4 ms·

Never knew you could be "racist" against a religion. I get it though, take a powerful word with negative connotations and use it to put your target on the defe

Never knew you could be "racist" against a religion. I get it though, take a powerful word with negative connotations and use it to put your target on the defensive, no matter how tangential the connection. Kind of like being called a "commie" in the 20th century.

meatysnapper 11y ago
What if the race is synonymous with a religion- Judaism and Jews being the obvious example?
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  Except it isn't. There's a clear distinction between Jews as an ethnic group and Judaism the religion. Hence frequent criticism of and among various Jewish movements without it being anti-Semitic.
  - _ak 11y ago
    Not really. You're considered a Jew by other Jews if at least one of your parents is Jewish (your mother in most sects, your father in a few other sects). That's very tribalistic. So, what's the common communal identifier of Jews? Jewish culture, and interwoven with that, Judaism. You can't separate the religious from the cultural component of that communal identity, and you can't separate Jewish culture from Jewish people. This also shows in how Israel regulates its immigration: both people with ethnically Jewish roots (at least one of your grandparents) and people of Jewish belief where ethnic roots hadn't been established at that time (biggest example: Ethiopian Jews) are accepted and granted citizenship. Conversion of people to Judaism are relatively rare, and are really a more recent phenomenon. Jews don't proselytize and often discourage conversion. Samaritans, the "sister" religion of Judaism (both derive from the Israelites from before the destruction of the first temple), are similar but even more extreme in that. How more tribalistic than that can you get?
    - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
      However, Jews also have disproportionately high levels of atheism, secularism and other forms of irreligion, which means much of the Jewish culture (Judaism) is relegated to irrelevance, but the ethnic identification nonetheless remains. Jewish culture as such is certainly interwoven with Judaism, but becoming increasingly syncretic. Look at the large number of hilonim in Israel.
- hackuser 11y ago
  People of many different ethnicities are Jewish.
- yebyen 11y ago
  I think a lot of people would disagree that there is such a thing as a Jewish race, to start with. This gets at the question of what exactly is a race, as well. I think it most likely has something to do with your genes and family lineage, without getting too deep into it. Unsure of this myself, I have googled and found that some writers with prominent search ranks say that Jews were always considered to be a race until after the holocaust. I still don't think it's remotely correct to say "synonymous" even here.
  - planfaster 11y ago
    Not only are Jews a race, they are the race most interested in racial-genetic studies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Aaron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Aaron
Apocryphon 11y ago
Racism is just shorthand for prejudices such as ethnocentrism, Orientalism, Othering.
- vezzy-fnord 11y ago
  I have never, never seen anti-Christianity been referred to as "racism" by anyone, not even evangelicals and fundamentalists. It would make large swaths of criticism of Christianity (not to mention many extreme metal bands) post-facto racist. "Othering" is far more general than racism, and relates to identity as a whole, not a specific racial identity.
  - Apocryphon 11y ago
    Granted, there are many types of anti-Islamic thought, everything from actually studying the tenets of the religion and arguing against it from different angles, all of the way to having ignorant, inaccurate cultural stereotypes- Islamophobia. My conflating of racism with anti-Islam is with the latter. Because people in the West are usually less familiar with Islam, it's not difficult for people to assume Muslims are "those brown people over there in the Middle East", not unlike how a medieval European might have the social construct of a "Saracen." The point is, when a show depicts Islam in an inaccurate way that lumps a bunch of different peoples and cultures together as one Middle Eastern hodgepodge, it can be considered false to life, and thus, "racist." Anti-Christianity doesn't work the same way in the West, because people here are generally less ignorant of that religion, and less likely to lump in all white people together as Christians. Maybe it's different in the East (though probably not the Middle East, where there are substantial Christian populations), and there they lump in all Christians as "those white people in America and Europe." In which case they would also be having a racist assumption.
  - hyperpape 11y ago
    I agree that's a bad definition. However, one aspect that makes a difference is many Americans' picture of a Muslim is someone with vaguely brown skin. The people who engage in anti-Muslim hate crimes sometimes end up attacking Sikhs, non-Muslim Indians, even Coptic-Christians. https://www.splcenter.org/news/2011/03/29/anti-muslim-incidents-sept-11-2001 https://www.splcenter.org/news/2011/03/29/anti-muslim-incide... In a case where a culture conceptualized all and only White people as Christians and stereotyped or attacked them, I would see no problem calling that racism.
calibraxis 11y ago
> Never knew you could be "racist" against a religion. Excellent, this graffiti taught people that one can indeed by racist against muslims, because race is a pseudoscientific social construct used to attack people!
- walshemj 11y ago
  With religions its sectarianism
oldmanjay 11y ago
I've come through the other side on this topic. When someone levels an "ism" charge, I assume the accuser has an agenda and become suspicious.
- rmxt 11y ago
  How exactly does that strategy address the original concern? It sidesteps the issue completely without refuting it.
- floatboth 11y ago
  "Has an agenda" is a completely, utterly meaningless phrase. Literally everyone has an agenda. It's okay. You have an agenda too. You just convinced yourself you don't.
  - oldmanjay 11y ago
    No, I didn't convince myself I don't, and didn't even insinuate such a thing. Your inferences are interesting in that light. My agenda is to understand and promote objective truth. The agenda of those who level charges of racism or sexism or other isms is generally to drive the debate down predetermined emotional channels as a shortcut to an actual discussion.
elif 11y ago
I think you're trying to make a point out of semantics and not reality here, but i'll take the bait... here's the first definition google gave me ( http://storage8.static.itmages.com/i/15/1015/h_1444933364_2424731_485f4b7228.png http://storage8.static.itmages.com/i/15/1015/h_1444933364_24... ) "a group of people sharing the same culture, history, language, etc.; an ethnic group."
gizmo 11y ago
A more intelligent approach is to evaluate whether claims about racism hold water instead of issuing a blanket dismissal. During the McCarthy era individuals got persecuted by the state for their beliefs. That's not at all comparable to people voicing an opinion that you may not agree with.
dragonwriter 11y ago
> Never knew you could be "racist" against a religion. Bigotry against a cultural identity really isn't all that substantially different when the basis of the cultural identity is "race" or "religion", and bigotry against a race or ethnicity can often manifest in bigotry against other cultural identities that are correlated with that race or ethnicity, such as religion. So, bigotry against a particular can both be a manifestation of racism, as well as being a thing substantially similar to racism independently of whether it is a manifestation of racism.
skywhopper 11y ago
What does religion have to do with whether Homeland is racist?

meatysnapper 11y ago

What if the race is synonymous with a religion- Judaism and Jews being the obvious example?

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
Except it isn't. There's a clear distinction between Jews as an ethnic group and Judaism the religion. Hence frequent criticism of and among various Jewish movements without it being anti-Semitic.
- _ak 11y ago
  Not really. You're considered a Jew by other Jews if at least one of your parents is Jewish (your mother in most sects, your father in a few other sects). That's very tribalistic. So, what's the common communal identifier of Jews? Jewish culture, and interwoven with that, Judaism. You can't separate the religious from the cultural component of that communal identity, and you can't separate Jewish culture from Jewish people. This also shows in how Israel regulates its immigration: both people with ethnically Jewish roots (at least one of your grandparents) and people of Jewish belief where ethnic roots hadn't been established at that time (biggest example: Ethiopian Jews) are accepted and granted citizenship. Conversion of people to Judaism are relatively rare, and are really a more recent phenomenon. Jews don't proselytize and often discourage conversion. Samaritans, the "sister" religion of Judaism (both derive from the Israelites from before the destruction of the first temple), are similar but even more extreme in that. How more tribalistic than that can you get?
  - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
    However, Jews also have disproportionately high levels of atheism, secularism and other forms of irreligion, which means much of the Jewish culture (Judaism) is relegated to irrelevance, but the ethnic identification nonetheless remains. Jewish culture as such is certainly interwoven with Judaism, but becoming increasingly syncretic. Look at the large number of hilonim in Israel.
hackuser 11y ago
People of many different ethnicities are Jewish.
yebyen 11y ago
I think a lot of people would disagree that there is such a thing as a Jewish race, to start with. This gets at the question of what exactly is a race, as well. I think it most likely has something to do with your genes and family lineage, without getting too deep into it. Unsure of this myself, I have googled and found that some writers with prominent search ranks say that Jews were always considered to be a race until after the holocaust. I still don't think it's remotely correct to say "synonymous" even here.
- planfaster 11y ago
  Not only are Jews a race, they are the race most interested in racial-genetic studies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Aaron https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Y-chromosomal_Aaron

Apocryphon 11y ago

Racism is just shorthand for prejudices such as ethnocentrism, Orientalism, Othering.

vezzy-fnord 11y ago
I have never, never seen anti-Christianity been referred to as "racism" by anyone, not even evangelicals and fundamentalists. It would make large swaths of criticism of Christianity (not to mention many extreme metal bands) post-facto racist. "Othering" is far more general than racism, and relates to identity as a whole, not a specific racial identity.
- Apocryphon 11y ago
  Granted, there are many types of anti-Islamic thought, everything from actually studying the tenets of the religion and arguing against it from different angles, all of the way to having ignorant, inaccurate cultural stereotypes- Islamophobia. My conflating of racism with anti-Islam is with the latter. Because people in the West are usually less familiar with Islam, it's not difficult for people to assume Muslims are "those brown people over there in the Middle East", not unlike how a medieval European might have the social construct of a "Saracen." The point is, when a show depicts Islam in an inaccurate way that lumps a bunch of different peoples and cultures together as one Middle Eastern hodgepodge, it can be considered false to life, and thus, "racist." Anti-Christianity doesn't work the same way in the West, because people here are generally less ignorant of that religion, and less likely to lump in all white people together as Christians. Maybe it's different in the East (though probably not the Middle East, where there are substantial Christian populations), and there they lump in all Christians as "those white people in America and Europe." In which case they would also be having a racist assumption.
- hyperpape 11y ago
  I agree that's a bad definition. However, one aspect that makes a difference is many Americans' picture of a Muslim is someone with vaguely brown skin. The people who engage in anti-Muslim hate crimes sometimes end up attacking Sikhs, non-Muslim Indians, even Coptic-Christians. https://www.splcenter.org/news/2011/03/29/anti-muslim-incidents-sept-11-2001 https://www.splcenter.org/news/2011/03/29/anti-muslim-incide... In a case where a culture conceptualized all and only White people as Christians and stereotyped or attacked them, I would see no problem calling that racism.

calibraxis 11y ago

> Never knew you could be "racist" against a religion. Excellent, this graffiti taught people that one can indeed by racist against muslims, because race is a pseudoscientific social construct used to attack people!

walshemj 11y ago
With religions its sectarianism

oldmanjay 11y ago

I've come through the other side on this topic. When someone levels an "ism" charge, I assume the accuser has an agenda and become suspicious.

rmxt 11y ago
How exactly does that strategy address the original concern? It sidesteps the issue completely without refuting it.
floatboth 11y ago
"Has an agenda" is a completely, utterly meaningless phrase. Literally everyone has an agenda. It's okay. You have an agenda too. You just convinced yourself you don't.
- oldmanjay 11y ago
  No, I didn't convince myself I don't, and didn't even insinuate such a thing. Your inferences are interesting in that light. My agenda is to understand and promote objective truth. The agenda of those who level charges of racism or sexism or other isms is generally to drive the debate down predetermined emotional channels as a shortcut to an actual discussion.

elif 11y ago

I think you're trying to make a point out of semantics and not reality here, but i'll take the bait... here's the first definition google gave me ( http://storage8.static.itmages.com/i/15/1015/h_1444933364_2424731_485f4b7228.png http://storage8.static.itmages.com/i/15/1015/h_1444933364_24... ) "a group of people sharing the same culture, history, language, etc.; an ethnic group."

gizmo 11y ago

A more intelligent approach is to evaluate whether claims about racism hold water instead of issuing a blanket dismissal. During the McCarthy era individuals got persecuted by the state for their beliefs. That's not at all comparable to people voicing an opinion that you may not agree with.

dragonwriter 11y ago

> Never knew you could be "racist" against a religion. Bigotry against a cultural identity really isn't all that substantially different when the basis of the cultural identity is "race" or "religion", and bigotry against a race or ethnicity can often manifest in bigotry against other cultural identities that are correlated with that race or ethnicity, such as religion. So, bigotry against a particular can both be a manifestation of racism, as well as being a thing substantially similar to racism independently of whether it is a manifestation of racism.

skywhopper 11y ago

What does religion have to do with whether Homeland is racist?