tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post565968702447358211..comments2024-03-12T22:31:46.500-04:00Comments on What Would Phoebe Do?: YPIS 8.0Phoebe Maltz Bovyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17996039330841139883noreply@blogger.comBlogger12125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-62976217757958456652014-05-11T10:12:43.433-04:002014-05-11T10:12:43.433-04:00Reform/Conservative Jews go to "Hebrew school...Reform/Conservative Jews go to "Hebrew school" for a few hours a day twice a week and learn Hebrew, Jewish history/culture, and some Torah (some of my best friends, as they say, are Reform, and I've taught at a Reconstructionist Hebrew School).<br /><br />Orthodox Jews go to "day school" or "yeshiva" (the two terms are nearly synonymous) where, in addition to secular subjects, a bearded dude comes in and smacks them with gemara folios from a relatively early age :)<br /><br />That's part of why Orthodox (even us "modern" ones) are so insular and bitchy about secular Jews -- it's not just a different religious practice, it is in many ways an entirely different culture.<br /><br />(Also, for the record, I have a few friends in the Princeton Orthodox community -- I am told that Tal does at least attend services)Stendhalnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-83261135161232615602014-05-11T09:46:29.459-04:002014-05-11T09:46:29.459-04:00Stendahl,
I stand corrected! And guilty of having...Stendahl,<br /><br />I stand corrected! And guilty of having no idea at which level of Jewish observance serious Talmud knowledge would begin. I mean, someone could say of me, that I'm a Jew from New York who went to Hebrew school and did a vaguely Jewish Studies PhD, so surely, Talmud! And yet, no Talmud. <br /><br />I might agree with your broader point, then - the rest of the essay, though wrong in countless ways, wasn't especially pretentious.Phoebe Maltz Bovyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17996039330841139883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-51333182555752612862014-05-11T09:30:08.506-04:002014-05-11T09:30:08.506-04:00His byline lists him as from New Rochelle, NY, and...His byline lists him as from New Rochelle, NY, and the article says he went to "Jewish day school" (a/k/a Talmud and Tzitzis, Inc.).<br /><br />But you're right, there is a difference between social Yiddish ("Oy, this verkackte tsimmes with my neighbor, it's got me all verschimmelt. That goyische gonif had the chutzpah to just walk into our kitchen and steal my cholent. The next time I see him, I'll potch that little pisher.") and yeshiva Yiddish (a Weltanschauung in which "Weltanschauung" is unavoidable).Stendhalnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-80032287624083347202014-05-11T08:04:37.687-04:002014-05-11T08:04:37.687-04:00Moebius,
Gross, but also weird, yet not weird. I ...Moebius,<br /><br />Gross, but also weird, yet not weird. I mean, George Zimmerman himself, given his appearance and background, is an odd hero for pro-white racists, and yet that's what's happened. So maybe what we're witnessing is a deeper expansion of who counts as white. Maybe, as absurd as it to someone even my age that a Jew could be so proudly white, these days, in the States at least, it's not. <br /><br />Stendhal,<br /><br />Interesting take. Despite being 110% Ashkenazi myself, and from a family where Yiddish was spoken not that long ago, that's a word I probably only encountered in grad school. The question really hinges on whether we have reason to think Fortgang studied the Talmud. Nothing in the (minimal) Googling I did of him would indicate this. I'd sooner guess 'freshman using unnecessarily long word' than 'unconscious Yiddishism,' but anything's possible.Phoebe Maltz Bovyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17996039330841139883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-8490696519895113162014-05-11T02:48:49.359-04:002014-05-11T02:48:49.359-04:00Besides those you addressed, I see another Jewish ...Besides those you addressed, I see another Jewish angle in this imbroglio. Would like to hear your thoughts: <br /><br />More than a few of Fortgang's detractors went after him for using the term "Weltanschauung" in his essay, using it as evidence of his out of touch, privileged upbringing: A clueless Princeton WASP (WASJ?) trying to use big words to bully his audience. <br /><br />The thing is, while Weltanschauung scans as rather pedantic German to the average American reader, it is also (like so many German words) proper Yiddish. And in the latter context, it is a familiar term of art to almost any Ashkenazi Orthodox Jew who (like me) studied Talmud growing up.<br /><br />The self-appointed privilege checkers (almost universally) claim that the point of "checking our privilege" is to encourage us to assume a stance of empathy--by continually questioning our social/cultural situatedness and its attendant presuppositions, we can more easily identify with the other.<br /><br />And in that respect, blithely using a linguistic artifact of Fortgang's (literal) ghetto heritage as evidence that he is incapable of relating to the contemporary ghetto of underclass America seems like something of a failure.<br /><br />Stendhalnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-45247911660776311422014-05-09T18:23:00.169-04:002014-05-09T18:23:00.169-04:00“I am sure there are some really racist white supr...<i>“I am sure there are some really racist white supremacists who point to me as a hero on the college campus.”</i><br /><br />What's...funny? ironic? sad? entirely unsurprising? ...is that Fortgang lacks the level of self-awareness to realize that many of his own words - from his Twitter account, before he deleted it, not on his privilege op-ed - are nigh-indistinguishable from what bona fide white supremacists say:<br /><br />eg - <a href="https://twitter.com/red3blog/status/462691207639220226/photo/1" rel="nofollow">1</a>, and <a href="https://twitter.com/blippoblappo/status/462624869071327232/photo/1" rel="nofollow">2</a>, the latter of which is essentially "Sure, Hitler was bad, BUT", and suggests that he's invoking his family's history more than a little opportunistically.Moebius Strippernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-69129074583739201682014-05-09T09:32:06.862-04:002014-05-09T09:32:06.862-04:00Britta,
Even at UChicago I encountered let's ...Britta,<br /><br />Even at UChicago I encountered let's just say those ideas. And in my experience, this contingent didn't think Jews were white, at least not in the same way that they thought of themselves as being white.Phoebe Maltz Bovyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17996039330841139883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-38156984531154048782014-05-09T00:23:58.795-04:002014-05-09T00:23:58.795-04:00I suppose it depends on the definition of white su...I suppose it depends on the definition of white supremacy. I doubt there are Klansmen at Princeton (although with legacies, you never know. Princeton is the "southern Ivy" after all). I am sure there are plenty of racists there who have enough social and cultural capital to know mask their racism in the 'right' sort of ways. Think John Derbyshire instead of David Duke. Brittahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02224221011978374915noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-35836983867563992682014-05-08T15:30:18.377-04:002014-05-08T15:30:18.377-04:00What, you mean you didn't drop everything and ...What, you mean you didn't drop everything and read it? I kid. <br /><br />But yes - it's unlikely that out-and-out white supremacists attend Princeton. Or that, if any do, they'd be all that moved by a defense of whiteness by someone white supremacists wouldn't consider white. Phoebe Maltz Bovyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17996039330841139883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-33274292847197841142014-05-08T15:22:52.719-04:002014-05-08T15:22:52.719-04:00I haven't got around to reading your article y...I haven't got around to reading your article yet but Fortgang says, “I am sure there are some really racist white supremacists who point to me as a hero on the college campus.”<br /><br />Really? Actual white supremacists at Princeton? They'd be lynched! He's probably referring to those marginally less PC than he is.caryatisnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-6788525623675178292014-05-08T11:52:53.221-04:002014-05-08T11:52:53.221-04:00Thanks Flavia! Thanks Flavia! Phoebe Maltz Bovyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17996039330841139883noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7146512.post-4181525734108562492014-05-08T11:26:15.026-04:002014-05-08T11:26:15.026-04:00Maybe the best thing I've seen written in this...Maybe the best thing I've seen written in this (though, I admit, I've been avoiding much of the commentary as unlikely to match the years of thought put into the official WWPD analysis of the phenomenon).Flaviahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17832765671541392835noreply@blogger.com