aka14kgold:

eshusplayground:

brehaaorgana:

nerdyqueerandjewish:

nerdyqueerandjewish:

Someone saying that jewish people never have dealt with immigration problems because we came from “white countries” holy shit

I’m like hi please learn more about Jewish history before you try to talk about Jewishness and it’s relationship to whiteness and race because if you don’t know something like this you definitely don’t know enough sorry!!

This is just SPECTACULARLY ignorant of the history of immigration to the US in general. But what’s most galling is that while immigration issues for certain white ethnic groups (i.e. mostly Catholic whites – Italians, Irish, Poles) shifted/improved over time, the St Louis ship FULL of 937 Jewish refugees was turned away in 1939.

At this point, I wonder if it’s a willful ignorance, and I need some ideas because I have no idea how to deal with that.

Honestly, with those people, I usually revert to the St. Louis example, and the statistics of its passengers upon returning to Europe. Occasionally I’ll invoke my rabbi’s Kol Nidre drash from a couple years back – on Syria and refugees – which began with the congregation raising hands based on periods of their families’ immigration (a tiny contingent for 1925-1990).

But at a certain point, I stop with all that, note that the KKK and other popular white supremacist groups think that (European, presumably) Jews are ‘infiltrating’ and ‘corrupting’ the white race, and remind them that blood quantum took over religious practice as the fundamental crime of Jews a long time ago. And occasionally, depending on the circumstances, I’ll remind them that my stereotypical Ashkie self was screamed at by the nephew of the local police chief in 1980-something for saying I was white.