Anti-Semitism

Teufel

Active member
Citizen
I'd never looked into Dahl's antisemitism before.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roald_Dahl

Criticism and controversy​


Anti-Semitic and Anti-Israel comments​


Dahl reviewed Australian author Tony Clifton's God Cried, a picture book about the siege of West Beirut by the Israeli army during the 1982 Lebanon War.[185] The article appeared in the August 1983 issue of the Literary Review and was the subject of much media comment and criticism at the time.[186][187][188] According to Dahl, until this point in time "a race of people", meaning Jews, had never "switched so rapidly from victims to barbarous murderers." The empathy of all after the Holocaust had turned "into hatred and revulsion."[187] Dahl wrote that Clifton's book would make readers "violently anti-Israeli", with Dahl stating: "I am not anti-Semitic. I am anti-Israel."[189] He asked: "must Israel, like Germany, be brought to her knees before she learns how to behave in this world?"[190] The United States, he said, was "so utterly dominated by the great Jewish financial institutions" that "they dare not defy" Israelis.[187]

Here I thought that was a relatively new trick.
 

Thylacine 2000

Well-known member
Citizen
It happens. Especially among brainwormed Millennials who realize in college that they have no identity of their own. Jews are the stars of the Bible, so in general people having mental crises and searching for a meaning that otherwise eludes them can often become unhealthily fixated on us. They can also claim it purely as cover for their loathing of mainstream normative Jewry. Or both!

New York State Senator Julia Salazar wholly manufactured a "Jewish" identity for herself, claiming all sorts of ancestors who other family members say never existed, and a family migration from British Palestine that likewise never happened. She went from being a fundie evangelical in Christians United For Israel to a socialist in "Jewish" Voice for "Peace" in about a year. She claimed to have had a conversion to Judaism in two months (which is impossible).


Then there's "I Have No Known Jewish Ancestors And Was Raised Evangelical But Decided I Was Jewish Without Conversion Because I Had A Fight With My Mom: The Nylah Burton Story"


Here are several high profile examples from Germany: https://m.jpost.com/international/h...ommunity-revealed-to-be-non-jewish-569895/amp

I personally have caught multiple "As-A-Jew"-s on Reddit who performatively bash Israel and mainstream Jewry and then when looking through their post history, surprise, they're Catholic (and then they delete). It's definitely a trend among the Extremely Online who want an alibi for being obsessed with supposed Jewish crimes and wickedness.

Not knowing Hebrew... that doesn't really mean anything, some people just weren't taught it, but acting like they are staying away from it on principle is freakishly fringe.
Speak of the Christian devil:

 

PrimalxConvoy

NOT a New Member.
Citizen
Speak of the Christian devil:

Christians aren't devils.
 

Spin-Out

i cant take it anymore im at my limit
Citizen
Christians aren't devils.
*looks at Christians' long history of endorsing and abetting colonialism, racism, slavery, genocide and environmental destruction to benefit themselves, their constant spreading of homophobia, antisemitism, misogyny, anti-intellectualism and ableism, and their nasty tendency to harbor and protect serial child rapists in their cloisters while fearmongering about LGBTQ+ people being "groomers"* you sure about that, homie
 
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Ungnome

Grand Empress of the Empire of One Square Foot.
Citizen
There's also the fact that the Jewish religion doesn't really have a 'devil', at least not in the Christian sense. It was a somewhat snarky twist on the common phrase.
 

Spin-Out

i cant take it anymore im at my limit
Citizen
i'm not jewish but iirc satan wasn't enemies with god in judaism; he was on god's side, but not humanity's, so he was basically an asshole prosecutor. "ha-satan" meant "the accuser," i think?
 

Thylacine 2000

Well-known member
Citizen
I wasn't saying "Christians are devils." In context of a recent conversation about As-a-Jews just-criticizing-Israel who turn out to be fakers and bigots, there was another example - and when you see something else that you were just talking about, you say "Speak of the devil."

There is no Hell in Judaism, and next to no concept of an afterlife at all (a very early cultural decision to separate it from how Egyptians acted). Satan is a "heel character" who obeys God, trying to tempt people into disobedience in a manner so obvious that they will recognize it and resist.
 

PrimalxConvoy

NOT a New Member.
Citizen
I wasn't saying "Christians are devils." In context of a recent conversation about As-a-Jews just-criticizing-Israel who turn out to be fakers and bigots, there was another example - and when you see something else that you were just talking about, you say "Speak of the devil."

There is no Hell in Judaism, and next to no concept of an afterlife at all (a very early cultural decision to separate it from how Egyptians acted). Satan is a "heel character" who obeys God, trying to tempt people into disobedience in a manner so obvious that they will recognize it and resist.
So why mention "Christian" when it was not relevant and it was a redundant term?
 

Tuxedo Prime

Well-known member
Citizen
So why mention "Christian" when it was not relevant and it was a redundant term?
I may regret wading into this, but as Thy2K had previously described a type (Christians co-opting Judaism for political reasons even to the point of creating a fake cultural identity), then found an article describing that very thing, the modifying adjective was colloquially fitting.

I parsed his meaning, but given how fraught interfaith dialogue can still be, I for one don't blame you for the initial confusion. I'd also like to thank Thy for providing the explanation, wasn't needed by all of us but education never really ends.
 

Thylacine 2000

Well-known member
Citizen
So why mention "Christian" when it was not relevant and it was a redundant term?
Because that's what ties the "speak of the devil", I'm-seeing-that-happen-again phrase more specifically to the context of non-Jews pretending to be Jews and also the character of the devil being more significant in Christian tradition.
 

PrimalxConvoy

NOT a New Member.
Citizen
Because that's what ties the "speak of the devil", I'm-seeing-that-happen-again phrase more specifically to the context of non-Jews pretending to be Jews and also the character of the devil being more significant in Christian tradition.
Unless the aforementioned faker in the above story is a (from their perspective at least) Christian, I would encourage you to avoid any unnecessary confusion by omitting the term. As a general term, regardless of whether any religion actually has such a character, we can all understand it without the need to specify whether it's "Christian" or not.
 

NovaSaber

Well-known member
Citizen
It's not confusing. In the phrase "the Christian devil", the word "Christian" is unmistakably an adjective describing "devil".

If we're being completely honest here, I actually find it hard to believe that even one person genuinely misunderstood it as "Christians, who are devils".

Also, "Christianity as default" is the most subtle form of Christian privilege, often used to justify more overt forms.
 

Spin-Out

i cant take it anymore im at my limit
Citizen
tbf i didn't misunderatand it, i just genuinely think that christianity is, in fact, pretty goddamn evil.
 


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