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by slg
1822 days ago
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>I did not read his post as being anti-Jewish It is a non sequitur that negatively generalizes Jews as guilty of the actions committed by a very small subset of Jews. This is anti-Semitic. It is similar to coming into the comments of a post about Ramadan and declaring that Muslims are terrorists. |
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> It is a non sequitur that negatively generalizes $X as guilty of the actions committed by a very small subset of $X. This is anti-$X.
Welcome to the Internet, and welcome to the club! This is a significant fraction of all social activity, it seems. People are into tribes, evidently.
2.
This whole thing depends on how the relevant categories are perceived. I think things are different in Israel than they are in, say, the United States.
In Israel, the ulta-orthodox are a distinct category, and mainstream/centrist/reform people will criticize them.
In the United States, people see the categories from further away, and they blur together into "Jewish", which causes both anti-Semitism, and reflexive defense of "my people" (even if they are not actually your people).
Second-generation kids from all manner of immigrant backgrounds have similar problems. They'll identify with extremist elements of "the homeland", because they think $MAJORITY/$NATIONALITY is the important dichotomy. When really, in the "homeland", there is some other political dichotomy which is actually important. And which they have been able to ignore, because they've lived in the United States.
A good example is a particular generation of Irish-Americans, who supported the IRA. Current examples include ABCs and ABDs. The relationship between them and those who stayed is complicated. Eventually the latter becomes a kind of mascot adopted by the former: "Notre Dame: The Fighting Irish!"
The best cure for this is to let people spend time visiting "the homeland", so they can come to realize that they're not from there any more.
This applies now to the situation in Israel. Peoples' allegiances are based on imagined categories, and those allegiances are not always reciprocated.
3. To emphasize my philosophical point:
> It is similar to coming into the comments of a post about Ramadan and declaring that Muslims are terrorists.
This implicitly requires an answer to the question: What -- or, I should say, Who -- is a Muslim? Who is a Jew? Who is a Gentile? This expands to every category.
4.
Similar questions now plague the United States. Who is Of Color? What does it mean to be White? Are you Black or are you Kanye?
There are a lot of boundaries. Circles cut around a collection of individuals, in the mind, to mark them.