[quote]Cephalic_Carnage wrote:
[quote]Tex Ag wrote:
[quote]Grneyes wrote:
[quote]Cephalic_Carnage wrote:
[quote]Jewbacca wrote:
[quote]Loudog75 wrote:
Brother, are you serious? You can’t be - or else you have no clue about the black experience.[/quote]
I am sorry, but, for such big dudes, you and Professor X are complete pansies.
As you can probably guess from my name, I come from a people who have a rather storied history of being shit upon.
We’ve been (like your people) slaves.
Nations have systematically discriminated against us for over 2,000 years, forbidding us to own land, persue professions, vote, whatever.
The Europeans kept us in ghettos (that’s where the word comes from, BTW)
We been expelled from contries, en masse, repeatedly
Nations have repeatedly tried to murder us, en masse.
Today, we are routinely attacked by terrorists in our country of origin and abroad (like, say, France, where little kids were murdered a couple days ago).
Iranians and others are striving to nuke us.
In fact, here’s a bit of “discrimination” I’ve had personally:
My wife murdered
My unborn child murdered in my wife’s womb
I’ve had scrapnel pulled out of basically every limb of my body.
In the USA, walking to shul in Brookline, MA, I was hit on the back of the head with a cobblestone by some white guy screaming “fucking Joooooos.” Gave me a concussion.
On the Berkeley Campus, visiting my new wife, I, my wife, and my 3 month old child were pelted with human shit and told to “go back to Israel” by some asshole who sprinted away.
Walking past the “Occupy Wall Street” morons, I got “joooo” and “fuck Israel” catcalls.
In Houston a couple weeks ago, I was putting gas in my rental car by the airport, when 3 or more black boys in a car launched a slurpee at my back, covering me with red sticky crap as they drove away — screaming “fuck you Jew!”
And that’s what I remember off the top of my head. Not a week goes past without some random person making shitty comments.
And sadly, my experience is hardly unique. While Jewish people amount to 1.8% of the USA population, we are the victims of 69% of religion-based hate crimes (yes, I will give you a link if you want it), and something like 16% of all hate crimes overall.
Now, I could be a pansy, and whine about people not “understanding the Jewish experience.”
But, I am not a pansy.
Instead, I chose to be happy, have a great and loving family, serve G-d and my fellow man, and do financially very, very, well, and not let the assholes get me down.
And I am hardly unique. Jewish folk do great overall in the USA.
Far better than average, in fact, despite widespread discrimination.
(In fact, the group most likely to be anti-semitic in the USA are — ready ---- blacks.) (And yes, I am happy to provide a cite to this.)
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Oh, and as aside, how much did affirmative action help me get into MIT and, later, Harvard Law? None at all.
Bumpkiss.
In fact, when I went to Harvard, they had a maximum number of Jewish students because we were doing too well, and they wanted to keep our numbers down.
+++++++++
In short, the victim mentality is a sure-fire way to be a loser.[/quote]
Sorry for your loss, man.
Where on earth does all that shit come from? What happens in and around Israel I understand, considering your neighbors.
But in the U.S. ? What perceived beef do people there have with you guys, anyway? What history?
Can’t say I’ve ever heard my few jewish friends and acquaintances say anything about being discriminated against here… Maybe some in the big cities if they’re unlucky enough to run into some wannabe-nazis… Do you dress in orthodox jewish garb (whatever it’s called, I’m not overly familiar with your religion I’m afraid) that makes you stand out or something? Without that, I wouldn’t even be able to tell you from adam.
Sounds like you’d be safest living in rural Germany or something… Ironically.
I hope you and your family stay safe… Or as safe as you can be, anyway.
[/quote]
The hate comes from the fact that Christians blame the Jews for Jesus’s death and the fact they don’t recognize him as the Messiah. Jews are still waiting for one so that automatically makes them an enemy of Christians. It also comes from the fact that Jews always seem to prosper. They were always the jewelers and bankers and always had financial means. And that caused animosity because why should non-Christians, especially the people who were responsible for Jesus’s death prosper while good, God-fearing Christians suffer in poverty? [/quote]
Banking and the charging of interest for borrowing money was considered usery and a sin, so that line of work was thrust upon Jews by the Christians. Just an interesting historical note.
My guess that many who hate Jews hate anyone else they think somehow got it better than them and deserve it less.
[/quote]
I’ve heard the about the interest thing before… Is that really something people still think about? Does the average poor guy even know about this? Scratch that… Where does the average person, poor or not, learn about this? History class? And if so, that’s actually something they remember and use as justification for the behavior described by our resident hairy space-Jew?
Amazing.
[/quote]
I have no idea if the average person knows about this, I was reading a history of the Jewish ghetto in Venice, Italy when I came across it- though I think I knew some of it from somewhere else.
Hate is easier to justify if you do not try to justify it very hard. Tidbit of history/heritage/opinion here and there is all it takes. You are outside the US, but if you look at the politiics swirling around lately you could see how enigmatic the “truth” and “facts” are right now.
In the Texas textbook debocle (sp?) last year or so it is even more clear. One of the leaders on the Tx school board is quoted as saying “Someone needs to stand up against these experts…”.
I think HG was right in his “haters are going to hate” comment. I think it often just comes down to that perspective in life.
I did manual labor in Mississippi and saw and experienced a lot of racial hate. I also experience some beautiful moments of caring with some who probably and more reasons than most to hate me because of the color of my skin, as others did. One moment in particular always brings tears to my eyes.
Some people seem to see color/ethnicity first, others seem to look for goodness (Jewbacca’s long post got me thinking about this).