This is for Kentish or anyone else who doesn't get what WCN is and how it's just fear and hatred dressed up as religion.

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This event, co-sponsored by Georgetown’s Center on Faith and Justice and the Baptist Joint Committee for Religious Liberty, explores the roots of White Christian Nationalism, explains what its adherents want and offers insights into how to counter toxic ideology. Participants: The Most Rev. Michael B. Curry, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church; Amanda Tyler, executive director of the Baptist Joint Committee; Dr. Samuel Perry, Associate Professor of Sociology, University of Oklahoma and Rev. Jim Wallis, Chair in Faith and Justice at the McCourt School of Public Policy and Director of the Georgetown University Center on Faith and Justice.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6L5QXTgErI


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Here's a story about a small town in northern New Hampshire (disclosure: I've been there, it's a nice town) that was torn apart by one ultra Evangelical woman's quest to destroy a mural that, in her view, promoted the "satanic" LGBT "lifestyle."


##########

https://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2024/0212/A-small-town-public-art-and-the-First-Amendment


In front of the library on Main Street in this northern New Hampshire town is a bronze Pollyanna statue, smiling with her arms flung wide. Pollyanna’s carefree days may be numbered. If the residents of Littleton vote to limit public art, as one Board of Selectmen member has suggested, the statue will have to be removed. There’s no middle ground: Either all art or none would be allowed on government property.

There’s no particular objection to Pollyanna herself. A few blocks away are the three paintings that sparked the debate over whether to limit public art. Tucked just off Main Street on the side of a building are three boarded-up windows – now painted with nature scenes. The project was sponsored by a local organization, North Country Pride. Fearing future art with overt LGBTQ+ themes, one member of the three-person select board raised objections to the painted panels late last summer, sparking a debate that has dragged on.

Disagreements over content, whether in art or in books, have been occurring across the United States, often resulting in bans covering school systems and libraries. In New Hampshire, what qualifies as art and the appropriateness of certain art have arisen in challenges to a lobster painting in Merrimack, a mural of baked goods in Conway, and the three panels in Littleton.


Selectwoman Carrie Gendreau, also a state senator, raised the objections to the murals. She has stated that many of her political views stem from her Christian faith, and used the word “demonic” to describe one of the panels in an interview with The Boston Globe. She did not respond to requests for comment.


#########


http://chs.asa-comparative-historical.org/white-christian-nationalism-the-deep-story-behind-the-capitol-insurrection/



To understand how American Christianity became entangled with racism and violence, we first have to trace it back to its Scriptural roots. Those roots are threefold. WCN is not just one story, but a combination of three. The first is a Promised Land story based on the Old Testament. The New England Puritans saw themselves as the heirs of the Biblical Israelites.They imagined themselves as a “chosen people, and they came to see the “new world” as their “Promised Land.” For a while, they thought the native peoples might be one of the “lost tribes” of Israel. But as their relationship with the natives shifted from curiosity to hostility, the Puritan settlers recast the Indians as “Canaanites” or “Amalekites”, who were occupying “their” Promised Land.

The second story is an End Times story based on the Book of Revelation. For much of Western history, most Christian theologians read that book in allegorical terms. The violent struggles it depicted between the forces of good and evil, they reasoned, actually represented the moral struggles that took place within the believer’s heart. But there were always some Christians who interpreted the text more literally, as a description of future events. Many Puritan radicals embraced such readings, and took them along to New England.

The two stories gradually fused together during the Puritans’ wars with the natives during the late 17th century. Puritan theologians such as Cotton Mather came to believe that the New World might be the central battlefield in the final struggle between good and evil foretold in Revelation. Needless to say, Mather placed himself and his Puritan brethren on the side of the good, and the Catholic French and their native allies on the side of evil. He and other Puritans likened the Indians to demons and depicted the Indian wars as blood sacrifices to an angry God. It was war — the violent struggle between the English and the French and the Indians that some historians now refer to as the “Second Hundred Years War” – that welded Protestantism and Englishness together in the New World.


But how did Protestantism and Englishness get entangled with whiteness? To answer that question, we need to shift our focus to the south, to that other seedbed of American culture: The Colony of Virginia. There, and elsewhere, the most common justification for the enslavement of kidnapped Indians and Africans was that they were “heathens.” But this argument broke down in the late 17th century as some enslaved persons converted to Christianity and some white Christians sought to evangelize them. The problem was initially resolved by shifting the legal basis of slavery from religion to color: “Blacks” could be slaves; “whites” could not. It was then more fully resolved by creating a new theological bases for slavery. Perhaps the most influential was the “Curse of Ham.” Blacks were the descendants of Noah’s son, Ham, the argument went, and their color and enslavement were a result of the curse that Noah had called down on head. This is the third story: The Racial Curse Story.



Edited 3 time(s). Last edit at 04/30/2024 08:04PM by anybody.

They taught me that white people were specially blessed for having been "valiant" in the Celestial War. White Mormons were doubly blessed and expected to prostrate themselves in goddam gratitude. We were to lead the world with Jesus as our king. We were spiritual royalty. Those shoes were too big for me to wear. I walked away barefoot.

^^^THIS^^^

No shoes, but you kept your soul, Don.

Contrary to your characterization I know full well what Christian nationalism is. I just don't have the obsession with it that appears to drive your posts

Christian Nationalism (a blend of politics and religion) has driven everything from the makeup of the current Supreme Court, to anti-abortion laws, the promotion of prayer and the Ten Commandments in public schools, an anti-LGBTQ agenda, the banning of books in school and public libraries, etc. It's at the root of why pregnant women in Idaho have to be airlifted out of state when something goes badly wrong with their pregnancies.

It promotes the attitude that the U.S. was "founded as a Christian nation." The Christian Nationalists are not interested in playing nicely with others. It's their way or the highway.

It may be that the movement has not affected you much personally. But it has affected most women, teachers, librarians, LGBTQ individuals, and more.

They were promised godhood after death. Why not start early?

Eventually, they'll come for you too or someone close to you.


Imagine what it's like not to be safe. Imagine what it's like living around people who when they find out you are not like them and they can't convert you, at best make life difficult for you, at worse, want you gone.


You may think this is just "much ado about nothing," but there are parts of the USA that I just can't live in any longer. I'm having to turn down jobs -- and a lot of big defense companies have plants in red states. This is affecting my life and my livelihood -- all because a group of religious nutbags want to control everybody and everything and turn my world into their world.


I don't want America to turn into a faux "christian" version of 1980s Iran, but we are headed that way.


The following isn't from "The Handmaid's Tale." It's for real.


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https://www.salon.com/2024/05/01/college-was-called-babylon-a-former-stay-at-home-daughter-exposes-christian-patriarchy/


"College was called 'Babylon'": A former "stay-at-home daughter" exposes Christian patriarchy


Christian fundamentalism is a competitive sport, with adherents often trying to outdo each other by escalating their extremism. Author Cait West is a survivor of this toxic dynamic, having grown up in a church and family seemingly intent on generating ever more stringent rules governing people's sexuality, education, and life choices — especially those of girls and women. In her new book, "Rift: A Memoir of Breaking Away from Christian Patriarchy," West details a childhood under a father who spent years trying to tighten his grip on his family, denying his children ordinary life experiences like dating, education, or even the barest amount of autonomy.


I grew up in the Christian patriarchy movement, which teaches that because God is masculine, he's the ultimate patriarch. That means that men are the best representation of God. Men are supposed to be leaders of the family, the church and the government. Women were created to submit, either to their fathers or their husbands. Growing up as a girl, I was told I would never leave the home until I got married. I wouldn't get a higher education. I wouldn't have dating relationships. I wouldn't have a career. My job was to learn homemaking skills and prepare to be a stay-at-home wife. And that's why they called girls like me "stay-at-home daughters," because we were living very differently from the outside world. We were proud of that fact.


I can only speculate, but my father has a tendency towards authoritarianism. I see this progression into more extreme beliefs and lifestyle as him finding validation in controlling his family. These teachings told him it was godly to control us this way. Having this validation was very appealing to him, but he's not the only type of person who gets wrapped up in this movement. People often get in because they're afraid of things they don't understand. Economic insecurity, social issues, or just being afraid of gender roles changing. They're fed these messages of fear from patriarchal pastors. They're promised, if you follow all these rules in your family, then, you're going to have a blessed house and you're gonna have many children and grandchildren and God will bless you. There is this fear and then this promise.


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Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/01/2024 07:11PM by anybody.

> Eventually, they'll come for you too or someone close to you.

I'm not in the slightest bit worried about it. It is another boogeyman to scare the populace. What I'm more worried about are further power grabs by those who already have police and the military etc under their wing. They're far more dangerous. Dictatorship is more likely to come from people who say they are concerned for our safety than some ranting bigot these days.

"College was called 'Babylon'": A former "stay-at-home daughter" exposes Christian patriarchy"

College IS Babylon. When I was in college in the 1980s, the Liberal Arts people were starting to lose their minds. Now they are completely gone. At least STEM is lucid.

Are Jews (recall their homeland is the present Israel) 'whites'?

Do or Can they claim an ancestry of Europeans?


I wonder what 'fussy' jews fill in for their IDs such as Passport, Driver's License, census, and other forms?

Don't Jewish people say/claim that being Jewish is More than a Religion!!

The whole "white" thing was started in North America in the late 17th Century and spread to the rest of the world. The term really wasn't even in use until around 1700 and originally though of as meaning European people north of the Alps.

Because "white" was a legal category in America, the question of who was and who was not "white" became a constant legal battle with many court cases.

In America, most Ashkenazi Jews are considered to be "white" by most people (Nazis and KKK types don't) while Sephardi and Misrazi Jews may or may not be depending on who you are talking to. After WW2, many "ethnic" groups from southern Europe, North Africa, Italy, Greece, etc. were "grandfathered in, so most Jews in the US are thought of as "white" today -- but there are Jews from every continent on Earth.


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https://www.umass.edu/legal/Hilbink/lpsc/RaceReading.pdf



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/2024 06:46PM by anybody.

GNPE Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Are Jews (recall their homeland is the present
> Israel) 'whites'?
>
> Do or Can they claim an ancestry of Europeans?
>
>
> I wonder what 'fussy' jews fill in for their IDs
> such as Passport, Driver's License, census, and
> other forms?
>
> Don't Jewish people say/claim that being Jewish is
> More than a Religion!!

Short Answer: Of course they can claim "ancestry of Europeans" if their forebears originated there.

I don't get what you mean by "fussy Jews". Isn't everybody a bit "fussy" about their own ID?


Longer Answer: Here are some excerpts from a (much) longer article that delves into the question: Are Jews White? The source is a podcast by The Association for Jewish Studies.

There are various speakers participating in the discussion.

One participant makes the point that not all Jews originated in Europe. Those would be the ones, I'm guessing, who have not/would *not* consider that they are European.


https://www.associationforjewishstudies.org/podcasts/are-jews-white-transcript


“Jewishness encompasses many different things. It can be an ethnicity, it can be a religion. It can be cultural. Some people understand it racially. So instead of people saying, well, obviously there's a lot of intersectionality baked into Jewish identities, instead there's a way in which Jews are often, in intersectional conversations, just placed into the category of white, and anything else about their identities is dismissed or stripped away.


“But if you're a Jew, or if you identify as Jewish, it might not seem so simple. First, and most obviously, not all Jews are of European background. If you're a Sephardic Jew and you trace your ancestry to the Jews who lived in Spain and Portugal and were expelled in 1492, or if you're a Mizrahi Jew with roots in Arab lands, then you may very well not see yourself as white, or as having benefited nearly as much by dint of being considered part of the white majority.


“But even if you are an Ashkenazi Jew and do benefit from being part of the white majority — well, maybe you don't see yourself as only, or simply, white. Maybe you feel that your Jewishness marks you as different, or perhaps you define yourself as a member of a Jewish minority whose collective identity has been shaped by centuries of antisemitism.


“And almost certainly, your grandparents, maybe even your parents, tell you about a time in the not too distant American past, when the socioeconomic status of Jews was less certain, and Jews were not yet fully acculturated into and accepted by the white, Anglo-Saxon American mainstream.


“Now, before we dive into that history, I want to acknowledge a few things. First, the title of this episode, Are Jews White?, is, in some sense, a deliberate provocation. Because as we've just seen, the answer is obviously no, not all Jews in the United States or elsewhere are white, are seen as white, or see themselves that way.


“But we also need to recognize that by white, we're not talking only about skin tone or physical features. We're also talking about whiteness as access to social, economic, educational, and other resources and opportunities that, until fairly recently, were available more or less exclusively to members of the white, Anglo-Saxon majority in America, and to which Ashkenazi American Jews, especially, have most fully laid claim.


“To preserve Jews as a cohesive group, some prominent Jews highlighted the distinctiveness of Judaism and Jewish ritual, and some used the language of race as a way of expressing Jewish difference.


“…not all Jewish leaders or American Jews generally thought or talked about themselves in racial terms. Many Jews of the period characterized Jewish difference in religious terms only. But the notion that Jews constituted a distinct race was not uncommon, both among Jews and Gentiles. Race was a newly coined scientific term used to explain perceived biological differences among people from various countries and regions of the world. African-Americans belonged, in the nomenclature of the time, to the Negro race, the Chinese constituted a race, as did the Irish, and nearly every other group.”

-----

I'm glad to have come across this article. It's certainly provided me with a lot of information I wasn't aware of before. The more information the better.

There are African Jews, too, and that should make us realize yet again that language, culture, and religion do not align with the (itself ridiculous) category of race.

Recall, for instance, Operation Solomon in 1991, when Yitzak Shamir's cabinet in Tel Aviv airlifted 14,000 Ethiopian Jews out of their homes lest they fall prey to rebels who were on the verge of toppling the government in Addis Ababa. There are other colonies of black Jews in other parts of Africa, too.

Ironically, and sadly, there was considerable opposition to the airlift in Israel insofar as many citizens thought that the Africans were, despite their millennia-old pedigrees, somehow not sufficiently Jewish or that they looked too different and would be an "embarrassment." In the event they did not integrate well into Israeli society and into the 21st century lived in isolated tent cities.

They thus represent proof that 1) Jews are multiracial, and 2) Israelis are not great, yet again, at dealing with ethnic differences.

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

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https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2020-08-03/ty-article/.premium/solidarity-with-black-people-this-ethiopian-israeli-doesnt-believe-it/0000017f-dc54-df9c-a17f-fe5ce51b0000


########

https://mepc.org/commentaries/ethiopian-jews-confront-racism-israel/

Despite the anger on display and the grievances expressed by members of the Ethiopian Jewish community superficially resembling the recent experience of Ferguson or Baltimore, Jerusalem Post’s Abramowitz argues that America is the wrong lens through which to see the developments in Israel: “The marches in Jerusalem and in Tel Aviv belonged to the plain-clothed Ethiopian soldiers. Nearly all of them have served, are serving or are about to serve in the IDF. Today’s battle is not against external enemies, but against invisibility and injustice….The Jews of silence today on racism in Israel are found not only in the Israeli government and the police force but also among world Jewry….These rallies by the Ethiopian community should be seen through the lens of hope and not despair; through the lens of Zionism and not Ferguson. There are only about 130,000 Ethiopian Israelis, with thousands of college graduates, near universal military service and now a whole generation that is empowered. There is not a single issue facing the Ethiopian community in Israel that can’t be resolved through enlightened philanthropy and government action.”

Arutz Sheva’s Shalom Pollack also makes an effort to distance, perhaps unconvincingly, the plight of Ethiopian Jews in Israel from that of the African-American community in the United States: “Ethiopian Jews dreamed for thousands of years to ‘return to Jerusalem.’ They were not snatched out of Africa to be slaves but were reunited with brothers in Israel….The color of the rioters’ skin may be the same as those burning Baltimore down, but my Ethiopian brothers and sisters have a Yiddishe neshama [soul]. They never terrorized Jewish neighborhoods in Brooklyn or mugged my grandfather. These brothers came home to us with a pure heart and soul….Surely we need cops — good Jewish cops, with a good Jewish education. Then their sticks would be holy… as their Jewish neshamot. Israel would do well to cultivate the Jewish neshama. That would solve just about all our problems.”

Lot's Wife Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> There are African Jews, too, and that should make
> us realize yet again that language, culture, and
> religion do not align with the (itself ridiculous)
> category of race.

I don't know the history well enough (or much at all, my bad) so this sentence in the article, that mentioned Jews/African Americans, surprised me: "...to a certain extent, Jews felt pressure to distinguish themselves from African-Americans, a pressure also felt by other immigrant groups".

The participants discussed in the article addressed this aspect of the issue but I don't want to paste in for our discussion the racist stereotypes they mention. They explain it though. It's kind of mind-boggling. To me anyway.


LW:

> They thus represent proof that 1) Jews are
> multiracial, and 2) Israelis are not great, yet
> again, at dealing with ethnic differences.

It must be in our DNA, some ancient survival instinct or something. Not seeing other humans just as humans. I guess back in the day they did have reasonable cause to distrust outsiders. Too bad that instinct has survived so long. Maybe in many cases it's still required. But it sure causes trouble.


This topic reminded me of a time back in grade school. I have no idea what our classroom discussion was about in that moment but a kid in the class suddenly pointed at me and said "She looks Jewish". "I'm English!" was my reflex response (as I'd been born there). I was uninformed enough that I didn't know there were Jewish people in England. I was also severely embarrassed as I was so very shy. Being singled out like that was mortifying to me. I wondered for a long time what she had meant by that comment and finally concluded (in my youthful ignorance??) that I looked Jewish to her because I had pale skin and dark hair. I don't remember at all why that was my impression of being Jewish. Maybe from watching all the WWII movies we saw as kids and that was the appearance of the people in them. Another youthful impression was that all the women over there seemed to wear headscarves. Not the greatest fashion statement but maybe it was always cold.

I had no clue that decades later this would still be one of the major contentious issues in the world. Up to this very day and beyond.

Sad.

> I don't know the history well enough (or much at
> all, my bad) so this sentence in the article, that
> mentioned Jews/African Americans, surprised me:
> "...to a certain extent, Jews felt pressure to
> distinguish themselves from African-Americans, a
> pressure also felt by other immigrant groups".

There is a tribe in South Africa called the Lemba. They have long insisted they are Jewish, a claim many people thought absurd. Then ten years ago some enterprising geneticists tested their DNA and found out that lo and behold, they have blood from the tribe of Levy. What appears to have happened was that Jews established a trading colony there and intermarriage produced black Jews.

The Ethiopians were a similar group. Like Coptic Christians they've been there from the first century CE at the latest. It makes sense to assume there are many other such groups in Africa, some of which have doubtless forgotten at least that part of their ancestry.


------------------
> It must be in our DNA, some ancient survival
> instinct or something.

It probably is. Early humans were all hunter-gatherers, meaning that there was a limit to the size of a community that could coexist in a given plot of territory. There was variance in the size of the group, to be sure, but anthropologists suggest that the tipping point is around 100-200 individuals.

In a world of foragers, the approach of outside groups was a threat. Not only did the outsiders possibly harbor diseases to which the home group may not have developed immunity, there was also the high probability that the newcomers would seek dominance over the limited territorial resources the home group enjoyed. In short, new faces augured possibly existential danger.

Is it surprising that natural selection favored loyalty to a territorially and economically viable size of group? I don't think so. Then came the agricultural revolution of some 11,000 years ago, a development that allowed societies to grow beyond the clan level--and that was when states became important, since communities larger than clans were unstable. Hence civilization, meaning in this case governments with police forces, armies, courts, and strong centralized religions that served to counteract the fissiparous tendencies that human genetics entailed.

Much of modern intercommunal strife stems from the difference between our genetic endowments and the size and complexity of modern polities.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/2024 08:48PM by Lot's Wife.

Was.in Jordan some years ago and Europeans was the word used by our Arab guide to describe Israelis.

Kentish Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Was.in Jordan some years ago and Europeans was the
> word used by our Arab guide to describe Israelis.

That's interesting, Kentish.

I see from the article I linked above that not all Jewish people automatically consider themselves to be European.

Because - geography. :P

your guide wasn't far off the mark. The modern-day state of Israel was, in fact, founded primarily by Jews who were trying not only to escape the Nazis but to escape the prejudices against them from other European governments. The funny (and sad) thing is that once they got to Palestine, many got involved in acts against both the Arabs and British that would be considered terrorism today. One of the most brazen of these acts was the bombing of the King David Hotel in Jerusalem in 1946, the act that ultimately culminated in the UK leaving Palestine. Below is the link to that story from Wikipedia,

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

though there have been many long-form nonfiction books written on the subject as well.

Native-born Palestinian Jews outnumbered European Jews right up until the birth of the state of Israel and probably beyond.*

In 1922, 78% of the occupants of Palestine were Muslims, 11% were Jews, and 10% were Christians. Of the Jewish 11%, European Jews were a very small minority.

In 1935, the numbers were 67% Muslim, 27% Jewish, and 8% Christian. The reason for the surge in the Jewish population was a wave of immigration driven by anti-semitic European governments in Europe.

In 1944, the figures were still 61%, 30%, and 8%. Even then Muslims were twice as numerous as Jews.

There was a significant increase in European immigration immediately after WWII, when good data became a lot harder to get, but it's not at all clear that Jews outnumbered Arabs; and if the Christian locals were included in the numbers there's little likelihood that Jews comprised a numerical majority.

As you note, blindguy, the European Jews who streamed into Palestine after WWII were not gentle. The Muslim majority, or at last plurality, was primarily dirt farmers with little education and even less experience in government and military affairs, for the Turks had controlled Palestine until the end of WWI and then the British had taken power under a League of Nations mandate. The Muslims, in other words, had never had a chance to run their own affairs.

They were sitting ducks when the Europeans arrived. Not only were the newcomers highly educated by any standard, they also included military leaders with extensive experience in actual war and resistance forces who had fought the Nazis for many years--including the survivors of the Warsaw Uprising, which was massive underground movement that stymied Hitler's forces for a very long time,

The European Jews proved absolutely and ruthlessly determined to create an Jewish state in Palestine. Terrorist groups focused primarily on the British; the attack on the King David Hotel, for instance, was perpetrated by the forces of Menachem Begin, who would become prime minister of Israel in the 1970s. And it didn't take long for those European militants to win, driving the UK out of Palestine in 1948.

The groups who had fought the British also engaged in terrorism against the Muslims in the middle 1940s, but that theater was largely a sideshow. It was the attempt by the other Arab states to destroy Israel in the 1948 War that drew a stark and seemingly permanent line between Jewish Israel and the Palestinian Arabs.

That too must count as one of the dendritic consequences of Hitler and Nazism.




*A Survey of Palestine: Prepared in December 1945 and January 1946 for the information of the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry. Volume 1," Printed by the Government Printer, Palestine, 1946, p. 141.

i think the Jordanian's term was used in a derogatory sense because of the fact of so many Israelis having originated in Europe and thus did not belong. It was intertesting that when our Israeli guide took us over the border with Jordan and we were transfered to a Jordanian bus his last words were: "Have a great time in Jordan. You will find the people welcomng and hospitable." On our return to that border crossing our Jordanian guide got off the bus early because he refused to set foot in Israel.

I'm grateful to live in a country where I can believe any damn thing I choose to believe.