in the UK too, no?

[DSeid]

Sadly, but not surprisngly, the place to find information on the "domination" of the UK media by Jewish executives is in anti-Semitic sites (http://radioislam.org/islam/english/jewishp/gbmedia/update.htm). Mostly. (http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/4520361)

Anyway, it does seem that there is an over-representation of Jews at the top of the UK media as well. Only 0.5% of the UK population, 1/4th that of America's, yet very well represented at the top of that industry ... and among British Nobel Prize winners too (14% of the Nobel Prizes awarded to British citizens have been to Jewish British citizens). Sound like a familiar pattern?

The linked article is on many Jew-hating sites. As you read it you can perhaps understand the context in which your innocent suggestions are heard.

[Spoke]

Sadly, but not surprisngly, the place to find information on the "domination" of the UK media by Jewish executives is in anti-Semitic sites (http://radioislam.org/islam/english/jewishp/gbmedia/update.htm). Mostly. (http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/4520361)

Yeah, not surprising, I guess.

The linked article is on many Jew-hating sites. As you read it you can perhaps understand the context in which your innocent suggestions are heard.

Yeah, I see your point. Too bad, because it is an interesting topic of discussion, but you're right; it does give troglodytes something to run with.

[dzero]

Sadly, but not surprisngly, the place to find information on the "domination" of the UK media by Jewish executives is in anti-Semitic sites. Mostly.
I'm just a newbie here but I'm not sure it's appropriate to link to anti-semitic sites for any reason. I don't intend to report it and since you've been here a lot longer I defer to your judgment, but if you have any second thoughts about that, I would prefer to see it removed. (didn't go there so don't know how bad it is).

[Spoke]

Sadly, but not surprisngly, the place to find information on the "domination" of the UK media by Jewish executives is in anti-Semitic sites. Mostly.
I'm just a newbie here but I'm not sure it's appropriate to link to anti-semitic sites for any reason.

In this case it serves a useful purpose. I can see why Jackmannii is up in arms now.

[Evil Captor]

Sadly, but not surprisngly, the place to find information on the "domination" of the UK media by Jewish executives is in anti-Semitic sites (http://radioislam.org/islam/english/jewishp/gbmedia/update.htm). Mostly. (http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/4520361)

Yeah, not surprising, I guess.

The linked article is on many Jew-hating sites. As you read it you can perhaps understand the context in which your innocent suggestions are heard.

Yeah, I see your point. Too bad, because it is an interesting topic of discussion, but you're right; it does give troglodytes something to run with.

And when troglodytes control the what topics you can and can't discuss, who wins? Hint: it ain't us.

[tomndebb]

I'm just a newbie here but I'm not sure it's appropriate to link to anti-semitic sites for any reason. I don't intend to report it and since you've been here a lot longer I defer to your judgment, but if you have any second thoughts about that, I would prefer to see it removed. (didn't go there so don't know how bad it is).Linking to a message board with an agenda of hatred will generally find the link broken on the grounds that we don't want to encourage trolls from such sites to sniff their way back to this board.

Simply linking to an obnoxious site is less likely to draw any staff reaction. (We allow all sorts of links to Fox News and MSNBC! :p ) As long as there is adequate warning of what one will find there and the intention is not to either mislead or to provoke fights, we are probably going to let such links alone.

[ /Modding ]

[DSeid]

spoke, I agree with Evil Captor and do not think that the subject is off limits for discussion. Knowing the context merely informs the discussion more fully.

And in this case sites like that were the most easily available source to answer your question and I do not doubt that information, even if their interpretation and spin of that information is what it is. Yes same pattern in the UK. Your requested "control group".

Like I've said before, that is the spirit in which the observation of Jews in Hollywood is commonly made, and that is why some want to pretend that it isn't even true that Jews are really over-represented there, and why Foxman tries to spin it as they "just happen" to be Jewish. And while yeah, that context may make some bristle at an insistence that Jews overwhelm Hollywood and tense up when the word "control" is used (the reaction that the article of the op was mocking), pretending that the over-representation does not exist, pretending that it is something that "just happens" out of random chance, or refusing to discuss it, are, I think, incorrect responses.

[Jackmannii]

I don't have that much of a problem with the "troglodytes" who run websites devoted to bigotry. Their agenda is clear-cut.

More repellent is the process of spreading hate through insinuation and Just Asking Questions (http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/JAQing_off#Examples). Here the agenda is still clear to those who've heard these tropes propagated over the years ad nauseum, but it may be less obvious if you haven't been following the sport, so to speak.

There's a passage in Herman Wouk's The Caine Mutiny where the Navy advocate who's defending the accused mutineers tells his clients that the lead judge in the case doesn't like Jews. His conclusion is based on the contemptuous overtones he hears when the judge pronounces his (classically Jewish) name. His comment runs something like "I have absolute pitch for those frequencies."

Reaction to this comment may be eye-rolling at the "oversensitivity" of the character, or recognition that there's real-world experience backing up his ability to detect even subtle forms of bigotry.

Personally, I don't think I have "absolute pitch" and there are occasions where people have innocent curiosity about subjects that raise hackles in those who've repeatedly heard them in negative contexts. After ten years on this board* I do believe that my relative pitch is well-developed and that I can detect the off-notes. There've been quite a few JAQoffs over the years.

*hurray for me! Do I get a prize? :dubious:

[DSeid]

Jackmannii,

Yes, some who are "just asking questions" are working an agenda. And some not. And we have no way of telling who is who with certainty. So how best to respond to someone asking questions, whatever your personal assessment of his/her motives might be, recognizing that the audience for the response is not only the questioner but also the others who may be listening, few of whom have reason to have the same relative pitch that you have?

spoke,

I'll ask you a similar question: Given what you now know about the context, how do you think we should respond, both to this particular charge, and the related charge that Jews are in charge of X, Y, or Z despised political philosophy? Recognize that political philosophies are in the space of new ideas and so it really is often true that Jews are highly involved in whatever political POV you despise. Communists? Yup, beginning with Marx and Trotsky. Capitalist Pigs? Uh huh. Some of the piggiest. Labour Rights organizers? Oh yeah. Free market economies? Yup. Both Chicago and Austrian schools. Neocons? You betcha. So much so that "neocon" became code for saying "Jewish" in some parts. Pacifists and anti-war activists? Of course. Libertarians? Uh huh. Civil Rights advocates? Yup. Bigots? We got em too. Jews control the media to promote their agenda and the nature of that agenda is often any and all of the above depending on the anti-Semite's target audience. Okay, probably few in the Tea Party but even the Religious Right has some prominent Orthodox voices. When someone is just asking, but is asking questions that sound as if they could come from that playbook, what, in your opinion, is the most effective response?

[Jackmannii]

Jackmannii,

Yes, some who are "just asking questions" are working an agenda. And some not. And we have no way of telling who is who with certainty.I disagree with that last statement.

Certainly if it's a first-time questioner who's raising a classic offensive stereotype, he/she may be unaware of how it's been misused throughout history and how it will be viewed, here or elsewhere*. Education can be helpful in such instances.

When bigoted attitudes (against one or more groups) are promoted in a hostile manner, using a lack of evidence (or easily refuted misinformation, such as that found on sleazy websites devoted to bigotry), and the person promoting bigotry does so over and over again despite attempts at education - then yes, I feel such a person can be characterized with certainty. Once their agenda is common knowledge their claims can be viewed with appropriate skepticism and dispatched (with evidence of course, but not requiring the level of repetitive effort one might expend to convince someone who is not a lost cause).

For instance, I find DSeid to be a decent and knowledgeable poster with whom I disagree at times, but whose evidence is generally of a high quality without requiring a bunch of fact-checking. Conversely there have been numerous posters here whose biases are so evident that far more rigorous standards must be applied before any of their claims can be accepted.

*Even if one is unaware of the baggage attached to certain topics, it doesn't mean that common sense can't be applied to avoid blurting out one's curiosity without doing a little research first. This board is famous (in certain forums in particular) for threads about bodily functions and inane inquiries of all kinds. Most everyone here is reasonably intelligent. Before you post questions/opinions about the alleged predilections of a particular ethnicity/religion/sexual orientation/whatever, it makes sense to do a bit of Googling to get a basic level
of understanding about the subject before posting to avoid unnecessary conflict and bad feelings.

Unless that's your intent in the first place.

[Siam Sam]

For Jewish directors other than Steven Spielberg I actually have to think about it. Hmm...Jerry Bruckheimer. Oliver Stone (half Jewish and I don't believe he identifies himself as Jewish.) Judd Apatow. Can't think of any others.

The Coen Brothers. Woody Allen.

[DSeid]

Jackmannii, thank you for the kind assessment of my contributions here. And likewise. We will have to disagree about much certainty we can have in our assessments. And of course if someone is openly hostile and sleazy then making their agenda clear may be all that is needed to respond appropriately. But we are talking about those just asking questions and even if you personally are certain as to their intent others may not be. Even Herman Wouk's character has his doubters; I would fear coming off more like another character referenced further upstream: Woody Allen's "D'Jew?" one. The conversation is not a private one with the questioner. How does attempting to "out" someone as having an agenda, even when you are sure that is the case (which I personally rarely am) play to others who aren't attuned to the same pitches you are? What approach is going to help diminish potential anti-Semitic beliefs the most? I honestly don't know and honestly fear that the answer is often "none of the above"; as I said upthread some, that in every direction the potential for madness lies.

[DSeid]

Well spoke I regret that you have left before seeing fit to respond to the question I asked.

Nevertheless I thought this small update was of note: upthread I had mentioned the tactic of blaming Jews for X, Y, or Z despised political philosophy (the exact one changing with the audience) since you will find Jews as major forces in almost all of them, but had made a possible exception of the Tea Party - well, the major funders of the Tea Party, the billionaire New Yorker Koch brothers, are not Jewish - Catholic (http://www.nndb.com/people/707/000170197/) of Dutch heritage - but apparently living in New York and having a name that might possibly sound Jewish is enough (http://www.nndb.com/people/707/000170197/) that the tactic can be used: ... It makes me so angry some times. I try to tell some black folk that things are much deeper than they seem. I bet they are Jewish as well. ... Koch is a jewish name, so I'd bet money that these brothers are indeed jews. ...Well, I don't think Jews are going to blamed for the Nazis or the skinheads anyway. (Cece's take notwithstanding. (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/797/was-hitler-part-jewish))

[Jackmannii]

Well, I don't think Jews are going to (be) blamed for the Nazis or the skinheads anyway. (Cece's take notwithstanding. (http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/797/was-hitler-part-jewish))What's kind of depressing is that the Jewish stereotypes of today have gotten progressively more boring.

Where are the colorful if disreputable figures of the past gone? For instance, the Jewish gangsters (i.e. members of Murder Inc.) and the swashbuckling spies and foreign adventurers (like Two-Gun Cohen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morris_Cohen_(adventurer)"), Moe Berg and Sidney Reilly). Reilly was quite the guy - as a pre-WWI British spy he got a job in a Krupp armaments plant to spy on the Germans, and when he had trouble getting weapons specifications his solution was to overpower and kill a security guard, break into the safe and escape with the Kaiser's goons hot on his trail.

Who's going to make a thrill-packed movie about Jewish Hollywood executives? I miss the good old days. :(

[Spoke]

Well spoke I regret that you have left before seeing fit to respond to the question I asked.

Nah, I was away from computer for the weekend.

spoke,

I'll ask you a similar question: Given what you now know about the context, how do you think we should respond, both to this particular charge, and the related charge that Jews are in charge of X, Y, or Z despised political philosophy?

The same answer I would give for all controversial topics: I think you should discuss the issue openly and honestly (--as I think you have in this thread).

What I don't think you should do is try to squelch debate with accusations of bigotry. (Which thankfully you have not done.) The problem with responding that way is that it tends to prevent the issue from being discussed at all. (Dopers who might otherwise participate in the discussion sit it out because they don't want to be smeared.) And leaving such controversial topics undiscussed doesn't eliminate bigotry; it just forces it underground. (In fact I think the stridency of the boards' self-appointed Grand Inquisitors of anti-Semitism probably only serves to create further resentment-- as I think you have correctly surmised.)

I have no anti-Semitic sentiments at all, but I enter a thread like this with dread, because I know there are a couple of posters who, like Jerry Seinfeld's Uncle Leo, are hyper-sensitive to the issue (I'm sure they would say "attuned").

I can read an article like the one you linked above and understand why some might be quick to arms to respond to perceived anti-Semitism. But I don't think such bristling responses are really productive.

[Jackmannii]

I have no anti-Semitic sentiments at all, but I enter a thread like this with dreadYou must endeavor to persevere. :D

[Spoke]

Spidey sense tingling again, Jackmannii? :rolleyes:

[Jackmannii]

And leaving such controversial topics undiscussed doesn't eliminate bigotry; it just forces it underground.I gave this some more thought and realized that this is why it's valuable to have spoke posting in this and similar threads. Apart from his opinions on a given topic he can illustrate some interesting ramifications we might not have otherwise considered.

spoke is worried about forcing bigotry underground. Isn't that what we've been increasingly doing in recent decades, both in the U.S. and abroad? Legislation has cracked down on discrimination in employment, housing and other public spheres. Both legal remedies and broad public disapproval have severely limited the activities of groups that openly promote bigotry. There are no more giant Klan marches and rallies (at most of what has passed for Klan events in recent years, the protestors far outnumbered the Klansmen, who required police protection). We don't have budding fascists filling Madison Square Garden to promote their ideology. And say what you will about talk radio, there's no one like Father Coughlin openly preaching hatred. Bigots feel vastly more inhibited about promoting their agendas. So should we feel bad about that?

Nah, I don't think so. I'm pleased by the fact that most hate groups these days could hold their meetings in a broom closet instead of hoping to fill an auditorium. Bigots largely confined to emoting anonymously on the Internet? A big improvement on the old days. And if, even on the Internet, it is made increasingly clear to bigots that they face scorn and ridicule for spreading poisonous nonsense and they start to dread expressing their bigotry, is that a bad thing? Not in my opinion.

There is a very wide latitude given to free speech in this country and it's a large part of what makes us great. It does not mean that saying ignorant and hateful things should come without a price, even if the price is merely the disapproval of your peers.

The argument will be made that the progress we've made in counteracting bigotry has gone too far and led to the rise of violent hate groups that operate in secrecy. This is debatable (perhaps in a separate thread in this forum). We have supposedly had an upsurge in activity by bigots due to the election of Obama. Should we have refrained from voting for him so as not to provoke such people? Where do you draw the line in protecting society from the negative impact of bigotry, for fear that another splinter group will dress up in camouflage gear in the Idaho woods and start plotting violence?

I hope spoke or some other supporter of the idea that "we musn't drive them underground" will start a discussion that aims to clarify if, and just where we need to draw the line in assuring human rights and combatting bigotry.

[Spoke]

Yes, Jackmannii, you have divined my meaning precisely. Thanks for "clarifying." :rolleyes:

I suppose you are right. Silence is best. If anyone dares notice the facts presented in the OP, they must be driven from our midst. Much better that approach than to have a rational discussion.

[dzero]

I gave this some more thought and realized that this is why it's valuable to have spoke posting in this and similar threads. Apart from his opinions on a given topic he can illustrate some interesting ramifications we might not have otherwise considered.

spoke is worried about forcing bigotry underground. Isn't that what we've been increasingly doing in recent decades, both in the U.S. and abroad? Legislation has cracked down on discrimination in employment, housing and other public spheres. Both legal remedies and broad public disapproval have severely limited the activities of groups that openly promote bigotry. There are no more giant Klan marches and rallies (at most of what has passed for Klan events in recent years, the protestors far outnumbered the Klansmen, who required police protection). We don't have budding fascists filling Madison Square Garden to promote their ideology. And say what you will about talk radio, there's no one like Father Coughlin openly preaching hatred. Bigots feel vastly more inhibited about promoting their agendas. So should we feel bad about that?

Nah, I don't think so. I'm pleased by the fact that most hate groups these days could hold their meetings in a broom closet instead of hoping to fill an auditorium. Bigots largely confined to emoting anonymously on the Internet? A big improvement on the old days. And if, even on the Internet, it is made increasingly clear to bigots that they face scorn and ridicule for spreading poisonous nonsense and they start to dread expressing their bigotry, is that a bad thing? Not in my opinion.

There is a very wide latitude given to free speech in this country and it's a large part of what makes us great. It does not mean that saying ignorant and hateful things should come without a price, even if the price is merely the disapproval of your peers.

The argument will be made that the progress we've made in counteracting bigotry has gone too far and led to the rise of violent hate groups that operate in secrecy. This is debatable (perhaps in a separate thread in this forum). We have supposedly had an upsurge in activity by bigots due to the election of Obama. Should we have refrained from voting for him so as not to provoke such people? Where do you draw the line in protecting society from the negative impact of bigotry, for fear that another splinter group will dress up in camouflage gear in the Idaho woods and start plotting violence?

I hope spoke or some other supporter of the idea that "we musn't drive them underground" will start a discussion that aims to clarify if, and just where we need to draw the line in assuring human rights and combatting bigotry.
The difference between open discussion and bigoted ranting should be obvious. Are you intentionally conflating the 2? Or is it that you think any bias against Jews must by definition be bigotry? If the latter, the mere fact that the supposed bigot is willing to have a frank discussion of the merits (or lack of same) of his or her position should be enough to encourage your participation - participation with an open mind rather than a single minded agenda.

The fact that you are either unable or unwilling to make such distinctions means that no discussion which falls even marginally within your view of what constitutes anti-semitism will be possible. Earlier in this thread I laid out some broad principles for discussion - principles which on their face applied generally to any subgroup of people - not just Jews. You repeatedly demonstrated no interest in discussing the substance of my argument. You chose instead to focus on what you saw as the anti-semitic undertones - which in fact were not present. After a few such exchanges, I chose to withdraw since my participation clearly was not required.

Everyone has biases - even you. The point is to feel free enough to be able to discuss them openly without becoming a target. Why is that so difficult to understand?

[DSeid]

I think it is more complicated than how either of you present it.

I highly doubt that most (or perhaps even "any") who hold bigoted or anti-Semitic beliefs perceive themselves to be bigots or anti-Semites. They think that what they honestly think is just truth as they see it: "I'm not prejudiced against Gypsies, it's just that they're lazy and dishonest." Fill in your favorites. It is only from the perspective of those who do not share the belief that one is bigoted or anti-Semitic.

Thus, at the risk of being mealy-mouthed, I can agree with both of you. It is a good thing that explicit bigotry is forced underground. And it is necessary to have rational discussions that honestly discuss what the tropes are, what overlap they may or may not have with reality, and hopefully thereby diminish their power.

It is the audience of those who have no specific belief set firmly held that I am concerned about, those whose main conscious experience with, name the minority but in this specific instance Jews, is limited to occasional real life contacts with those who so explicitly self-identify, and to the many images and tropes that they see and hear in the media and from others. For these folk jackmannii it isn't really underground, it is just not when you or I are in earshot ... which is most of the time. They hear these tropes no matter what. Wouldn't you prefer that they hear them in a forum in which some rules of politeness must apply, "above ground" where the worst explicit bigotry is verboten, and by enough light to disabuse them some?

Sure, some of those who are "just asking questions" are actually firmly set in their belief set, a belief set that you and I would perceive as bigoted or anti-Semitic, working an agenda (and no dzero, to some of us that difference is not always so obvious); but even then the audience consists of a greater number of those who really are, in the non-pejorative sense of the word, just ignorant - not stupid, just uninformed. Should their only exposure to the tropes be in hushed but unchallenged tones?

[Spoke]

I highly doubt that most (or perhaps even "any") who hold bigoted or anti-Semitic beliefs perceive themselves to be bigots or anti-Semites.

And I doubt those who make war against the anti-Semites they imagine to be all around them perceive themselves as paranoid. :)

[DSeid]

You smiley face but it is true. And as noted before, being paranoid doesn't mean they are not out to get you. And in the case of Jews it is true: we are paranoid and the world has, time after time, proven itself to be out to get us. We ignore that history at our potential peril.

And back to the article referenced in the op - it is that paranoia that the article mocks, which I think is a dangerously naive position to take. Anti-Semitism is dismissed by many nowadays because, afterall, Jews are so over-represented in the ranks of the achieved. How can prejudice against them be held as significant compared to bigotry against other groups for whom bigotry has kept from as much success? Yet historically the combination of being perceived as "other" coupled with "success" has set up Jew-hating - add in hard economic times and a few Jews visibly doing well despite it, or worse yet, a few profiting during it - and you can easily see some Jew-hating getting traction, and called "just asking questions". Paranoia? Maybe. But still a realistic paranoia. I would be very surprised if a large fraction of those who self-identify as Tea Party did not endorse many beliefs that I would consider very anti-Semitic.

[Spoke]

You smiley face but it is true.

I smiley faced it because I did not want it to come across as hostile.

[Spoke]

And yes, I understand the history, and I understand the reason for concern when such tropes arise. But I think that causes some to err on the side of paranoia, even fanatical paranoia. And it only takes a few encounters with actual anti-Semites, I would imagine, to reinforce that paranoia.

I can only tell you that your way of dealing with the situation is better than the smear-and-shout-down approach. That can only breed resentment.

[DSeid]

spoke, well "better" is a matter of outcome. Did you end up no longer believing that there is good reason to believe that Jews "overwhelm" Hollywood and functionally discriminate against non-Jews in that industry? If in the future someone tells you that Jews "control" Hollywood, how will you respond?

[Spoke]

spoke, well "better" is a matter of outcome. Did you end up no longer believing that there is good reason to believe that Jews "overwhelm" Hollywood and functionally discriminate against non-Jews in that industry? If in the future someone tells you that Jews "control" Hollywood, how will you respond?

As I said up front, "Jews" as a group don't do anything. Nor do "Jews" as a group control anything. There is of course no grand conspiracy.

Whether there is a (non-sinister) good-old-boy network operating in Hollywood, which results in Jews predominating in the industry is, I think, an open question. I trust you see (as I do) the distinction between a conspiracy and a social network.

[Chen019]

Chen, play out a scenario with me.

What if that hypothesis IS true? Honestly I do not want to be in a circumstance in which the answer I have to give to the question of why so many Jews in positions of influence in our society is that one. Spoke apologized for his/her earlier comment but boy, if just supposing a cultural factor triggered that as a knee jerk response ... can you imagine how it would play among others if the answer given after full analysis really was that statistically Ashkenazi Jews are hereditarily smarter than average especially in verbal and math areas, and thus more likely to produce more of the leaders in the spaces of ideas? That circumstance would evoke resentment especially if true.

Just as a what if. Can you see making that argument, even if, or maybe especially if, it turns out to be one well supported, would do anything other than evoke Jew-hatred, and a reactive rallying around the concept that, no, it is all good-ole-boy Jews looking out for each other and/or Jewish conspiracy as preferred things to believe? Human nature being what it is, do you think that if, hypothetically, the facts strongly argued against it, that such would at all make such beliefs at all less pervasive? Or more pervasive?

Good question. I tend to think it would reduce resentment because it offers a simple, non-sinister, explanation for statistical differences.

Psychologists and educational researchers have pegged their average IQ at 107.5 to 115. That's only modestly higher than the overall European average of 100, but the gap is large enough to produce a huge difference in the proportion of geniuses. When a group's average IQ is 100, the percentage of people above 140 is 0.4%; when the average is 110, the rate is 2.3%.
http://articles.latimes.com/2009/apr/18/science/sci-jewish-iq18/2

Steven Pinker has written about this and pointed out that it's important to note that group differences relate to averages not individuals.

[Jackmannii]

Or is it that you think any bias against Jews must by definition be bigotry?Yes. Bias against "Jews", "blacks", "Catholics", "Muslims" etc. is by definition bigotry.

A dictionary definition of bias: "a. A preference or an inclination, especially one that inhibits impartial judgment.
b. An unfair act or policy stemming from prejudice.

Dictionary definition of bigotry: "Irrational suspicion or hatred of a particular group, race, or religion"....the mere fact that the supposed bigot is willing to have a frank discussion of the merits (or lack of same) of his or her position should be enough to encourage your participation - participation with an open mind rather than a single minded agenda.As I mentioned before, there are instances where people pose questions in a calm and non-hostile manner which touch on stereotypes about an ethnic group, and which deserve calm and factual responses. When one's biases become obvious over time with repeated entries into such discussions to find fault with said ethnic group* then one is not seeking a "frank discussion", but to spread prejudice.Everyone has biases - even you.Yes. I am intolerant of intolerance. It is one of my failings.

*To be sure, few openly condemn the entire group, just the "bad" members of said group (and by extension, other members of the group who fail to rigorously condemn the "bad" members). A few "good" members of the group are held up as shining examples, often including the "best friend" of the person Who Is Not A Bigot. The "good" are given great weight as group members who are ignored or shouted down by the rest because they speak the Truth. Example: Clarence Thomas, well-recognized as a Good Negro.

[Evil Captor]

I suspect that the tendency of some to assume bigotry on the part of anyone not being vigorous enough wrt being anti-anti-Semitic will cause a lot of people not to post to a thread like this, not because they have any intense fear of being labelled anti-semitic, but because they just don't care that much about the topic, whatever their opinion is on it. Do the Jews control Hollywood? Who cares, really? And if you don't care, why stick your tootsies in that water, even if you are pretty sure Jews DO control Hollywood?

There are only three groups who would post here:

1) those who honestly don't care if they are tagged as anti-Semites or not
2) those who are anti-Semitic and want to seize the opportunity to stick it to the Jews
3) those who honestly care about free and open debate and want to see the topic explored in a fair and logical manner.

Given the level of intensity some people here bring to debates relating to Jewishness (thinks about some very long and dull threads relating to Israel and Palestine) it is hard to see how members of group 3 are not gonna get wrongly tagged as anti-Semites by some. So, debate stifled. Not a good thing.

[Malthus]

I suspect that the tendency of some to assume bigotry on the part of anyone not being vigorous enough wrt being anti-anti-Semitic will cause a lot of people not to post to a thread like this, not because they have any intense fear of being labelled anti-semitic, but because they just don't care that much about the topic, whatever their opinion is on it. Do the Jews control Hollywood? Who cares, really? And if you don't care, why stick your tootsies in that water, even if you are pretty sure Jews DO control Hollywood?

There are only three groups who would post here:

1) those who honestly don't care if they are tagged as anti-Semites or not
2) those who are anti-Semitic and want to seize the opportunity to stick it to the Jews
3) those who honestly care about free and open debate and want to see the topic explored in a fair and logical manner.

Given the level of intensity some people here bring to debates relating to Jewishness (thinks about some very long and dull threads relating to Israel and Palestine) it is hard to see how members of group 3 are not gonna get wrongly tagged as anti-Semites by some. So, debate stifled. Not a good thing.

Here on the Dope, some people get pissy about almost every conceivable topic. I doubt there is any particular magic about being tagged a Jew-hater moreso than being tagged a racist, woman-hater, gay-hater, etc. etc.

Those shrinking violets who cannot stand the thought of someone on an anonymous board tagging them with an unflattering label, don't post in debates, period.

[Spoke]

When one's biases become obvious over time with repeated entries into such discussions to find fault with said ethnic group* then one is not seeking a "frank discussion", but to spread prejudice.

:rolleyes: Y'know for someone who is constantly decrying innuendo, you sure seem to use it a lot.

Here's the earlier thread that seems stuck in Jackmannii's craw (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=387638). Judge for yourselves whether I am the raving anti-Semite Jackmannii longs for me to be.

[Voyager]

More than 23% of the New York Metropolitan area is Jewish. And roughly one out of three (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/06/16/nyregion/city-milestone-number-of-jews-is-below-million.html?pagewanted=all) White New Yorkers is Jewish.

Are you saying that it is inaccurate to have a few shows that are set in New York have a main character and/or have something culturally Jewish feature in the plot somehow?

I have some experience in how one gets into show business in New York. Most kids who went to auditions took the subway. We came in from Princeton, which was about as far as you could live and do it once a week or so. (And my daughter's manager was good about not sending her on crap auditions.) Add to this the fact that a ten year old with two full time working parents is unlikely to get involved, and you'll get a preponderance of Jewish kids acting in NY. (Or more than our numbers, anyway.) This will carry over to older people also, some from New York and some from other urban areas.

IIRC, btw, (this is for general broadcast, not a response to you) the early producers were not tycoons, but people who set up in LA to be close to the Mexican border where they somehow had to flee to escape Edison's lawyers. And the producers of the '30s and '40s worked really hard at making movies that wouldn't seem the least bit Jewish. You'd think the cabal controlling the media wouldn't have waited until after WW II to make Gentleman's Agreement, wouldn't you?

[DSeid]

:rolleyes: Y'know for someone who is constantly decrying innuendo, you sure seem to use it a lot.

Here's the earlier thread that seems stuck in Jackmannii's craw (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=387638). Judge for yourselves whether I am the raving anti-Semite Jackmannii longs for me to be.Raving anti-Semite? Nah. But yes, I can see how he sees a pattern consistent with the "just asking questions" tactic. You saw it fit to raise the possibility of conspiracies that just happen to involve Jewish individuals working against American interests in service of Israel's then, as in: "Now does all of this add up to a 'conspiracy' or the presence of Israeli agents in the US government? Not necessarily." And now see it fit to suggest that well maybe there is pervasive discrimination by Jews against non-Jews in Hollywood because lots of Jews means that such probably has been going on.

Yes, spoke, a pattern of someone suggesting the mere presence of a large number of Jews around centers of power - be it Hollywood or in the positions of influence in a conservative administration - is enough to raise suspicion, that such deserves investigation for discrimination, or "bears watching" and is "cause for concern", is enough, more than enough, to get the spidey sense tingling, even if they doth protest that they never claimed there was a Jewish "conspiracy", just that there could be one - just that these particular Jews near power and influence are looking out for their own and having more loyalty to Israel than to America.

You really can't appreciate why that pattern raises eyebrows? Really?

I do not know if you are or are not a duck, have no interest in discussing whether or not you waddle, but I really do have to let you know that that pattern sounds very much like a quack.

You asked.

But I still maintain that little good is usually accomplished by making that accusation even when it is clear beyond any shadow of doubt that one is, in fact, dealing with a duck.

[Spoke]

I think it takes some extra-powerful spidey sense to see anti-Semitism there.

[DSeid]

Again, I am not saying that there is any anti-Semitism there, not necessarily anyway. Just a pattern that is cause for concern, that bears watching ...


:)

[DSeid]

spoke, I really do want to make it clear. I am not accusing you of being an anti-Semite. And I am nearly 100% sure that you would not consider yourself one. But without question the pattern that you have engaged in makes even the dullest spidey-sense tingle some. Me, I don't have much confidence in that sense, and, again, usually see little value in sharing it when it does tingle. It's driven below ground much of time. Once again, even if, hypothetically, I was dealing with someone who I knew well enough to know with confidence that their motivations were anti-Semitic, I would see that responding with reasoned discussion in a forum that had rules against overt hate speech would be the least poor option, as that would reach the greater number who are just, in the non-pejorative sense of the word, ignorant.

And again, remember that the White person who crosses the street without thinking about it when a Black youth is coming the other way, does not consider himself a racist. Juan Williams does consider himself to be prejudiced against Muslims, just because he gets suspicious and nervous when he sees one on his plane. You consistently see Jews aggregating in positions of power as cause for concern and suspicion, "not necessarily" as a sign of a conspiracy, but ... just asking questions.

... Maybe in each case they'd do well to ask themselves why they do behave in the way they do?

[Spoke]

You consistently see Jews aggregating in positions of power as cause for concern and suspicion...

No, I don't. Please read the other thread more carefully. I don't give a damn what religion or ethnicity is involved.

spoke, I really do want to make it clear. I am not accusing you of being an anti-Semite.

Thank you.

But without question the pattern that you have engaged in makes even the dullest spidey-sense tingle some.

Ah, the "but."

What pattern?

Once again, even if, hypothetically, I was dealing with someone who I knew well enough to know with confidence that their motivations were anti-Semitic, I would see that responding with reasoned discussion in a forum that had rules against overt hate speech would be the least poor option, as that would reach the greater number who are just, in the non-pejorative sense of the word, ignorant.

I think that is the best response when you are battling monsters that may be entirely imaginary. Otherwise you can come across looking like a nut.

[Jackmannii]

I think it takes some extra-powerful spidey sense to see anti-Semitism there.Since you've fallen in love with the overpowering cleverness of your "spidey" meme, here's a reminder from the current thread (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13011064&postcount=119) (leaving aside any of the others in which you've shared your ethnic insights) that ESP is not required to figure out where you're coming from.

As DSeid noted...you asked. :)

[FinnAgain]

Interesting google hits for that phrase, "Jewish supremacism".

[DSeid]

He did immediately realize that was an out of bounds thing to say and apologized.

To return to the original discussion ... spoke this was the means by which you suggested we should determine whether or not there was discrimination by Jews against non-Jews in the American media business:
I thought of a possible control group. Is the British film industry dominated by Jewish executives the way the US film industry is? If not, that would tend to argue against the whole special aptitude/experience/brainpower explanation. If the explanation is special aptitude (for whatever reason) the Jews should rise to the top of the industry in the UK too, no?The data was presented to you that Jews are similarly over-represented in the British media - and similarly over-represented among British Nobel Prize winners. Which by your suggested analysis before getting your answer was a result that would be very much against a discrimination case and more consistent with the cultural factor (or even other causes for aptitude and/or interest) explanation.

You still however persist in stating that Jewish discrimination against non-Jews in Hollywood as the cause of the large Jewish presence in the industry "is an open question" ... would you care to comment about why that information did so little to alter your belief set after you had presented it as such a potentially meaningfully telling bit of data?

[FinnAgain]

I suppose someone could say to a gay man "don't be such a faggot" and then apologize for that, too.


You still however persist in stating that Jewish discrimination against non-Jews in Hollywood as the cause of the large Jewish presence in the industry "is an open question" ... would you care to comment about why that information did so little to alter your belief set after you had presented it as such a potentially meaningfully telling bit of data?

It's the problem with Just Asking Questions. An Argument By Insinuation stands on the suggestion (or what's behind it). If we were going to analyze employment, we'd need data to start with: how many positions do we define as 'leadership', how are people distributed amongst them, how many people applied for which positions, who made hiring decisions, etc...
We'd perform that analysis first and then try to draw conclusions from the data.
It's the difference between having a conclusion "Jews are Clannish" and then trying to find support for it "So let's sue Hollywood to find out about their hiring practices in discovery" and trying to find out about how Hollywood's upper management works and then drawing conclusions from it.

Just Asking Questions about Jewish Clannishness is designed to work simply by the insinuation, and it does its jobs. We don't have to analyze anything, the question "Just how clannish are those Jews" serves the function it's designed for even if it's not answered. It may even work better if it's not answered, only asked (ideally, repeatedly).
"Doctor Bob definitely overperscribed controlled substances for financial gain and there's some specific facts we can analyze, and we can confirm or rebut this once and for all immediately." is not as effective at attacking his character as "let's continually probe Doctor Bob and make him a target of inquiry for potential drug sales."

Britain could have been investigated first as a 'control' as used to refute his argument before he made it. Instead, without investigating, he used it as innuendo to support it... and then abandoned it without comment. Of course, maybe Jewish Clannishness has ruined the British film industry, too.

And as Spoke linked to his own Conspiracy Theory about Traitor Jews, I guess that's subject for discussion too. It follows the same pattern: a claim is made with little or not evidence, it follows classical anti-Semitic slurs, it is based on innuendo, it suggests something inherent in being Jewish that makes some Jews "bad Jews" if they give in to some sort of inherent ethnic behavior/loyalty/proclivities/what-have-you. And Something Must Be Done to investigate the potential treachery/bad behavior of Jews.
Now does all of this add up to a "conspiracy" or the presence of Israeli agents in the US government? Not necessarily.
I simply said that the numbers suggest a good-old-boy network, which may be putting these companies at risk of a discrimination suit

There isn't necessarily a conspiracy of Traitor Jews who are really Israeli agents in the US government, but there might be.
There isn't necessarily a pack of Clannish Jews who only look out for other Jews and keep non-Jews out of positions of power, but there might be.

Bonus points, of course, for the whole "sure this trope is classical anti-semitism, but there are some Questions that Just have to be Asked... what, are you one of those Paranoid Jews?"

[Spoke]

He did immediately realize that was an out of bounds thing to say and apologized.

To return to the original discussion ... spoke this was the means by which you suggested we should determine whether or not there was discrimination by Jews against non-Jews in the American media business:The data was presented to you that Jews are similarly over-represented in the British media - and similarly over-represented among British Nobel Prize winners. Which by your suggested analysis before getting your answer was a result that would be very much against a discrimination case and more consistent with the cultural factor (or even other causes for aptitude and/or interest) explanation.

You still however persist in stating that Jewish discrimination against non-Jews in Hollywood as the cause of the large Jewish presence in the industry "is an open question" ... would you care to comment about why that information did so little to alter your belief set after you had presented it as such a potentially meaningfully telling bit of data?

Because I didn't see much real information there.

You gave us two (http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/4520361) cites (http://radioislam.org/islam/english/jewishp/gbmedia/update.htm).

The first appears to be an attempt to list every Jewish person ever involved in the British entertainment industry. It turns out to be a pretty thin list, probably not comprising more than the 0.5% of British entertainers that would be predicted by chance.

The second is an OMFG!!! JOOS CONTROLS THE MEDIAZZZ! -type site, comical in its desperation to prove its thesis, to the point that I don't think we can trust the site to even be truthful about who is and is not a Jew. Example:

British Sky Broadcasting is also a significant television broadcaster in the United Kingdom, and a part of the global media empire, News Corporation, of the suspected Jew Rupert Murdoch.

"Suspected Jew?" :rolleyes: (Murdoch is a Christian, ftr. (http://www.nndb.com/people/420/000023351/))

So I don't think we yet have good information on Jewish presence in British media. :shrug:

[Spoke]

Since you've fallen in love with the overpowering cleverness of your "spidey" meme, here's a reminder from the current thread (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13011064&postcount=119) (leaving aside any of the others in which you've shared your ethnic insights) that ESP is not required to figure out where you're coming from.

As DSeid noted...you asked. :)

When posters start talking about the innate superiority of Jews which causes them naturally to rise to the top of every field, I don't know what you could call that except Jewish supremacism. DSeid assured us that was not his meaning and I took him at his word and apologized for the crack.

[Spoke]

And now FinnAgain has joined the party! FinnAgain, rather than descend into your traditional post-parsing tedium, I will first just note that you are grossly distorting the discussion in that older thread. I again invite readers to check out that thread for themselves (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=387638) and draw their own conclusions, rather than take your word for what was said (and more particularly, what was secretly meant).

Secondly, since I gather from your username that you are a lover of great literature, I direct you to this worthy passage, which seems especially fitting here:

At this point they came in sight of thirty or forty windmills that are on that plain.

"Fortune," said Don Quixote to his squire, as soon as he had seen them, "is arranging matters for us better than we could have hoped. Look there, friend Sancho Panza, where thirty or more monstrous giants rise up, all of whom I mean to engage in battle and slay, and with whose spoils we shall begin to make our fortunes. For this is righteous warfare, and it is God's good service to sweep so evil a breed from off the face of the earth."

"What giants?" said Sancho Panza.

"Those you see there," answered his master, "with the long arms, and some have them nearly two leagues long."

"Look, your worship,'' said Sancho. "What we see there are not giants but windmills, and what seem to be their arms are the vanes that turned by the wind make the millstone go."

"It is easy to see," replied Don Quixote, "that you are not used to this business of adventures. Those are giants, and if you are afraid, away with you out of here and betake yourself to prayer, while I engage them in fierce and unequal combat."

So saying, he gave the spur to his steed Rocinante, heedless of the cries his squire Sancho sent after him, warning him that most certainly they were windmills and not giants he was going to attack. He, however, was so positive they were giants that he neither heard the cries of Sancho, nor perceived, near as he was, what they were.

"Fly not, cowards and vile beings," he shouted, "for a single knight attacks you."

A slight breeze at this moment sprang up, and the great vanes began to move.

"Though ye flourish more arms than the giant Briareus, (2) ye have to reckon with me!" exclaimed Don Quixote, when he saw this.

So saying, he commended himself with all his heart to his lady Dulcinea, imploring her to support him in such a peril. With lance braced and covered by his shield, he charged at Rocinante's fullest gallop and attacked the first mill that stood in front of him. But as he drove his lance-point into the sail, the wind whirled it around with such force that it shivered the lance to pieces. It swept away with it horse and rider, and they were sent rolling over the plain, in sad condition indeed.

Sancho hastened to his assistance as fast as the ass could go. When he came up and found Don Quixote unable to move, with such an impact had Rocinante fallen with him.

"God Bless me!," said Sancho, "did I not tell your worship to watch what you were doing, because they were only windmills? No one could have made any mistake about it unless he had something of the same kind in his head."

"Silence, friend Sancho," replied Don Quixote. "The fortunes of war more than any other are liable to frequent fluctuations. Moreover I think, and it is the truth, that the same sage Frestón who carried off my study and books, has turned these giants into mills in order to rob me of the glory of vanquishing them, such is the enmity he bears me. But in the end his wicked arts will avail but little against my good sword."

And I wish you happy jousting.




(FTR, the passage is from an 1895 translation, out of copyright.)

[DSeid]

And enjoy your windmills as well, spoke.

[DSeid]

Oh, btw, spoke, you seem very dismissive of the quality of evidence of Jews in British media, but fail to realize that that it is pretty much the exact same quality of evidence that you have claimed represents Jews "overwhelmingly" being employed in US media, to such a degree that it is presumptive evidence of discrimination. Your basis for that conclusion? An article that points out that many of the current heads of the major American movie production houses are Jewish and an impression you have of the rest of the industry. With no other support for the claim, you have been acting as if there is an established factual basis that the whole industry is, not just represented significantly more than their share of the population, but is "overwhelmingly" Jewish, and then speculate "non-sinister" but still neferious reasons for that alleged "fact" from there (if there are Jews in large numbers there then it must be because they have been hiring each other to the exclusion of giving non-Jews a fair shake) ... on evidence of the same sort as is used by those, how you call it? "JOMFG!!! JOOS CONTROLS THE MEDIAZZZ! -type sites": a handful or so of names.

Again, I will respond politely to those just asking questions, whatever their motives may be. I will engage in debate on the subjects at hand. But if you are going to establish a record of trotting out what sound like slightly watered down versions of the standard anti-Semitic tropes and then ask us (which includes me) to judge whether or not they sound like slightly watered down versions of the standard anti-Semitic tropes ... well if asked I will answer honestly. Yes, yes they do. Whatever your motives actually are, that is what they sound like. And I don't even need my finely tuned paranoia to hear it that way.

[FinnAgain]

Oh, btw, spoke, you seem very dismissive of the quality of evidence of Jews in British media, but fail to realize that that it is pretty much the exact same quality of evidence that you have claimed represents Jews "overwhelmingly" being employed in US media, to such a degree that it is presumptive evidence of discrimination. Your basis for that conclusion? An article that points out that many of the current heads of the major American movie production houses are Jewish and an impression you have of the rest of the industry. With no other support for the claim, you have been acting as if there is an established factual basis that the whole industry is, not just represented significantly more than their share of the population, but is "overwhelmingly" Jewish, and then speculate "non-sinister" but still neferious reasons for that alleged "fact" from there (if there are Jews in large numbers there then it must be because they have been hiring each other to the exclusion of giving non-Jews a fair shake) ... on evidence of the same sort as is used by those, how you call it? "JOMFG!!! JOOS CONTROLS THE MEDIAZZZ! -type sites": a handful or so of names.


A list of Jews in Hollywood (whether or not it's accurate, comprehensive, or rigorous in its analysis) is a firm basis for looking at Jewish Clannishness in Hollywood where Jews aim at helping others Jews and hurting Gentiles in order to maintain Jewish power and control. In fact, we should probably sue Hollywood due to such a list. And if such a list existed for the British entertainment industry we could know that the Argument by Insinuation was aimed at the wrong targets and was just a smear and... what's that? There is exactly such a list for the British entertainment industry?

Can't see how that's relevant...
(Is it any surprise?)

When posters start talking about the innate superiority of Jews which causes them naturally to rise to the top of every field, I don't know what you could call that except Jewish supremacism. DSeid assured us that was not his meaning and I took him at his word and apologized for the crack.

A reminder for folks reading along: this is the current context of the curiously styled claim that there is such a thing as "Jewish supremacism." (http://www.google.com/search?q=jewish+supremacism&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a)

Posters can also check for themselves as to just how accurate Spoke's claims are about why he went and cried "Jewish supremacism!" Did anybody, at all, in fact talk about "innate superiority of Jews which causes them naturally to rise to the top of every field"?

No, I am not suggesting anything genetic. I am suggesting that it has to with more than a culture of achievement. After all Jews don't achieve across the board. There are other cultural factors that have led to achievement in some very particular venues, probably two factors most of all, both a result of this: for many many hundreds of years Jews have been the outsider, the "other" in any society in which they have resided. An educated literate outsider group spread across cultures and communicating with each other.

Being an outsider group gives you a different perspective, drives you to prove yourself sure, and coupled with a history of persecution, drives you to try to gain security and both acceptence and respect. But that different perspective brings a willingness to try different ideas. And is in the context of a religion that highlights its myths that have its heros arguing with God himself. When your culture isn't completely part of the box, it is easier to think outside of it.

Being spread out among the world's culture s and traveling between them, having nothing but knowledge and the ideas picked up from around the world as a meaningful asset, results in a culture that tends to recombine those ideas into new ones. What is in that box can be used for something slightly different in this box if we just tweak it a little, and maybe mix it up with something from this other box too. New York in particular was home to Jews coming from around the world all stuck together in small neighborhoods and exchanging ideas and perspectives and ambition. (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13009963&postcount=112)

Why, that's the exact opposite of what Spoke is claiming anybody said. Not innate superiority at all, but contextual and situational differences in culture. Not the top of every field at all, but "achievement in some very particular venues".
What an odd sort of set of mistakes for a person to make. But I guess such errors are bound to happen as one is engaging in the noble cause of fighting Jewish supremacism.

you are grossly distorting the discussion in that older thread.

Indeed. Tell us more about how your own quoted words, verbatim, about how Jews with differing politics than yours in Washington are quite possibly a Jewish conspiracy or actual Israeli agents distorts your words and unfairly alleges that you claimed that Jews with differing politics than yours in Washington are quite possibly a Jewish conspiracy or Israeli agents.

Perhaps your innuendo about how people like Wolfowitz have "close personal ties to Israel" (that you invented) and thus can't really be trusted and that such people might just be so far gone that they can even be trusted to make policy decisions (if they disagree with your politics), since they may be unable to tell the difference between things that are in their own home's interest and things that sacrifice their home country for the benefit of a foreign land. Tell us about how your own claims on that subject distort your own claims on that subject.

Perhaps you could explain how your own claims that "A Clean Break", a paper that advises Israel to stop having US support and to act on its own was really the sinister nucleus for a plan put into action by Wolfowitz et al, who are (naturally) not-necessarily-traitors-but-Jews-Who-Must-Be-Watched distorts your claims about that group of potential traitor Jews who must be watched.

Do you find that your own words often grossly distort your own words and what you explicitly state is really something that's "secretly meant"?
Or is this a special circumstance?
Not that there isn't something charming about being called Quixotic by you, mind.

Of course, rather than pairing your words up against a work of fiction, one could look at your warnings of potential-Israeli-traitor-and/or-Jewish-Conspirator-Wolfowitz-et al against, say, Charles Lindbergh's Des Moines speech.

The second major group I mentioned is the Jewish.

It is not difficult to understand why Jewish people desire the overthrow of Nazi Germany. The persecution they suffered in Germany would be sufficient to make bitter enemies of any race.

No person with a sense of the dignity of mankind can condone the persecution of the Jewish race in Germany. But no person of honesty and vision can look on their pro-war policy here today without seeing the dangers involved in such a policy both for us and for them. Instead of agitating for war, the Jewish groups in this country should be opposing it in every possible way for they will be among the first to feel its consequences.

Tolerance is a virtue that depends upon peace and strength. History shows that it cannot survive war and devastations. A few far-sighted Jewish people realize this and stand opposed to intervention. But the majority still do not.

Their greatest danger to this country lies in their large ownership and influence in our motion pictures, our press, our radio and our government.

I am not attacking either the Jewish or the British people. Both races, I admire. But I am saying that the leaders of both the British and the Jewish races, for reasons which are as understandable from their viewpoint as they are inadvisable from ours, for reasons which are not American, wish to involve us in the war.

We cannot blame them for looking out for what they believe to be their own interests, but we also must look out for ours. We cannot allow the natural passions and prejudices of other peoples to lead our country to destruction.

.
Now does all of this add up to a "conspiracy" or the presence of Israeli agents in the US government? Not necessarily. But what is very clear is that the Bush administration has included a lot of people with uncomfortably close ties to Israel.

It is not necessary that Perle, Wolfowitz and the others be actual agents for Israel. It is enough cause for concern that they have very close personal ties to Israel. And that is enough to cause me to wonder whether their concern for Israel might cloud their judgment about what is best for the US, or that they might actually conflate in their own minds the interests of Israel and the interests of the US. That is the danger in my view.

So when I see (as I did after 9/11) conservatives talking about taking out Saddam Hussein, and then Syria, and then Iran, I begin to wonder. That list looks suspiciously like a list of Israel's enemies. I certainly see where the US taking them out would benefit Israel. But it seems to me that the US conducting such attacks would only engender more terrorism against the US in the long-term, and would not serve US interests. In particular I see an attack against Iran as unnecessarily stirring up a Persian/Shiite hornets' nest, when up to now only Sunni Arabs have carried out attacks on US soil.

So you don't have tyo buy into conspiracy theories to recognize that what is good for Israel is not always good for the US.

Can you, perhaps, make your next bit about how we need to watch real close to make sure that blacks aren't stealin' watermelons and sharpening up some spears to chuck around (not that we have any proof but it's something we really do have to watch out for), coupled with a preemptive bit about how only a Quixotic crusader or stone-cold paranoid might question why such an Argument by Insinuation just happens to be based around classical racist tropes. Those crazy paranoid blacks, eh, eh?
Now if only we can get some quality Watermelon Inspectors on the case...

[ThoughtfulDialogue]

The title of this OP was taken from a column by Joel Stein in the LA Times (http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-stein19-2008dec19,0,4676183.column)

I was reminded of this column by the recent Rick Sanchez fiasco, and mainly by comments in the couple of related threads here on the SDMB that categorically stated that saying that Jews control the media is anti-semitic.

And yet, here is Joel Stein:


Some questions:
* Is he wrong?

* Is he correct, but it's only OK to say it in public if you are Jewish?

* Are the facts correct, but do not translate to "Jews control Hollywood/the media"?

* Are the facts correct, and translate to "Jews control Hollywood/the media", but it's not good to say so in public because that would provide fodder for anti-semites and crazy bigots of various kinds?


Yes, he's correct, but I'm not sure if it matters. Jewish people own nearly every major studio and control the financing in Hollywood. That doesn't mean it is a conspiracy. But there are implications in relation to our countries relationship to Israel. What do you think happens to an actor who comes out in strong support of the Palestinians? They very nearly get blacklisted.

Hollywood has an enormous impact on shaping our views and values in this society and it may be better, in an ideal world, if there was a more balanced ethic ownership in Hollywood. It is up for debate what impacts the heavily Jewish owned studios have in deciding what content gets the green light and what doesn't, but it is an interesting discussion.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to even have the discussion for fear of being labeled an anti Semite. Its a worthy discussion. Personally, regardless of who owns Hollywood, I think we as a culture give way too much power to these people to shape our values and our minds. Support Independent films and music.

The stuff Hollywood is releasing these days is pretty awful, as a general rule.

[FinnAgain]

Jewish people own nearly every major studio

Cite?


and control the financing in Hollywood.

Cite?


But there are implications in relation to our countries relationship to Israel.

Because you know those Jews, eh, eh?
And, what with all those... how many movies recently unambiguously supporting Israel? Well, there was Munich, a decidedly, shall we say, less than bright endorsement, that was made by one of the very Chief Jews, Spielberg himself. Maybe he isn't in on the Hollywood Jew Agenda, though? And, damn, that received numerous Oscar nominations. Maybe the Jews who control Hollywood need to beam some more control rays at the Oscars?


What do you think happens to an actor who comes out in strong support of the Palestinians? They very nearly get blacklisted.

Mmmm hmmm.
Like Daniel Day-Lewis, outspoken opponent of Israeli policy (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/article424676.ece) and was then given the starring role in There will be blood (which The Jews went on to silence by giving two Oscars). Or of course Daniel Glover who, bizarrely, in 2009 supported an (actual) blacklist of films from Tel Aviv
(http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=13057472) at the Toronto International Film Festival... and has since been "blacklisted" by The Jews to the tune of a dozen movies that he has made or will be making. (http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000418/)

Mmmm hmmmm.



Hollywood has an enormous impact on shaping our views and values in this society

Of course. That's why Bush never could have gotten elected, let alone twice and... oh.

It is up for debate what impacts the heavily Jewish owned studios have in deciding what content gets the green light and what doesn't, but it is an interesting discussion.

Indeed.
Also 'interesting' and 'up for debate' is whether or not the heavily "Jewish owned' (cite?) studios have stopped beating their wives.

I do agree with you though, it's simply too bad that, without any facts people would like to invent non-facts and speculate about just how nefarious Jewish control of Hollywood really is. What's the world coming to?
Now if only we could get a quality scientific study done on "Gays: limp wristed lisping, mincing potential pedophiles, or just wimps?"

[DSeid]

But there are implications in relation to our countries relationship to Israel. What do you think happens to an actor who comes out in strong support of the Palestinians? They very nearly get blacklisted.Not only is this untrue, but some of the Jews in Hollywood are strong supporters of Palestinian rights. You can be a Jew, even a Zionistic one, even an Israeli, and believe in the creation of a Palestinian state and that settlements are a bad idea. Many American Jews do, especially the liberally minded ones that Hollywood is supposed to be so full of.

Hollywood has an enormous impact on shaping our views and values in this society and it may be better, in an ideal world, if there was a more balanced ethic ownership in Hollywood. It is up for debate what impacts the heavily Jewish owned studios have in deciding what content gets the green light and what doesn't, but it is an interesting discussion.While I suspect that there are some perspectives that many Jews share as a result of a shared cultural heritage, the concept that Jews are monolithic in their views and perspectives is laughable. Jews range from neocons and capitalist pigs and free market economists, to communists and socialists and human rights activists and tree huggers, and all points in between. There is no "Jewish POV" to be promoted in the media.

Its a worthy discussion. Personally, regardless of who owns Hollywood, I think we as a culture give way too much power to these people to shape our values and our minds.
Actually, I increasingly doubt that it is so worthy a discussion.

[Spoke]

A reminder for folks reading along: this is the current context of the curiously styled claim that there is such a thing as "Jewish supremacism." (http://www.google.com/search?q=jewish+supremacism&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a)

Curse you, FinnAgain, you wily sleuth! You've exposed me! It's true: I am a secret follower of David Duke. (And here I thought my work on the Obama campaign was a perfect cover! Damn! That FinnAgain is good!)

:rolleyes:

My coinage of the phrase "Jewish supremacist" in this thread was my own, and I think a fitting descriptor of what I was seeing. The irony of the phrase was intentional, given the usual context of the word "supremacist," and was meant to prick the consciences of those who seemed like they might be buying into the idea that Jewish achievement is the result of innate superiority.

(It's no good if you have to explain the irony, but some people are a little slow I guess.)

As for the rest of your usual run-on post, I again encourage readers to read the earlier thread (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=387638) to see my comments in proper context rather than as sliced-and-diced-for-deception by you.

[FinnAgain]

as sliced-and-diced-for-deception by you.

Indeed. And people should notice that the quote I provided is 100% verbatim and intact, making your claims of "deception" by "slicing and dicing" somewhat curious. Odd, though, that a block of several paragraphs taken verbatim isn't enough. There's always a greater 'context' and the words don't reaaaaaaaly say what they say. A direct quote of your own words is now somehow suspect, naturally your words are probably in a conspiracy against you (not necessarily Jewish but maybe and we should sue and/or investigate). I'm sure that's my fault too. I probably got to your words first with offers of JewGold.

Why, when your own words are quoted they say things that don't look good, and that's obviously the fault of something other than those words. Obviously! It must be enemy action. Or, at least, it is not "necessarily" enemy action but we really need to look at see if the people who quote your own words are agents of a foreign power working to bring down your crusade against Jewish supremacism (which you coined yourself), or if there's just a conspiracy.

Just like you ignored all your other little 'errors', like how you invented 'close ties' for Wolfowitz with a foreign power, or how a paper about how a foreign power should work without any US help and should even reject US aid in more general terms was really the nucleus of a group of potential-traitors-or-foreign-agents' attempt to subvert the US in order to... give even more US help to that nation and to give even more aid to that nation. Or how an incomplete and unverified list of only the most visible positions in leadership is prima facie evidence that we need some lawsuits to do some Jew busting.

Just like your honest reaction to an explicit claim about cultural influences that led to over-representation in a few fields was to sagely notice that it was really a case of "Jewish supremacism" about how Jews were innately superior in absolutely everything.
And even when confronted with the actual quote, somehow you can't seem to catch your error.
Just like a list of Jews in Hollywood is proof of a JewClan fucking things up for honest gentiles, but the same list (which you asked for as something that would debunk your Clan Theory) in the UK is to be handwaved away.

Certainly, there is no pattern behind your arguments and no pattern behind your denials. But some of those damn paranoid Jews (when they're not conspiring to take over your country or working as a clan to fuck over gentiles) keep seeing a problem. Of course, you might at some point realize that the problem isn't necessarily whether or not people think you are a racist, but the fact that you keep using the same arguments, which keep to the same patterns patterns (even up to the denials), and which use the same terms that racists use while they make the same exact claims that you're also making. One would think the link might be somewhat obvious.

[DSeid]

spoke you really are misrepresenting here. Finn is correct: I had responded to a claim that Jewish successes in other fields were due to "a culture of achievement" by stating that I believed that other cultural factors were at play, that wanting to achieve was not uniquely Jewish, and that Jewish achievement was not even across all fields. You response was out of left field and when called on it you, to your credit, realized that and apologized. The apology was accepted and we moved on.

To spin it as other than that is misrepresentation of the facts.

[FinnAgain]

Of course after the apology Spoke alleged that you were really "talking about the innate superiority of Jews which causes them naturally to rise to the top of every field". And that he didn't "know what you could call that except Jewish supremacism." But that since you had assured us that was not your meaning, he took you at you word. Ya know, out of charity.
('Now, I'm sorry I said you were being such a faggot, but saying you didn't like football sure seemed like something a sissyboy would say. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt thought that you weren't really acting like a fag.')

Interesting how a claim of cultural factors that cause limited effects in some fields is really Jewish supremacism about innate superiority in absolutely everything. One wonders how such a mistake gets made. Or what it reveals about an argument.

However, since those are his own words they probably need to be ignored as unrepresentative of his argument.

[Spoke]

DSeid, I would love to discuss this with you further via PM if you like. I appreciate your candor and graciousness in discussing what I know are highly-charged topics. Unfortunately, some of your cohorts do not share those traits, and I can see this thread headed toward mudslinging. I've no interest in participating in that.

[FinnAgain]

Yeah, if this thread keeps up, people may keep posting your own words which you'll have to deny! And they may even point out all your many very strange and curiously un-retracted errors.
Attacking your argument on its lack of merit is the worst type of mudslinging.
Of course, your hunt for Jewish Supremacists, Jewish Conspiracies, Double Agents of International Jewry, and Jewish Clannishness is not mudsligning, at all.

And good Jews will just shut up and take it.

Of course, DSeid, this is exactly what I have been talking about. It's a fairly effective tactic as long as someone counts on Jews not standing up for themselves. Someone uses classical racist arguments, generally either not backed up by facts or with invented 'facts' or simply pretending that something which was said was really the exact opposite and then when called on it they resort to cries of "Jewish paranoia!" and tries to load the discussion in such a manner that their racist arguments have to be "graciously" accepted by their targets. The tactic itself relies on Jews to adopt the stereotypical position of obsequious, inoffensive, meek intellectuals.

"Now, negroes, you're not necessarily all shiftless, lazy moochers. But it's a subject that bears examination and I hope you'll all be gracious enough to calmly look at my claims, unless you're some kind of Quixotic paranoids. Now, let's look at the incidents of watermelon theft amongst your people..."

Of course, nobody would expect that to fly. But Jews? Jews should shut the fuck up and take it, or serve as accomplices and grant legitimacy as centuries-old racist tropes are revived with the flimsiest of justifications ("Now, we don't necessarily have any proof, but those Jews have to be watched carefully lest they betray/hurt/conspire against honest gentiles!")
There's a reason that people who trot out the same old anti-Jewish tropes routinely look for a token Jew to help sell their position while loudly trumpeting the fact that, why, a Jew agrees with them about Jewish malfeasance, a Jew agrees!

It's the same reason Spoke somehow managed to confuse cultural factors and limited areas of relative increased success with innate superiority across absolutely everything, managed to miss his error, and managed to not retract it. Racist arguments don't work on the facts, so other tactics need to be relied on to sell them. Or at least, change the subject once they're pointed out.

[Spoke]

"It is easy to see," replied Don Quixote, "that you are not used to this business of adventures. Those are giants, and if you are afraid, away with you out of here and betake yourself to prayer, while I engage them in fierce and unequal combat."

;)

[FinnAgain]

It's the same reason Spoke somehow managed to confuse cultural factors and limited areas of relative increased success with innate superiority across absolutely everything, managed to miss his error, and managed to not retract it. Racist arguments don't work on the facts, so other tactics need to be relied on to sell them. Or at least, change the subject once they're pointed out.

Never could have guessed you'd try to change the subject.

And change it to something so novel, too. You use blatantly racist arguments and then when you're called on it, why, those who catch you must be Quixotic paranoids! Who could have guessed? Just like those uppity negroes who object to us wondering about how often they steal watermelons and loaf around, crazy paranois Jews also object to the patriotic inquiry you bravely lay down that just happens to have no factual support and directly mirrors classical anti-Semitic tropes.
And nobody ever could have predicted it.

Cabals of Jews controlling Hollywood and hurting gentiles (even you, you tell us, if you dared try to approach the Jewish bastion of power, would be harmed by their dastardly cabal and kept from a career in Hollywood)... how could you ever predict that echoes traditional slurs about Jewish control of the media? A conspiracy and/or pack of Israeli agents controlling the US government in order to subvert their own home in the service of their (alien, naturally) Jewish masters? How could you possibly predict that echoes traditional slurs about Jewish control of governments? And why might anybody see a pattern unless they were a paranoid, tilting at windmills? But looking for Jew-traitors and Jew-cabals and Jew-clans hurting gentiles? That's just good sense.
Truly, your arguments are unpredictable and varied.

But not to let you change the subject, have you figured out yet how you happened to make the mistake that limited cultural factors that produced relative increased success in a limited number of fields was really a claim of innate superiority that extended to absolutely everything? Ya know, while you were hunting for Jewish supremacists (a phrase which you totally invented on your own)?

Maybe you've figured out how Wolfowitz had very close ties to Israel despite the fact that you imagined it?
Perhaps you've figured out why some Jews serving on the PNAC is ammunition for racist smears about dual loyalty and potential Israeli agents, and why you ignore that the same PNAC also had the people who were actually in charge of making the decisions, like Cheney, Rumsfeld, Libby etc...? Perhaps you can explain why the racist argument you use just happens to use fiction to support it, distorts facts to make its case and focuses exclusively on the Jews in an organization when the Gentiles in it had much more power to actually implement their goals?
Maybe you can explain how an explicit agenda to have a foreign nation divorce itself from US aid, especially US military aid was really turned into a conspiracy to get the US to give aid to that foreign nation, especially military aid?

Not that your refrain of "I keep saying racist things, why do people keep pointing that out?!?" isn't touching and heartfelt, what with your Scientologistesque tactic of never actually addressing the flaws in your nonsense and instead immediately going on the attack instead (please, quote more Cervantes, that'll address how you make such convenient mistakes).

You can answer those any time now.
Let me know when you're going to, it'll be time for me to buy a lottery ticket.

[Spoke]

You don't like Cervantes? How about a Lyndon Johnson story, then? A bit more earthy, but...

There's an old story about Lyndon Johnson, 36th President of the United States and consummate politician. One version of the story has it that a political ally once came to him for advice. "I'm in a tight campaign," he said. "My opponent is well-funded, well-organized, and ahead in the polls. What should I do?"

Johnson replied, "Call him a pig fucker and make him deny it."

You seem to be from the Johnson school of debate.

[dzero]

I haven't been following the most recent exchanges very closely, so I can't comment directly. What I can say is that if I were a member of an ethnic group that had been the target of bloody pogroms for a couple thousand years, I too might be a bit sensitive to any comments that seemed to indicate even the vaguest racial bias. If you truly believe that such racially motivated slaughter is still possible in this country, then such a high degree of sensitivity would be justified. The fact that genocide still happens in places like Rwanda and the Balkans makes such a world view at least plausible. But is it really plausible for the US in the 21st century? Because if it's not, then I think you need to give people the benefit of the doubt until they leave absolutely no doubt as their views. And by that I mean objectively there is virtually no doubt.

I might have biases as to specific groups of people whether based on race, religion, ethnicity or whatever. That doesn't make me a bigot. I give people the benefit of the doubt until they prove to me that they don't deserve it. My preconceptions don't determine a priori how I will treat someone or what my opinion of them will be. THAT is what makes someone a bigot.

[DSeid]

dzero, while I agree with giving the benefit of the doubt, I must also tell you that I cannot say that I believe it is impossible for it to happen in America, or elsewhere, in this century - highly unlikely, sure, but still possible.

spoke, let us just see how far we can agree before you go.

1) Currently the heads of the major Hollywood movie houses are mostly Jewish at least culturally.

2) The industry seems to have a fair number of Jews in its ranks. In fact a significant number of Academy Award winning movies and movies recognized as the world's best historically have had Jewish directors.

3) Jews are similarly extremely well represented in several other fields that involve managing ideas, especially new ones - science, math, medicine, economics, literature, chess, music, political thought, etc. The reasons for that may be unclear (I lean to some very particular historic cultural factors) but acknowledging that fact is not "supremacism". It is a matter of record as uncomfortable as I may be having to point it out.

4) There has been no evidence presented in this thread, or that I am aware of existing, that Jews are any more represented in the movie industry overall than they are in any of those other fields. (The current crop of studio heads being Jewish is not evidence of that.) There is no evidence that Jews "overwhelm" Hollywood despite a previous claim made here that they do, no more than they overwhelm as winners of the Nobel Prize.

5) Good-ole-boy networking is an insufficient explanation for the large presence of Jews in all those fields. To try to evoke it as plausible for one, so therefore the presence of some significant number should be considered as presumptive evidence of discrimination against non-Jews, is absurd.

6) Jews do not represent a single POV and even though they may skew to the liberal side statistically, they are spread across the political spectrum.


I think you will agree easily to the first three and to #6. #4 you may not want to accept but is the case. And the fact that you have so far persisted in clinging to #5 as "an open question" boggles me.

[FinnAgain]

If you truly believe that such racially motivated slaughter is still possible in this country, then such a high degree of sensitivity would be justified.

But what if it's not the 'brutal racism' of genocide, but simply the 'smiling racism' that typifies Spoke's arguments? He doesn't want Jews shot, he just wants to sue Hollywood because there are too many Jewish CEO's and they must be acting as a clan to harm gentiles. He doesn't want to have Jews deported, but he's fine inventing non-facts and using blatantly unsound logic to argue for why any Jew in politics whose opinions differ from his is either a potential conspirator against America or an actual foreign agent working to bring down their own home for the benefit of foreign masters.

What does it matter if there's a new round of pogroms or if Spoke gets his ways and Jews are, again, treated as "Jews rather than Americans", just like we were once "Jews rather than Germans" and "Jews rather than Russians" and "Jews rather than ..." What does it matter if there's not a genocide but any Jew who dares enter politics has to be screened for potential Dual Loyalty?

Wolfowitz lived for half a year in Israel when he was nine years old or something, because his dad got a job there and later Wolfy did a bit of consulting work for their government. And this, ecuswbrkt, is reason to consider him having "close ties" to Israel and to watch out lest he be revealed as a part of a ring of traitor Jews or as an actual Israeli agent. And yet, Bill Clinton won a Rhodes Scholarship and studied in Oxford as an adult and then later cooperated with NATO in an actual war, and yet the same folks hunting for Jewish Dual Loyalty didn't suggest that Clinton was really a pawn of the European elite.

Some Jews happened to advocate for Israel to stand on its own and act militarily without any US aid and without US economic aid, and this is taken as prima facie evidence to search for either a Jewish Conspiracy or actual Israeli agents who then used that plan to get the US to give Israel military and economic aid. The PNAC consisted of some of the most powerful members of the Bush administration, from Rumsfeld to Cheney to Libby, but there were also some Jews on it, so we need to investigate to see if there was a Jewish Conspiracy or if they were actual Israeli agents.

Is it really acceptable if Jews are just subjected to pervasive, disgusting racist nonsense as long as they're not butchered? Is that going to be the standard? "You can assume that all Mexicans are probably knife-carrying thieves and blacks are lazy layabouts, and you can push for that to be a standard topic of conversation with those who object subjected to character assassination... but as long as you don't hit them it's okay."

Because if it's not, then I think you need to give people the benefit of the doubt until they leave absolutely no doubt as their views. And by that I mean objectively there is virtually no doubt.

1. That doesn't follow at all. If no-genocide, then someone like Spoke who reliably and repeatably uses racist arguments with obvious bullshit logic and which are based either on mere innuendo or outright fiction... then we can't object? If, when those errors are pointed out that person, like Spoke, can't ever seen to address let alone retract them, and instead personally attacks those who note the flaws in his arguments, we can't point out what's going on? Do we offer the same leeway to other crusaders against "Jewish Supremacism", like David Duke? Why not?

2. We can never be objectively at a state where there is virtually no doubt as to someone's views. Never. Look at this thread. Spoke alleged that a suggestion of cultural influence that caused disproportionate success in limited areas was a claim of innate Jewish superiority in all areas always and thus an example of "Jewish Supremacism" and yet, maybe Spoke just refused to actually read what was said. Maybe he didn't kneejerk from the facts that were actually written to an old racist trope about a Jewish superiority complex, what with them calling themselves Chosen and such. Maybe it was just a strange accident and the reason he won't retract his claims which he maintained even after his "sorry I called you a faggot" apology has nothing to do with racism... but who knows and who cares? Who knows what his views are? Hell, I honestly believe that David Duke really believes he's not a racist, just that he too is a valiant crusader against Jewish Supremacism, also unfairly criticized for his honest views.

Just like some of my in-laws really didn't think they were racists but saw a huge problem when their white granddaughter married a black man.

We can never win the "Guess what's in my heart!" game. That's why people who say racist stuff so often are almost guaranteed to use it, extensively.
But we can be pretty safe in saying that someone who reliably and repeatedly says racist things is using arguments that should be unacceptable even if that person believes that their fight against whatever race/ethnicity/group is justified.

#4 you may not want to accept but is the case. And the fact that you have so far persisted in clinging to #5 as "an open question" boggles me.

If there was evidence for it, it wouldn't be racist ranting about the Clannish Jews who control Hollywood. Spoke can no more retract it than he can even properly address it. The topic of conversation has to be changed or the facts have to be handwaved away (a list of Jews in Hollywood is proof of yet more American Jew traitors hurting gentiles and if there was such a list of British Jews in their movie industry it would be proof that there's no such Clan operating in America. What, there is the same kind of list of Jews in Britain's film industry? Can't see how that's relevant...)

As for why 5 has to be an "open question", because Spoke can't support his racist ramblings with facts. Jews in American government have to be subjected to Loyalty Probes because they worry Spoke. Jews in Hollywood need to be sued because they might just be Clanning up to fuck with gentiles. It isn't the facts that govern it, it's finding a way to combat the grave menace of Jewish Supremacism.

Spoke is, ironically, engaging in the Johnson school of mudslinging that he tells us is so horrible. We don't need to prove that Jews are potential conspirators against America if they're in government, or outright foreign agents. We don't need to prove that Jews are a nasty Clan who are fucking over gentiles who try to get into the media (which Jews largely control). We've just got to make those Ky... good American citizens deny it. We've just got to make "American Jews: threat or menace?" the perpetual topic of conversation and allege that any Jew that doesn't want to play along is a crazy paranoid weirdo. It's not the facts that are important, it's the innuendo because facts can be rebutted but innuendo never can be.

To properly challenge those (not necessarily but potentially) nefarious Jews, we don't have to prove that they're doing anything wrong at all. But if we keep up enough innuendo, treat them as foreigners in our midst, subject them to double standards, fabricated 'reasoning' and a constant barrage of insinuation and innuendo, then the job is done. Don't prove that Jews are traitors, just continually make Jews prove that they really are loyal Americans.


You seem to be from the Johnson school of debate.

Guess I shouldn't buy that lottery ticket yet.

Care to explain how your own words are now an unsubstantiated claim? Of course you don't, but can you amuse me at some point and give it the ol college try? Can you explain how your baseless racist rantings that you can't and won't offer solid logic for, let alone proof, put you "ahead in the polls" and how quoting your own words is dastardly character assassination?

Of course not. If people saying silly racist things could defend them, they would be making good arguments and not spewing racism.
Good try though. What're you going to try to change the subject to next, and/or how are you going to avoid addressing your many odd (yet convenient!) honest mistakes? Do we get another Scientologist-Attack bit about how quoting your own words and asking you to address the glaring errors in your racist rantings just shows how much the person who's pointed that out really has to hide.

Am I Fair Game now, Spoke?

And just to remind you, not that I expect you to answer because people who say racist things can't defend them and have to change the subject when called on it:
have you figured out yet how you happened to make the mistake that limited cultural factors that produced relative increased success in a limited number of fields was really a claim of innate superiority that extended to absolutely everything? Ya know, while you were hunting for Jewish supremacists (a phrase which you totally invented on your own)?

I believe this is the point where you launch another impotent bit of character assassination and allege that by quoting your own words and showing what you yourself said, I'm being a meany.
Do I buy that lottery ticket yet?

[DSeid]

Oh I'll add a few more points.

7) There are well established tropes that anti-Semites have commonly used through history and that they continue to use to this day. Some of these are:
-Jews in powerful positions should not be trusted; their concern for what is "good for Jews" will cloud their judgement. The advanced version evokes a conspiracy, but only when the crowd is already known to be receptive to that sort of thinking. Variants include that Jews are promoting some despised political viewpoint, be it neocon or communism or globalism or liberalism. All of which are political views that some Jews possess.
-Jews are too powerful of a force in our media and as a result our culture is too heavily influenced by "their" values. Variants of this include the lack of Christian values, a lack of respect for organized religion and revealed truths, a bias towards Israel, and others. Again, the advanced version for receptive crowds explicitly suggests a conspiracy, but stage one is to get the crowd just accepting the possibility that maybe it is not a good thing that there are so many Jews so successful in this field.
-Jewish success is not due to talent or hard work but due to Jews being so clannish - meaning that they look out for their own, effectively discriminating against the rest of us.
-Jews think they are better than the rest of us - the Jewish Supremacist meme.

8) A common current tactic is to try to water down those tropes to a "just asking questions" level to at least get the basic concepts implanted as something reasonable to think about.


9) Someone who evokes several of those tropes, even in the slightly watered down versions, will set off many a Jew's spidey sense. Spidey sense is not infallible, and someone who is, just coincidentally and innocently raising at least three of those tropes, may be honestly surprised and offended by having their motivations questioned. But once the historic context has been politely explained ignorance is no longer an excuse, and once they are in full possession of that knowledge their calling those who hear them as watered down versions of the classic Jew-hater tropes delusional or hypersensitive is even harder to accept as innocent ignorance.

Again, considering some tropes classically used by anti-Semites to be reasonable does not mean one is a Jew hater. Lack of specific knowledge is more common than hatred I think. But engaging in a pattern of promoting the (watered down versions of the) tropes and then attempting to mock those who express offense while being aware of how those tropes have been used in the past, is, at best, not very smart.

I see Finn's post on preview. I really don't want to be piling on, but I already wrote this, so I am posting it.

[FinnAgain]

On a side note, "ecuswbrkt" is interesting.
Not quite sure how that happened.

[tomndebb]

Finn, I realize that this is one of your hot topics, but your post #215 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=13059847&postcount=215) gets way too personal in regards to your interpretation of beliefs that you claim that Spoke holds.

Back off and limit your comments to actual statements that other posters have made in this thread without projecting "what they really mean (in your opinion)" onto the discussion.


[ /Modding ]

[DSeid]

I might have biases as to specific groups of people whether based on race, religion, ethnicity or whatever. That doesn't make me a bigot. I give people the benefit of the doubt until they prove to me that they don't deserve it. My preconceptions don't determine a priori how I will treat someone or what my opinion of them will be. THAT is what makes someone a bigot.This is also an interesting concept. What makes one "a bigot"?

Is it attitude and beliefs or action only? Is the little old home bound White lady who holds a host of stereotypic and hurtful beliefs about various minorities, but who has no actual contact with any individuals from those groups, so does not actually treat any one differently from anyone else, not a bigot?

Is it possible, especially if one is not consciously aware that one holds particular biases, for someone who has "biases as to specific groups of people whether based on race, religion, ethnicity or whatever", to then treat people from those groups exactly the same as they do everyone else? Or is it more likely that they, without making any conscious decision to do so, interact with members of those groups differently? And if they consciously believe that their goal is "give the benefit of the doubt" but their actions are actually, even subtly, biased, are they bigots?

I am not sure.

[FinnAgain]

This is also an interesting concept. What makes one "a bigot"?

Is it attitude and beliefs or action only? Is the little old home bound White lady who holds a host of stereotypic and hurtful beliefs about various minorities, but who has no actual contact with any individuals from those groups, so does not actually treat any one differently from anyone else, not a bigot?

I didn't touch on this before, but the distinction that was drawn is a very odd one. if someone has biases as to specific groups of people whether based on race, religion, ethnicity or whatever, as it was put, it seems odd not to say that they have biases against those groups. And there are several terms we have to describe such biases.

The idea that those biases don't really count unless they're acted upon seems idiosyncratic. Someone who thinks that all gay men are just waiting to rape young boys doesn't have to go out and beat up gays in parking lots in order for folks to say that there's a problem with their beliefs.
Nor is it particularly convincing that someone might hold prejudices about an ethnic group but treat individual members with the 'benefit of the doubt'. If someone thinks that all blacks are probably lazy drug addicts but they talk to a black man and figure that he's 'one of the good ones' (and so articulate, too!), I'm not sure how it makes things any better.

Bigotry, racism, prejudice, whatever, are patterns of belief. To argue that they don't apply because they don't match specific actions seems to confuse what it means to hold negative beliefs about a group.

[dzero]

I didn't touch on this before, but the distinction that was drawn is a very odd one. if someone has biases as to specific groups of people whether based on race, religion, ethnicity or whatever, as it was put, it seems odd not to say that they have biases against those groups. And there are several terms we have to describe such biases.

The idea that those biases don't really count unless they're acted upon seems idiosyncratic. Someone who thinks that all gay men are just waiting to rape young boys doesn't have to go out and beat up gays in parking lots in order for folks to say that there's a problem with their beliefs.
Nor is it particularly convincing that someone might hold prejudices about an ethnic group but treat individual members with the 'benefit of the doubt'. If someone thinks that all blacks are probably lazy drug addicts but they talk to a black man and figure that he's 'one of the good ones' (and so articulate, too!), I'm not sure how it makes things any better.

Bigotry, racism, prejudice, whatever, are patterns of belief. To argue that they don't apply because they don't match specific actions seems to confuse what it means to hold negative beliefs about a group.
You must realize that in most cases biases are vague and therefore fairly innocuous. Unless I've been taught to hate a particular group, why would I think of them the most horrible thoughts conceivable? Do you really think that's how most people operate - that they are all seething, heaving volcanoes of racial, ethnic and religious hatred? I don't believe that you do but that seems to be what you are describing.

Also, you need to distinguish between bias and prejudice. Thinking that all gays are pedophiles is a prejudice not a bias. Prejudice is the realm of the bigot.

A further distinction is that someone possessed of a bias remains open to new information inconsistent with that bias. Only when they are not open to such information does it become prejudice and therefore bigotry.

I'm sure you could have seen that distinction for yourself but my guess is that you didn't because it is inconsistent with the argument you want to make, which is that any kind of bias amounts to bigotry. Well, it doesn't. If you're honest with yourself, you will realize that you too have biases regarding various groups. It's inconceivable that you or anyone would not. That doesn't make you a bigot.

Let me give you an example. I was born in Alabama - well before the civil rights movement. I have a copy of an old will from one of my father's ancestors which talks about the disposition of slaves. But I was never taught to hate black people. In fact, I was taught to respect everyone. However I was also taught that certain types of social interactions were acceptable and some were not. As a result of that I do have certain biases which I wish I didn't, but they are so deeply ingrained that there is nothing I can do about them. What I CAN do is refuse to act on those biases - which is precisely what I do - without exception or deviation - ever.

So am I a bigot? No. I am not.

It's no different than having lustful thoughts for a woman you barely know. Does that make you an adulterer? No, it doesn't. Because what matters is how you treat people - and that includes indirect contact as well - like voting for a black president for example.

[DSeid]

dzero, you excessively discount the power and impact of "vague" biases; they are, in real life, not so innocuous in their impacts. I submit to you that fairly little of the harmful effects of biases are due to people who are "seething, heaving volcanoes of racial, ethnic and religious hatred", but instead are the result of individuals who are not even consciously aware of their biases, who have bigoted thoughts but who would recoil from the concept of being labelled a bigot, but who still express, reinforce, and in minor but many multiple ways act on, stereotypes and biases every day. The David Dukes and skinheads are obvious but their actual impact is small; those who think it reasonable to post a list of Jews who have been no more vocal in their support of Israel and who have no more actual ties to Israel than a host of Christian conservatives higher up in an administration with the comment that it is reasonable to ask if their judgement is clouded and that while they are not necessarily Israeli agents, they could be ... and who then suggest that Jews overwhelm Hollywood and discriminate against non-Jews ... and who feels comfortable calling someone who says that maybe Jews succeed in Hollywood on the basis of cultural factors and talent is a bigot and a Jewish Supremacist ... is not as necessarily such a seething volcano, may recoil from the concept of being thought of as a bigot, but is the one who has more potential to cause harm. The taxi drivers who are just too nervous to pick up the Black fare, the citizens who fear an Islamic Community center ... these people with their vague biases and indescript discomfort, cause more harm, even though many voted for a Black man for President.

[FinnAgain]

You must realize that in most cases biases are vague and therefore fairly innocuous. Unless I've been taught to hate a particular group, why would I think of them the most horrible thoughts conceivable?

So far you've argued that if there's no genocide then racism isn't a really big deal and if you don't have "the most horrible thoughts conceivable" then bias about a group doesn't count as fully. But that doesn't hold. There are degrees of racism and someone who doesn't like Mexicans is a racist, just to a lesser degree, as someone who was lynching 'uppity' blacks during the civil rights struggle.
The distinction you're trying to draw between "bias" and "prejudice" is also nonsensical. If one prejudges a group then they have a bias having to do with that group. If someone has a bias having to do with a group, then they have prejudged them.


A further distinction is that someone possessed of a bias remains open to new information inconsistent with that bias. Only when they are not open to such information does it become prejudice and therefore bigotry.

This is a spurious distinction. What you're describing is someone who's prejudiced against a group but who remains open to new information. With that logic even hardcore racists who later change their minds weren't really racists. Besides, what does it mean to be open to new information? "I think blacks are inferior and all the evidence I've seen hasn't changed my mind, but if I see some hypothetical evidence it might change my views."


It's no different than having lustful thoughts for a woman you barely know. Does that make you an adulterer? No, it doesn't. Because what matters is how you treat people - and that includes indirect contact as well - like voting for a black president for example.

That's also a non sequitor. Having lustful thoughts means you do lust after someone. Adultery is an action, not simply thoughts. Bigotry/racism/prejudice/bias describes beliefs. Someone who privately thinks that blacks are inferior and shouldn't marry white people but smiles at their black employees and doesn't mistreat them is still a racist.

[dzero]

dzero, you excessively discount the power and impact of "vague" biases; they are, in real life, not so innocuous in their impacts. I submit to you that fairly little of the harmful effects of biases are due to people who are "seething, heaving volcanoes of racial, ethnic and religious hatred", but instead are the result of individuals who are not even consciously aware of their biases, who have bigoted thoughts but who would recoil from the concept of being labelled a bigot, but who still express, reinforce, and in minor but many multiple ways act on, stereotypes and biases every day. The David Dukes and skinheads are obvious but their actual impact is small; those who think it reasonable to post a list of Jews who have been no more vocal in their support of Israel and who have no more actual ties to Israel than a host of Christian conservatives higher up in an administration with the comment that it is reasonable to ask if their judgement is clouded and that while they are not necessarily Israeli agents, they could be ... and who then suggest that Jews overwhelm Hollywood and discriminate against non-Jews ... and who feels comfortable calling someone who says that maybe Jews succeed in Hollywood on the basis of cultural factors and talent is a bigot and a Jewish Supremacist ... is not as necessarily such a seething volcano, may recoil from the concept of being thought of as a bigot, but is the one who has more potential to cause harm. The taxi drivers who are just too nervous to pick up the Black fare, the citizens who fear an Islamic Community center ... these people with their vague biases and indescript discomfort, cause more harm, even though many voted for a Black man for President.

You seem to think that people can exist in the world and not have any kind of bias. You're wrong. Bias is, in my humble opinion, and evolutionary adaptation. I believe there is research to support that opinion but I'm not sure I could track it down easily. I don't think that is necessary though if you think about it. We never have all the information we need when dealing with new situations or people. So out of necessity we will make certain assumptions based on whatever partial information we have. We understand that some of it may be wrong or misleading but we also know that there is likely to be an element of truth as well. It may be distorted in the same way as other myths and legends, but just as those usually have some basis in fact, however attenuated, we know that there is a good chance our preconceptions will have some kernel of truth as well.

What you are failing to do is look at this objectively. Try to remember the last time you encountered someone whom you did not know but about whom you had some preconceptions. Did you assume those beliefs were fact and act accordingly or did you use them as a hypothesis to gauge the situation you were in at the time? This is what I'm talking about and this is what both you and Finn seem to be doing your best to ignore.

All people, everywhere and always, have been, are, and forever will continue, to be biased in a staggering number of ways and about an indefinite number of subjects. Whether I think Fox News is a shill for the neo-cons or that North Koreans eat their babies, you, me and everyone will be biased about something. Sometimes that something will be a group of people. But in that case I'm not allowed to have any bias because, well, I don't know why. It's ok for me to be biased against Fox news. You don't have a problem with that. But if I have a bias about blacks, I've somehow stepped over a line. Well, as I've already shown, I haven't stepped over anything.

If you want to make the case for latent bias as being the genesis of the next holocaust, you're going to have to make a much more convincing argument than you have. And if that isnt' your fear, then what is? Whatever it is, is it more important than my right to discuss my thoughts and ideas? If you're going to try to shut me up the minute I broach a subject that is indicative of a bias, you'd better have a damned good reason. So what is it that makes discussing anti-semitic tropes, memes, etc so verboten that I dare not speak their name?

Do true anti-semites use the ruse of "intelligent discussion" as a blind for their true agenda? Abso-fucking-lutely. Does that somehow mean I need to STFU? That's not even guilt by association. That's guilt by some transitive property of being human.

FinnAgain: I have made the points I thought were important as clearly as possible. If you don't see them, it's because you don't want to and nothing I say will change that. You are willfully misinterpreting what I've said and responding to arguments I have not made. I see no point in engaging you.

[FinnAgain]

FinnAgain: I have made the points I thought were important as clearly as possible. If you don't see them, it's because you don't want to and nothing I say will change that.

Not only did I see them I directly responded to them. Much like the argument that if someone doesn't agree with you, why, they must not understand you or be lying about what you aid. It's rather funny that I quote your words, respond to them, and I'm somehow misrepresenting them. Now that's funny.

Of course, it's rather elucidative that when faced with your own words, you too would like to claim (without pointing out any actual errors, naturally) that your words aren't what you really meant to say, and also that people should be free to say racist stuff without someone trying to "shut you up" by daring to speak their mind about what they're saying.

I directly quoted your words and pointed out where there were contradictions or errors in logic, so like Spokes claims, yours too must be distorting what you're saying. Funny that the those who are arguing for their right to say anti-Semitic things without criticism are continually being misrepresented by their own words.
Curiouser and curiouser.

If you actually have a point, why don't you point out a single instance where I was incorrect about what you said. Just one will do. Something tells me I shouldn't hold my breath.


If you want to make the case for latent bias as being the genesis of the next holocaust, you're going to have to make a much more convincing argument than you have. And if that isnt' your fear, then what is?

You keep jumping to this, why? If it's not genocide then who cares? If it's not genocide then it doesn't matter? What exactly is your point, anti-Semitism is okay as long as Jews aren't rounded up and gassed?


Whatever it is, is it more important than my right to discuss my thoughts and ideas? If you're going to try to shut me up the minute I broach a subject that is indicative of a bias, you'd better have a damned good reason. So what is it that makes discussing anti-semitic tropes, memes, etc so verboten that I dare not speak their name?

You have an interesting double standard there. You want to be able to discuss anti-semitic tropes, memes, etc... but if someone else wants to tell you that's offensive and you shouldn't be saying that, why, that's wrong.


Do true anti-semites use the ruse of "intelligent discussion" as a blind for their true agenda? Abso-fucking-lutely. Does that somehow mean I need to STFU? That's not even guilt by association. That's guilt by some transitive property of being human.

That's also a weird non sequitor. Nobody has said that you shouldn't be saying racist/anti-Semitic/offensive because anti-semites use the same conversational tactics, but that you shouldn't be talking nonsense and using anti-Semitic tropes because you'd be talking nonsense and using anti-Semitic tropes.
But of course your response seems to be "but if it won't lead to a Holocaust then just shut up and don't object!"

Go figure.

[Spoke]

spoke, let us just see how far we can agree before you go.

Sure, DSeid.

1) Currently the heads of the major Hollywood movie houses are mostly Jewish at least culturally.

Seems that way, from the OP.

2) The industry seems to have a fair number of Jews in its ranks. In fact a significant number of Academy Award winning movies and movies recognized as the world's best historically have had Jewish directors.

Yes, but that's a bit of a sidetrack. The Stein article seems to be focused on the management end of the business, not the creative end.

3) Jews are similarly extremely well represented in several other fields that involve managing ideas, especially new ones - science, math, medicine, economics, literature, chess, music, political thought, etc. The reasons for that may be unclear (I lean to some very particular historic cultural factors) but acknowledging that fact is not "supremacism". It is a matter of record as uncomfortable as I may be having to point it out.

Jews are very well represented in the upper echelons in a number of fields (a fact which, just so you're clear, causes me no resentment whatsoever). However, they are NOT as dominant in those other fields as they seem to be in the ranks of management in Hollywood. As I noted upthread, Jews comprise something like 20% of the lawyers in the biggest firms. That is greater than their percentage of the general population, but not so great that it couldn't be explained by cultural emphasis on achievement and/or cultural emphasis on communication skills.

4) There has been no evidence presented in this thread, or that I am aware of existing, that Jews are any more represented in the movie industry overall than they are in any of those other fields. (The current crop of studio heads being Jewish is not evidence of that.) There is no evidence that Jews "overwhelm" Hollywood despite a previous claim made here that they do, no more than they overwhelm as winners of the Nobel Prize.

Here I'm not so sure. Here's the article which prompted the OP (http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-stein19-2008dec19,0,4676183.column) and which seems to be saying that nearly all of the upper management in the entertainment industry is Jewish. If all the studio heads are Jewish, and most of the upper management is Jewish, I think it's a fair bet that similar percentages of lower management in the entertainment industry are Jewish. (Assuming promotion from within the ranks.)

Those numbers for lower management are not available, so the evidence we do have is suggestive, but not conclusive.

The numbers among upper management are so skewed that they might provide encouragement to a discrimination lawyer with an aggrieved client in his lobby. The actual numbers in lower management, as well as the hiring practices in the affected companies, would be factual matters that would have to be fleshed out during the discovery process. (Depositions, written discovery, etc.)

5) Good-ole-boy networking is an insufficient explanation for the large presence of Jews in all those fields. To try to evoke it as plausible for one, so therefore the presence of some significant number should be considered as presumptive evidence of discrimination against non-Jews, is absurd.

You are comparing apples and oranges here I think. Stein writes: "The Jews are so dominant, I had to scour the trades to come up with six Gentiles in high positions at entertainment companies. When I called them to talk about their incredible advancement, five of them refused to talk to me, apparently out of fear of insulting Jews. The sixth, AMC President Charlie Collier, turned out to be Jewish."

While Jews may be overrepresented in some professions (such as doctors and lawyers), they are not dominant to that extent. You don't have to "scour the trades" to come up with Gentiles in high positions in those professions. And that is why the numbers in Hollywood suggest that something more than just merit-based achievement may be at work. It suggests, as I have said all along, a (non-sinister) good-old-boy network.


6) Jews do not represent a single POV and even though they may skew to the liberal side statistically, they are spread across the political spectrum.

Of course. There is no Jewish hive mind. (Why are you even asking me this? Nothing I have ever written suggests anything to the contrary.)


And the fact that you have so far persisted in clinging to #5 as "an open question" boggles me.

Sorry, but it is an open question. We just don't have enough information to know. (In particular I mean information about lower management, and about hiring practices.) We have information that is suggestive of discrimination, bot not in any way conclusive.

And while some in this thread seem to think that the very idea of a lawsuit is anathema, and maybe indicative of some sort of anti-Semitic grudge, I couldn't disagree more. It seems to me like a lawsuit might clear the air. If there is are no discriminatory hiring practices at work, evidence adduced in discovery should disclose that fact, and put the idea to rest.

[DSeid]

dzero I must have expressed myself poorly.

I recognize that everyone has biases; I was merely objecting to your discounting those biases as "fairly innocuous" if they are "vague" - you are very wrong, seriously wrong, about that. Vague biases are often the worst kind because they are so endemic and so ... accepted. One needn't be a "seething, heaving volcano of racial, ethnic and religious hatred" to have their biases have very harmful effects, and it is especially when one is unaware of even having the biases that some of the greatest harm can be done. It are those biases that create systematic oppression.

Biases are short cuts, cheats of sorts, and over the course of evolution have no doubt been adaptive. But like many other of our biologic predispositions, what served us well in prehistory can be maladaptive in today's world. We no longer live in small kinship based bands. Being distrustful of the "other", oppressing the "other", is indeed part of our evolutionary heritage, and did serve to help pass on the genes of those who did it better than those who did not. But is still maladaptive for our society of today.

I think that your assumption that a prejudice (bias) likely has some basis in fact, some element or kernel of truth, is frighteningly ignorant. I hope that you reconsider that position.

You are also confusing experience based learning with prejudices. I know from experience that John Stewart often makes me laugh; turning on his show and expecting to be entertained is not being biased, it is experienced based learning. I know from past observation that Fox spins the news to a particular political end and creates a news cycle for that purpose; that also is not a bias, it is experience based learning. OTOH being receptive to a belief that I should be afraid of a random Black man, or of a random Muslim person on a plane, or any of the anti-Semitic tropes that I listed, is not experience based learning - it is distorted generalization from highly filtered images of reality without enough actual reality to offset it. It is allowing the mythologies of the haters to substitute for real experience given a state of ignorance.

Of course Holocausts cannot occur without these less horrific more mundane acts of prejudice, so of course latent biases are the genesis of not only the next Holocaust, but of the genocides that are occurring on this planet in our time. But I don't need to be worrying about genocide to be concerned about the harm of accepting prejudicial tropes as reality and to be concerned about the harms that the our individual biases may cause unless we remain vigilant against them.

Of course discuss your thoughts and ideas. And when those thoughts and ideas are based not on actual evidence but on fictions created by those with bigoted beliefs, be prepared to be told that such is the case. And if you develop a record of expressing those tropes as reasonable thoughts, and if you persist in expressing them even after the facts have been pointed out to you, and it has been explained to you how those are historically fictions created by the haters and the oppressors, then be prepared for others to conclude bad things about your motives. A lie that is allowed to be repeated enough gets some to believe that there must some kernel of truth ... and then that it must be true. The tropes cannot be allowed to fester and spread. I give the benefit of the doubt that they are "asking" out of simple and innocent ignorance; but when the apparent ignorance becomes willful, stubborn, and repetitive, then ramping it up a notch is indicated.

Is that more clear?

[DSeid]

spoke that article is not evidence. It is a column written by a columnist trying to mock something that I think he is naive to try to mock. It is not a comprehensive review of the ranks of even upper management in movie making at this particular time. It is noting that right now the heads of the majors are mostly Jewish. And saying that Jews shouldn't be afraid to be proud of what those of their culture have accomplished. Instead be pleased that we live in a country in which that can occur.

To pretend that that column, written as a bit of entertainment, is serious research, is pathetic. But your persisting in presenting it as such is consistent and tells me what I need to know.

[tomndebb]

You are comparing apples and oranges here I think. Stein writes: "The Jews are so dominant, I had to scour the trades to come up with six Gentiles in high positions at entertainment companies. When I called them to talk about their incredible advancement, five of them refused to talk to me, apparently out of fear of insulting Jews. The sixth, AMC President Charlie Collier, turned out to be Jewish."Of course, this is simply spin on the part of Stein. What evidence does Stein have, (which he carefully failed to present), that the individuals called were "afraid" of anything, (as opposed to dismissing Stein as some sort of shit-stirring crank and choosing to not feed his unrevealed agenda)?

Given an industry that was nearly created by a single ethnic group, (much as most U.S. industry was created by WASPs in the nineteenth century), it hardly strikes me as out of line that less than a century later that industry might still be dominated at the highest levels by the same ethnic group. (My Dad joked, a couple of years after JFK's election, that that had been nice, but that Catholics had finally gained genuine admittance to American society when James Roche was selected CEO of General Motors.)

[Darth Panda]

Indians totally run Bollywood. Which kind of makes me happy that the Jews are taking care Hollywood. It could be so much worse...

[dzero]

dzero I must have expressed myself poorly.

I recognize that everyone has biases; I was merely objecting to your discounting those biases as "fairly innocuous" if they are "vague" - you are very wrong, seriously wrong, about that. Vague biases are often the worst kind because they are so endemic and so ... accepted. One needn't be a "seething, heaving volcano of racial, ethnic and religious hatred" to have their biases have very harmful effects, and it is especially when one is unaware of even having the biases that some of the greatest harm can be done. It are those biases that create systematic oppression.

Biases are short cuts, cheats of sorts, and over the course of evolution have no doubt been adaptive. But like many other of our biologic predispositions, what served us well in prehistory can be maladaptive in today's world. We no longer live in small kinship based bands. Being distrustful of the "other", oppressing the "other", is indeed part of our evolutionary heritage, and did serve to help pass on the genes of those who did it better than those who did not. But is still maladaptive for our society of today.

I think that your assumption that a prejudice (bias) likely has some basis in fact, some element or kernel of truth, is frighteningly ignorant. I hope that you reconsider that position.

You are also confusing experience based learning with prejudices. I know from experience that John Stewart often makes me laugh; turning on his show and expecting to be entertained is not being biased, it is experienced based learning. I know from past observation that Fox spins the news to a particular political end and creates a news cycle for that purpose; that also is not a bias, it is experience based learning. OTOH being receptive to a belief that I should be afraid of a random Black man, or of a random Muslim person on a plane, or any of the anti-Semitic tropes that I listed, is not experience based learning - it is distorted generalization from highly filtered images of reality without enough actual reality to offset it. It is allowing the mythologies of the haters to substitute for real experience given a state of ignorance.

Of course Holocausts cannot occur without these less horrific more mundane acts of prejudice, so of course latent biases are the genesis of not only the next Holocaust, but of the genocides that are occurring on this planet in our time. But I don't need to be worrying about genocide to be concerned about the harm of accepting prejudicial tropes as reality and to be concerned about the harms that the our individual biases may cause unless we remain vigilant against them.

Of course discuss your thoughts and ideas. And when those thoughts and ideas are based not on actual evidence but on fictions created by those with bigoted beliefs, be prepared to be told that such is the case. And if you develop a record of expressing those tropes as reasonable thoughts, and if you persist in expressing them even after the facts have been pointed out to you, and it has been explained to you how those are historically fictions created by the haters and the oppressors, then be prepared for others to conclude bad things about your motives. A lie that is allowed to be repeated enough gets some to believe that there must some kernel of truth ... and then that it must be true. The tropes cannot be allowed to fester and spread. I give the benefit of the doubt that they are "asking" out of simple and innocent ignorance; but when the apparent ignorance becomes willful, stubborn, and repetitive, then ramping it up a notch is indicated.

Is that more clear?
You're still dodging the most important question. If I have certain biases regarding blacks - which I have already admitted - and I don't act on them, how does that hurt anyone? If I express those biases and want to discuss them but refuse to accept your version of the so-called "facts", whom am I harming?

You have no answer to that because there is no harm - neither real nor speculative. You object to anyone even entertaining the idea that every major studio is headed by someone of presumed Jewish heritage due to any reason other than the fact that they just so happen to be better at this sort of work than anyone else. What other possible explanation could there be? Without exaggeration, you seem to believe any other proposed scenario is, by definition, bigoted. And yet you are the one implying that I'm the party who is deluded and ignoring the facts. Personally, I would have to classify that as nothing less than ironic. You won't even consider any other possibility - not because any alternative is so outlandishly implausible (although you no doubt see it that way), but simply because it doesn't doesn't match your world view - which obviously must be perfectly and completely correct.

I think it is amusing that you talk so blithely about "facts" when in many situations of this sort the facts, by design, cannot be obtained. I'm at least willing to admit that your explanation may be correct. I think the odds are heavily against that outcome, but I won't dismiss it. You have repeatedly demonstrated no such willingness of any kind. Again, who more closely matches the profile of a bigot?

Along the same lines you say that I should learn from my experience. That is simply ridiculous. If my only exposure to black people has been when I have been robbed, do you really think I should use that experience as the basis for formulating broader views on race relations? How can you not see the absurdity of that approach?

And finally, how can you have the unmitigated chutzpah to tell me what I'm thinking or how I have arrived at my views? Are you reading my mind? Should I go back to wearing my tin foil caps and living in a Faraday cage?

You don the trappings of impartial empiricism quite well, but in my opinion, you have lost sight of what any of those words mean.

[adhay]

Back to the OP.

Pretty much. So what?

Goldman? Sachs? Bush? Obama?

Call me zenjew.

What's the diff between zenjew and a Jew?

Capitalization and motive.:p

[tomndebb]

You object to anyone even entertaining the idea that every major studio is headed by someone of presumed Jewish heritage due to any reason other than the fact that they just so happen to be better at this sort of work than anyone else. What other possible explanation could there be? Without exaggeration, you seem to believe any other proposed scenario is, by definition, bigoted. And yet you are the one implying that I'm the party who is deluded and ignoring the facts. For someone who was accusing other posters of "deliberately" mischaracterizing your remarks, you seem to be doing a pretty good job of the same thing, here.

First off, the discussion appears to have diverged with you and DSeid making separate points, meaning that you are both responding to points not actually made. I suspect that you both need to step back and take a look at your core arguments and try it again, fresh. Assert a specific thesis without relying on previous posts and defend that without getting hung up on what might have been said (and possibly misunderstood) in previous posts.

Second, I see no place in the thread where DSeid has asserted that the only possible explanation for the prevalence of Jewish CEOs in the movie industry is some innate capacity. There are any number of reasons why one ethnic group might dominate a particular niche in a particular industry. DSeid has not claimed that only one possible reason could exist. He has noted that some of the arguments advanced for that prevalence--or the perception of that prevalence--bear a close parallel to arguments that have been proferred about "Jewish dominance" in other realms that are based on stereotypes and anti-semitism. The discussion has tended to focus on whether the stereotypes have validity (or whther they are harmful) while alternative explanations have tended to be lacking or mentioned only in passing.

[dzero]

For someone who was accusing other posters of "deliberately" mischaracterizing your remarks, you seem to be doing a pretty good job of the same thing, here.

First off, the discussion appears to have diverged with you and DSeid making separate points, meaning that you are both responding to points not actually made. I suspect that you both need to step back and take a look at your core arguments and try it again, fresh. Assert a specific thesis without relying on previous posts and defend that without getting hung up on what might have been said (and possibly misunderstood) in previous posts.

Second, I see no place in the thread where DSeid has asserted that the only possible explanation for the prevalence of Jewish CEOs in the movie industry is some innate capacity. There are any number of reasons why one ethnic group might dominate a particular niche in a particular industry. DSeid has not claimed that only one possible reason could exist. He has noted that some of the arguments advanced for that prevalence--or the perception of that prevalence--bear a close parallel to arguments that have been proferred about "Jewish dominance" in other realms that are based on stereotypes and anti-semitism. The discussion has tended to focus on whether the stereotypes have validity (or whther they are harmful) while alternative explanations have tended to be lacking or mentioned only in passing.
If I have mischaracterized anyone's position, then certainly, I apologize and I welcome any explanation DSeid would like to offer for this most striking apparent coincidence. I did make a good faith effort to reprise what I believed that explanation to be but I am more than happy to stand corrected.

[adhay]

... Thanks for your well-considered response. ;)

[DSeid]

... You're still dodging the most important question. If I have certain biases regarding blacks - which I have already admitted - and I don't act on them, how does that hurt anyone? I guess I have not been as clear as I intend to be. I don't think that you can help but act on them. You at least have some hope to minimize it because you are explicitly aware of your biases. I also do my imperfect best and am often amused when reality is so different than my preconceptions would lead me to have expected them to be. But if you really do not have your behavior affected by your biases at all you either live where you do not interact with those of whom you have biases (which of course may a function of having them though), or you are much more thoughtful in your actions than most of us. We are all to some degree part of the problem, some of us more and some less than others. The ones who do not think they can be part of the problem are perhaps at greater risk to actually be more of the problem though.

Indeed over-generalizing from extremely limited experience, or even fictive experiences, is a core part of forming stereotypes. And superstitions. It is not what I mean by experienced based learning. Do you really not understand the difference?

As to the rest, the points have been made before. Are you suspicious of the Nobel Prize winning Jews as well? How could it be that such a small percent of the world's population has produced such an unreasonable percent of Nobel prize winners (and Kyoto Prize winners, and ...)? Maybe there is a conspiracy by the Nobel Prize Committee to award it to Jews who do not deserve it? They are controlled by Jews! Or maybe only Jews are given the access to the right research facilities across the world ... we should be open to all possible explanations.

Very seriously, if you can explain why that has occurred, with an explanation that is not also sufficient to explain that at this one point in time the top positions in the some of the major movie production houses are Jewish, then have at it. My suggested explanation is on record, but if clannishness seems absurd to explain the number of Nobel winners, then there is no cause to selectively evoke it for a different field.

As to Tom's request, perhaps you'd like to go through the same nine points I put out for spoke.

Btw, what of your thinking have I told you that you did not tell me? (Sure, chutzpah I got, but I claim no mind reading ability. I can only tell people what things sound like and what people will very likely conclude and not to be surprised when you hear it.)

[Spoke]

Given an industry that was nearly created by a single ethnic group, (much as most U.S. industry was created by WASPs in the nineteenth century), it hardly strikes me as out of line that less than a century later that industry might still be dominated at the highest levels by the same ethnic group.

And would we excuse an historically WASP-dominated industry for hiring only WASPs in upper management positions? Of course not.

Yes, it is understandable that the film industry is still dominated by the same ethnic group that founded it. Understandable does not equal legal. To the extent hiring decisions may be made based on ethnicity, or based on good-old-boy networks that by their nature tend to exclude other ethnicities, then Hollywood may have crossed a legal line. And that is all I am saying.

[Spoke]

To pretend that that column, written as a bit of entertainment, is serious research, is pathetic. But your persisting in presenting it as such is consistent and tells me what I need to know.

I'm not "pretending that it is serious research." But on the other hand, I don't think Stein is lying about what he found. Do you?

[dzero]

I guess I have not been as clear as I intend to be. I don't think that you can help but act on them. You at least have some hope to minimize it because you are explicitly aware of your biases. I also do my imperfect best and am often amused when reality is so different than my preconceptions would lead me to have expected them to be. But if you really do not have your behavior affected by your biases at all you either live where you do not interact with those of whom you have biases (which of course may a function of having them though), or you are much more thoughtful in your actions than most of us. We are all to some degree part of the problem, some of us more and some less than others. The ones who do not think they can be part of the problem are perhaps at greater risk to actually be more of the problem though.
Not that anyone cares, but I really hate doing these sorts of vivisected posts. I don't think I can avoid it this time.

You do realize that you're really saying my previous statements as to scrupulously never acting on my biases are bullshit - right? I think it's interesting that you arrive at that conclusion based on nothing more than supposition. You don't even know what those biases are since I have never disclosed them, but yet you have no trouble assuming that I am lying. Do you really think there is any way I can have a constructive conversation with you when you won't even accept that I might be telling the truth? And don't you think the ease with which you made that determination demonstrates the level of your presumptuousness? What basis do you have for saying that I am lying about some unknown quantity other than your own apparent bias as to my veracity?

Indeed over-generalizing from extremely limited experience, or even fictive experiences, is a core part of forming stereotypes. And superstitions. It is not what I mean by experienced based learning. Do you really not understand the difference?

I was attempting to lead you to the illogical but inevitable extremes of such an approach. Were I to live a few score lifetimes, THEN I might have the sort of exhaustive experience your model would require. Every individual's experience will be subject to chance. Unless their experience is exhaustively random and repetitive, there is no way to determine if it is representative of the experiences of the population as a whole. Therefore, while it can be useful, it will never give you a truly unbiased perspective. The range and variety of human interaction is so infinitely complex that even the estimate of a few score lifetimes is likely woefully inadequate.

As to the rest, the points have been made before. Are you suspicious of the Nobel Prize winning Jews as well? How could it be that such a small percent of the world's population has produced such an unreasonable percent of Nobel prize winners (and Kyoto Prize winners, and ...)? Maybe there is a conspiracy by the Nobel Prize Committee to award it to Jews who do not deserve it? They are controlled by Jews! Or maybe only Jews are given the access to the right research facilities across the world ... we should be open to all possible explanations.

Very seriously, if you can explain why that has occurred, with an explanation that is not also sufficient to explain that at this one point in time the top positions in the some of the major movie production houses are Jewish, then have at it. My suggested explanation is on record, but if clannishness seems absurd to explain the number of Nobel winners, then there is no cause to selectively evoke it for a different field.
We can move on to such issues later if you insist. For now I would appreciate it if you would be kind enough to reiterate your explanation for why the head of every major studio seems (and I would emphasize the word "seems") to be of Jewish heritage.

As to Tom's request, perhaps you'd like to go through the same nine points I put out for spoke.
I would prefer that you restate your explanation to avoid any possibility of misunderstanding.

Btw, what of your thinking have I told you that you did not tell me? (Sure, chutzpah I got, but I claim no mind reading ability. I can only tell people what things sound like and what people will very likely conclude and not to be surprised when you hear it.)

Perhaps I took this quote too personally.
Of course discuss your thoughts and ideas. And when those thoughts and ideas are based not on actual evidence but on fictions created by those with bigoted beliefs, be prepared to be told that such is the case. And if you develop a record of expressing those tropes as reasonable thoughts, and if you persist in expressing them even after the facts have been pointed out to you, and it has been explained to you how those are historically fictions created by the haters and the oppressors, then be prepared for others to conclude bad things about your motives.
It seems that you were outlining the path of anyone who even entertains some sort of bias - as if this were the inevitable product of such evil .

[tomndebb]

And would we excuse an historically WASP-dominated industry for hiring only WASPs in upper management positions? Of course not.Are you sure about this?

Aside from vague mutterings about "the man" (in a rather different context), I have never heard of any serious effort to investigate WASP dominance of any industry. I have certainly never heard of a lawsuit filed, or even proposed, to found out the "truth" about such dominance.

How many industries are dominated by one ethnic group or another?
How many of those industries get seriously challenged?

After 90+ years of Jewish "dominance," where are the actual charges from people who have been "kept out" of movie company board rooms? If there have been no serious complaints or lawsuits prior to this, why would we think that there is any reason look for nefarious actions, now?
For that matter, what nefarious actions were employed by Iger, (or, I suppose, Michael Eisner), to wrest control of Disney into Jewish hands? Do none of these publicly traded entertainment conglomerates have independent boards of directors who can seek out Gentiles for higher positions?

[DSeid]

Stein wrote a column that points out that at this one point in time the very top positions at several of the majors are Jewish as part of a humorous bit: "Hollywood: If you enjoy TV and movies, then you probably like Jews after all.", trying to make the point that Jews should be proud of having a culture that produces such successful people and of living in a country in which such is possible, not fearful of the anti-Semite's spin and accusations of clannishness or of "control" ... he did not do a broad survey of the industry. I believe he made a few calls so he could make his point: Jews be proud and be not fearful. You have a culture that produces people who accomplish in a country that allows you to achieve. I accept that Jews are very successful in the entertainment business. Football not so much so, among the top ranked players of "Go", not so much, but in entertainment Jews have done well. But that as evidence that Jews are discriminating against non-Jews in the business? Or even that Jews are more represented in the movie business elite levels than in the fields of economics or physics? Nope.

dzero, where did I say you were lying? I said that I doubted that it is possible for anyone to not act on their biases, even if they do not realize it. If you read that as calling you a liar then the wrong people are being called hypersensitive in this thread.

To restate my "why" see post 112 and 120 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=580689&page=3)I am not suggesting anything genetic. I am suggesting that it has to with more than a culture of achievement. After all Jews don't achieve across the board. There are other cultural factors that have led to achievement in some very particular venues, probably two factors most of all, both a result of this: for many many hundreds of years Jews have been the outsider, the "other" in any society in which they have resided. An educated literate outsider group spread across cultures and communicating with each other.

Being an outsider group gives you a different perspective, drives you to prove yourself sure, and coupled with a history of persecution, drives you to try to gain security and both acceptence and respect. But that different perspective brings a willingness to try different ideas. And is in the context of a religion that highlights its myths that have its heros arguing with God himself. When your culture isn't completely part of the box, it is easier to think outside of it.

Being spread out among the world's cultures and traveling between them, having nothing but knowledge and the ideas picked up from around the world as a meaningful asset, results in a culture that tends to recombine those ideas into new ones. What is in that box can be used for something slightly different in this box if we just tweak it a little, and maybe mix it up with something from this other box too. New York in particular was home to Jews coming from around the world all stuck together in small neighborhoods and exchanging ideas and perspectives and ambition.

Hollywood was one of those ideas. More than any other group in America, Jews created Hollywood, because of the cultural willingness to gamble a little on an idea, a drive to prove oneself, a strong heritage of creative thought, and a tradition of having enough chutzpah to believe that we could. Those traditions are less strong than they once were and are less unique than they once were. But they have run deep. Accepted as factual: Jews are over-represented relative to their numbers in the highest levels of intellectual and creative fields, (including Nobel Prize winners* - 37% of US winners and 22% worldwide, US National Medal of Science winners - 38%, , and the Japanese Kyoto Prize - 25%) ranging from physics, to chemistry, to economics, to medicine, to art, to comedy, to movie making. In terms of the last one, they are not just the heads of studios and over-represented as writers, but disproportionate to their numbers the Academy Award winning directors, roughly 37% of the best director awards have gone to a director with some Jewish cultural tie from its inception to 2004 anyway. 40% of the American Film Institute's best movies of all time had directors with Jewish cultural ties as well.

Call my being willing to acknowledge those as facts as having a "Jewish supremacist mindset" if you need to, or "bigoted" if it pleases you, but they are what drove this op. Those Jews achieving things.

So the question is why? Why over the course of nearly a century so many Jews in positions of high achievement particularly in the space of dealing with new ideas?

Conspiracy? Well no one here has trotted that out, anyway. But it has been an accusation made often historically and currently in other venues. And one that many in this country and around the world still believe even if most are not so dumb as to state it outright.

Clannishness? Well that has been a common accusation made, and is why so many Jews want to downplay the accomplishments of others who share their cultural heritage. We fear the consequences of that conclusion. It gets really ugly really fast. Sometimes really really ugly.

Genetically intellectually superior? I really don't think so. Really.

Something intrinsic to the cultural heritage? Uh, yeah, that's my belief. And my speculation as to what aspects of the cultural heritage have been key are what you have dismissed as mythology. Or bigoted supremicist thinking.**

Oy.

*Not just science, over-represented as winners in literature and as winners of the Nobel Peace Prize as well.

**Oh spoke, if you are going to call me a bigot then don't pussyfoot around with it. Pit me and I'll be glad to discuss it with you further.
I hope that is clear enough.

[dzero]

Stein wrote a column that points out that at this one point in time the very top positions at several of the majors are Jewish as part of a humorous bit: "Hollywood: If you enjoy TV and movies, then you probably like Jews after all.", trying to make the point that Jews should be proud of having a culture that produces such successful people and of living in a country in which such is possible, not fearful of the anti-Semite's spin and accusations of clannishness or of "control" ... he did not do a broad survey of the industry. I believe he made a few calls so he could make his point: Jews be proud and be not fearful. You have a culture that produces people who accomplish in a country that allows you to achieve. I accept that Jews are very successful in the entertainment business. Football not so much so, among the top ranked players of "Go", not so much, but in entertainment Jews have done well. But that as evidence that Jews are discriminating against non-Jews in the business? Or even that Jews are more represented in the movie business elite levels than in the fields of economics or physics? Nope.

dzero, where did I say you were lying? I said that I doubted that it is possible for anyone to not act on their biases, even if they do not realize it. If you read that as calling you a liar then the wrong people are being called hypersensitive in this thread.

To restate my "why" see post 112 and 120 (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=580689&page=3)I hope that is clear enough.
Unfortunately no. Were I a suspicious person I might think the extensive reply was more in the nature of an attempt at obfuscation. But please understand that I am not accusing you of obfuscation. :D

And while you think it is unlikely I could avoid acting on whatever my unknown biases might be, you are willing to accept that it is possible - correct? Please answer this question directly.

Forgive my simple mindedness but it would be useful for me to capsulize your argument. Would it be fair to say that, to the extent it is true, the head of every major studio is Jewish is combination of pure chance and the admirable and pervasive work ethic of Jewish culture. I understand that this won't capture all of the nuances, but is it close enough for the purposes of discussion?

[Spoke]

Are you sure about this?

Aside from vague mutterings about "the man" (in a rather different context), I have never heard of any serious effort to investigate WASP dominance of any industry. I have certainly never heard of a lawsuit filed, or even proposed, to found out the "truth" about such dominance.

Sorry Tom, but that's just an argument from ignorance.

Here's a suit against Honda (http://www.theautochannel.com/news/press/date/19990819/press028561.html) just as a quick example:

According to the lawsuit, Honda has long operated under a "buddy system," in which upper management consisting only of whites and Japanese managers use favoritism to decide assignments and promotions, resulting in a glass ceiling preventing blacks from moving up in the company.

The lawsuit notes that even as late as 1998, only 3% of Honda's managers were black, despite the fact that for many years, the percentage of African-Americans in Honda's overall workforce has been significantly higher. The lawsuit alleges that this is due to the fact that "Honda has segregated blacks into the lowest level production jobs, while whites and Japanese dominate the management positions," the result of a pattern and practice of race discrimination that goes back many years and continues today.

[tomndebb]

Sorry Tom, but that's just an argument from ignorance.

Here's a suit against Honda (http://www.theautochannel.com/news/press/date/19990819/press028561.html) just as a quick example:That example does not support your claim.

The suit claims discrimination against blacks; the top manangement includes both "whites" and Japanese, (with no indication that the "white" management is limited to a single ethnic group such as WASPs or Germans or Irish). Exclusion of one specific group is not the same as a claim that a single group has excluded all others.

[DSeid]

... while you think it is unlikely I could avoid acting on whatever my unknown biases might be, you are willing to accept that it is possible - correct? Please answer this question directly.While I have yet to meet a human being who is able to completely not act on their biases, it is possible that you are one. Or that you are not human or even a living creature. I do not even know for sure that you are not a program running. So sure I can accept it is possible.

Forgive my simple mindedness but it would be useful for me to capsulize your argument. Would it be fair to say that, to the extent it is true, the head of every major studio is Jewish is combination of pure chance and the admirable and pervasive work ethic of Jewish culture. I understand that this won't capture all of the nuances, but is it close enough for the purposes of discussion?Nope, not even close.

Pure chance has nothing to do with it in my mind and Jews have no greater work ethic than most other cultures, and not as much as quite a few. Neither do we possess any particular culture of achievement that a multitude of other cultures do not also have. Nor do we achieve across the board.

My preferred explanation rests on other cultural factors. And as long winded, sorry, "extensive", as you may feel my posts that explain my speculations on that matter are, they really are as concise as I can state it:
Diaspora and being forced to move on with no ability to take much in the way of physical assets.
Literacy.
Tradition of arguing over religious interpretations rather than of accepting truth as revealed.
Outsider status, with the fresh look that brings and the insecurity it results in.
Equals a population that values ideas as the most portable assets and that highly prizes the ability to handle them, manage them, and trade in them. Not the best hunters, not the best farmers, the Cossacks were not crazy about Jews with guns and if the farmland was arable they'd let a Jew farm it? But generations of the idea import/export business. That inventory you can always pack up in a hurry.

And Hollywood? An idea import/export business like no other. To the degree that those cultural traditions are still extant (and they become less so as time goes on, and being a knowledge worker with wide exposure to different cultures' ideas is no longer as unusual), of course Hollywood has more than its share of Jews.

[New Deal Democrat]

Jews do not control Hollywood. Orthodox Jews certainly do not, or there would not be so many R rated movies.

Jews do have a prominence in Hollywood that is far out of proportion to their numbers. This is also true for the worlds of finance, journalism, and the academy. They have won one out of five Nobel prizes. The reason is because the average IQ for an Ashkenazic Jew is 112. Jews earn their prominence in fields requiring superior intelligence.

BTW, I am not Jewish, or I would not be posting this.

[Spoke]

That example does not support your claim.

The suit claims discrimination against blacks; the top manangement includes both "whites" and Japanese, (with no indication that the "white" management is limited to a single ethnic group such as WASPs or Germans or Irish). Exclusion of one specific group is not the same as a claim that a single group has excluded all others.

In other words, Honda is even less exclusive than our hypothetical WASP-run company, and it is still subject to a discrimination suit (based on exactly the sort of good-old-boy hiring and promotion practices I've been talking about).

I guess I don't understand your argument. Are you arguing that an all-WASP management team wouldn't be susceptible to a discrimination lawsuit? Because I assure you it would. Are you arguing that it is legally acceptable to make hiring and promotion decisions based on ethnicity or religion? Because I assure you it is not.

[tomndebb]

In other words, Honda is even less exclusive than our hypothetical WASP-run company, and it is still subject to a discrimination suit (based on exactly the sort of good-old-boy hiring and promotion practices I've been talking about).

The thread is a discussion about an ethnic group having nearly exclusive control of an industry.

I pointed out that we do not routinely attack ethnic groups (or the specific managers belonging to a particular ethnic group) simply for dominating other industires. I noted that WASPs controlled a number of industries, for years, with no objections raised against them.

You asserted that we did object to ethnic groups who dominated certain industries, then pointed to an example where multiple ethnic groups shared control of a company and the company was sued by a different ethnic group for exclusion.

You have not made a case that our society demonstrates antipathy to ethnic domination of an industry (outside objections to Jews). We certainly do not demonstrate such antipathy on a routine basis.

I guess I don't understand your argument. Are you arguing that an all-WASP management team wouldn't be susceptible to a discrimination lawsuit? Because I assure you it would. Are you arguing that it is legally acceptable to make hiring and promotion decisions based on ethnicity or religion? Because I assure you it is not.Embedded in this paragraph is an assumption that exclusionary practices have been employed to keep the WASPs (or Jews) at the top of the industry. So far, not a single incidence of such exclusionary actions have been presented, (while I have provided the counter example that the WASP, Roy Disney, recruited the Jewish Michel Eisner to take over the Disney Corporation--hardly an example of Jews getting to the top by excluding others).
On the other hand, no one has presented an example of any industry in which control by a single ethnic group has been challenged in court.

Making a claim that there just might possibly be some sort of exclusionary activity, (that has never been legally challenged in 90+ years of history in the industry) is nothing but basesless speculation. We have not even established that Jewish prevalence in the entertinment industry reaches the level of control; we have been working off the ramblings of one Op Ed piece that used cherry-picked data to make a point. Where is the list of all the entertainment industry corporations with a list of their CxOs so that we can see whether there is true control or dominance or whether there is simply a high proportion of Jews in the industry--much as there is in Law and academia? Perhaps this whole discussion is based on a smoke and mirrors assertion.

[Spoke]

You have not made a case that our society demonstrates antipathy to ethnic domination of an industry (outside objections to Jews). We certainly do not demonstrate such antipathy on a routine basis.

Yes we do. We have anti-discrimination laws designed to prevent discriminatory hiring and promotion practices.

Please clarify: do you think that if, hypothetically, one ethnic group were being hired or promoted to the exclusion of another, it would be legal?


On the other hand, no one has presented an example of any industry in which control by a single ethnic group has been challenged in court.

You are being purposely obtuse. Good-old-boy hiring and promotion practices that lead to one ethnic group dominating a company to the exclusion of others subjects that company to US anti-discrimination laws. The Honda case should show you that. The fact that management there is dominated by two ethnic groups rather than one is a distinction without a difference. The point is that another ethnic group is being excluded.

[DSeid]

Yes we do. We have anti-discrimination laws designed to prevent discriminatory hiring and promotion practices.

Please clarify: do you think that if, hypothetically, one ethnic group were being hired or promoted to the exclusion of another, it would be legal? Yes. Unless it could be shown that the reason one was being hired to the exclusion of the other was because of ethnicity. The fact that NBA players are mostly Black is not presumptive evidence of discrimination against Whites. The fact that in 1997 only 1.8% (http://www.jstor.org/pss/2963254) of the Harvard Medical School was Black was not evidence that Harvard discriminated against Blacks, only that their efforts at affirmative action were failing to achieve their goals.

And even the fact that only 3% of Honda's management was Black was not considered evidence of discrimination against Blacks by Honda. The suit was not only dismissed (http://www.clearinghouse.net/detail.php?id=10718) in a summary judgement but the court awarded "$51,770.48, against the plaintiffs and in favor of the defendant"

Not the best "quick example" to choose methinks. All it shows is that going on a fishing expedition on the basis of some isolated statistics is a poor decision to make and one that the courts frown upon. And they at least had some real numbers and some plausible systemic process that could lead to discrimination to point at.