Plugged in and ready to fall

[maypirate]

Here is your backstory: I was loud at lunch, some German students said something to me, I assume it was "Shut the fuck up," I ignored them and said "They killed my people."

I made an assumption of an insult, I retaliated with the first thing that came to mind.

Yes, it was bad, it was very very bad, that`s not something we should joke about, no they weren`t responsible, I know that, I know that, old blood, old wounds, I know, I`m fucking smart enough. I`m well aware of the brutality, I have enough sense and enough of a soul to respect the Shoah.

So you don`t dare tell me that I should know better, especially if you follow it up with an admission that you don`t follow your own advice.

I don`t owe you an apology, you don`t stand for them or my goddamn people Israel, all my owed apologies are to God, for my transgressions, for I should have known better, you don`t dare tell me what do or chastise me like you were my father on sedatives and say "I think we should think about this." You don`t stand there with your arms folded like I`m the younger one and I should know better and it`s good that you`re there to teach me, it`s good that you know I feel guilty, it`s good that I know my anger isn`t always logical.

And you NEVER call me half Jewish.

You NEVER call me that.

YOu wouldn`t understand, because you wear it like a badge, use it as a punchline for a joke. You wouldn`t understand what I`ve gone through my whole life, just because my mom happened to Hail Mary when she was young, you wouldn`t understand.

Faith is faith, faith is in your blood with belief, there is not only race there is what you feel in your heart, and if I am half Jewish what do you call converts? What do you call people who have "Jewish blood" but follow Christ? What do you say to that?

What do you say to that?

They are my people if I am Jewish in my heart, and I am Jewish in my heart, and you NEVER call me half Jewish.

And I don`t owe you an apology, I made a mistake and I owe recognition to myself and shame to God.

And you, Reid Sheridan, are one of four things that have made me cry since I came to Japan. Congratulations.

Comments

[mcjew.livejournal.com]

First, I want to apologize. I'm sorry I hurt you so deeply. I had no intention of injuring you. Calling you half Jewish was in bad taste and, in all honesty, you changed my perspective on that.

And now, I should explain why I acted the way I did. Hearing what you said made me angry. It made me really, really angry. But I knew that I could achieve nothing constructive if I let myself get emotional, and so I kept myself as calm as possible (on sedatives, as you describe it). That doesn't mean I wasn't feeling emotion. I just wanted to make sure I was as reasonable as I could be. I think that one of the reasons I called you half Jewish is that I hadn't calmed myself down by that point.

I spoke for such a long time because I was trying to explain to you (and to myself) why I was so angry about what you said. I wasn't trying to give you a lecture on ethics, that's why I avoided absolutes as much as I could. That's why I said "I feel that that invokes the Holocaust in a disrespectful way" rather than "that invokes the Holocaust in a disrespectful way." I don't mean to say that I know better, but I wanted to explain why I found it really offensive. We both had our arms folded. I understand how the height difference would make me seem patronizing.

I didn't want to lecture you on how you should behave, but I did want to explain why I believe that what you said was really inappropriate. It made me so angry.

I never said you owed me an apology. You apologized, guardedly, and I thanked you for it. You said something that I found offensive, and you evidently are not apologetic about it now. That's fine; that's your choice.

But you say something in here that really bothers me, and that's your comment on my own Jewishness. I've certainly never experienced the issues you have, since all the Orthodox Jews would accept me as Jewish regardless of my gentile father. I'm sure you have faced discrimination and hardship because the "wrong" half of you happens to be gentile, and I'm sure as a Reform Jew you have a lot of issues with Orthodox and Conservative Jews. I don't argue with that. But Judaism is not simply a punchline for me. I don't believe in the Jewish theology, which means that I don't study the Bible. But that doesn't mean I haven't studied Judaism itself. I've read a decent amount of the Old Testament, I've studied the time in Egypt, Rambam, the golden days of France and the Dreyfus Affair, the Inquisition, the pogroms in Poland, the shtetl and the ghetto; I've spoken to a Holocaust survivor about the Night of Broken Glass, learned about the horrors of the einsatzgruppen, been to several Holocaust museums, toured historic synagogues on the Lower East Side, read Night, Life in Auschwitz, Tough Jews, and I wrote a paper about anti-Semitism in American during World War II because I wanted to learn more about it. This isn't supposed to make you think I'm a great Jew, which I'm certainly not. But you should know that just because I'm not interested in the Bible doesn't mean that Judaism has no meaning for me.

I was not trying to speak for the Jews of the Holocaust or anything like that. I was angry, and I wanted you to know why. When I think about what happened during the Holocaust, I don't see any punchlines. I see Primo Levi being abducted and separated from his family and brought to the brink of death through slave labor. I see Mengele making arbitrary chalk lines on a brick wall that resulted in the deaths of thousands. It makes me want to vomit.

I'm sorry I offended you. I didn't want to make you cry, and I didn't want to anger you. I wanted to make you understand what I thought was hurtful and inappropriate about your comment. Evidently you understand that just fine. I hope you feel better.

[cone-monogatari.livejournal.com]

On a completely unrelated note...the girls LJ name is elevbess...you know a girl named Bess? She likes cool things!!!!

[oliverio.livejournal.com]

drama
in japan
drama!

hahah, tangled webs. no bess is a first year so amber does not know her.

[oliverio.livejournal.com]

i love the issue of context with these things, its so easy to cleave things in two: black and whites, when you're writing....