Anti-Semitism. In principle, is this the same as...

[Alan B]

...Anti-Christian or Anti-Muslim?

Note: I'm not conflating this with anti-Judaism, anti-Christianity or anti-Islam.

Personally, I'm not anti any religion or follower of a religion (unless they try to foist themselves down my throat). Although some religious practises the world could well do without...

[pErvinalia]

I set out to address this, but couldn't come up with anything coherent. It's actually harder than I thought it would be.

One thought - there must be atheist Jews. There's by definition no atheist Christians/Muslims. So anti-semitism isn't necessarily anti-judaism.

[Rum]

The complicating factor here is that 'Jew' is often used interchangeably to mean a person of the that particular faith - Judaism and a person of the Jewish nation - Israel, as well as of Jewish ethnicity. This is an ethnoreligious group in other words - and yes it is a real word. This interchangeability of usage often confuses discussion - as it has in the other thread on more or less this theme.

One can of course be anti the religion and not the 'race' or the nationality. One can be anti any or all of them. I would suggest that 'Antisemitism' is something else through - it is a set of prejudiced and usually bigoted beliefs that attribute the whole lot - the grab bag terms that can apply to Jewish people and assume a number of negative attributes to them - usually sinister - and I don't have to list those.

I'm pretty much anti- Judaism, though there is a lot of humanist thinking in the religion, I've got nothing at all against the people, I'm conflicted about the state but I'm certainly not antisemitic.

[Alan B]

I'm not sure how there can be atheist Jews since in my naivete, I'm thinking that a Jew is by definition a follower of Judaism. If a Jew converted to, say, Christianity, would they still be a Jew? How can you have a Jewish Christian?
If a person rejected their religion and became an atheist they would be an atheist of the country of which they are a citizen: Israeli atheist, British atheist, etc.

[Rum]

I'm not sure how there can be atheist Jews since in my naivete, I'm thinking that a Jew is by definition a follower of Judaism. If a Jew converted to, say, Christianity, would they still be a Jew? How can you have a Jewish Christian?
If a person rejected their religion and became an atheist they would be an atheist of the country of which they are a citizen: Israeli atheist, British atheist, etc.

Well I think you are incorrect. There are a load of people who would identify themselves as Jewish but not believers in Judaism.

Here's a list of a bunch of 'em in fact:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_J ... _agnostics

[Alan B]

Oh. Didn't know that.

[JimC]

It's an interesting phenomenon in the US, I gather. Jews with no belief in god, but a need to at the same time have at least some connection to the whole Jewish cultural identity thing. This intertwining of religion, ethnicity and culture has no real parallels elsewhere, I suspect...

[Svartalf]

especially when you notice that the ethnicity side of things is very important, what with sephardim and ashkenazim regularly calling each other false Jewsover shuch silly questions as what candle of a manorah is to be lit/snuffed out first...

[Brian Peacock]

Anti-Semitism is the name for the bigotry which focuses on a persons (actual or presumed) Jewish identity. I would say it is more like 'Islamophobia' than 'anti-Christian' or 'anti-Muslim' in as much as in these cases 'Jew' or 'Muslim' are words which target people on a broader basis than their religion alone. An anti-Semite doesn't care if a person is an Orthodox, Reformed, high-days-and-holidays only, lapsed, or atheist Jew - they're still 'a Jew.' After the same fashion, an Islamophobe doesn't care if a person is a Shai, Sunni, Ibadi, Sufi, a reluctant, or an atheist, an educated professional, a refugee, a widow, or a lone child 'Muslim' - they should still all be banned from entering the United States.

[Hermit]

Anti-Semitism is the name for the bigotry which focuses on a persons (actual or presumed) Jewish identity. I would say it is more like 'Islamophobia' than 'anti-Christian' or 'anti-Muslim' in as much as in these cases 'Jew' or 'Muslim' are words which target people on a broader basis than their religion alone. An anti-Semite doesn't care if a person is an Orthodox, Reformed, high-days-and-holidays only, lapsed, or atheist Jew - they're still 'a Jew.' After the same fashion, an Islamophobe doesn't care if a person is a Shai, Sunni, Ibadi, Sufi, a reluctant, or an atheist, an educated professional, a refugee, a widow, or a lone child 'Muslim' - they should still all be banned from entering the United States.

...or Australia, or the UK, or Germany, or France, or Hungary, or...

[Svartalf]

well, I'm all for letting shi'a muslims enter France, so long as they are Persian, or at the worst Kurdish, and not Arabs. (and Kurds tend to be sunni so I haveto make some exception for them too)

[Scot Dutchy]

The trouble is that being born into certain religious communities you are stuck with the description. A muslim or catholic will always be a catholic or muslim. A point well used in arguments about numbers of believers. The catholic church claims it represents so many when it does not as plenty are non-believers. The same is true of muslims which is why in Rotterdam the biggest mosque in the Netherlands is in trouble due to numbers; there aren't any.

[Rum]

I don't agree. My partner was born in a Catholic family. None of her family 'practice' or even think of themselves as Catholic. She is very agnostic in her outlook. I think the recent history of the Catholic church, not least the abuse that has been uncovered has eroded their credibility amongst people who would have been 'natural' believers more quickly than anyone could have guessed. Ireland used to have what was in effect a shadow government in the form of the Catholic Church. No longer.

[Scot Dutchy]

I don't agree. My partner was born in a Catholic family. None of her family 'practice' or even think of themselves as Catholic. She is very agnostic in her outlook. I think the recent history of the Catholic church, not least the abuse that has been uncovered has eroded their credibility amongst people who would have been 'natural' believers more quickly than anyone could have guessed. Ireland used to have what was in effect a shadow government in the form of the Catholic Church. No longer.

Rum the catholic church has your partners soul. She is on the registry. To remove her name from the registry is almost impossible. There is a Dutch guy on Ratskep who did manage but it took a lot of time and effort.

The effect of the abuse carried out by the catholic church is very visible in Ireland. In my wife's home town in Limerick County there is only one Sunday mass that is poorly attended and the priest is an African. In my wife's youth there were at least three priests and three masses on a Sunday and there was also a daily mass.
That is all gone.

BTW for a muslim it means death if he claims he does not believe (well according to the koran).

[Svartalf]

I don't agree. My partner was born in a Catholic family. None of her family 'practice' or even think of themselves as Catholic. She is very agnostic in her outlook. I think the recent history of the Catholic church, not least the abuse that has been uncovered has eroded their credibility amongst people who would have been 'natural' believers more quickly than anyone could have guessed. Ireland used to have what was in effect a shadow government in the form of the Catholic Church. No longer.

well, my family (mother's side particularly) are practicing catholics... and one of my aunts had a child out of wedlock and would have been banished by my grandparents if my mom and aunts had not intervened... then again, she also became a jehovah witness and has had a real weird position concenring family celebrations ever since... I mean, all weddings are catholic, and for a very long time (until my grandma became too old to attend) the Xmas rituals included compulsory attendence of midnight mass.