Whoa, please. I’m not trying to stereotype, I’m just trying to deal with the issue of the thread: whether an insult against a group is a “personal insult” and therefore a rules violation. I said, when this first came up, that characterizing a group is stereotyping, and so probably shouldn’t be done anyway.
However, just because I think characterizing a group is stereotyping doesn’t mean that members won’t do it.
Now, in that context, the interesting question was raised, if there are groups that are bound by their beliefs/ideas, then is it OK to attack those beliefs? That is, would statements, such as “Republicans are money-grubbing pigs” or “Democrats are Communists” be personal insults (in the sense of our rules), in a discussion where some members have identified themselves with each party? I’m trying to wrestle with that, and I think there’s a range in which no, it is not a personal insult. That is, there are cases where you can insult the idea or group without violating our rules against personal insults.
At the other extreme, to insult some groups (such as by gender, age, ethnicity, race, etc) is certainly to insult the individual members in that group, and is a violation of our rules.
I therefore raised the question of dealing (at that level) with insults against a religion. On the one hand, the religion is based on beliefs, and so to attack those beliefs (and to insult the religion) is not a “personal insult” against members. On the other hand, if the attack on the religion is tied to ethnicity then it is a violation of our rules. That’s the only point I was trying to raise.
Is it possible to attack Judaism (a group bound by beliefs) but not attack individual Jews? Of course. The former is discussion/debate; the latter is personal insult (racism) and not allowed here.
Is it possible to attack Judaism AND in fact be attacking individual Jews? That is, to have racism disguised as discussion/debate? Again, I think yes.
And I think Judaism isn’t the only such situation. It might be possible to seemingly challenge Islam, but in fact be insulting Arabs. It might be possible to seemingly challenge Hinduism, but in fact be insulting Indians. It might be possible to seemingly challenge Catholicism, but in fact be insulting Mexicans. That’s the dilemma I was trying to raise, and that’s why I raise the point that religion can be tied to ethnicity.
That’s the only point I was trying to make. I was certainly not suggesting that “all X are Y,” only that there are countries/nationalities that are predominately one religion or another. Hence, the categories of religion and ethnicity are not as separated as (let us say) the categories of political affiliation and gender.