Talk:Jews/Archive 17

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Assimilation

Is there a source for this: "but assimilation has remained relatively low over much of the past millennium, as Jews were often not allowed to integrate with the wider communities in which they lived" It seems like a guess rather than a fact. (from 6.4 Population changes: Assimilation) Jd2718 07:59, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

from Template:Fact/doc: Regarding unsourced or poorly sourced information:

1. if it is likely true, but needs specificity, you may use {{specify}}
2. if it is not doubtful, you may use {{fact}} or {{citequote}} tag to ask for better citation in order to make the article complete.
3. if it is doubtful but not too harmful to the whole article, you may use {{verify source}} tag to ask for source verification.
   
4. If it is doubtful and (quite) highly harmful, you may move it to the talk page and ask for a source.
   
5. If it is very doubtful and very harmful, you may remove it directly without the need of moving it to the talk page first.

do as you see fit according to these guidelines. (I think that {{verify source}} is called for). Jon513 22:13, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

The article says : "descended from the ancient Israelites and from converts who joined their religion.". I know that today you are strongly discouraged from converting if you do not have Jewish blood and strongly encouraged if you do. So was it "Jews were often not allowed to integrate with the wider communities in which they lived" or did the Jews discourage assimilation as they do today?

and my next question, are the number of converts large enough to be worth mentioning? (If not then the definition of "Jewish" is essentially racial.) References please? Fourtildas 07:54, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

I do not know anything about encouraging conversation for those "with Jewish blood". Non-Jews are never encouraged to convert even if they have a Jewish father. Only people of questionable status are encouraged to convert.

I do not see any contradiction between Jews discouraging assimilation and not being allowed to integrate in the wider communities in which they lived.

Converts are noteworthy even if there were never any convert to illustrate that Jewish not a racial definition (as you pointed out), but rather a mix between religion and race. The amount of converts is debatable, but there have alway been at least a few. See Khazars for a discussion about a mass conversion and the possibility that all Ashkenazim are of Khazar decent. Jon513 15:21, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

It has surely been argued by someone that little green men from Mars control the White House, but...

I see that I cannot edit this page, although I also don't seem to see any notice that it is locked. What's that all about? Anyhow, I ran across the following assertion:

(It has been argued that governmental policies of the United States, with a Jewish population of about 2% of its total population, are largely determined by an Israeli lobby [11], although this assertion has been challenged.)

I suppose that many things have been argued, but this comes awfully close to cracked pottery. I suggest replacing the word "largely" by "disproportionately". The way it stands now you have an uncommon conspiracy theory distracting from a decently written article. Replacing the world would transform the parenthetical remark into a statement of the much more widely held belief that the aforementioned Israeli lobby (perhaps more accurately called Jewish lobby, because it is usually alleged to represent mainly American Jews) holds at least epsilon more power than one would expect given its size alone. This does not imply that epsilon is particularly large, nor that such disproportionate influence is disagreeable in any way. Alternatively, one could replace "governmental policies" by "foreign policy with regards Israel", and obtain a different, more radical statement that can be heard fairly often, especially in Europe. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Sjeng (talk • contribs) 19:27, 24 January 2007 (UTC).

Jews

I reverted user, Ivan Kricancic edits on this page. The infoxbox for ethnic groups, features the "popplace" tag for the region with the centre/largest/native population, which Israel has. See, Japanese people, Egyptians, Russian people for examples, or check out the template for it, Template:Ethnic_group. In addtion to being the orgin of the Jewish diaspora (or see diaspora), as of 2006, Israel contains the single largest Jewish population on Earth. Epson291 08:09, 25 January 2007 (UTC)

Conflicting Entries

This article ("Jew") claims that the number of jews living in the United States is between 5,300,000 and 5,671,000. The article, "American Jews", claims that the number of jews in the United States is 6.4 million. It sites this source: http://sev.prnewswire.com/publishing-information-services/20061222/UNTH01421122006-1.html. Furthermore, "Jewish population" claims the number to be 5,914,682. In the interest of consistency, at least two of these articles should be changed. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 137.99.174.125 (talk) 22:49, 26 January 2007 (UTC).

Incorrect/POV to use the term "Diaspora" to describe Jews living outside Israel?

The article describes Jews outside Israel as a "Diaspora". As diaspora refers to people who have been forced to leave their homeland it doesn't seem like a NPOV way of describing Jews living in North America, Europe, or elsewhere in the world outside the state of Israel. Wikipedia describes diaspora as "is used (without capitalization) to refer to any people or ethnic population forced or induced to leave their traditional ethnic homelands". As, for example, Jews living in Europe haven't been forced to leave Israel (actually, it's more likely to be the other way around) it would seem a very ideological statement, not befitting Wikipedia, to classify them as a Diaspora. Better to just use the term "outside Israel". Regards Osli73 01:41, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

' I have reposted it here. Maybe you are unaware on the term diaspora, but it is a word originally used for Jews not living in Israel, and in the later half of the 20th century came to include other peoples not living in their ethnic homeland, forced or not. See Indian diaspora. If you review the history of Israel and Judah, you will see in 586 BC Jews for forced from Judea by the Babylonians, and Jerusalem in AD 136 by the Roman Empire. Epson291 06:25, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

Collage image

What is the deal with the collage image? Was there a discussion anywhere on who gets to be included? Why is Natalie Portman one of the top 10 Jews? Seems odd to me.-Andrew c 06:46, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

I didn't see a discussion either, but I think the collage is OK. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't mind to see 5 (or more) women there. And who says that these are "the top 10 Jews"? ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 06:53, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

The idea that we have an ethnic group info box filled with 10 fairly notable jews implies that it is a top ten list. Looking through other ethnic group infoboxes, such as the African American box, we have W.E.B DuBois, MLK, Malcom X, and Rosa Parks, looking at the Greek one, we have John Capodistria, Pericles, El Greco, and Alexander the Great. It just seems odd to have Natalie Portman (out of all possible actors), and now that I look again Shiraz Tal as well. I do not think the best solution would be to add more indivuals (besides, wouldn't that be undue weight? if there are more notable men than women, having an equal number of each is misleading). If anything, I would recommend less people (4 seems to be the average with other boxes).-Andrew c 18:22, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

The reason I got 10 (5 and 5) was off the Egyptians box. And they have included modern Egyptian singer, Ruby, there. The box is not meant to be top 10 Jews ever in any way. That would be rather silly (and POV), and there are far to many famous Jews. I rather regret not including Maimonides. Anyways, the list is meant to be famous and prominent Jews, both today and in the past.

I was also trying to equalize black and white photos with colour ones (6 to 4), and men to women (which I got to 6 to 4). The reason for this is too is there is lots of contributions by both Jewish men and women, there is not reason to not to include both promiment Jewish men and women, there are certianly enough (I agree with User:Humus sapiens).

There are other people to that can always be done, Anne Frank, Mordechai Anielewicz, etc... but I didn't want to represent the Shoah right at the top of the page.

Here is the list of people and roughly the reasons.

Albert Einstein - the most famous Jewish scientist (and in general for that matter)

David Ben Gurion - first Israeli prime minister

Shiraz Tal - top Israeli model

Theodore Herzl - founder of modern Zionism

Benjamin Disraeli - first (ethnically) Jewish head of state since the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah and the only one to this day outside of Israel (he was a praticing Christian Anglican however, so he might not be the best)

Natalie Portman - famous Israeli actress

Menasseh ben Israel - famous Rabbi and founder of the Hebrew printing press

Golda Meir - First Israeli women prime minister and third in the world

Menachem Mendel Schneerson - last Rebbe of Chabad (and the line of Schneerson Rebbes) [ Chassidic ]

Regina Jonas - first women Rabbi [Reform]

Those are the reasons, it is not a top 10 list. As for Natalie Portman and Shiraz Tal, they are famous Jewish women and they represent modernitiy, so it isn't just dead people up there. Other pages have modern people too, actors, singers etc, becuase they are prominent people of that ethnic (and ethnic-religious in the Jewish case) group (plus they are both women.Epson291 06:05, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm not a Christian myself, but shouldn't the list include the most famous Jew? Fourtildas 05:58, 22 February 2007 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Fourtildas (talk • contribs) 05:57, 22 February 2007 (UTC).

I hope you're joking, because I laughed out loud at your suggestion. --GHcool 04:12, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

And here I was thinking he meant Moshe! ☺ —Elipongo (Talk|contribs) 04:27, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

section order

shouldn't the modern state of israel and related sections be moved below the history section, in conformity to other similar articles on culture and people? Chevrox 21:01, 28 January 2007 (UTC)

Ashkenazi-centric portrait collage

TALK about an Ashkenazi-centric portrait collage...where are the pictures of the Mizrahi Jews, or Ethiopian Jews (Beta Israel), or Bnei Menashe, or Persian Jews, etc, etc.? As an person of Sephardic heritage, I am amazingly offended that the image box is so amazingly biased toward the Ashkenazim; there are only two Sephardic Jews in that portrait collage as well (and NO Mizrahi Jews), even though Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews make up a huge portion of the population of Israel (there are about 2 million Mizrahi alone in Israel). The box should also be split evenly between men and women (5 men + 5 women); it currently is not. --172.132.153.245 05:40, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Hi, the photo has since been changed. However, please assume good faith. This was not done on purpose by me. I am both of Sephardic (Iberian) and Ashkenazi heritage. I would like to point out, Ashkinizem presently make up 80% of the world Jewry (and it was over 90% in Albert Einstein's generation before the Holocaust), so 8-2 or 3 Ash to Sef, is normal. (women however, make up 50% of the population). [And if you read the post above, I had tried to make to make the women count 5-5, I was close at 6-4.] I hope it is resolved now with the new photo by user:Pharos. Shabbat Shalom! Epson291 06:24, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

It's true that the Ashkenazim are currently the dominant Jewish ethnicity in the world, but it wasn't always that way. In fact, non-Ashkenazi Jews were the majority for the vast bulk of Jewish history, up until the 1700s. Around this time the Ashkenazim started reproducing faster than ANY other ethnic or national group in Europe, and with this immense swelling in numbers they soon surpassed the Sephardim and others. However, keeping this in historical perspective, Sephardic and Mizrahi Jews were in fact the majority of the Jewish population for thousands of years, while the Ashkenazim have only been the majority of the world Jewish population for approx. 300 years since the massive increase in their numbers in the 18th and 19th Centuries. --172.132.31.106 04:55, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Still the amount of notable women verses notable men is certainly not equal. Jon513 08:16, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, but there are still 50% men and 50% women. There is not 50% Sephardi and 50% Ashkenazi, regardless of notability. Anyways this issue was resolved a while ago, but I felt a need to respond to his accusations that I purposely tried to centre it on Ashkenazi Jews more then Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews, which I did not. Epson291 22:43, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

So many people act these days (especially certain groups of admins. that closely watch and exclusively manage/edit certain groups of articles while ignoring the vast majority of others not pertaining to the topic of Judaism) on Wikipedia that 'issues' have already been 'resolved' and are thus set in stone; but isn't Wikipeida a constantly evolving project? If one spots POV does one have the right to point it out? Take the name of the article American Jews (incorrect) vs. Jewish Americans (correct): one certain admin. claims that since it has been at American Jews for the past year and half that it is now set in stone and never to be moved again (when it was only recently wrongly moved in an extremely 'shady' page move). Typically, this admin. was never able to answer me when I asked him/her about the previous 4-5 years (or how ever long) when it was at the correct article name. --WassermannNYC 02:22, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Mention of "Jewish" in articles about Jewish athletes

Hi. I am involved in a discussion on my home page with 4 commentators on whether it is appropriate for me to mention the fact that Jewish athletes are Jewish in their Wikipedia entries. One commentator does not want me to mention it at all, generally. Even when the person has been elected to a Jewish Sports Hall of Fame. Two others are generally against mention being in the lead paragraph. (The issue here, in part, I think relates to whether one can view the Jews as a nation). Only 1 is generally supportive. I just set forth my thoughts on this in detail, but if any of you would like to contribute your thoughts, please take a look at the most recent discussion on my home page. Thanks.--Epeefleche 02:34, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

Smaller collage

I suggest a smaller collage of four portraits: two men, two women, two Ashkenazim, two Sephardim, people who are predominately identified with Europe, the Middle East, Israel and the US, one scientific figure, one religious figure, one political figure and one cultural figure.

• Albert Einstein
• Maimonides
• Golda Meir
• Emma Lazarus

My algebra is perfect!--Pharos 22:39, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Works for me, mostly because this will put an end to useless disputes about it, I hope. ←Humus sapiens ^ну? 11:29, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Is trying to equally represent both women and Jewish ethnic minorities a "useless dispute" to you Humus sapiens? Also, the names should be alphabetized in order to avoid undue preference and bias. Come on now people. --172.145.36.50 08:59, 15 February 2007 (UTC)

Actually, I tried it that way originally, but changed it to the current order for aesthetic reasons. There just seems to me more visual balance with that arrangement (because of the concentrations of bright and dark in the portraits); alphabetizing in this case would I think be overkill.--Pharos 02:29, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

User 172.145.36.50 , why are you picking fights? User:Humus sapiens' reasons are logical, that it should be the most notable, regardless in this case, of either gender or what country the Jew is from..... And Pharos, I think the photo is perfect, you got everything balanced, so other's won't be upset from precieved bias. Epson291 22:49, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

Epson, I am not "picking fights," so please don't make baseless assumptions when my motivations here are entirely noble -- I am simply recognizing POV (probably subconscious POV) and trying to have someone remedy it because I am semi-computer illiterate and don't know how to work with pics here on Wikipedia (though I may try to toy with them soon). I still believe that the names should be alphabetized, because in the current photo collage the women are 'behind' the men -- and besides...ALL of the lists on Wikipedia are alphabetized, so why not this one? Alphabetizing names is standard procedure for ALL lists of names on Wikipedia, correct? And equal representation of the sexes in the interests of a NPOV is standard procedure too, right? However, Pharos says that norms should be ignored in favor of "aesthetics" and "visual balance," and you seem to agree with him/her -- I'm sorry, but you are both wrong: the names should be alphabetized just like they are in all of the other lists on Wikipedia.

I know it seems tedious/pointless, but Wikipedia has to take these factors in to account if it is serious about NPOV. People are strongly influenced by images (even if they only glance at them), so if they see a collage with 7 men and only 3 women, and all of the women are located at the end or bottom of the collage, that clearly makes them seem 'lower' somehow (again, mostly subconscious perceptions). You all must admit though that the names should be alphabetized like all of the other lists of names on this site; thus the pictures also should be switched/shuffled around.

On another note, I also fear disputing something else since you all seem to think that I'm "picking fights" here, but I'd consider taking the little-known Emma Lazarus off of the collage in favor of a more prominent (Sephardic or Mizrahi or minority Jewish) woman. Pharos' algebra was indeed very good, nice and sound and balanced, but Emma Lazarus doesn't seem relevant or notable enough as either a Jew or a writer to be included at the top of such an important and high traffic page. --WassermannNYC 02:03, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

BTW Pharos: looking at your original photo collage that I'd prefer [1] since it keeps the names alphabetized per Wikipedia norms/procedure...it actually seems more visually balanced than the other one to me since you have the two black&white photos in the center which are flanked by the sepia-toned pics at the two ends. Just a thought... --WassermannNYC 02:11, 23 February 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism?

Is it such a great idea to have a large swastika at the top of this page?!?! --Mike315 19:13, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Mike, can you point out what page you're referring to? Justin Eiler 19:20, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

It was a piece of vandalism from yesterday that's already been reverted.--Pharos 19:27, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Thanks--the question had me confused. Welcome, Mike315. :) Justin Eiler 19:33, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the response and prompt action!!--Mike315 21:39, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

Holocaust reference at end

Quote: "There is a debate among scholars over whether the Holocaust only refers to Jewish victims, or to all groups targeted by the Nazis, or to some subset of those groups."

Now, this is not hard science, and arguing about this definition is pointless. The only use for a consensus on the definition would be to make the term current in [academic and media] discourse. Current status of discourse would be to grant legitimacy to both. But once again, what is there to debate? elpincha 14:57, 18 February 2007 (UTC)

Hmm, it doesn't seem right, I've updated the tag. It seems to be a left over source from an older edit, but I didn't delete it though. A lot of times, it seems Wikipedia users take NPOV to interesting lengeths. I have never heard any one claim that the Holocaust was the systamatic muder of ONLY Jews....(Though in context, people may be referring to only Jews (or another) when talking about the Holocaust, but that doesn't mean they are denying other victims). Epson291 23:06, 21 February 2007 (UTC)

New US Population Estimates

New US population estimates by a Brandeis University study places the number of American Jews between 6 - 6.4 million. The study is [here. I think this is significant enough to include in the article caz | speak 23:17, 18 February 2007 (UTC)