#how to make ur jew an actual person and not a stereotype: a small guide

[princessg3rard]

wanna infodump at me?<3

🚬🍓

SURE !! <3

this is going to be basically an “how to make ur jewish character a normal person with a cohesive background” bc I’m doing it rn and have noticed that a lot of gentile writers don’t really pay attention to the details and differences between communities :3

so I’m writing series of jewish!mcr fics now, right ?? so the first order of business was to figure out what kind of jew they’ll each be, which was actually kinda hard - like I need to make sure I make them part of communities I know well enough to represent well, right ?? anyways it ended up being not that bad, since I know plenty of Italian/greek jews and South American jews to represent at least half well (btw that would make them all sephardi, despite the majority of east coast jews being ashkenazi).

then, it’s to time to decide where they fall on the religious spectrum !! contrary to popular belief, u can be jewish and an atheist at the same time, bc judaism is an ethnoreligion - but u can obvi be super devout and religious, so what kind of beliefs can ur jewish character possess ??

the spectrum is as follows:

atheist — secular — traditional — religious — ultra orthodox (haredi)

for the purpose of my fic, and in light of the members’ actual upbringing, they all fall within the “traditional” category, with a quite religious upbringing (so for example, bc frank went to catholic school his jewish version went to little yeshiva (but didn’t go to the big yeshiva, he’s too cool for that)). pay attention to the way ur jew interacts with tradition and scripture - most jews celebrate every holiday and observe Yom Kippur, but only from traditional and futher on the religious side keep the shabbat and strict kashrut laws.

up next, how do they interact with their community ?? do they go to their synagogue ?? do they participate in purim parties ?? do they have an elaborate or small Seder ?? do they eat cheese on Hanukkah ?? do they avoid kitniyot on Passover ?? etc. etc.

these questions can be helped by the prior aspects of their jewish identity - community, denomination, level of religious devotion :) it helps guide u in what they can and can’t eat, when they dress up, when they invite all their friends and family over to show them their culture - and develop story beats accordingly !!

make sure that ur jew dresses up for holidays (chag/chagim) and shabbat !! it’s quite important to most jews to wear their “Sunday best” in holy days like that :3

k I’m done yapping thanks for coming to my ted talk :)