WANT TO UNDERSTAND JEWS? TRY LISTENING

CONFUSION AROUND THE TERMS “JEW” AND “JEWISH” IS A SYMPTOM OF A LARGER DISCONNECT. BUT PLENTY OF PEOPLE DON’T WANT TO HEAR IT.

Here’s an idea.

Is “Jew” a bad word? The obvious answer is hell no. It is a neutral noun describing a people. But context and tone matter.

When Jew is used as an adjective (“Jew banker”) or a verb (“He Jewed me down”) you know you are dealing with a bigot.

Because of the historical mistreatment of the word “Jew” by enemies of the Jewish people (or, to be generous, ignorant people), it has become weighted with more than its objective meaning. This has created challenges.

Well-meaning non-Jews may find the word “Jew” too blunt. “Jew” is not a plosive word — that is, a word that begins with a hard consonant and tends to catch the listener’s attention more than the words that surround it (“pop,” “pepper,” “bucket”). But it does tend to catch the ear. That is probably more of a cultural than a linguistic phenomenon.

Because the word has been used as a pejorative, well-intentioned people may avoid it, couching it instead in softer-sounding terms, like “Jewish person” or “a person of the Jewish faith.” A brilliantly hilarious exploration of this was a scene in the TV show It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia in which the guys argue over the appropriateness of the term “Jew.” Watch it here. I’ll wait.

Sensitivities around the word are not just a non-Jewish sensation. There is a silly old joke that plays on this topic: A couple from the old country move to New York’s Lower Eastside, go to the greengrocer and ask for 10 pounds of oranges. The grocer says, “For juice?” And the wife turns to the husband and says, “See, it’s happening here now.”

Recently I wrote about how the word “Zionist” is perceived as a bad word — in some cases, by people who deliberately use it in a pejorative sense, but also by people who do not understand the definition.

The definition, of course, is simply the right of Jewish people to national self-determination. In other words, there is nothing objectively objectionable about the term Zionist — unless you have a problem with Jews and their right to national self-determination which, as I keep reminding people, kind of puts the lie to the tired old refrain “Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism.” If you’ve got a problem with Jewish national self-determination, you’ve got a problem with Jews.

In a parallel, but different, phenomenon from the abuse of the term “Zionist,” the word “Jew” is sometimes used pejoratively and this has presented challenges for Jews, obviously, but also for well-intentioned people who get caught up in trying to do the right thing, like the guys from Always Sunny.

As a writer and communications professional who has worked for Jewish newspapers and organizations for 30 years, I have struggled with this myself. In my case, it is a slightly different issue. When you are writing on a particular topic a lot, you struggle not to be repetitive. Therefore, it is, I think, understandable that I would interchangeably use the terms “Jews” and “Jewish people” to shake it up a bit.

Editors occasionally change my phrasing from “Jewish people” to “Jews” — shorter is almost always better — but maybe my language choice also reflects a deep-seated awkwardness around the single word “Jew.” (Others have written about this.)

When I was in high school, the term “gay” was the most efficient attack by bullies. This is something that gay people have needed to reclaim and deal with as we come out and take our places in the world.

Since antisemitism is often called the world’s oldest hatred, the term “Jew,” which is objectively a simple descriptor for a member of an identifiable group, becomes laden with cultural meaning.

Comedians have also had a field day — Jewish comedians, almost exclusively — with the suffix in “Jewish.” In English, -ish implies a sort of ambiguity, a not-quite-all-in descriptor. It can mean “belonging to” or “part of a group” (“Danish” or “Jewish”) but it can also mean “somewhat” or “approximately” (“Come by around seven-ish”) or “resembling something but not being exactly like it” (“childish”).

This nuance can be confusing even for people who should maybe be expected to get it. I have to admit being amused at encountering many Israelis over the years who stumble over the English term for their people. I have on several occasions heard Israelis say, “He is a Jewish.” An understandable mistake, since many demonyms in English are both adjective and noun (“He is Canadian”; “He is a Canadian”).

In any event, sensitivities exist around words, whether they should or not.

The larger issue here is that the confusion around nomenclature is part of a broader confusion. I also wrote about this recently: People — including me — carry confusion around the very definition of what a Jew is. A simplistic explanation is that Jews belong to a religious group. But the definition is broader than this.

Based on conversations with rabbis and professors I spoke with …

• Jews are a cultural and ethnoreligious group

• Jews are part of a peoplehood with a religious tradition at the core

• Jews are a community with a shared historical narrative, cultural expression, practices and traditions

Basically, Jews are descended from those who traditionally followed Judaism the religion (whether or not that contemporary Jew is a believer or an adherent of that religion) and they are a nation, a peoplehood, a culture.

This is different from many other group definitions. And, whereas decent people in almost every other instance respect differences and accept the fact that individuals and groups should be free to self-define, when it comes to Jews, there is an extraordinarily common phenomenon in which we insist that Jews fit into one of the boxes we assign people.

The fact that people do not understand some of the very basic things, like literally what a Jew is, has implications for the way Jews are perceived in the world.

In the simplest and probably most problematic formulation, if Jewish people are not a race, then antisemitism is not racism. That lets the perps off almost scot-free. That’s one way the world is able to turn its attention away from the very serious problem of antisemitism.

Words matter. But while confusion around this terminology is a problem in itself, it is a symptom of a larger issue.

If we want to create the inclusive, diverse, multicultural society we claim to seek, we need to understand other groups better. For reasons I have discussed previously and will again, there is a remarkable tendency, even among antiracist activists who celebrate diversity, to determinedly refuse to listen or understand when it comes to complexities of Jewish identity.

This is most noticeable when Jews attempt to discuss their experiences with racism and their relationships with Israel. In both these instances, they are likely to be met with aggressive shutdowns. Rather than being listened to when they express themselves, Jews are routinely met with rejections of their experiences. (“Anti-Zionism is not antisemitism!” is the most obvious example but far more often it is a change of subject, placating words or other dismissive reactions.)

In almost every instance, these reactions to Jewish expressions that they are experiencing discrimination amount to the retort, “No you’re not.” This is the most unprogressive response imaginable — especially since it comes, almost always, I would venture, from self-described progressive antiracists.

Jews, I think, need to be able to articulate this complexity more effectively. Although that is to place the emotional labor on them which, yet again, is an abrogation of progressive approaches to antiracism.

The larger issue, though, is that non-Jews need to listen.

Even leaving aside the smaller number of people who are actively antisemitic, there is a much wider circle of people who just, for whatever reason, seem steadfastly determined not to listen when Jews talk about their experiences.

I shouldn’t need to say this, but obviously I do.

If you genuinely want to understand Jews and antisemitism, try listening to Jews.