From: flax@frej.teknikum.uu.se (Jonas Flygare)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.mideast
Subject: Re: jews as a race
Date: 22 Jan 1993 09:59:33 GMT
Organization: Dept. of Control and Systems, Teknikum, Uppsala
Distribution: talk
Reply-To: flax@frej.teknikum.uu.se
NNTP-Posting-Host: frej.teknikum.uu.se

In article <C18q0u.J87@usenet.ucs.indiana.edu>, kgivon@silver.ucs.indiana.edu (karen lee givon) writes:
|> In article <1993Jan21.1777.23048@channel1> "wayne mcguire" <wayne.mcguire@channel1.com> writes:
|> >To: Josh Backon
|> >
|> >I'm quickly trying to catch up on a meg of messages, so this will
|> >be brief.
|> >
|> >Let's all try to keep our cool, ok? Let's try to treat one
|> >another with mutual respect and friendliness, and I hope you will
|> >try to help me understand what the connections between religion
|> >and ethnicity in Israel are all about.
|> 
|> Wayne, I have not felt the least bit of respect from you.  All you have
|> shown us is an obsession with proving that Judaism is racist (on an
|> inappropriate newsgroup I might add).  

I've been having guite an enlightening letter exchange with wayne, 
unfortunately he haven't given me permission to quote him, so I can only
summarize.

|> >I don't think I'm a stupid person, but so far I cannot make heads
|> >or tails of the various explanations I have seen so far, and I am
|> >trying my damnedest.
|> 
|> I really don't think you're trying to understand anything.  People ask
|> me questions about Judaism all the time and I try to answer them.  The
|> feeling I get from you is not that you want to understand, rather that
|> you are obsessed with what you believe to be bad points of Judaism,
|> Jews, and Israel.

According to Wayne he is pro-Israeli. In my opinion he does a fairly 
good job of hiding that.

|> >You mentioned a few converts who are prominent in Israeli life.
|> >(I note that two of them are wives are prominent Israelis, but we
|> >will let that pass.)
|> >
|> >I still have the impression that converts occupy a small role in
|> >the high levels of the Israeli government, the rabbinical
|> >establishment, and the American Jewish establishment, for that
|> >matter. The power in these institutions is overwhelmingly
|> >concentrated in the hands of ethnic Jews.

Those jews who all show easy to recognize common traits, right?

|> As far as I and most other Jews are concerned, when a person converts to
|> Judaism, they become an "ethnic Jew".   This could be hard to
|> understand, so perhaps we should use another word besides ethnicity,
|> (not race).  I've always considered Jews to be a people or a worldwide
|> community.  

This is the _point_ I have tried to get across to WM in several emails.
It always falls back to one thing. Being Jewish is a 'gene thing', not a
'faith thing'. I might as well say that being Swedish is in _my_ genes..
It all sounds sort of like a home-made Mendel in the making.

|> >Shamir was not a religious man, according to what I have read.
|> >Like Ben-Gurion, he may have even been an atheist. Certainly he
|> >wasn't an observant Jew. Like Jabotinsky, his mentor, he was a
|> >Jewish patriot in the ETHNIC sense, just like an Italian or
|> >German might be an Italian or German patriot.
|> 
|> And what is the problem with this?

Bad genes, probably.

|> >The Israeli power structure is overwhelmingly controlled by
|> >ethnic Jews, many of whom have no religious beliefs whatever.
|> >
|> >Is not Israel an ethnocentric state, despite the policy of
|> >admitting a few converts each year? 
|> 
|> First of all, I know of no quota that Israel follows regarding how many
|> converts may live in Israel.  I assume this is what you mean by
|> "admitting".

|> And don't those converts have
|> >to accept and submit to a system which is controlled by ethnic
|> >Jews, and which is dedicated to their interests and agenda?

|> They accept and submit to the laws of Judaism.  That's what I always
|> thought was the point of converting to any religion.  If they don't want
|> to submit to Judaism they shouldn't convert.  Seems fairly simple to me.
|> Would someone convert to Christianity and not want to accept and submit
|> to that religion?  That would be silly.

Or an immigrant to the US refusing to follow US Laws. It's a system
controlled by 'ethnic' americans, dedicated to _their_ interests
(BIG surprise, btw...) and agenda... I refuse! I _WILL_ carry on
sacrificing a maiden every first day of the month, like I always do!
(Screams fading away as white-clad men carry me away.. :)

|> And what is this agenda you refer to?  Wouldn't they also become the
|> interests and agenda of the convert?
|>  
|> >If I misunderstand, please explain. Enlighten me.
|> 
|> I don't think any amount of enlightening will change your mind.  

I have to agree.
To Wayne: If you feel offended at me hinting of the content of your posts,
I'm sorry, but when you state things in email that casts light on the things
you post here I can't discard that. 

--------------------------------------------------------
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