Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Monday, September 6, 2010
Clearing things up
Okay, now I know that no one honestly gives a shit, but I get asked these questions so often, to the point that it's getting retarded.
1) Are you a Jew?
Get this - I'm a Jew by Nationality, not by Religion. Jews are a "peoples", just as the Slavs, Serbs, Spaniards, etc. Judaism is the religion, of which I'm not. I don't go to synagogues or wear black on saturdays. I did not have a bar mitzvah. I am an athiest - I have no religion.
2) How can you say you're Jewish by nationality? Jews don't have a nation, they live in Israel! Shouldn't that make your Israeli?
Not all peoples had a nation. Before Yugoslavia broke up, it was composed of serbs, slovaks, croats, bosnians, and the rest of those eastern europeans. Now they each have their own countries. The Jews got Israel, sure, but my dad's (I'm Jewish on my father's side) parents and their parents and their parents, and so on and so forth, were Jews before Israel existed.
Likewise, it would be good for you to know that Hitler did not order the death of Jews based on their religion - it would be stupidly easy to convert to christianity, the state religion of Nazi Germany. He ordered their deaths based on their race, something a bit harder to change.
3) You were born in Israel, shouldn't that make you Israeli?
I don't know how you know that, but sure. Yeah, I was born in Israel, but I consider myself a Ukrainian Jew. I'm something like five eights of Ukrainian descent and three eights of Jewish descent. My parents lived in Israel for three years only because the Soviet Union had collapsed and they didn't want to stick around. I have no Israeli relatives or anything of that nature.
As a fun fact, Keanu Reeves was born in Lebanon, but he considers himself Canadian and not Lebanese.
And that's all I can think of for now, but if I can remember more I'll add them to this post.
1) Are you a Jew?
Get this - I'm a Jew by Nationality, not by Religion. Jews are a "peoples", just as the Slavs, Serbs, Spaniards, etc. Judaism is the religion, of which I'm not. I don't go to synagogues or wear black on saturdays. I did not have a bar mitzvah. I am an athiest - I have no religion.
2) How can you say you're Jewish by nationality? Jews don't have a nation, they live in Israel! Shouldn't that make your Israeli?
Not all peoples had a nation. Before Yugoslavia broke up, it was composed of serbs, slovaks, croats, bosnians, and the rest of those eastern europeans. Now they each have their own countries. The Jews got Israel, sure, but my dad's (I'm Jewish on my father's side) parents and their parents and their parents, and so on and so forth, were Jews before Israel existed.
Likewise, it would be good for you to know that Hitler did not order the death of Jews based on their religion - it would be stupidly easy to convert to christianity, the state religion of Nazi Germany. He ordered their deaths based on their race, something a bit harder to change.
3) You were born in Israel, shouldn't that make you Israeli?
I don't know how you know that, but sure. Yeah, I was born in Israel, but I consider myself a Ukrainian Jew. I'm something like five eights of Ukrainian descent and three eights of Jewish descent. My parents lived in Israel for three years only because the Soviet Union had collapsed and they didn't want to stick around. I have no Israeli relatives or anything of that nature.
As a fun fact, Keanu Reeves was born in Lebanon, but he considers himself Canadian and not Lebanese.
And that's all I can think of for now, but if I can remember more I'll add them to this post.
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