By Any Other Name

Just so, Jews want to be called Israelites, and the tailors dressmakers . . . But when an intrinsically innocuous name is discredited, this is not due to the name but to what is named. Hence the new name will soon share the fate of the old one.
- Arthur Schopenhauer

Now I'll say "a Jew" and just the word Jew sounds like a dirty word and people don't know whether to laugh or not.
- Lenny Bruce

I dislike the word Jew. I realize it's been around too long to go out of fashion, but it's worth stating that Schopenhauer is wrong. "Jew" sounds like a slur in a way Israelite and Hebrew do not. Jew itself is simply an abbreviation of Judean, which is much less nebulous. (The idiot asks: "If Jew is a nationality, why isn't there a Jewish passport?") Judean refers to a specific country of origin, Judea or Judah, as Egyptian does to Egypt, Italian does to Italy, etc. The Zionists should have called their state Judea and reclaimed the old usage. Israelite would then be reserved as a religious term, Judean as a geo-ethnic one.

Chinese people don't go around calling themselves Chins - why should Judeans be called Jews? Stupid puns like Jewcy, Jew-crew and Jewlicious do not help matters. As proud as I am of my ancestry, I take no pride in the guttural designation that has been attached to it. There are groups of blacks claiming to be the true Israelites or the true Hebrews, but never the true Jews. Why? Because Jew is an unpleasant word. I wish as silly a thing as a word didn't affect people's perceptions, but it does. "To Israelite someone" just doesn't sound the same, does it?

Comments

  1. latté islandJuly 20, 2009 at 9:43 PM

    I think the reason blacks don't call themselves Jews is they're making a distinction between present day Jews and ancient Israelites. I don't see anything derogatory in that, it's just a way to make their point (which is nuts, but not insulting).

    I wouldn't mind continuing to use the word "Jew," just as gay people say faggot or black people use the n word. After you own it that way, it sounds cool. The only problem is, the j word refers to religion as well as ethnicity, so people misunderstand.

    I like "Ashkenazi," and even though many anti-semites point out its similarity to nazi, that works just fine for me, because using it that way is a marker for stupidity, i.e. the word Ashkenazi has its own defense system, like a poisonous plant.

    ReplyDelete
  2. DudeJuly 21, 2009 at 10:57 AM

    I guess you'd like living in a Portuguese-speaking country. "Judeu" is quite similar to "Judean".

    ReplyDelete
  3. Ernest MirallesAugust 5, 2009 at 7:24 PM

    Well, i like to name myself as a Jew ~don't have any bad feeling about this word~ but it causes me some trouble; so as I live in Spain where "Judío" is the translation for Jew the word sounds very pointing to Judea.

    Furthermore it is very important to state the side you are in, as in Spain there are a lot of anti semitism, so you must fight it back. One must be Jew definitely or try to hide. I prefer fighting.

    ReplyDelete
  4. ¡Benjaminista!August 15, 2009 at 6:34 PM

    Benjamin Disraeli said to a heckler in parliament:

    "Yes, I am a Jew, and when the ancestors of the right honourable gentleman were brutal savages in an unknown island, mine were priests in the temple of Solomon."

    If "Jew" is good enough for Disraeli, it must be good enough for me.

    ReplyDelete

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