Jewish Pride? Whatever.
The NY Times has an article on the Mets’ newly acquired Jewish right-fielder Shawn Green. The story quotes lots of Jewish baseball experts and a kid with Jewish hair.
I gotta tell you… I’m a freakin’ huge baseball fan. And I’m a professional Jew. And I couldn’t care less what religion Green is. I didn’t even care when he was on the Dodgers (who lost tonite in extra innings… F%$*!).
Why are people obsessed with Jewish baseball players?
(In an unrelated note… at a party last night someone says to me, “You contribute to Jewschool, right? That is so cool.” Heh.)
I showed my father this post and I asked him, (since he’s such a huge baseball fan AND a professional Jew) why he thought people are so obsessed with Jewish baseball players.
His response was “Because you can count the current players on one hand.”
To add to that, I think it’s Jewish sports figures in general.
Jews are stereotypically viewed as being bad at sports, but as we have seen historically, they aren’t. Hank Greenberg, Sandy Koufax, Al Rosen…there are tons of Jewish baseball players, it’s true. But it’s still always nice to see nice Jewish boys proving the stereotype wrong.
I get it….there is good representation and bad representation.
Eg. Rosanne Barr, bad representation, Natalie Portman, good representation.
Being less than 1% of the population Jews get a lot of negative attention. Having good representation makes us proud. It shows the best of what we can be. I am sorry to say you are bad representation. It makes us ashamed of who we are. I found your blog by chance which led me here.
With that being said, I disagree with everything you stand for. I am trying to understand your point of view but reading your posts on various websites literally makes my stomach hurt.
For the life of me, I will never understand how two generations after the Holocaust a Jew cannot be a Zionist. It is my Zionism that led me to Judaism. How can you see your brothers get slaughtered and that not have an effect on you? I don’t care how much of the Torah you know – your soul is ugly and hateful.
One thing that self deprecating Jews must learn is that loving your enemies who wish to destroy you will not make them love you — it will build there resolve to destroy you and torture you further. Terrorists don’t want to negotiate; they want to drive us into the Red Sea.
I hate to say that you are throwing your Jewish brothers and sisters under the bus that will eventually be blown up by terrorists.
It is shameful that when Israel is defending itself against a known terrorist organization a Jew still does not support the war. God helps those that help themselves. Letting terrorists systematically destroy, families, villages, a nation, and a people is not peace loving it is plain stupid!
I will pray that you have a change of heart and appreciate that the IDF is fighting for the life of every Jew. When our enemies say that they hate Israel they mean the hate Jews. Whether you are a Zionist or not, they will view you as a Jew and their goal is to destroy you.
Did you ever wonder why Superman was created by two Jewish kids from Cleveland at the same moment Hank Greenberg was slugging his way to immortality 150 miles away, or how Stan Lee (nee Leiberman) created Spiderman in Queens in the same year that Sandy Koufax was at his best with your boys in Blue? As it has been since little Israelites first started flipping Moses trading cards 3,200 years ago, It’s all about the mythology. We all need our heroes, who are, at their best, both larger than life and struggling with the same foibles as the rest of us. Still don’t get it? Go back and reread your Joseph Campbell (or Don Dellillo).
On a separate note, while it’s great that you’ve attended my alma mater (HUC NYC SSM class of ’99), and it’s cool that you’ve been blogging since ’02, please don’t refer to yourself as a “professional Jew.” No one’s paying you to be Jewish, dude.
if you don’t like the term, fine.
as i don’t think i have to explain, it describes the fact that working for the Jewish community is how I pay my bills. i have no great affinity for the colloquialism, and i certainly don’t wear it as a badge of honor.
aside from the fact that it falls apart when subject to clever analysis (“No one’s paying you to be Jewish, dude”), is it really such a problematic phrase?
Hey, aren’t we all supposed to be doctors, lawyers, and bankers?
The Jewish baseball player goes against the stereotype.
A little bit of Jewish pride coming out of the mouth of an Irishman, this is the way America’s supposed to be. Denis Leary evokes Sandy Koufax, putting Mel Gibson in his place.
Dennis Leary rips on Mel Gibson