Why is BF.net anti-Semitic?

[imaji]

Wow, a lot of bases to touch...

 

"And since for some reason I got called out for my avatar by you, which was pretty lame if I do say, the picture in mine is a close-up of Woody Guthrie's guitar. I honestly thought that pretty much everyone would know that, but whatever, though."

 

I wasn't calling you out, per se, merely grasping at an obvious 'stretching' of clearly stated rules. Fascism is a political system. Site rules clearly state to avoid references to politics. It would be incongruous to allow your avatar and not mine, whether yours is pro or con towards the mentioned belief system, and whether or not the historical reference (Woody's guitar) existed.

 

"Kinky and the Texas Jewboys is Kinky Friedman's band. He is actually Jewish himself."

 

I am aware, but it would in fact be possible for someone to mock their own race and heritage, just ask Bill Cosby.

 

"I am speaking out by saying I do not like it. I find it insulting and inflammatory."

I would be much more willing to consider pulling it if you had a reason besides "I don't like it". What offends you? The letters j-e-w? The word Jew? The pairing of the word "Jew" with "boys"? (I know black people that consider being called "boy" derogatory, due to historic connotation...I find it ridiculous, but then again, the word "gay" meant "happy" when i was growing up, and now, evidently, it can't mean anything EXCEPT homosexual...go figure...sometimes I hate this country). Does the blending of Jewboys with a Cowboys logo trigger your "offense" button? WHAT? "I don't like it" doesn't address anything in particular except what one COULD call an oversensitive martyr complex.

 

"I was aware of Kinky Friedman, etc before this avatar business but it still struck me as pretty provocative."

 

If you mean provocative as in "attention grabbing", excellent. If you mean provocative as in "trying to start a fight", I'd suggest, as above, that any "problem" perhaps exists within your own prejudices and biases as opposed to the logo.

 

"the first time i saw that avatar it caught my eye too, and of course i had no idea whether you were mocking the jewish religion or not. I do know that I would never use my religion as part of my fantasy football nickname, but thats me."

 

When did I ever state I was orthodox hassidim? Jew is a nationality, a race, if you will, Judaism is a religion. Not all Jews practise Judaism, just like all the Irish aren't Catholics, and all the English aren't Anglican. I have it on good authority that all black people don't celebrate Kwanzaa, either. If you are going to go in that direction, Hebrew Hammer's avatar is MUCH more "provocative", to use a previously mentioned adjective. His Star of David is much more overt, and the silhouette in it clearly identifies a religious figure.

 

"That would be like if Marquette actually did change their nickname to the jumping jesuits as the students wanted a few years ago."

 

What exact;y would be wrong with that? Marquette is, in fact, a Jesuit owned university that enforces religious policies (however loosely) on their student body, is it not? ANd before you say "no", I took classes at MU within the past 10 years and still have a student handbook around somewhere, it made for very interesting reading to a guy who enjoys philosophy and religion as much as I do.

 

"Something like this, coming from a Jewish guy, is about as offensive as a WWJD bracelet. Besides, is Jerry Jones Jewish (I really don't know) or Romo?"

 

So is it your position that no person of Jewish descent should ever be allowed to convert to, for instance, Christianity? What races and nationalities are allowed freedom of religion in your book? Can the French choose to be Methodist, or are they stuck with Catholicism? Are all Germans required to be Lutheran? The arguments/observations stated here in these last few posts are extreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeemely interesting to me.

 

"If you can be offended by the avatar you better know what 18 really means."

 

I have absolutely no idea what that's supposed to mean, but then again, the avatar doesn't offend me. =)

 

I'd best stop for now, lest this turn into a clearly banned political/religious discussion. Anyone interested in further discourse, I can be contacted by PM or at yahoo with my same username (imaji).

[SeriesFinale]

"I was aware of Kinky Friedman, etc before this avatar business but it still struck me as pretty provocative."

 

If you mean provocative as in "attention grabbing", excellent. If you mean provocative as in "trying to start a fight", I'd suggest, as above, that any "problem" perhaps exists within your own prejudices and biases as opposed to the logo.

My prejudice and bias against what, appropriated slurs? Prejudice and bias is a heavy accusation which I frankly resent.

[imaji]

"I was aware of Kinky Friedman, etc before this avatar business but it still struck me as pretty provocative."

 

If you mean provocative as in "attention grabbing", excellent. If you mean provocative as in "trying to start a fight", I'd suggest, as above, that any "problem" perhaps exists within your own prejudices and biases as opposed to the logo.

My prejudice and bias against what, appropriated slurs? Prejudice and bias is a heavy accusation which I frankly resent.

I am curious to know when the word "Jew" became a slur? As noted previously, the Journal ran a page 2 feature 3 Sundays ago titled "The top 5 Jewish hitters in Baseball History". Is "Italian" a slur? Is "Irishman" a slur? What must Jewish people be called, "Hebrews", and that exclusively?

edit:

 

Every human being has prejudices and biases. You are (hopefully) prejudiced against rattlesnakes, and I'm quite certain you have a bias against Cubs fans and certain foods. Why do those words scare you?

[pogokat]

Imaji---

 

I understand your sentiment and think you make some very strong heartfelt points about your image. I don't think you are breaking the rules of the forum.

 

Of course, i do think this discussion and the direction it is headed is reminiscent of the discussions we had prior to the banning of political and religious discussion.

 

This is a baseball forum...not anything else. We have off topic discussion, but it is as an aside, rather than a central point of the site. Because of this, we decided to cut out conversations that make people angry and uncomfortable. Things got prettty bad around here in 2004, so it just had to happen...

 

why? well, this place is meant to be fun...i see few people having fun here.

 

You are not in the wrong in anyway, however i think bringing this fight to brewerfan is misguided---just as misguided as a well informed discussion on free speech would be. Not that what you are saying is wrong, bad, incohherant, or offensive, but that this isn't the proper forum for it.

 

In asking you to remove your image, the mods were more of less hoping to avoid a situation like this. Honestly, it's hard to expect that this topic won't come up over and over again on the board, so perhaps it would be bets to let it fade away now.

 

Support your heritage, live your way---this country is free and a helluva democracy. But, perhaps it would be wise to focus on the topic at hand, rather than forcing an uncomfortable issue.

 

 

 

anyway, i see that you already said you'd drop the conversation, but i wanted to throw my thoughts out there...

[imaji]

For educational purposes:

 

"

Jew

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Jew (Hebrew: ????????, Yehudi (sl.); ?????????, Yehudim (pl.); Ladino: ???????, Djudios; Yiddish: ????, Yid (sl.); ?????, Yidn (pl.))^{[1][/sup] is a member of the Jewish people who are an ethnic group originating in the Israelites of the ancient Middle East. The Jewish people or the Jewish nation also consists of others who converted to Judaism throughout the millennia. The ethnicity and the religion of Judaism are strongly interrelated, and converts are both included and have been absorbed within the Jewish people.}

The Jews have suffered a long history of persecution in many different lands, and their population and distribution per region has fluctuated throughout the centuries. Today, most authorities place the number of Jews between 12 and 14 million,^{[2][/sup] the largest number of whom live in the United States (40.5% in 2002) and Israel (34.4% in 2002), with the remainder distributed in communities of varying sizes in almost every country. The total world Jewish population, however, is difficult to measure and is subject to the controversy of secular, halakhic or other parameters of defining who is a Jew.}

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jew

 

Amazing how many times Wikipedia can use slurs in one preface, eh?

 

http://www.jewwatch.com/images/pic%20page%20folder/gif-logo-jewwatch-2.jpg

The Jew Watch Project Is The Internet's Largest Scholarly Collection of Articles on Jewish History

Free Educational Library for Private Study, Scholarship, and Research

The Jew Watch Project's 637 Million Pages Served Demonstrate Our Focus on Professionalism

http://www.jewwatch.com/

 

 

http://www.jewfaq.org/whoisjew.htm

 

http://jewschool.com/

 

 

 

Please stop yourselves, your ignorance on the subject really does nothing but make you look like closet racists.

edit:

I hadn't seen pogokat's post as I composed this last one. I'm frankly stunned that (a) this became an issue in the first place, and (b) that it has snowballed into a "MAJOR ISSUE".

My last line basically sums up my feelings. This is closet racism from people who don't even realize they are racists. It's ok. Please feel free to delete my account at Brewerfan.net.

[homer]

I think this all would have died a quick death had mods locked this thread after it had been decided to let him keep his avatar.

 

Having said that, tossing out the race card in that last post was really uncalled for and extremely rude. Why not enlighten people that might be a little ingorant instead of accusing them (falsely I might add) of racism? Some of the posters in this thread are Jewish (I know for that for a fact).....are they racist for being insulted by your avatar? That would be ironic.

[brewerjamie15]

It may be late in some circles, but I believe that locking this thread is a good idea because not much more can be gained here. I only see trouble headed our way and I would like to avoid that. I would invite anyone interested in continuing the topic or asking for further explanations as to why this thread was locked to contact me via inbox or at my brewerfan email. jamie@brewerfan.net

 

Thank You