Why is there Antisemitism?

DC said:
Since the Banking crisis i have heard some very antisemitic comments in real live debates. Like some that claimed its all the fault of Jewish bankers.
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Is that a cause of antisemitism or an effect? After Enron I didn't see any outcry over business people of whatever Ken Lay's religion was.
 
Zax63 said:
Is that a cause of antisemitism or an effect? After Enron I didn't see any outcry over business people of whatever Ken Lay's religion was.
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I find it interesting that DC has actually heard people express clear anti-semitic opinions openly in conversation, presented as a commonplace experience for him.

As an American, I find it hard to imagine being party to such a conversation even once, let alone fairly often.
 
No, it really is religion first and foremost. The assumption that Jews are a lower order, a kind of throwback, is fundamentally built into Christianity and Islam.

DC said:
i do believe atheists are just as prone to it as anybody else,
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Atheists are susceptible, even if less so. They live in an information culture dominated by the faithful. Atheism does not automatically clue someone into the history of Christian antisemitism, or how stereotypes work.

Want another reason, just for fun? Orthodoxy. Orthodoxy carries visible markers, which provide a basis for racialization. Antisemitism thrives where Jews are most orthodox.

theprestige said:
I find it interesting that DC has actually heard people express clear anti-semitic opinions openly in conversation, presented as a commonplace experience for him.

As an American, I find it hard to imagine being party to such a conversation even once, let alone fairly often.
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There are parts of the world, including the US, where antisemitism is just something people have to live with.
 
Israel is a very prosperous nation in an area where most people are poor and have nothing. Those without often envy those with. You have a group of people that worked hard to build up their nation, but then surrounded by people who have done little more than pray to a deity to make their lives better and yielding no positive results from their religion. The only way they can justify their religion is to pretend that those who are doing well and aren't worshiping their god must be evil. Otherwise it means their god is doing nothing for them and rewarding those who don't worship their god.

A big factor that I often see overlooked is the culture we're brought up in to be taught that those with money and power are the bad guys and those without money or power are the good guys. Right down to star wars and all the movies we have been shown growing up as little kids. So when you see a country like Israel which is doing well financially and is surrounded by poor areas, it's easy to have that mindset that has been forced into us growing up that they must be bad.

The Situation in Palestine just does not fit the movie plots we were brought up with.
 
theprestige said:
I find it interesting that DC has actually heard people express clear anti-semitic opinions openly in conversation, presented as a commonplace experience for him.

As an American, I find it hard to imagine being party to such a conversation even once, let alone fairly often.
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huh common place? what does that mean exactly.

it is not something i come across every day. :boggled:
 
Jonnyclueless said:
Israel is a very prosperous nation in an area where most people are poor and have nothing. Those without often envy those with. You have a group of people that worked hard to build up their nation, but then surrounded by people who have done little more than pray to a deity to make their lives better and yielding no positive results from their religion. The only way they can justify their religion is to pretend that those who are doing well and aren't worshiping their god must be evil. Otherwise it means their god is doing nothing for them and rewarding those who don't worship their god.
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Whooole lot of projection and stereotyping going on here.
 
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There is antisemitism for the same reason there is racism.
Some people will always seek to blame others for their misfortune and what better way to pick some group that stands out and isn't really capable of defending itself (if only because they don't even know their accusers).
Judaism just was an easy target in the past and has remained so. Of course there are those that seek to blame israel, but the jews they attack generally don't live there and have nothing to do with the state, so that is just a lie. They hate jews because they have either been taught to, or latched on to the most popular conspiracy theory.

What should be minded though is that not all critisim of the state of israel is actual antisemitism. Disagreeing with what a nation does is not an automatic hatred of the followers of the main religion in that nation. After all, not all those that dislike the US hate christians in general.
 
Antisemitism only exists because people forget that John Stewart and Mel Brooks are Jews.

There are lots of Jewish bankers though (didn't realize it until I looked some names up right now): Lloyd Blankfein, Lawrence Summers, Alan Greenspan. Probably a lot more, the fact that Bernie Madoff is a jew doesn't help much either. Jews do seem to be over represented among influential bankers (anyone have stats?), this would feed in to the jewish conspiracy stuff.

Jews are also clearly over represented in the Senate and House...so yeah feeds in to more conspiracy.
 
People need to blame others for their problems. Groups of people who are different are easy targets.

Different religion, different colour, different language and different gun laws...........

All idiotic reasons.
 
Doctor Evil said:
The answer is that Antisemitism exists today because it was common in the past, and has a long history. I will explain.

Prejudices always existed. One can say being prejudiced is part of human nature, unfortunately. We are all prone to confirmation biases, which are crucial here. When you are prejudiced against a certain group you will tend to remember bad things that members of that group do more than their charitable actions. It gets even worse. You will also tend to assume that the intentions of said members of the group are bad, even when they are not. This is a self reinforcing mechanism.

The Jews were more unlucky than most, in that they were a minority under peoples which used hatred of Jews as a political tool. This probably starts with the Roman emperors of the Flavian dynasty which used their victory over the Jews to gain legitimacy. (They were the first emperors not from one of the big families - so they needed that.) Then there was the small issue of Christianity becoming the dominant religion in Rome, and the need to deflect the fact that the Roman's were the ones which killed Jesus.
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Well there is also the point that governments were not secular at the time. So from a Roman point of view jews were not doing their civic duty and worshiping the governments gods. This is an important point.
 
Probably because paranoia and suspicion about people who look and act differently was an excellent survival trait for most of human history. Today, not so much.
 
Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs,
dimensions, senses, affections, passions; fed with
the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject
to the same diseases, heal'd by the same means,
warm'd and cool'd by the same winter and summer
as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed?
If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us,
do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?
If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that.
If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility?
Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his
sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge.
The villainy you teach me, I will execute,
and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.

- The Merchant of Venice
 
Brainster said:
Probably because paranoia and suspicion about people who look and act differently was an excellent survival trait for most of human history. Today, not so much.
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very interesting point.
 
I think its incorrect to define anti-Semitism as simply "not liking Jews".

I believe true anti-Semitism originated as a result of the 2,000 year olf schism between Jews and Christians, and the many results of that continued competition and then persecution and stereotyping.

Not liking Jews because you think Matzo balls taste bad, is not true anti-Semitism, in my view.
 
Thunder said:
I think its incorrect to define anti-Semitism as simply "not liking Jews".

I believe true anti-Semitism originated as a result of the 2,000 year olf schism between Jews and Christians, and the many results of that continued competition and then persecution and stereotyping.

Not liking Jews because you think Matzo balls taste bad, is not true anti-Semitism, in my view.
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Why pick that rift, why not the rift between say the Samaritans and the Jews? Or the rift between the Romans and the Jews?
 
Doctor Evil said:
The answer is that Antisemitism exists today because it was common in the past, and has a long history. I will explain.

Prejudices always existed. One can say being prejudiced is part of human nature, unfortunately. We are all prone to confirmation biases, which are crucial here. When you are prejudiced against a certain group you will tend to remember bad things that members of that group do more than their charitable actions. It gets even worse. You will also tend to assume that the intentions of said members of the group are bad, even when they are not. This is a self reinforcing mechanism.

The Jews were more unlucky than most, in that they were a minority under peoples which used hatred of Jews as a political tool. This probably starts with the Roman emperors of the Flavian dynasty which used their victory over the Jews to gain legitimacy. (They were the first emperors not from one of the big families - so they needed that.) Then there was the small issue of Christianity becoming the dominant religion in Rome, and the need to deflect the fact that the Roman's were the ones which killed Jesus.
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The Jews appear to have been luckier than many, the Roman, ancient Egyptian, Aztec, Thracian, (it's a long list) cultures from that time don't exist any more. The Jewish culture does. That's a testament to a strong culture, and is to be admired.

That doesn't make the Holocaust 'lucky', but the Holocaust was not just about Jews, it was also about homosexuals, gypsies and other groups the Nazis hated.

History is full of hatred's and oppression, the Jewish history contains it's own story of Jewish oppression of the original inhabitants of Israel. Joshua is still celebrated today. (Although it is apparently a beat up, the conquest was not nearly as fantastical as it is made out to be in the legends, but that is pretty normal for a legend).

In short, many groups have oppressed and discriminated against other groups on a racial basis around the world and throughout history, and this still happens today. Why anti-semtism? Why any racism, it is always for stupid and ignorant reasons.
 
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