Since Sweet Willy is now on record as claiming that Jewish religion and ideology are a threat to everyone, I don’t think I have anything more to contribute.
Well, except this: Ton-Ton Macoute! is a completely phenomenal album by Johnny Jenkins. His cover of Dr. John’s “Walk on Gilded Splinters” is truly a delight every time I hear it, and the album features some amazing Duane Allman riffs. If you like Nawlins sounds, I strongly recommend its purchase.
Really? Reread your statements. You made a comparison between Israeli treatment of Palestinians and U.S. treatment of refugees that has little bearing on reality and serves merely to demonstrate how one-sided your thinking is on this issue.
Sweet Willy, your points really are absurd. Let us think this out logically, shall we? Do you really think that Judaism is a racist religion. Tell me, what evidence do you have, precisely? I note that you repeatedly return to Israel’s imigration policy. You suggest that Israel excludes Muslims and Arabs who are trying to enter the country. Statistics, please. Oh, and since you think Israel is so positively racist, you must surely have some evidence of attacks on the Muslims currently living in Israel. What? Nothing? Much to your surprise, Sweet Willy, you may find that the Muslims are actually treated with some amount of humanity. Oh, and I notice that you seem to fear that Israel is going to spontaneously drop the bomb on innocent people out of racism. Gee, we have LOADS of evidence that this will happen. Sure, theoretically, Israel could, but why would they? I have the feeling that you are rather racist yourself, Sweet Willy. How can you point your finger at a religion that has been through the Holocaust and has lived through terrible violence since the creation of its own state. Really. Sure, this doesn’t make racism okay, but it makes finger-pointing virtually useless. For every so-called act of racism you can come up with that it Jewish, many more can be found that were against the Jews. Judaism is not a racist religion. We do not go into our temples and recite our desire to kill all those different from us. We do not suggest that there is some great punishment in store for those who are not our religion. I admit, we do mention our hope that some day the entire world will turn in awe toward our God, but this is simply a hope, that all religions have (though some suggest this should be achieved through violence and some do not.) Now, I’m sure you can find some racist act in the Torah, but, Judaism has evolved from such actions. We no longer support them, but in fact despise racist action. So, what evidence do you have, Sweet Willy? What logic is behind your seemingly racist comments?
Jackmanii, Again, my comments were based on someone elses comparison of immigration policies. You are right. There is no comparison. Stop twisting my statements to suit yourself.
Jewish race and religion are inseperable. The religion and the nation of Israel bestowe special privilidges to people based upon theire rac. It doesn’t matter if you are born at the north pole to an Eskimo father and a Jewish mother. You are still a Jew. It doesn’t matter if you even believe in God, you are still considered one of the chosen people of God and given special consideration by people who don’t even know you based completely on your race. That my friend is racism. Maybe you don’t see it that way. I do.
Your truly amazing state of denial aside, I will take this as a retraction, and a welcome one at that.
“‘Cos little Willy, Willy won’t go home
But you can’t push Willy round
Willy won’t go, try tellin’ everybody but, oh no
Little Willy, Willy won’t go home”
“Little Willy” - The Sweet
But they are effective.
Frankly it is the realm par excellance for the sarcastic response, if only becuase humiliating these kind of people is often the best response.
Ah yes, in re the issue of articles, rather than “speculating” needlessly, why not just ask?
Page 3, top left column, Editor’s Editorial on “world affairs” – I’d give a web citation but since it’s in Arabic and not an image, it would be pointless.
However, for a rather more accurate, and yet more disturbing --like I’ve said, the truth is bad enough without speculation-- see these articles. I checked them against the articles and they are accurate.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-032002blood.story?coll=la-home-todays-times
BTW in re the Muslim opinion poll which is oft cited here, see this:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A5708-2002Mar22.html
First and foremost: I generally use the word racist in reference to someone who is against a specific group (note also that I am, in this case, using it to refer to any group and not just a specific race.) This being so, I admit that you are right in the regard that, in a sense, Judaism is racist. However, such an argument is very dangerous because all religions are racist in the sense that they believe that they are right and everyone else is wrong. Now, in terms of Judaism being a race, and so separating it from other religions, technically, it isn’t a race. Why? The reason is that the Jewish religion is capable of gaining new members outside of the current race. True, if your mother is Jewish, by Jews you are considered Jewish. This is a fact. I can not pretend that this is not true, for then I would become a liar, which is never a useful label for one who plans to make a point. However, you must consider also the fact that such a system will generally only hold up for a certain number of generations. Let us say that a Jewish woman marries a Catholic, and decides to raise the children catholic. 100 generations later, no one is going to remember that technically, the descendents of this couple are technically. It probably wouldn’t take 100 generations either. And so, it really doesn’t make such a large difference, as the arrogance is not exclusive to Judaism, either in the realm of race or religion. As for Judaism being a threat, one would have to assume that such arrogance would cause Jews to gain a prejudice for other religions. This might occur, but it is no more likely to occur in Judaism than in most other religions (unless there are many religions unknown to me that view themselves as inferior.) So, Sweet Willy, what point are you trying to make?
It seems you are referring to me here, as you quoted two of my posts above.
If you look closely (okay, not closely at all, if you read what I wrote) you will notice that I was not comparing anyone’s immigration policies, I was explaining to you the historical reason for the Right of Return law.
Yeah Jackmanii, good idea. Resort to taunting. Grow up.
I am lending a degree of support to the OP. “Is Jewish Ideology a threat to us all?”
I am glad you see this. Racism is actually not something done against a specific group. Racism is the belief in the superiority of one race above another. Lots of religions believe themselves to be closer to God than others but the Jewish faith takes into account your race, your heritage, when making this consideration. I don’t know exactly how superior this makes Jewish people feel but I grant that others may perceive themselves inferior when faced with the notion that thier neighbor was born a “chosen one” and unfortunately no such inherent rights to glory were bestowed upon them. It is a very curious mix of race and religion.
Any idea what that certain number is? It seems to be holding up just fine in the year 2002 AD. I would suggest that it will hold up for as long as people subscribe to the ideology.
Agreed. Jewish are defintiely not the only people who attempt to legitimize racism.
Yes. And when the Vatican sees fit to arm itself with nuclear weapons, it then will also be a threat to me.
In terms of whether or not such a system of Jewish heritage will always hold up, look at the Catholic Church. Now, surely some Catholics today have Jewish heritage, but it is so difficult to trace such things back to such a great extent that it is almost pointless. True, with our better understanding of genetics, soon we may be able to trace back further, but what difference would it make? Why should you care? Some Jews (note I said some, for not all Jews support this concept in all cases, but many do) may believe someone of Jewish heritage to be Jewish regardless of their beliefs, but why on Earth does it matter to you? Such people are not seeking out these people of Jewish decent and forcing them to be Jewish, nor seeking them out to provide special privaleges. True, some privaleges are given, but these are mainly limited to imigration to Israel and conversion to Judaism. Also, one must generally already be seeking out such privaleges to take advantage of them, and how many cases do you know of where a person who doesn’t believe in Judaism in the least took advantage of this? Once again, I fail to see how it truly makes a gigantic difference. Also, in terms of Israel being a threat in terms of its possession of nuclear weapons, how stupid do you think Israel is? If Israel were to wage nuclear war based soley on a racist mentality (and what evidence do you have that Jews would support this?) it would probably result in its own destruction. Surprisingly perhaps to you, Israel does not consist of a bunch of Jewish radicals who want to destroy all other races (as a matter of fact, I have never myself encountered such a radical. Maybe you could find some statistics on how many Jews want to destroy all other racists.) Israel is a patch of civilazation in an area of the world where civilization seems to be a rarity. Civilized countries generally know better than to wage nuclear war. So, remind me again why precisely you view Israel and Judaism as a threat? I seem to be confused.
I find it interesting that you need to resort to a total corruption of the Jewish beliefs regarding their “chosen” status in order to make your case.
The concept of being chosen in Judaism has rather more to do with God’s choosing them to present His views of rectitude to the world. It is the imposition of an obligation, not a bestowing of glory. It is a subject that has been discussed several times on this MB (most recently in just the last couple of days). There is no exaltation of Jewish people as being inherently better than anyone else in any literature that I have seen, so applying it here appears to be simply the act of taking the word “chosen” out of context to make a false point.
As to “Jewish ideology,” I have seen no statement regarding what such a thing would be. Is it the Jewish penchant for universal education? That certainly seems threatening.
Given that Israel is a parliamentary democracy that has, in the last few years, given power to different parties alternating between those who sought to provide concessions for peace and those who sought to enforce peace with military might, it seems difficult to discern some single ideology to oppose.
As recently as two weeks ago, members of the Jewish military publicly announced that they opposed actions being carried out in the occupied territories. So much for the single-minded ideology of Israelis (or Jews). (Of course, that was prior to the current wave of bombings–all of which have been carried out by Yasser Arafat’s own party while he “claimed” to be willing to meet to negotiate a truce. Those sorts of actions are liable to have united Israeli opinion in the way that the WTC attacks have generally united the fractious citizens of the U.S.)
Until you actually lay out this “Jewish ideology” that you purport to believe in (without resorting to corrupting Jewish teachings based on a misreading of the word “chosen”), then your point appears to be simply that you would like to cast stones at some group and they are currently visible targets.
Mandos,
I truely appreciate your civility in this debate. Some are less than that in addressing the possible and fundamental flaws in ideals that they hold dear.
It matters to me because it is an attempt to create a divide based on someones idea of when and where genealogy starts and stops. We are all human beings. Homosapiens. People. History teaches us that in our attempts to seperate ourselves from our fellow humans beings, based on race, we have secondarily created hostility and hate out of the most noble causes. The bottom line is that racism is a dead end street. Your race does not make you any better or worse as a human being. This is by no means limited to Jewish ideals. That just happens to be the topic at hand.
Only the United States has ever used weapons of mass destruction in warfare. Others saw the utter destruction and have armed themselves with nuclear weapons. Did they just think they were cool so we should get some? No. They are wholely intended as a threat. How would you characterize the nuclear weapons held by any nation? I consider Israel an exceptional threat due to the matter - of - fact racist principles they harbor. While the principles are not so harmful in and of themselves, you must consider that it is an atmosphere, an ideology(racism), that has historically proven to bring out the absolute worst in human nature.
There is significant history to support war based on racist mentality. It probably would result in the destrustion of Israel. I try to consider whom else might get destroyed in the process.
I would not make that characterization.
I view Judaism as a threat because the religion does promote racism. I view Israel as a threat because it endorses and includes Jewish religious ideals in the body of its national policy and maintains a significant military force in support of such policy.
So you continue to assert without providing any evidence that there even are such “Jewish religious ideals” much less that they have been incorporated into Israeli law.
The sole “Jewish ideal” that I can see is the ability to provide a haven for a religious group with a history of over 2,000 years of persecution. Do you have a specific reason to deny these people refuge as a point of law?
I’m remembering something about planks and specks. Or maybe it was kettles and pots.
Whichever, it’s usually pretty silly to deride others for stubbornness and refuse to even consider the possibility one might oneself be wrong.
Tom ,
Have you read this thread? I know you have. Twice here is stated the Israeli rights of return. It does exalt Jews as being prefered citizens. It does make exaltation in the name of heritage in black and white print. It is racist in its intent.
I have yet to find any area of relent with you Tom. I don’t expect it here. I think I have said all I can say in explaining my POV.
Aside from your asssertion that it is “bad,” Sweet Willy, you have provided no actual reasons why providing a refuge for a persecuted group is evil. Since we seem to have established that no other group is excluded (barring any evidence that may appear in the future) you simply seem to be asserting that no group should be allowed to provide refuge for people like themselves.
You may claim that is some sort of “exaltation,” but, given your misunderstanding of the phrase “chosen people,” your failure to identify any specifically “Jewish” ideology, and your refusal to spell out an actual reason why providing refuge is wrong, it would appear that you are simply basing your objections on a gut feeling that anything done by any group that includes religious belief must be “bad.”
Not very persuasive, I’m afraid.
A question about the things that Shahak writes ?
(I have read parts of what he writes)
How present is this “attitude” among religious jews today ?
Remember back on page one when you were whining that there was no evidence that you were an anti-Semite?
That’s for providing it so clearly.
Fenris
Er…“Thanks for providing such clear evidence.”
Main Entry: an·ti-Sem·i·tism
Pronunciation: "an-ti-'se-m&-"ti-z&m, "an-"tI-
Function: noun
Date: 1882
: hostility toward or discrimination against Jews as a religious, ethnic, or racial group
Fenris,
I certainly do not advocate hostility or discrimination against Jews. I have made every effort to present my point of view without advocating anything of the sort. If you believe my fundamentals against racism are hostile, suit yourself. Might as well call me anti - white, anti - black, anti - catholic, etc. etc. etc. I don’t view such matters with much regard to what group of people it is coming from. It reeks from any direction.