james_davis_nicoll | Given open antisemitism is mainstream again in the US

I vote yes, but I should observe I'm neither Jewish nor a person of color.

As a white demi-Jew, I think it's not helpful to conflate white Jews with POC, anti-Semitism and racism being two separate (though frequently related) axes. However, could be worth keeping stats on percentages of Jewish creators.

... OTOH, saying that, I am aware of the risk of them being used to show that there are Too Many Jews in SF/F, that we have secretly infiltrated and are controlling etc. etc. etc.

(Or, alternatively, "Look, we can't be racist, we have Jewish authors!")

This could be a tricky one.

I'm Jewish (and white and male), and I was feeling waffly about these issues when I saw your post. Then I clicked to see the comments and saw that Rydra had expressed them already. Hence the icon.

Edited 2016-11-21 19:03 (UTC)

What if the stats tracked all religions, or at least the major groups? E.g., Buddhist, Christian, etc.? So many othering opportunities there.

As a white Jew, this idea makes me really uncomfortable. Given the accelerating Anti-Semitism, maybe I'll feel differently in a month, but for now I think that collapsing Anti-Semitism into racism erases some important power differentials and experiences.

Agreed.

One man's opinion: Antisemitism has been a problem on both the left and the right for quite some time, so I would say yes. The fact that we're right around the beginning of the 'war on christmas' season also makes it seem somehow particularly appropriate.

I'd say no, because people can choose to stop being a white Jew but can't choose to stop being a poc and Black Jews are treated differently to white Jews, but you could keep a separate tally of Jewish and Muslim authors (ETA to clarify: especially because some Muslims are white people).

Edited 2016-11-21 16:56 (UTC)

I don't think people like Bannon are interested in whether or not someone has 'chosen' to stop being Jewish.

No, neither do I. Nor do I believe racists can accurately categorise people by appearance anyway. Nonetheless, some Jews are also Black, and some Muslims are white, and white Jews/Muslims aren't treated with the same racism as poc.

Race is, of course, a ridiculous unscientific form of categorisation anyway but as white people insist on imposing their racism I unfortunately have to deal with the consequences.

Pretty sure that he won't care about such things. I don't know him, thanks be, but I'm sure of that.

I assume James means ethnic Jews, who are still considered Jews by white supremacists even if they don't practice Judaism. Black Jews are POC no matter what, and white Europeans who convert to Judaism ... well, I doubt Ivanka's facing any antisemitism except through proxy.

ethnic Jews, who are still considered Jews by white supremacists even if they don't practice Judaism

Perhaps you need practical examples. If fleeing the US as refugees under false papers, who would find it more difficult to disguise their appearance: Marge Piercy or N.K Jemisin? Who is most likely to be stopped by a racist stranger, whether a policeman or a white supremacist terrorist? If you still don't get the difference between being a white Jew and a Black person then, as usual, I'll give up and assume you're trolling rather than that stupid.

P.S. I'm multiracial and in both cases, fleeing Jews and fleeing non-white people, I can draw on my own family history to know what the realities are.

Edited 2016-11-21 17:58 (UTC)

Okay, so Jews have an easier time fleeing persecution, but the potential for persecution and fleeing is still there. Are we supposed to ignore that? What about Hispanics who can pass for white? Or Native Americans? Afghans? Iranians? People of mixed race? Why should the test be, "Can they sneak through a police checkpoint?" instead of, "Will they have to leave their home when Steve Bannon calls for ethnic cleansing?"

http://james-nicoll.livejournal.com/5780215.html?thread=107747575#t107747575

Why should the test be, "Can they sneak through a police checkpoint?" instead of, "Will they have to leave their home when Steve Bannon calls for ethnic cleansing?"

Because one of these is already happening you racist ignoramus.

Edited 2016-11-21 19:11 (UTC)

Sometimes I remember why I put an LJ note on a user!

Most readers will probably assume you mean me and not the ever trolling Sean O'Hara, lol.

P.S. Hi! I haven't seen you around for ages! :-)

I suspect you may have mistaken me for someone else.

I recall you from Racefail, no?

Because one of these is already happening

Did anyone say otherwise? No.

The issue is, the situation is changing rapidly. There has been a spike in antisemitic attacks across social media enabled by the guy who is soon to be President of the United States, and his chief political strategist is part of a literal Neo-Nazi movement. "Jews will have an easier time escaping" isn't an acceptable response -- and it raises the very obvious question, "Where?" Brexit-era Britain? Soon-to-be La Pen-dominated France? An Israel run by an increasingly authoritarian government?

Get with the program. We don't have time for stupid "Judean People's Liberation Front" infighting. If you're worried about whether Jews are people of color, or whether "white nationalist" is a better term than "alt right" you are part of the problem right now.

I've written to my Congressman today and donated to the Standing Rock Sioux. What the fuck have you done to make a difference?

Yes. Thank you. I live in a city where peoples' front porches and vans are being spray painted with swastiksas. I do not want to hear "oh, you can escape if you just move" to a vastly more expensive city? To another country that may not even have me, because "I'm moving to Canada/Australia/New Zealand" is not as easy as it sounds at first?

"Oh, you can escape if you change your name from Naomi to Jane."

"Oh, you can escape if you stop celebrating the High Holy Days."

"Oh, you can escape in someone's basement for three years."

I mean? What?

Without entering an opinion on whether or not Ashkenazi Jews should be counted with PoC for James's purposes, I think it would be very difficult indeed to disguise my Ashkenazi features from anybody interested enough to be an anti-Semite.

I'm sure that's true, and not only of you, and that people who're not Jewish are targetted by anti-Semites for "looking Jewish" exactly as Sikhs have been targetted for "looking Muslim".

Interestingly, when I'm not with my family, I'm most often mistaken for Jewish and this mistaken identity has mostly been by white Jewish people (who, in London, are very cosmopolitan about the range of physical features considered likely to be Jewish). Before Brits were familiar with hijabis I was occasionally mistaken for Muslim due to my tendency to wear hats. Being multiracial means I have complicated experiences.

Yes, I was mistaken for Muslim, though only once, and by a Muslim woman (as far as I know). And a former friend of mine whose mother had been a Holocaust survivor had once been singled out in her school by a Nazi who had come to give a talk (before she was pulled out and sent to a Jewish school) on physiognomy as having particularly Aryan features (she was Jewish; nobody told the speaker, thank goodness). It's a slippery fish.

Actually, people can't stop being 'white Jews'. There is a distinct cast of features that is considered ethnic Jewish, and it is used in some parts of the US to discriminate. Is it the same as discrimination against black people in the US? No. But it is quite real in some locales. The antisemites will talk about Tay Sachs, e.g.

http://james-nicoll.livejournal.com/5780215.html?thread=107747575#t107747575

That’s right, keep posting that link all over the thread, goysplaining to Jews that we’re not **really** oppressed.

You are everything that is wrong with fandom social justice and then some.

A lot of people were murdered within living memory after believing until it was too late that they could "stop being white Jews". Whatever you personally believe, people who murder Jews think it's an indelible ethnicity not a belief system.

Again:

http://james-nicoll.livejournal.com/5780215.html?thread=107747575#t107747575

Srsly, I'm going to keep linking what I've already said until the race-splaining white people read it. Except you, vom_marlowe, and Sean O'Hara always white-splain to me and never listen. I wonder who'll want their turn next.

LOL. None of them are whitesplaining. They're calling you out for an ill-thought out remark.

You seem to have meant that White Jews can easily pass as Gentiles, but the way you phrased it made it sound like you think being Jewish is a choice. You could apologise and say that that's not what you meant, but I think you'd rather drink battery acid than admit to a mistake, so now you're choosing to twist any way you can to avoid being criticised.

Funny that you classify Jews only as Black and White. Are you aware of the existence of Mizrahi Jews? You might chose to classify Andre Chouraqui, Charles Saatchi, and Bahar Soomekh as White because they're not Black, but it's a fair bet that most people don't and most committed racists sure as shit don't.

Nope.

And "Black" in English English is often used to denote non-white people, aka POC in USian English. Sometimes "Black Jew" means one thing and sometimes it means another. It's customary to read for context.

"Nope."
So... you actually meant that you think people can just stop being Jewish any ol' time they feel like it?

"And "Black" in English English is often used to denote non-white people."
Odd. I've always been called 'Asian' by English English people for being Pashtun; never 'Black.'

But I'll trust that you're telling the truth and not just trying to backpedal furiously, because you clearly know everything about every topic under the sun.

Edited 2016-11-22 23:01 (UTC)

As a white Jew, I don't think white Jews should be categorized as POC. It erases Jews of color and obscures how white privilege interacts with Jewishness.

But it's not because "people can choose to stop being a white Jew". I find that phrasing and justification dismissive and troubling. Partly it's because, as other people have pointed out, you really can't; anti-Semites don't care what religion you declare. Partly it's because, paradoxically, anti-Semites have also used that argument for forced conversions. Mostly it's because it sounds about the same to me as saying "people can choose to cut off their right hands". My Jewishness is as much a part of me as my gender, sexuality, or race. Passing is not the same thing as not being something.

Okay, thank you for the explanation. I apologise for upsetting you. I wasn't, of course, advocating "passing" as a way of life for anyone.

This isn't directed at coffeeandink but belongs in this train of thought so I'm posting it in this comment: I now understand that this context is not a time and place where nuance is possible due to the divide and rule enforcement of whiteness here but I note that the experiences of multiracial people from multiracial families appear to have been rendered invisible again. The white people who were racist to me were racist, and at least three of them are regular offenders, my apology above in no way exonerates their racism.

To reiterate: coffeeandink and any other Jewish person who was upset by my use of the phrase "people can choose to stop being a white Jew" have my unreserved apologies for that phrasing and my clumsy reference to the controversial subjects of Jewishness and appearance, and Jewishness and cultural assimilation.

This is the trans woman from the earlier comment. And this strikes me as either unbelievably naive, or intensely disingenuous:

I wasn't, of course, advocating "passing" as a way of life for anyone.

Because the argument that you made was that white Jews could choose to not be Jews anymore. Therefore, quite logically, if white Jews are oppressed, they are oppressed because they are choosing to be so. Judaism is not a culture, not an ethnicity, not a race, but a choice.

I will leave aside the obvious fact that it's relatively easy, especially now, to find out if someone is of Jewish heritage even if they are acting WASP-y as WASPs can be. Even back in the 40s, people were 'found out' as having Jewish heritage who didn't even know it themselves, and records are more comprehensive and better-kept now than then.

But: yes, you were basically saying, they don't deserve extra support, visibility, or emphasis, because they could pass. So if they don't choose to pass, they don't deserve attention, because they could get it from the mainstream if they only chose to pretend not to be Jewish.

So if they want attention they should...

...well....

...pass, and get that attention from the mainstream. And not steal it from the real minorities.

That's the inevitable conclusion from what you've said, and your mealy-mouthed 'I apologize but then take my apology back in the next sentence because I really do think you aren't a proper minority' reads as.

Speaking as a trans woman who is a Jew, I think that's fairly horrifying. Judging who is a proper minority and who is not shouldn't be based on whether something is visible to the naked eye, which seems to be what you're saying here--if I can "look goy enough" that I'm only an optional Jew. Yeah, I can look like goyim. I can also look like a man. It doesn't make me either of those things, and I don't think it should exclude me from either category.

My Jewishness is as much a part of me as my gender, sexuality, or race. Passing is not the same thing as not being something.

I would like to emphasize this, because, as it happens, I am myself both a trans woman and Jewish.

Being told that I could "choose to stop being a white Jew" to avoid oppression is precisely parallel to all the people over the years who told me that I could "choose to stop acting like I was a woman." It feels the same, in my gut.

In theory? Yes. I could. (Actually, it would be easier to fake masculinity than to fake non-Jewishness; I have a penis to display to 'prove' the former, but in the latter, anyone doing even marginal research would quickly discover my Jewish family.)

In practice? Both would be soul-killing.

The idea that my oppression as a Jewish woman is avoidable because I could just stop being Jewish is, to me, identical to the idea that my oppression as a trans woman is avoidable because I could just live as a man.

I would ask, as humbly as I can manage, that this argument that Jewishness can be put on or cast off like a jacket not be used again.

Interestingly, that would make Heinlein the only straight white male in the Big Three.

The three-way with Hubbard does not disqualify him?

I'd do a separate tally myself.

Did I inadvertently delete a comment? If so, I am not sure how.

Anti-Jewish prejudice is anti-semitism.

Anti-Roma prejudice is anti-ziganism.

Is there a word for anti-Muslim prejudice? I am tired of racists being able to say "Muslim isn't a RACE" and thereby de-rail efforts to point out their prejudice.

"Islamophobia" but the usual response is either "it's rational to fear and hate Muslims because they're all murdering raping scum who want to kill us all" or "you're trying to smear legitimate critique of a religion as something analogous to racism".

Yeah, and anything with the -phobia stem is subject to clobber-verse-style "disputes" in the form of "phobia means FEAR and I'm not AFRAID of them; I don't like them for legitimate reasons!"

There should be a category like non-white/POC for non-Christians who are hated by white supremacist terrorists: Jews, Muslims, and presumably also Hindus (especially the nationalists).*

* No, I have no idea if Buddhists are hated in this context or if Buddhism is a religion but I'm guessing right-wing Christian hate preachers claim Buddhists are hated by the Christian god and are going to hell too.

Hindus, Buddhists and Sikhs are a subset of Muslims in the White Nationalist classification system.

You mean seriously or they just classify all non-christian religions under the one the dislike the most?

That second one.

They don't generally class Jews as Muslims, despite being non-Christian.

We get our own category.

My boss is Indian. I've heard people call him a terrorist, a Muslim, and tell him to go back to the Middle East, either directly or behind his back. And when informed of the error, they say, "There's no difference."

When you wrote classification system, I thought you meant in the ideology, not in the day to day beliefs of people.

Also, on an individual level they often think Sikhs are Muslim. I just came from an rally against hate (which is not something we should need to have), and one of the speakers was a Sikh man who had been followed around a store last week by someone yelling anti-Muslim insults at him.

Well, non-Christian works, but I prefer to define people by what they are, rather than what they aren't. That whole "I am normal; everyone else is different" center-of-the-universe thing.

Yes, I agree with you and try to practice that in most contexts but in this context the people who're being targetted are successful non-assimilationists, whether "racial" assimilation into whiteness or religious assimilation into one particular brand of western Chistianity. I dunno. We work with what we have. :-/

Include atheists?

Also, I'm not sure what the best term would be Neo-Pagans, Wiccans, and the like.

Edited 2016-11-21 18:47 (UTC)

I dunno? My instinct is not because atheism is hypothetically not a religion but it's certainly an alternative belief system... and [pretend I made an intelligent comment about Buddhism as atheism/religion].

My instinct is that Jews and Muslims are specifically targetted because they've proved especially resistant to Christian assimilation in western cultures.

There's a good bit of prejudice against atheists. It hasn't been invoked strongly recently, but it could be.

The newer sorts of Paganism have run into prejudice-- it was a long fight to get pentacles allowed on graves at Arlington, and there have been issues with child custody.

Prejudice against atheists doesn't make the news, but it's there under the surface. Public opinion polls show that people distrust atheists more than any religious group. And any atheist who's ever lived around evangelicals knows to give noncommittal answers any time religion comes up.

Yes, as I said, anyone who successfully resists assimilation into the right-wing-Borg could be targetted for that, which is why, alas, there are already multiple categories of bigotry defined: misogyny, racism, homophobia, transphobia, ablism, anti-Semitism, anti-zyganism, Islamophobia, &c ad nauseam.

james-nicoll's question, as I understood it is whether to roll all these into two categories (gender and "race"+religion) or record separate categories. As differing prejudices come and go I personally think it's more practically useful to record the current major targets of hate-crimes by category.

I'm not sure that's why Jews have been targeted. Jews have in various periods made great attempts at assimilation that have been rejected by Christian societies (see wealthy Sephardic Jews in 18th-century England, for example). It seems to me more like the other way around: Jews have not completely assimilated because of constantly being targeted.

Edited to add: I think Jews have been targeted historically because we're a minority, and thus easy to beat up on without the fear of a mass uprising, and because Christianity needed to go out of its way to define itself against Judaism to begin with, thus setting the precedent of stoking that animosity.

Edited 2016-11-22 05:46 (UTC)

I'm not sure that's why Jews have been targeted. Jews have in various periods made great attempts at assimilation that have been rejected by Christian societies (see wealthy Sephardic Jews in 18th-century England, for example). It seems to me more like the other way around: Jews have not completely assimilated because of constantly being targeted.

In the comment you're replying to I said: "My instinct is that Jews and Muslims are specifically targetted because they've proved especially resistant to Christian assimilation in western cultures."

So you appear to be saying that you don't think Jews have been targetted for not converting to Christianity? Except your eta seems not to be saying that? As far as I can see we're in agreement. Possibly you misread my previous comment that you're replying to as saying [something else but idek what]?

Note: it's very easy to misread in established threads on emotive subjects, which is why I'm double-checking with you on whether I've understood you.

I appreciate you double-checking with me. I thought we were differing when it came causality. I think Jews have been unable to assimilate (as distinct from converting) because we have been targeted, not that we have been targeted because of refusing to assimilate. Witness the past 50 years in the US, when Jews have assimilated quite a bit as the targeting has lessened greatly. But I do make the distinction between assimilation and conversion, so perhaps that's another area of difference?

I think we're differing on the nuances of definitions, which is inevitable without interminable discussion (and possibly even then as you and I speak differing Englishes).

I was originally, in this specific context, intending a meaning of full religious assimilation into (a subset of western) Christianity, i.e. conversion, by the "assimilation" in "My instinct is that Jews and Muslims are specifically targetted because they've proved especially resistant to Christian assimilation in western cultures."

I also posted a variation upthread saying: in this context the people who're being targetted are successful non-assimilationists, whether "racial" assimilation into whiteness or religious assimilation into one particular brand of western Christianity." Because elusis asked for an alternative word for "Islamophobia" and I think one can't find useful words without examining what one is attempting to communicate, in this example bigotry against people living within a competing/alternative/[better near-synonymous word] religion.

"My instinct is that Jews and Muslims are specifically targetted because they've proved especially resistant to Christian assimilation in western cultures."

Possibly, but anti-Semitism in Western culture pre-dates Christianity. The blood libel itself was first propagated by with an Graeco-Egyptian named Apion, who claimed that Jews sacrificed Greek Gentiles in their temple.

Back when Christianity was nothing more than a minor Jewish sect, pagan Roman authors also accused early Christians of sacrificing children and engaging in cannibalism, blood-drinking and incest.

The Roman emperor Hadrian went on an anti-Jewish warpath in the first century in response to the failed Jewish rebellion against the Roman Empire. The temple was destroyed and circumcision, studying the Torah, and observing the Sabbath were all banned on pain of death, though that was later amended to allowing Jews to worship as they wished if they paid a tax.

The Romans' anti-Jewish feelings were no doubt heightened by the Jews' refusal to assimilate, though. Both Jews and early Christians refused to honor the Roman pantheon or worship any of the deified Roman emperors.

"bigotry" might be a useful catch-all, and covers sexism too.

"Bigot" has already been declared a verbum non grata equal to "racist" in talking about the right wing, open to charges of "you're the real ____ because you brought it up."

Also, one sometimes wants to be specific, not general.

I usually think of the word for anti-Muslim prejudice as 'islamophobia'.

See previous. We aren't allowed to use "homophobia" or "transphobia" any more because they nitpick that they aren't scared, just disapproving.

(Presumably the sarcasm tags up there are visible?)

I go with yes, add to the tally.

My gut reaction (as a Jewish woman) is to say no, because I don't think there are the same barriers in publishing for Jewish creators as there are for POCs. I'm not sure why, but the idea makes me vaguely uncomfortable.

Also, another reason not to include white Jewish people in a "People of Colour" category, as so many commentors here have more than amply demonstrated, is that as soon as you include white people in POC then white people's issues (including hypothetical future issues) immediately dominated and drown POC's issues until the POC are rendered invisible again. And if, like me, POC won't settle for being invisible then your many racist Nice White Liberal commentors will target us as enthusiastically for their hate as any Trump supporter would target us. QED.

I see less hypothetical future issues and more "these issues happened in living memory and we shouldn't make the mistake of thinking they won't happen again."

I thought pale-skinned Ashkenazi Jews were white in the US until this election, but a) I've always lived in NYC, so that may have skewed my experiences, and b) I'm rapidly revising that opinion at this point.

Unfortunately, pale-skinned Ashkenazi Jews aren't considered white in some parts of the US. I know this for a very unpleasant fact. I wish it were otherwise, but it's not.

Also, I think it's a bit rich to complain about centering Jews and their concerns in a discussion of a post that is specifically about Jews.

I think it's a bit rich to complain about centering Jews and their concerns in a discussion of a post that is specifically about Jews.

Are you implying I did this? Because I'd like you to quote me doing that. In fact, afaik, I wholeheartedly centred Jews by repeatedly pointing out that the discrimination faced by Jews is non-identical to the discrimination faced by POC.

Hmm. Perhaps I misunderstood what you meant? I read "as so many commentors here have more than amply demonstrated, is that as soon as you include white people in POC then white people's issues (including hypothetical future issues) immediately dominated and drown POC's issues until the POC are rendered invisible again" as a snide comment about the discussion above of Jewish concerns about oppression "dominating and drowning out" PoC's issues in this post. Was I wrong?

I refuse to frame my response in a wrongness/rightness binary (the Right are the enemy, lol).

It was a comment to our host's original question, using this post (as it stood then) as a demonstration of a common process of marginalisation imposed by white people on POC using the definition of whiteness as a successful divide a rule tactic against marginalised people. I was targetted for whitesplaining and racist trolling by several white people who are all repeat offenders because I dared to have an opinion about the definition of a marginalised identity to which I belong. I resent my labour being demanded to endlessly restate reasonable opinions because people more privileged than me fail to extend me the benefit of any doubt or assume my good faith. Even if I wrote a perfect essay length comment every time my words would still be misinterpreted through racist lenses. But, because I recognise your marginalised identity, and because I am behaving in good faith, here follows the essay length comment I shouldn't have to write.

I don't now nor have I ever believed that Jewish people have the privilege of an unmarked state of whiteness, no matter how average-for-localised-values of whiteness they appear, or wealthy they are, or culturally assimilated in the contemporary west. (And it's even more complicated outside the west, obv.)

I think that demonstrates one of the problems with defining Jewish people within binary terms of whiteness / "colouredness" rather than whiteness / Otherness, or whiteness / non-whiteness, or the unmarked state / the marked state. Although it goes without saying that binaries are often inadequate and undesirable, especially to express ideas as complex as human identities.

I've done anti-oppression work with Jews who define themselves in a multitude of ways, most of which I agree with and some I don't, but trying to find those useful definitions within a mainstream cultural space dominated by whiteness is invariably be harder due to the divide and rule effect of prevalent whiteness.

My comment at the beginning of this thread could have been better expressed perhaps if it was much longer but I don't aim at perfection and prefer mutual assumptions of good faith (unless proven otherwise) to everyone having to write a perfectly expressed, essay length, comment every time an anti-oppression discussion arises. I still mean exactly what I said about POC being marginalised by whiteness, white people, and in some circumstances also "white" Jewish people. "white" Jews have some power to marginalise POC for "colouredness" and POC have some power to marginalise Jews for Jewishness. The power balance varies in different circumstances. "Black" Jews live on the intersection facing oncoming traffic from every direction.

Trans Jewish woman from above:

The complexity of this is certainly true, and certainly well-documented. But the fact is this: you said something that is really quite horrifying (that people who identify as one thing should not be counted as being a part of that thing because they could lie and say that they identified as another thing), and you've been called out on it, and your response has been consistently... mealy-mouthed. You may not aim at perfection, but I cannot assume good faith from someone who thinks that it's easy to just pretend to be a different identity than you are. That strikes me as a fairly horrifying point of view. (And, honestly, it does not strike me that you are assuming good faith from other people in the discussion; rather, you seem to be assuming bad faith from people who disagree with you, framing disagreements as people drowning out the voices of the multiracial. Well, all right: but then it is fair for me to assume bad faith of you and accuse you of drowning out the voices of trans people and Jews.)

It would reassure me greatly if you would acknowledge that, without a side dish of "but I have to be horrifying because other people are worse," please. Because "you can choose to not be Jewish" is just one short step from "you can choose to be a man."

Holy CRAP.

This reads to me as "when you start allowing trans men to have an opinion, then other men may also have an opinion! so let's make the dudes shut up, and if we shut up some trans men too, well, that's an acceptable cost."

Ashkenazi Jews may read as white to some people, including you. That does not make them white, in the same way that a trans man who can "pass" as a cis man is not a cis man. It's vile to say that a white-passing Ashkenazi, like a male-passing trans man, should keep his mouth shut so that your idea of what kind of coloureds, or queers, can be heard better. It's just vile.

It seems to me that Jews have generally been well-represented within SFF/F writing and publishing.

I assume, he said without actually checking because that worked out so well last time, they are reasonably well represented in my reviews. Getting back to why I track POC, it's because unless I do, I overlook their books.

Then there’s your answer: Track the numbers for a while without publishing them, then see if it turns out you were neglecting Jewish writers. You want to do it without publishing them because it’ll look bad if you track Jewish writers for a while then stop. You can always publish the figures later on if that looks necessary.

FWIW I agree with the comments here that suggest including American Jews in one big PoC category only confuses the issue. White supremacists might not be interested in granular differences in what they consider Other, but that doesn't mean we have to play along. And, as someone also pointed out, the history of opportunities available to Jewish-Americans in publishing is different than for African-Americans—and that's only one aspect of different ethnic experiences. For that matter I'd suppose you can break Jewish experiences in America into those of Ashkenazi background and those of Sephardic background.

In other words, you'd have to break non-white into different categories, and while that would be interesting I'd think it's too late to go back and do that now to your entire reviewing history.

On the one hand, I agree that the publishing opportunities available to Jews and black people have been vastly different. On the other, I suspect there are significant relevant differences in various opportunities among the groups already in the category of PoC, so I'm not sure that's a solid argument.

That also is true.

Jews are still considered mostly-white, but you might want to prepare for the next 6 months or so.

It didn't even occur to me at first that by "with POCs" you meant as POCs. I thought you meant tracking Jews in their own category, which I still think makes more sense.

Or an "ethnic/religious minority" category.

Latino is actually an ethnic group. Muslim is religious. Jewish could be either or both.

Instead of considering whether an author is Jewish (How would you know? Sometimes they aren't too sure themselves), I think you should consider whether the reviewed story itself is Jewish, using Lenny Bruce's famous easy-to-learn metric: https://books.google.com/books?id=3jjNW-_TnusC&lpg=PP1&dq=isbn%3A0671760890&pg=PA63

Hmm. I don't know. I've been turning this over in my head.

Well, what is whiteness? Whiteness is, to my mind, being considered white by other already-confirmed-white people. In my experience, I've been treated as white all my life.

However.

There have been times of acceptance for Jews before, and they have ended. I fear we are at a potential turning point in the US. So I'd say hold off on a definitive answer for another few months and see what happens.

Given open antisemitism is mainstream again in the US

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