If someone made such a suggestion, I would suspect that you would be correct. Since I have seen no one make any suggestion even resembling yours, I am confused why you would put it forth.
Clearly, aside from those who wish to eradicate all religions, most people of good will would probably favor a plan in which society was encouraged to accept all peoples regardless how they might be perceived as “different.” I am under no illusion that it would be easily done, but the promotion of a pluralistic society such as we are attempting in the U.S. would be a good start.
I seem to recall that early Russian Communists had planned on taking that approach to “the Jewish problem.” They felt it a problem as much as did the Nazis but felt that aculturation was the answer. I cannot find my source however.
Thanks Tamerlane for all the additional historical background. It pains me to realize that ancient Israel was really only an independent nation state for a few hundred years, and that after that it was either under one dominion or another or just recovering from one rebellion or another. As far as ancient powers went they were pretty Podunk. More a nation of insurgents most of the time.
I see we are well into the pointless "Am not! Did too! portion of the thread. Revisionism aside, the only real attempt at providing meaningful cites for any of your claims (including supposed ethnic characteristics) has come from DSeid. Not to mention your allegation that attempts to criticize Israeli policy are dismissed on this board as anti-Semitism, a whine that you’ve utterly failed to document.
After all those repetitions and expansions on stereotypes, followed by sneers about how you were unwilling to “pander” to ethnic sensibilities, it is not surprising that the benefit of the doubt would be exhausted and clinging to the ledge by a fingertip.
Would seem what? Never mind, I get the idea. Your misunderstanding is easily cleared up. I was not suggesting that you were racist, only that I doubted that we’d ever see you so vigorously pursuing the “historical truths” behind the stereotypes/slurs of blacks (or any other non-Jewish ethnic minorities). Of course, you’ll have ample chance to prove that you are an equal-opportunity truth-seeker in future threads.
I don’t need or want your apology (although if you prefer, you can simply take your conditional apology and apply it to everyone else except me).
Take greater care with your selection of words, eschew stereotypes that are commonly perceived as slurs unless you come very well-armed with cites and statistics, and a repetition of this can be avoided.
BTW Tom, I don’t entirely blame you for apparently not wanting to read everything that’s occurred in the thread during your absence, but commenting on early statements without recognizing everything that’s occurred in the interim (and repeating positions I have not taken) is rather pointless.
I’m absolutely stunned at how long this thread has dragged on. And the amount of time that two people can argue over something like this.
I want to know who in this thread is actually Jewish. I’m assuming Abe andJackmanii are…who else? I’d be shocked if any non-Jew could feel so passionately about this stuff.
I went back to the beginning because you went back to the beginning just two posts earlier. Nearly everything that has occurred in the interim has already simply been reiterations of the “Am not! Did too!” exchange and my comment is a rframing of the original dispute with an attempt to short circuit a few of the errors that I see took this thread down a wrong path.
Perhaps you might want to consider that the discussion has, indeed, been driven by your effort to beat down Abe without attempting to understand the point he made rather than the point you want him to have made. (Note that while Abenever used the word “clannish,” that was a central point of your accusations for a substantial part of the diispute.) Your rather hollow repeated refrain that I should read what has been posted suggests that you are not actually reading anyone’s posts except through your own filters. (I have, for example, not seen you back away from a condemnation of “cohesive” simply because you focused your attacks on “insular” and your repeated objection to “tribalism” indicates that you neither read what Abe originally posted nor any of his corrections to that error.) I have read every post in this thread, (several exchanges multiple times), and basically I see Abe holding too long to a word that you did not like (and a word that I do not like) and you ignoring everything he posted because you did not like that word.
Going back to the beginning was an effort to get folks to take a breath and see whether they have let the increasing passions of the dispute color their perceptions of what is the real point rather than what they want to perceive in their opponent. It was not ignoring everything that had occurred (although some of it would be better lost) but suggesting that the discussion start over with a clean slate to see whether it must follow the same path.
Well, I’m shocked, okay not shocked, more :rolleyes: that Jack and Abe are at it again, now clearly not arguing over content but whose fault it was. Plenty of missteps to go around, leave it at that, 'kay?
I’m still curious. It may be true that Jews tend to self-associate more than other cultural groups, even while being active members of society and of its secular functions. Being honest with myself I realize that my three closest freinds (beyond my wife of course :)) are all also Jewish. Sure I work and socialize with non-Jews too, but my closest freinds are Jewish. I’m not clannish, I’m not insular (I don’t think), but I don’t happen to have many close Christian freinds. Have I been socialized this way? And if so, does this contribute to the possibility of increasing Jew-hatred in this country?
Jack, can I distract you from you from your ongoing activities with Abe to offer comment?
Come on. I was explaining how it was difficult to be predisposed to “benign intent” from the beginning. What followed was not reassuring to me or to other posters. Completely ignoring the Grand Parade Of Stereotypes and again trying to put words in my mouth about Jews being invisible is not at all helpful.
By the way, I was probably unclear in one of my comments to Abe earlier. He was preconditioning an apology for wrongly using “loaded” terms on the basis that I admit jumping on his case prematurely. What I meant to respond was, if he really feels that he did something that requires apology, why not do so unconditionally to everyone else except me?
DSeid, I don’t think that anecdotal evidence means much. For instance, I associate mostly with non-Jewish people. That is similarly meaningless in the big picture.
As to isolated studies like the one you mentioned earlier (assuming sociological and scientific research are equivalent in rigorousness and reproducibility), I know of a rare study suggesting that there’s a basis to homeopathy and that hospitalized patients who are prayed for do better than their non-prayed over counterparts (studies which are arguably flawed, not supported by any followup research and/or refuted by other work).
Do you employ homeopathic dilutions in your practice and pray for all your pediatric patients in the hospital?
I was sort of relieved to hear the study had been debunked. Though I’m an agnostic, it was chilling to think that any deity would help some patients get better and leave others to rot, merely to prove its existence and/or reward those who worship it.
You know, seeing that PaulFitzroy* is shocked at the length and tenor of the thread, maybe it really is time to call a halt. Besides, Myakot wants me to read her a bedtime story.
*Have no fear, Paul you’re so far ahead in the 2004 Winston Cup standings for lengthy and vituperative threads, that it would take at least a dozen more like this for anyone to have a hope of catching you.
Funny Jack, I had just posted on GQ about a meta-analysis of homeopathy and the problems of meta-analysis.
A single study is only worth so much, to be sure. As I said before. And there are intrinsic problems comparing Jewishness as a cultural identity with other cultural identities. But it is the only data we have, and it is, I reluctantly admit, consistent with my own anectdotal experience. Now I doubt that the same results would hold for other “ethnicities” that share minority religious status (eg Indian Hindus, Arab Moslems, Sikhs, etc) as for Italians, etc that share majority religious status. These populations are new to the game of being a religious minority in another culture. I would be very interested in a study of the assimilation of Indian Hindus in particular, given my particular stereotypes. (What, me have stereotypes?!) Maybe I’ll search for some data. But I doubt that I’ll find a direct comparison.
I 've been lurking over the course of this thread because there’s nothing I know or can say that hasn’t been touched on or expressed better by all involved. I just wanted to chime in and say “Thank you” to everyone; you may not reallize it, but in reading this thread from start to end, there is enough material in here for at least three or four Master’s-level theses.
So far no direct comparison but this interesting paper which confirms my sense that the only valid comparison should between groups that consider themselves in a Diaspora, generally meaning that their minority cultural status has both religious and non-religious aspects. For large portions of history this niche was occupied almost exclusively by the Jews, and they have been at it a very long time. Now those other groups have joined us , and my sense is that Jews are the least insular of that bunch. But I have no data yet to support that claim.
Still haven’t gotten an answer to my question…I’m just curious. Who’s Jewish here?
Why am I “shocked?” I’ve encountered two types of people in my lifetime who have an intense concern and preoccupation with Jews, the type of people who can discuss anti-Semitism for 5 pages. Those two types of people are Jews and anti-Semites.
I’m not “shit my pants in amazement” shocked, just surprised, that people could argue over whether or not Jews are clannish, which has been the overarching theme of the more recent pages of this trifling, legnthy debate, not “social justice” or any other lofty concept you might crusade in the name of.
If Jews are “clannish,” so what? Is that a bad thing? I don’t see how it is…as far as I’m concerned it means they can rely on each other. Most immigrant groups are clannish, and the Jews have been immigrants in almost every nation on Earth. So they’ve decided to rely on each other to advance socially and economically. It’s what certain people might call a “wise strategy.” Not some dirty word to be ashamed of.
You really need to develop a wider range of acquaintances.
Except for three points:
Jews have frequently assimilated (to greater or lesser extent) when they have been permitted to do so, indicating that they are not inherently “clannish”;
Jews can no longer be considered as “immigrants” to the U.S. when more recent arrivals such as the Poles and Serbs or, to a lesser extent, Italians are no longer seen as immigrants–and Jews have not been immigrants to the Nertherlands for several hundred years;
The accusation of clannishness has been used to rationalize attacks on them on the grounds that thjey do not “really” want to join the larger society–a point that is historically inaccurate.
I think that the my questions on the relative insularity of minority groups belongs in its own thread, so I’ve made one in case anyone wants to participate.
Actually, I had read some earlier posts in this thread which mentioned drawing people in the Jewish community, in a manner of speaking, away from Talmudic studies, for example. (I will not tackle or appraise the Talmud itself here; that’s a whole seperate topic.)
I confess to not having the documentation, and as I type this it’s 12:55 a.m. PST. I’ll post at a more convenient with a link, or better yet, a date and time and poster’s name, with an appropriate quote, to clarify what I posted earlier.
