That's Racist! (Racists Don't Care)

[Romana]

I saw this story on the news today.
When it got to this part, wait, wut?

“The attacks, they are random, they are anonymous, they are racially based,” longtime Williamsburg resident Marianne Cocchini said. “I think we all need to be educated on both sides of the equation.”

Educated on both sides of the equation? Just WTF does she think the Jews there need to be educated about? How not to look Jewish? For Orthodox Jews and Hasidim, that's more of an ask than she'd think. And who says it would help? There was an attack not long ago where the guy walked up to his victim and asked "are you Jewish?" and then attacked him even without an answer.
The reporter dropped the ball, not asking her to clarify.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Comedians who poke at society have to be brazen and arrogant almost by definition. The razor edge of that humor cuts many different ways, and being thoughtful and prudent works against that creative exploration. There's no magic formulat for getting it right every single time.

I don't think anyone expects them to get it right every single time, just to acknowledge that sometimes they do get it wrong, and to apologize when that happens.

 

[Arilynn]

I know this may be ignorant, but wouldn’t it be wrong to say that Jews are a race, and if so, didn’t Goldberg’s comments reflect US racial ideas? Also, if it was anti-semitic for the Nazis to label being Jewish a race and thus lumping disparate people into one racial category, then isn’t it wrong to say that the Nazis were racist against the Jews?

I don’t understand why what she said was so wrong, but I assume I’m missing some major idea.

 

[Romana]

I know this may be ignorant, but wouldn’t it be wrong to say that Jews are a race, and if so, didn’t Goldberg’s comments reflect US racial ideas? Also, if it was anti-semitic for the Nazis to label being Jewish a race and thus lumping disparate people into one racial category, then isn’t it wrong to say that the Nazis were racist against the Jews?

I don’t understand why what she said was so wrong, but I assume I’m missing some major idea.

In the video I posted earlier, the guy describes how the Nazis "made" the Jews a race. They constructed a definition based on physical characteristics and pseudoscience so that the Jews, for all intents and purposes, were, not only a race, but an inferior one.
This definition was fungible when they wanted it to be. If a Jewish child fit the desired profile of the Lebensborn program, they conveniently ignored their "dirty Jewish blood".
This faux -racial definition persisted among antisemites and is still alive and well.
As to what the woman in the news clip said? That depends on what she meant by "educated in both sides of the equation ". Does she think the Jews have to be educated about why their attackers hate them? If it's not that, what are the two sides?

 

[Arilynn]

In the video I posted earlier, the guy describes how the Nazis "made" the Jews a race. They constructed a definition based on physical characteristics and pseudoscience so that the Jews, for all intents and purposes, were, not only a race, but an inferior one.
This definition was fungible when they wanted it to be. If a Jewish child fit the desired profile of the Lebensborn program, they conveniently ignored their "dirty Jewish blood".
This faux -racial definition persisted among antisemites and is still alive and well.
As to what the woman in the news clip said? That depends on what she meant by "educated in both sides of the equation ". Does she think the Jews have to be educated about why their attackers hate them? If it's not that, what are the two sides?

I’m not sure who the woman in the news clip is.

It makes sense to me that it was antisemitic for the Nazis to say there is a Jewish race. But then wasn’t Whoopi Goldberg reflecting this when she said it wasn’t about racism? I’m completely confused.

 

[Romana]

I’m not sure who the woman in the news clip is.

It makes sense to me that it was antisemitic for the Nazis to say there is a Jewish race. But then wasn’t Whoopi Goldberg reflecting this when she said it wasn’t about racism? I’m completely confused.

No, she wasn't. Because it's racism even if the construct of race is imposed and artificial.
The Nazis believed, and still do, that the Jews are a separate and inferior race who should be exterminated. That's racism even if skin color is not involved.
If was also not about "two groups of white guys fighting each other." What means did the Jews in Germany have to fight with?
Whoopi now knows this, and she apologized.
It was wrong of her to say those things, but it was out of ignorance, and now she knows.
The woman in the cheek is in the news article I posted upthread.

https://www.virtualverse.one/forums/threads/thats-racist-racists-dont-care.10275/post-190110

 

[Innula Zenovka]

I’m not sure who the woman in the news clip is.

It makes sense to me that it was antisemitic for the Nazis to say there is a Jewish race. But then wasn’t Whoopi Goldberg reflecting this when she said it wasn’t about racism? I’m completely confused.

The British comedian David Baddiel explains it thus, in his book Jews Don't Count

When online I talk about racism against Jews, people – from both left and right – sometimes decide to object by saying that Jews are not a race and therefore cannot suffer racism. This is an old canard, generally employed by those who have learned that racism is bad, but can’t be doing with extending that sufferance to Jews: and so they downgrade the category of anti-Semitism to that of religious intolerance. Which gives them more of a free hand with Jews, as religious intolerance is not as bad as racism. (In fact, religious intolerance could almost be seen as a good thing in this view, religion being a belief system with power and money attached, worthy of satire).

Except anti-Semitism has very little to do with religion. As I have often said, I’m an atheist and yet the Gestapo would shoot me tomorrow. Racists who don’t like Jews never ask the Jew they are abusing how often they go to synagogue. They just see the Jewish name and they know. Which is why it’s racism. One’s Jewishness, just like one’s skin colour, is an accident of birth, and as far as the racists are concerned – and they, sadly, are the people that matter as far as racism goes – you can never lose either.

 

[Romana]

SCOTUS Just Blew Up the Voting Rights Act’s Ban on Racial Gerrymandering

By greenlighting Alabama’s egregious map, five justices declared open season on racial minorities’ voting power.

slate.com

 

[Khamon]

I know this may be ignorant, but wouldn’t it be wrong to say that Jews are a race, and if so, didn’t Goldberg’s comments reflect US racial ideas? Also, if it was anti-semitic for the Nazis to label being Jewish a race and thus lumping disparate people into one racial category, then isn’t it wrong to say that the Nazis were racist against the Jews?

I don’t understand why what she said was so wrong, but I assume I’m missing some major idea.

It is not wrong to say that the Nazis were racist against the Jews. Racism is an artificial construction based on a fabricated specification of a racial group. Race does not exist; humans are humans; there is no actual racial difference between any human and any other human. The Nazis are intentionally racist against what they refer to as "the Jewish Race" that, in their made up definition, includes anyone of Jewish descent (sons of Isaac), anyone who practices any form of Judaism, and anyone who sympathizes or in any way supports them.

The Germanic Nazis also constructed their own "Aryan Race" and were, in reverse fashion, racists against anyone that didn't meet those specifications. White Americans have perpetrated the same ridiculous dogma for over two-hundred years. It will not end soon or well.

 

[Arilynn]

And then there is anti-Semitism. Genetically Jews are the descendants of refugees from the Middle East who intermarried with people from the countries they settled in who share cultural heritage based on their religion. Despite their diversity racists lump them all together and apply often contradictory stereotypes (Jews have been said to be both financial manipulators pulling global strings and unskilled labor taking jobs away from Christian immigrants).

tl:dr Racists often create races to fit their stereotypes.

In the video I posted earlier, the guy describes how the Nazis "made" the Jews a race. They constructed a definition based on physical characteristics and pseudoscience so that the Jews, for all intents and purposes, were, not only a race, but an inferior one.
This definition was fungible when they wanted it to be. If a Jewish child fit the desired profile of the Lebensborn program, they conveniently ignored their "dirty Jewish blood".
This faux -racial definition persisted among antisemites and is still alive and well.
As to what the woman in the news clip said? That depends on what she meant by "educated in both sides of the equation ". Does she think the Jews have to be educated about why their attackers hate them? If it's not that, what are the two sides?

It is not wrong to say that the Nazis were racist against the Jews. Racism is an artificial construction based on a fabricated specification of a racial group. Race does not exist; humans are humans; there is no actual racial difference between any human and any other human. The Nazis are intentionally racist against what they refer to as "the Jewish Race" that, in their made up definition, includes anyone of Jewish descent (sons of Isaac), anyone who practices any form of Judaism, and anyone who sympathizes or in any way supports them.

The Germanic Nazis also constructed their own "Aryan Race" and were, in reverse fashion, racists against anyone that didn't meet those specifications. White Americans have perpetrated the same ridiculous dogma for over two-hundred years. It will not end soon or well.

So saying Jews constitute a race is antisemitic.That makes sense to me.

The British comedian David Baddiel explains it thus, in his book Jews Don't Count

When online I talk about racism against Jews, people – from both left and right – sometimes decide to object by saying that Jews are not a race and therefore cannot suffer racism. This is an old canard, generally employed by those who have learned that racism is bad, but can’t be doing with extending that sufferance to Jews: and so they downgrade the category of anti-Semitism to that of religious intolerance. Which gives them more of a free hand with Jews, as religious intolerance is not as bad as racism. (In fact, religious intolerance could almost be seen as a good thing in this view, religion being a belief system with power and money attached, worthy of satire).

Except anti-Semitism has very little to do with religion. As I have often said, I’m an atheist and yet the Gestapo would shoot me tomorrow. Racists who don’t like Jews never ask the Jew they are abusing how often they go to synagogue. They just see the Jewish name and they know. Which is why it’s racism. One’s Jewishness, just like one’s skin colour, is an accident of birth, and as far as the racists are concerned – and they, sadly, are the people that matter as far as racism goes – you can never lose either.

Maybe this is part of the divergence: I don’t think either antisemitism or religious intolerance is “not as bad as racism”. Antisemitism includes the Holocaust, pogroms, and hundreds of years of often murderous action. More recently, it also conjures temple shootings and the violence of Charlottesville. Racism includes bloody, torturous lynching, George Floyd, and so much other lethal violence. I don’t see one as better than the other. That makes no sense to me.

I know some identify as cultural Jews without being religious. But, being from Minnesota, I know that there are blue-eyed, blonde Jews, Jews with Asian last names, and converts who weren’t born into Judaism. Which goes back to Nazis saying that there is a Jewish race was antisemitic scapegoating and continues today.

There is no Jewish race, right? So why aren’t people saying Whoopi Goldberg erred by failing to the issue was antisemitism and instead are using that antisemitic idea that there is a Jewish race and thus anti-Jewish racism?
…
Regardless, all of you folks saying I’m wrong tells me I’m wrong. And I can pretend I understand what was said in this thread even though that’s apparently untrue. Doing that always rankles me, but I can stop questioning and just accept there is something I’m missing. (I’m really literal; is that part of the problem?) I’d rather, however, understand my error than fake comprehension. So I’m not *trying* to be annoyingly dense and apologize if me effortlessly being so causes anyone pain. I’d just like to understand my error.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

There is no Jewish race, right? So why aren’t people saying Whoopi Goldberg erred by failing to the issue was antisemitism and instead are using that antisemitic idea that there is a Jewish race and thus anti-Jewish racism?

There's no Irish race, but what would you make of the adverts "Room to let. No blacks, no Irish" that were once not uncommon in parts of the UK before the Race Relations Act 1968? Racist against Blacks but what against the Irish?

British law defines racism as hostility towards someone based on their actual or presumed "race, colour, nationality (including citizenship) or ethnic or national origins," which I think is a useful way of looking at it.

It's also long regarded Sikhs as an ethnic, rather than religious, group, protected by statutes against racial, rather than religious, discrimination (though not for the purposes of the census, somewhat contentiously), as a result of Mandla v Dowell-Lee (a Sikh boy was refused admission to a school because his father refused to make him stop wearing a dastar and cut his hair).

 

[WolfEyes]

Maybe this will help?

Currently, H. s. sapiens is the only widely accepted subspecies of H. sapiens, and the necessity of this designation remains a matter of debate, since traditional taxonomic practice subdivides a species only when there is evidence of two or more distinct subgroups. Several subspecies of H. sapiens have been proposed. For example, Swedish naturalist and explorer Carl Linnaeus, in the 10th edition of his Systema Naturae (1758), classified modern human beings into four subspecies according to geographic origin: H. s. asiaticus, H. s. europaeus, H. s. afer, and H. s. americanus. Linnaeus’s classification was later discarded because of the recognition of racial prejudice and outdated notions of European superiority implicit in his taxonomy and because of discoveries that only superficial differences existed between these groups.

Homo sapiens sapiens | Characteristics & Facts | Britannica

Homo sapiens sapiens, subspecies of Homo sapiens that consists of the only living members of genus Homo. Traditionally, this subspecies designation was used to separate modern humans from more-archaic members of H. sapiens. It is thought to have evolved sometime between 160,000 and 90,000 years...

www.britannica.com

 

[Khamon]

To act racist means to act hatefully toward someone, or a group of people, because I believe they meet a specification of what I call a race. The race doesn't exist. My hateful behaviour exists. We describe my hatefulness as "racist" because I'm committing the hate under the delusion that a person, or group, belongs to a non-existent race. We have to use the terminology to address my hatefulness because I've predefined it.

Factually, though, there is no Jewish race. There is no Italian race. There is no black race. There is no Asian race. There is no white race. Acknowledging, and basing actions on, a racial definition is racist. Using the term "race" to describe a group of people in a social or political dialog is a mistake that condones the practice and further aggravates the issues. We need to somehow focus our attention on needs and solutions using concepts and terminology beyond what the racists have imposed to justify their fear.

I wish that had been Ms. Goldberg's point and the public discussion could have continued.

 

[Grandma Bates]

To act racist means to act hatefully toward someone, or a group of people, because I believe they meet a specification of what I call a race. The race doesn't exist. My hateful behaviour exists. We describe my hatefulness as "racist" because I'm committing the hate under the delusion that a person, or group, belongs to a non-existent race. We have to use the terminology to address my hatefulness because I've predefined it.

Factually, though, there is no Jewish race. There is no Italian race. There is no black race. There is no Asian race. There is no white race. Acknowledging, and basing actions on, a racial definition is racist. Using the term "race" to describe a group of people in a social or political dialog is a mistake that condones the practice and further aggravates the issues. We need to somehow focus our attention on needs and solutions using concepts and terminology beyond what the racists have imposed to justify their fear.

I wish that had been Ms. Goldberg's point and the public discussion could have continued.

Race is not a biological classification but is a tool made up by people to help enforce divisions wthin society. The case of immigrants from Southern Italy to the United States is an interesting case study:

The Religious Boundaries of an Inbetween People: Street Feste and the Problem of the Dark-Skinned Other in Italian Harlem, 1920-1990 on JSTOR

Robert Orsi, The Religious Boundaries of an Inbetween People: Street Feste and the Problem of the Dark-Skinned Other in Italian Harlem, 1920-1990, American Quarterly, Vol. 44, No. 3 (Sep., 1992), pp. 313-347

www.jstor.org

Italian Immigrants, Whiteness, and Race: A Regional Perspective on JSTOR

Stefano Luconi, Italian Immigrants, Whiteness, and Race: A Regional Perspective, Italian American Review, Vol. 11, No. 1 (Winter 2021), pp. 4-26

www.jstor.org

As long as they were seen as outsiders or intermingling with undesirable people then they were conveniently pushed into their own artificial racial group that made it easier to isolate and identify them. At that time, Italy itself was divided between North and South with northerners using language and practices that kept their southern compatriots divided into another group that closely parallels the language and practices that divided American society.

The history of South Africa and the racial divisions they defined takes the whole charade to even more ridiculous levels.

 

[Romana]

To act racist means to act hatefully toward someone, or a group of people, because I believe they meet a specification of what I call a race. The race doesn't exist. My hateful behaviour exists. We describe my hatefulness as "racist" because I'm committing the hate under the delusion that a person, or group, belongs to a non-existent race. We have to use the terminology to address my hatefulness because I've predefined it.

Factually, though, there is no Jewish race. There is no Italian race. There is no black race. There is no Asian race. There is no white race. Acknowledging, and basing actions on, a racial definition is racist. Using the term "race" to describe a group of people in a social or political dialog is a mistake that condones the practice and further aggravates the issues. We need to somehow focus our attention on needs and solutions using concepts and terminology beyond what the racists have imposed to justify their fear.

I wish that had been Ms. Goldberg's point and the public discussion could have continued.

Perhaps it was the point of her apology. But she didn’t get a chance to continue it, at least on air, because that’s when they suspended her.
Odd sort of timing there.

 

[Romana]

There is a lot of WTF in this article.

Classroom “Nazi Salute” controversy at Mountain Brook High School – Southern Jewish Life Magazine

Just another WordPress site

sjlmag.com

 

[Free]

The racist ‘crack pipe’ panic and the White House’s shameful capitulation | Opinion

Republicans manufactured a racist “crack pipe” scandal, so the Biden admin threw Black people who use drugs under the bus.

www.inquirer.com

Starting on Tuesday evening, with little warning, Republicans — including Pennsylvania gubernatorial candidate and former Philadelphia-area U.S. Attorney Bill McSwain and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas — freaked out over a misrepresentation of a Biden policy that was announced months ago.

Last year, as part of the American Rescue Plan, the Biden administration announced an unprecedented $30 million in grants for community organizations working to reduce the harm of drug use. These activities include the distribution of naloxone (the opioid overdose antidote), syringes, fentanyl testing strips, and smoking kits — a critical investment as America is losing 100,000 people to overdoses per year.

Also potentially included in those smoking kits: clean pipes to allow for safer smoking of drugs such as crack, meth, or fentanyl.

So of course guess who is in overdrive.

Never give them the front, never give them the center, and never give them the end. And even when they're telling the truth ASSUME THEY ARE LYING. The only way to fight the trolls.

 

[Innula Zenovka]

Woman who posted antisemitic conspiracies about Grenfell fire jailed

Tahra Ahmed who falsely claimed online that victims were ‘burnt alive in a Jewish sacrifice’ given 11 month sentence

www.theguardian.com

Evernote link

No First Amendment in the UK.

 

[Romana]

Woman who posted antisemitic conspiracies about Grenfell fire jailed

Tahra Ahmed who falsely claimed online that victims were ‘burnt alive in a Jewish sacrifice’ given 11 month sentence

www.theguardian.com

Evernote link

No First Amendment in the UK.

Someone should make Sarah Palin read that.
That is what blood libel looks like.

 

[Romana]

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