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jessicalprice · 2 years ago

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culture isn’t modular

I did a thread (actually several) on Twitter a few years ago about Christianity’s attempts to paint itself as modular, and I’ve been seeing them referenced here in the cultural christianity Discourse, and a few people have DMed me asking me to post it here, so here’s a rehash of several of those threads:

A big part of why Christian atheists have trouble seeing how culturally Christian they still are is that Christianity advertises itself as being modular, which is not how belief systems have worked for most of human history.

A selling point of Christianity has always been the idea that it's plug-and-play: you don't have to stop being Irish or Korean or Nigerian to be Christian, you don't have to learn a new language, you keep your culture.

And you’re just also Christian.

(You can see, then, why so many Christian atheists struggle with the idea that they’re still Christian--to them, Christianity is this modular belief in God and Jesus and a few other tenets, and everything else is... everything else. Which is, not to get ahead of myself, very compatible with some tacit white supremacy: the “everything else” is goes unexamined for its cultural specificity. It’s just Normal. Default. Neutral.)

Evangelicals in particular love to contrast this to Islam, to the idea that you have to learn Arabic and adopt elements of Arab culture to be Muslim, which helps fuel the image of Islam as a Foreign Ideology that's taking over the West.

The rest of us don’t have that particular jack

Meanwhile, Christians position Christianity as a modular component of your life. Keep your culture, your traditions, your language and just swap out your Other Religion Module for a Christianity Module.

The end game is, in theory, a rainbow of diverse people and cultures that are all one big happy family in Christ. We're going to come back to how Christianity isn't actually modular, but for the moment, let's talk about it as if it had succeeded in that design goal.

Even if Christianity were successfully modular, if it were something that you could just plug in to the Belief System Receptor in a culture and leave the rest of it undisturbed, the problem is most cultures don't have a modular Belief System Receptor. Spirituality has, for the entirety of human history, not been something that's modular. It's deeply interwoven with the rest of culture and society. You can't just pull it out and plug something else in and have the culture remain stable.

(And to be clear, even using the term “spirituality” here is a sop to Christianity. What cultures have are worldviews that deal with humanity’s place in the universe/reality; people’s relationships to other people; the idea of individual, societal, or human purpose; how the culture defines membership; etc. These may or may not deal with the supernatural or “spiritual.”)

And so OF COURSE attempting to pull out a culture's indigenous belief system and replace it with Christianity has almost always had destructive effects on that culture.

Not only is Christianity not representative of "religion" full stop, it's actually arguably *anomalous* in its attempt to be modular (and thus universal to all cultures) rather than inextricable from culture.

Now, of course, it hasn't actually succeeded in that--the US is a thoroughly Christian culture--but it does lead to the idea that one can somehow parse out which pieces of culture are "religious" versus which are "secular". That framing is antithetical to most cultures. E.g. you can't separate the development of a lot of cultural practices around what people eat and how they get it from elements of their worldview that Christians would probably label "religious." But that entire *framing* of religious vs. secular is a Christian one.

Is Passover a religious holiday or a secular one? The answer isn't one or the other, or neither, or both. It's that the framing of this question is wrong.

And Christianity isn’t a plugin, however much it wants to be

Moreover, Christianity isn't actually culture-neutral or modular.

It's easy for this to get obscured by seeing Christianity as a tool of particular cultures' colonialism (e.g. the British using Christianity to spread British culture) or of whiteness in general, and not seeing how Christianity itself is colonial. This helps protect the idea that “true” Christianity is good and innocent, and if priests or missionaries are converting people at swordpoint or claiming land for European powers or destroying indigenous cultures, that must be a misuse of Christianity, a “fake” or “corrupted” Christianity.

Never mind that for every other culture, that culture is what its members do. Christianity, uniquely, must be judged on what it says its ideals are, not what it actually is.

Mistaking the engine for the exhaust

But it’s not just an otherwise innocent tool of colonialism: it’s a driver of it.

At the end of the day, it’s really hard to construct a version of the Great Commission that isn’t inherently colonial. The end-goal of a world in which everyone is Christian is a world without non-Christian cultures. (As is the end goal of a world in which everyone is atheist by Christian definitions.)

Yet we focus on the way Christianity came with British or Spanish culture when they colonized a place--the churches are here because the Spaniards who conquered this area were Catholic--and miss how Christianity actually has its own cultural tropes that it brings with it. It's more subtle, of course, when Christianity didn't come in explicitly as the result of military conquest.

Or put another way, those cultures didn't just shape the Christianity they brought to places they colonized--they were shaped by it. How much of the commonality between European cultures is because of Christianity?

It’s not all a competition

A lot of Christians (cultural and practicing), if you push them, will eventually paint you a picture of a very Hobbesian world in which all religions, red in tooth and claw, are trying to take over the world. It's the "natural order" to attempt to eliminate all cultures but your own.

If you point out to them that belief and worldview are deeply personal, and proselytizing is objectifying, because you're basically telling the person you're proselytizing to that who they are is wrong, you often get some version of "that's how everyone is, though."

Like we all go through life seeing other humans as incomplete and fundamentally flawed and the only way to "fix" them is to get them to believe what we believe. And, like, that is not how everyone relates to others?

But it's definitely how both practicing Christians and Christian antitheists relate to others. If, for Christians, your lack of Jesus is a fundamental flaw in you that needs to be fixed, for New Atheists, your “religion” (that is, your non-Christian culture) is a fundamental flaw in you that needs to be fixed. Neither Christians nor New Atheists are able to relate to anyone else as fine as they are. It's all a Hobbesian zero-sum game. It's all a game of conversion with only win and loss conditions. You are, essentially, only an NPC worth points.

The idea of being any other way is not only wrong, but impossible to them. If you claim to exist in any other way, you are either deluded or lying.

So, we get Christian atheists claiming that if you identify as Jewish, you can’t really be an atheist. Or sometimes they’ll make an exception for someone who’s “only ethnically Jewish.” If the only way you relate to your Jewishness is as ancestry, then you can be an atheist. Otherwise, you’re lying.

Or, if you’re not lying, you’re deluded. You just don’t understand that there’s no need for you to keep any dietary practices or continue to engage in any form of ritual or celebrate any of those “religious” Jewish holidays, and by golly, this here “ex”-Christian atheist is here to separate out for you which parts of your culture are “religious” and which ones are “secular.”

Religious/secular is a Christian distinction

A lot of atheists from Christian backgrounds (whether or not they were raised explicitly Christian) have trouble seeing how Christian they are because they've accepted the Christian idea that “religion” is modular. (If we define “religion” the way Christians (whether practicing or cultural) define it, Christianity might be the only religion that actually exists. Maybe Islam?)

When people from non-Christian cultures talk about the hegemonically Christian and white supremacist nature of a lot of atheism, it reflects how outside of Christianity, spirituality/worldview isn't something you can just pull out of a culture.

Christian atheists tend to see the cultural practices of non-Christians as "religious" and think that they should give them up (talk to Jewish atheists who keep kosher about Christian atheist reactions to that). But because Christianity positions itself as modular, people from Christian backgrounds tend not to see how Christian the culture they imagine as "neutral" or "normal" actually is. In their minds, you just pull out the Christianity module and are left with a neutral, secular society.

So, if people from non-Christian backgrounds would just give up their superstitions, they'd look the same as Christian atheists.

Your secularism is specifically post-Christian

Of course, that culture with the Christianity module pulled out ISN'T neutral. So the idea that that's what "secular society" should look like ends up following the same pattern as Christian colonialism throughout history: the promise that you can keep your culture and just plug in a different belief system (or, purportedly, a lack of a belief system), which has always, always been a lie. The secular, "enlightened" life that most Christian atheists envision is one that's still built on white, western Christianity, and the idea that people should conform to it is still attempting to homogenize society to a white Christian ideal.

For people from cultures that don't see spirituality as modular, this is pretty obvious. It's obvious to a lot of people from non-white Christian cultures that have syncretized Christianity in a way that doesn't truck with the modularity illusion.

I also think, even though they're not conceptualizing it in these terms, that it's actually obvious to a lot of evangelicals. (The difference being that white evangelical Christianity enthusiastically embraces white supremacy, so they see the destruction of non-Christian culture as good.) But I think it's invisible to a lot of mainline non-evangelical Christians, and it's definitely invisible to a lot of people who leave Christianity.

And that inability to see culture outside a Christian framing means that American secularism is still shaped like Christianity. It's basically the same text with a few sentences deleted and some terms replaced.

Which, again, is by design. The idea that you can deconvert to (Christian) atheism and not have to change much besides your opinions about God is the mirror of how easy it’s supposed to be to convert to Christianity.

Human societies don’t follow evolutionary biology

The Victorian Christian framing underlying current Western ideas of enlightened secularism, that religious practice (and human culture in general) is subject to the same sort of unilateral, simple evolution toward a superior state to which they, at the time, largely reduced biological evolution, is deeply white supremacist.

It posits religious evolution as a constantly self-refining process from "primitive" animism and polytheism to monotheism to white European/American Christianity. For Christians, that's the height of human culture. For ex-Christians, the next step is Christian-derived secularism.

Maybe you’ve seen this comic?

The thing is, animism isn’t more “primitive” than polytheism, and polytheism isn’t more “primitive” than monotheism. Older doesn’t mean less advanced/sophisticated/complex. Hinduism isn’t more “primitive” than Judaism just because it’s polytheistic and Judaism is monotheistic.

Human cultures continue to change and adapt. (Arguably, older religions are more sophisticated than newer ones because they’ve had a lot more time to refine their practices and ideologies instead of having to define them.) Also, not all cultures are part of the same family tree. Christianity and Islam may be derived from Judaism, but Judaism and Hinduism have no real relationship to one another.

But in this worldview, Christianity is "normal" religion, which is still more primitive than enlightened secularism, but more advanced than all those other primitive, superstitious, irrational beliefs.

Just like Christians, when Christian atheists do try to make room for cultures that aren't white and European-derived, the tacit demand is "okay, but you have to separate out the parts of your culture that the Christian sacred-secular divide would deem 'religious.'"

Either way, people from non-Christian cultures, if they’re to be equals, are supposed to get with the program and assimilate.

You’re not qualified to be a universal arbiter of what culture is good

Christian atheists usually want everyone to unplug that Religion module!

So, for example, you have ex-Christian atheists who are down with pluralism trying to get ex-Christian atheists who aren't to leave Jews alone by pointing out that you can be atheist and Jewish.

But some of us aren’t atheist. (I’m agnostic by Christian standards.) And the idea that Jews shouldn’t be targets for harassment because they can be atheists and therefore possibly have some common sense is still demanding that people from other cultures conform to one culture’s standard of what being “rational” is.

Which, like, is kind of galling when y’all don’t even understand what “belief in G-d” means to Jews, and people from a culture that took until the 1800s to figure out that washing their hands was good are setting themselves up as the Universal Arbiters of Rationality.

(BTW, most of this also holds true for non-white Christianity, too. I guarantee you most white Christian atheists don’t have a good sense of what role church plays in the lives of Black communities, so maybe shut up about it.)

In any case, reducing Christianity--a massive, ambient phenomenon inextricable from Western culture--to the specific manifestation of Christian practice that you grew up with is, frankly, absurd.

And you can’t be any help in deconstructing hegemony when you refuse to perceive it and understand that it isn’t something you can take off like a garment, and you probably won’t ever recognize and uproot all the ways in which it affects you, especially when you are continuing to live within it.

What hegemony doesn’t want you to know

One of the ways hegemony sustains and perpetuates itself is by reinforcing the idea not so much that other ways of being and knowing are evil (although that’s usually a stage in an ideology becoming hegemonic), but that they’re impossible. That they don’t actually exist.

See, again, the idea that anyone claiming to live differently is either lying or deluded.

There are few clearer examples of how pervasive Christian hegemony is than Christian atheists being certain every religion works like Christianity. Hegemonic Christianity wants you to think that all cultures work like Christianity because it wants their belief systems to be modular so you can just ...swap them. And it wants to pretend that culture/worldview is a free market where it can just outcompete other cultures.

But that’s... not how anything works.

And the truth of the matter is that white nationalist Christians shoot at synagogues and Sikh temples and mosques because those other ways of being can’t be allowed to exist.

They don’t shoot at atheist conventions because there’s room in hegemonic Christianity for Christian atheists precisely because Christian atheists are still culturally Christian. Their atheism is Christian-shaped.

They may not like you. They’re definitely going to try to convert you. They may not want you to be able to hold public office or teach their kids.

But the only challenge you’re providing is that of The Existence of Disbelief. And that’s fine. That makes you a really safe Other to have around. You can See The Light and not have to change much.

What you’re not doing is providing an example of a whole other way of being and knowing that (often) predates Christianity and is completely separate from it and has managed to survive it and continue to live and thrive (there’s a reason Christians like to speak of Jews and Judaism in the past tense, and it’s similar to the reason white people like to speak of indigenous peoples of the Americas in the past tense).

That’s not a criticism--it’s fine to just... be post-Christian. There’s not actually anything wrong with being culturally Christian. The problems come in when you start denying that it’s a thing, or insisting that you, unique among humankind, are above Having A Culture.

But it does mean that you don’t pose the same sort of threat to Christianity that other cultures do, and hence, less violence.

#cultural christianity #christian hegemony #christian atheists

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edenfenixblogs · 1 year ago

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I don’t think most non-Jews understand how disappointed we are in the left right now. How completely abandoned we’ve become. How our contributions to progress for other groups have been erased or disavowed or hidden. How the actual tangible things that Jews have contributed to black rights and civil rights are being ignored. How we’re being told we contribute and have contributed nothing.

How we are being told that the world has been kind to us when it never has. As if my mom didn’t grow up getting called a Kike and getting beat up for being Jewish. How I thought I had friends until I caught them saying “xyz was beautiful until Jews showed up.” How people told me I was pretty “for a Jew.” How I grew up hearing stories about bombs being set off in Israel in buses and markets. How I couldn’t even go two weeks without hearing that and how nobody cared and somehow, every time that happened, the whole world became more hostile to me for some reason.

I just don’t understand. I don’t understand what leftists are doing. Or why. I hate that I have to say—of course, I support a free and self determined Palestine (which I truly do)—in order for you to decide I’m worthy of care and support.

We showed up for you. All of you. And the entire movement is abandoning us at best or targeting us at worst. Celebrating our deaths. Saying we deserved it. How are we supposed to trust you ever again? How are we supposed to feel safe ever again?

A very few select people who are in my life have taken the chance to actually learn about and dismantle their own unconscious antisemitism during this time. And I’m eternally grateful for them. But most people haven’t reached out at all. Most people are still sharing hateful things that could get me hurt and they don’t care. Most people Reblogging my posts are still Jews. Because we are alone. And it sucks. You need to be as loud about antisemitism as you are about Palestine or you’re an antisemite (unless you’re Arab/Muslim/Palestinian—I totally get that these groups are also doing damage control in their own communities just like Jews are).

But we are all in tremendous pain right now.

This moment will pass. And when it does, I will remember how many people let me down. I will remember that when I needed support more than I’ve ever needed it in my life, people fucking vanished. They pretended violence against my people wasn’t happening. They ignored and rewrote the history of Israel to suit their own narratives.

You don’t know what it feels like to be hated this much for opposite things. PoC hate us for being too white. White supremacists hate us for not being white enough. Europeans hate us for being middle eastern. Middle easterners hate us for being western/European. Everyone hates us for being settlers but continually kicks us out of their countries so that we have to settle somewhere else.

I saw a post going around from a Black person who said that the reason he and his fellow black activists go protest for Palestinians instead of fighting antisemitism (as if it’s a binary, which it’s not) is that Jews don’t show up. Muslims and Palestinians do. And honestly? Fuck that guy. Heather Heyer died standing shoulder to shoulder against racism in 2017. [CORRECTION: When I first wrote this post I was under the impression that Heather Heyer was Jewish. I want to correct to avoid spreading misinfo. She was just the first (and incorrect) Jewish civil rights activist I thought of. However there are plenty of other actual Jewish civil rights activists to choose from. If you have reblogged this post from me, please feel free to add a link to the permalink version of this post with my correction to your reblog.]I have devoted substantial time and effort and money that I don’t even get paid a lot of because I don’t get paid a living wage. I have continually reached out to PoC people in my life of all religions to ask how they are doing and what I could be doing to help more—both for them personally and how they would best like me to help their community. I have elevated their voices at every opportunity. And not one person I checked in with has done the same for me or for my community.

And it’s bone chilling. It’s awful. And it’s even worse knowing that when it’s over, people will want to go back to normal. They won’t apologize. They won’t self reflect. They’ll just live their lives, maybe a little more aware of how much they hate us and completely indifferent to the harm they’ve caused us. How disposable they made us feel. And the thing is…it’s not hard for you to know. You just have to ask.

Too many people are cowards. Too many people care about looking good than actually learning something or making the world better. And to those people: you should be ashamed of yourself.

I don’t have any hate in my heart. Truly. Not a drop for any group of people. But I have a tremendous lack of trust that anyone would actually lift a finger to keep me safe.

#antisemitism #leftist antisemitism #anti zionisim #I dare a goy to republic this challenge #goyim ID yourself in the tags if you reblog this #cuz i straight up don’t believe goyisch activists give a shit unless they straight up say they do #i’m not okay #honestly #this is the Nazi stuff I am most scared of #sure the Nazis rounded us up #but you fuckers were the ones who watched and did nothing #you’re the ones who voted the Nazis in #you’re the ones who didn’t stop them #fuck all y’all for real #i/p #israel #palestine #correction issued

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iizzeee · 5 months ago

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Guys, I am begging you. Please please please please please PLEASE do NOT vote 3rd party, or not vote at all.

I get it. I really do. Biden’s handling of Israel has been, not gonna mince words, dogshit. Abominable. Unspeakably bad.

But we cannot afford to protest like this.

We don’t need Biden as president. We do need to keep Trump out of office. And to those who respond “well, I don’t want just the lesser of two evils,” please, for the love of god, grow the fuck up.

For one, why wouldn’t you want the lesser of two evils. It is, by definition, LESS EVIL.

“Why can’t we just have no evil, why isn’t that an option.” I really wish it was. Just as much as you. But it’s not. These are our cards, and we have to play our hand to the best of our ability.

Which brings us to two.

Trump is more evil. Like, so much more evil. We’re comparing apples and oranges here guys.

I understand that a lot of you might doubt that. The largest demographic of people advocating for third party or non-votes are in the 18-26 range. New voters, with one or no elections under their belt.

So they don’t remember.

Most of us (I myself fall under this age range) don’t remember 2016. The election, that is. They don’t remember how so many people protested Hillary vs Trump by going 3rd party or writing in joke votes, because they saw the two as equally bad. And Trump won.

Half of us don’t remember the Trump presidency. We’ve heard he was a weird, bad, bigoted president, but don’t fully grasp the scope of how bad.

So off the top of my head, here are some highlights of real things Donald Trump did while he held office.

- threw toilet paper at hurricane victims like he was trying to shoot a 3-pointer

- fired the man investigating him for election fraud

- called African countries “shitholes”

- appointed members of the Supreme Court who would go on to overturn roe v wade

- stole classified documents from the white house to hide at his resort

- tried to instate a Muslim Ban

- incited a insurrection to try and keep himself in office, and maybe hang his VP if there was time

- looked directly at an eclipse. Like no glasses, full on.

- fueled covid conspiracies. Also told people to “drink bleach” to fight the virus

- withdrew us from the Paris Climate Accord

- cofefe. Remember that? What a fun, normal thing for the president to tweet at 2am.

- employed literal white supremacists

- called Nazi’s “very fine people”

- got endorsed by the KKK, and refused to condemn David Duke

And that’s just what I can remember right now.

So if you’re angry at Biden about Palestine, please please please do not think for a fucking second Trump would be better. He would almost certainly actively be worse. He would give Netanyahu the green light. If you think Biden has used a loose leash, at least it’s some kind of leash. Trump would be all in. Full chips, flying to the Middle East to send in the bombs himself.

If you’re still hesitant, consider this last plea.

Things are bad. These shouldn’t be the only two choice we have, but they are. You can’t look at the menu, which is offering either bland soup someone spit in or actual rat poison and go “could I have some steak”.

You can order the soup and live to write a one-star review on Yelp, maybe call health inspections on the restaurant or contact the owners and say “you guys know your menu has only two options and they’re both dogshit. If you don’t add more, you’ll be unemployed soon.”

Or you can order rat poison and die.

If we elect Donald Trump in the fall, we will be eating rat poison. He has repeatedly said himself to be in favor of a dictatorship. He quotes Hitler. If he is put in office, the change we all want and so critically need will not be fucking POSSIBLE. Because with Biden, it’ll be hard, and tedious, and long, and exhausting, but at least it will be goddamn possible.

So, come November, please don’t order the rat poison.

Please just eat your shitty ass soup so we can live to get really angry about it.

Please.

#gaza #usa #politics #2024 elections #trump #biden administration #joe biden #israel #social justice #election 2024

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sissa-arrows · 5 months ago

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French Israeli piece of shit: Wanna know why the Arabs don’t protest and break and burn shit in Israel like they do in France? First Arab who walks by gets beaten up. Even the nice Arabs. The peaceful ones with nice corner shops. We beat them up, broke everything did a carnage. It’s the only language the Arabs understand, they think that as long as you’re not in the streets to kill them you’re weak and they can do whatever they want. The war, what we’re doing in Gaza hasn’t been done in a long time. What we’re doing in Gaza… you know what we’re doing. Not a single Arab in Israel is moving not even their ear unlike 2021. Not a single burned tire. Nothing because they know that Israelis, including the leftists, if they do anything we will catch them and hang them to a traffic light.

People in the conversation: That’s good!!!

The same piece of shit: I can send you pictures of Arabs taped from head to feet. Their face, their eyes everything.

Mila a piece of shit: I absolutely want to see this.

A third piece of shit: If you want Mika I have really nice ones from the army.

Mila the piece of shit: I want to see it.

The two pieces of shit who have pictures: Sending you the pics in DM.

Mila: *laughing*

Come again and tell us how “Israel” is nice and how the “Israeli Arabs” are not mistreated. The thing is the three people who were talking are easily identifiable. We all know who they are know their names and faces. Mila is even invited on TV regularly to pretend to be a victim. But none of them was arrested. Let’s pretend a group with white supremacists and Muslims who can easily be identified because they are known and use their picture and full name on social media was calling for the murder of Jews? Do you think for one second it wouldn’t be all over the news and the piece of shit would be in police custody already? But hey it’s just anti Arab racism so nothing to see here. They are just celebrating the death of Palestinians. Fuck Zionism. Fuck every single person who stand with “Israel” in any form or shape even the “neutral” ones and both siders. You’re a piece of shit and I have absolutely zero respect for you or even any empathy.

(The two guys in the conversation are Zionist Jews the girl Mila is a white supremacist. A couple years ago when she was 17 and nobody knew her she insulted Muslims during a live video, idiots answered by insulting her cause she is queer. And she became a symbole in France they started using her to show how the Arabs are savages and saying that blasphemy is a right in France. They didn’t listen to us when we were like “Nah she didn’t insult Islam she insulted Muslims that’s not blasphemy that’s racism” and now years later after being told her behavior was perfectly okay multiple times including by politicians and the medias, she is casually calling for the murder or Arabs and asking for pictures of dead Palestinians.)

#anti palestinian racism #anti arab racism #cw death #colonial violence #Zionism #Zionism is a murderous ideology #anti Zionism is a duty #antizionism #Zionist violence

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memecucker · 6 months ago

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The complaint alleges how, for more than six months, Palestinian students, Arabs, Muslims, students perceived to be Palestinian, and students associated with or advocating for Palestinians, have been the target of extreme anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab, and Islamophobic harassment, including receiving multiple death threats, being harassed for wearing keffiyehs or hijab, doxed, stereotyped, being treated differently by high-ranking administrators including Columbia University President Minouche Shafik, an attack with a chemical agent that led to at least 10 students requiring hospitalization and dozens of others, including a Palestinian student, seeking medical attention, and more.

Palestine Legal is representing four students and the student group Columbia Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), who have all been the target of anti-Palestinian discrimination and harassment by fellow students, professors, and/or Columbia administrators.

“As a Palestinian student, I’ve been harassed, doxxed, shouted down, and discriminated against by fellow students and professors — simply because of my identity and my commitment to advocating for my own rights and freedoms,” said Maryam Alwan. “I’m horrified at the way Columbia has utterly failed to protect me from racism and abuse, but beyond that, the university has also played a role in this repression by having me arrested and suspended for peacefully protesting Israel’s genocide in Gaza. The violent repression we’re facing as peaceful anti-war protesters is appalling. Palestinian students at Columbia deserve justice and accountability, not only for Israel’s decades-long oppression and violence against our people, but for the racism and discrimination we’ve experienced here on Columbia’s campus.”

Columbia has actively contributed to pervasive racism and discrimination against Palestinian students on campus, causing both mental and physical harm. For example, students have been arrested, assaulted, suspended, locked out of campus and their classes, forced to seek medical attention, and forced to drop classes and delay their own graduation.

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worfsbarmitzvah · 2 months ago

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I've thought about how gentile Abrahamic religions are antisemitic religious colonialism before and it pisses me off a ton and I'm thankful you said it, but now that it's someone besides me saying it, I'm gonna give some criticism (please don't take this personally)

Everything up to Abraham (particularly Adam and Noah) have G-d creating and tending to the entirety of humanity, right?

During Abraham's time, it should stand for something that G-d tends to Hagar and Ishmael, right? Especially since Hagar gives her own name for G-d and He makes a promise to Ishmael that he'll be the father of nations (or something like that). And I think the Prophet Muhammad is supposed to be descended from Ishmael.

And Noahides are a whole Thing in all this too ofc.

But the bigger thing is there are definitely texts and interpretations that take G-d being the G-d of the Hebrews and extend it to Henotheism, but for the Jews who are purely monotheists and say there is truly only one G-d in existence and He belongs only to us, isn't it cruel to totally deny the vast majority of humanity the Divine, especially if He is still their Creator and controls the world(s) they live in?

this whole thing is coming from the assumption that judaism was always monotheistic. it wasn’t. at one point in time we were monolatrous, meaning we only worshipped one g-d but didn’t deny the existence of others. hell, the language used in the torah supports this (the way the text treats egypt’s g-ds being perhaps the most prominent example). hashem has always been our specific g-d, since before the idea emerged that he is the only g-d. our/the world’s perception of him may have since evolved into this idea of one singular deity, but it has not always been that way.

hagar and ishmael still come from our mythology surrounding our particular g-d. the idea then emerged in islam, which was born with the same jewish roots that christianity was, that muslims were descended from ishmael. and, like, i don’t really mind or care about that either way. ishmael’s not a super major figure in our folklore. the story, along others in breishit, genuinely does lend itself to the idea that hashem can be the guardian of many different peoples, families, and nations. and to tell the truth i don’t genuinely have much of a problem with sharing some folklore and roots.

but it NEEDS to be acknowledged where those roots come from. for so much of history, right up until today, christians and muslims have pretended they know our g-d and our folklore and our history better than we do. they have MURDERED us for worshipping our g-d and practicing our customs in OUR way, the way we have been since before their religions and cultures emerged. if the religions that find their roots in our culture were more willing to listen to us, respect us, and learn from us, maybe i’d be less angry. but they’re not. they’ve tried and tried and tried to eradicate us and erase where they came from and make our stuff theirs. i don’t think it has to be like that forever but i don’t think we’re very close to it not being like that as of now.

also, i can’t think of a single cultural mythology that doesn’t have a creation story of some kind. it’s just the kind of thing that societies do when they try to make sense of their place in the grand scheme. the fact that we believe our g-d created the entire world does not actually mean that that story or that g-d belongs to the entire world. the fact that everybody thinks our creation myth applies to and belongs to them is just more evidence of how widely our culture has been co-opted.

there’s nothing we can do to change the fact that our g-d has been made universal (either through the natural evolution of our theology or from colonialism and cultural theft, more likely a combination of both) and i have to be fine with that. sure, fine, the people who have adopted our g-d as their own without actually bothering to understand us at all can outnumber us by orders of magnitude.

but why does our holy city have to also be their holy city? the christians have the vatican and rome and islam has mecca and medina. why do they need jerusalem? why can’t even that just be ours?

again, i have to push this aside and be okay with sharing if i truly want to have peace in our land. and i do, because i love eretz yisrael and yerushalayim more than i hate what has been done to her. the situation has grown so far beyond the injustices i am angry about that it is impossible to right those injustices without creating brand new ones. so i will be okay with sharing our g-d, our texts, and our land. but that doesn’t mean the injustice of it won’t burn like a fire in my heart.

#txt #ask #anonymous #jumblr #< yeah fuck it i’ll tag this one. im saying a lot of things and i wanna see if they make sense to people

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rotzaprachim · 1 year ago

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a longer analysis needed maybe but I think we’re giving too much moral credit to white supremacists and white nationalists when we say thing like “it’s just a fight if they hate Jews or Muslims more.” They hate us both and in neither interchangeable nor neatly separable ways, just like how antisemitism and Islamophobia are neither interchangeable nor fully separable and deeply racialized ideologies that often get misunderstood as simply “religious.” What they’re actually doing is making strategic decisions about the political capital they can use. Can someone be radicalized in a given moment against Muslims, or against Jews? What is the best way to advance our movement? Can we push a broad platform of hatred towards jihadi terrorists who are going to invade western society, or get people worked up about the Zionist deep state globalists who control our government from within? What is the most effective way to radicalize someone into not only hatred but the idea entire ethnic and religious groups are at the root of all our social problems and that the nation - or the world - would be better without them? Do not assume innocence. And furthermore, do not assume you are safe from their schema of who the world would be better without, even if they aren’t saying your name, right now

#White nationalism #white supremacy #Way way too much white nationalism and Neo Nazism being given the time of day right now way #They havent decided they’re alright with Muslims now or that they support Palestinian liberation #They’ve realised that people will allow any degree of antisemitism as long as they say Zionists not Jews #And that they’ve got an entire new level of platform to pull people into antisemitic ideology that harms EVERYONE #There’s no split in white supremacy. Just a change in tactics

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coyote-teeth-poetry · 4 months ago

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Being queer and religious is like:

Yes, I have religious trauma. No, not in the ways that you think.

Yes, the institution of religion as a whole is corrupted. No, not like that.

Yes, I feel rejected. No, not by God.

No, I can’t leave my religion, anymore then I could “leave” being queer. They both are intrinsic parts of me.

Yes, God is love. No, not in that way.

Yes, I feel uncomfortable in religious spaces. Queer spaces make me feel the same.

No, I will not change or give up any part of myself to mollify the other side. I couldn’t if I tried.

No, these two different parts of me are not “at war,” they don’t contradict each other.

Queer religious people deserve love and respect, not in spite of their religion, but including it. Even if the distrust of religion is warranted, that shouldn’t translate to the people.

They also deserve to have their queerness respected. No, it is not in defiance of God, it is reveling in the beauty of his creation.

Queer Muslim, Christian, and Jewish people, (and many, many others,) stand in the face of all the pressure put on them to conform, in one way or another. Queer spaces will never entirely be comfortable with them, religious spaces will never entirely be comfortable with them.

But we’re here anyway.

God loves you, I love you. Peace be with you.

#queer #queer pride #queer christian #religion #religious trauma #muslim #queer muslim #jewish #queer jews #pride month #queer religion #When I say religious I’m talking about the Abrahamic religions. Of course there are others #many of which accept queer people #this is just my area of knowledge

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gentlebeardsbarngrill · 5 months ago

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06/17/2024 Daily OFMD Recap

TLDR; TellTaleTVAwards; Cast & Crew Sightings; David Jenkins; Taika Waititi; Vico Ortiz; Con O'Neill; Guz Khan; Samba Schutte; Lindsey Cantrell; Zine Fundraisers; Articles; Fan Spotlight; Cast Cards; Our Flag Means Fanfiction; NeverLeft Podcast; Love Notes; Daily Darby/Today's Taika;

== Tell Tale TV Awards ==

You did it!!! Congrats everyone! Thank you so much for voting over the past weeks! Both OFMD and Rhys won!

Source: Tell Tale TV Awards

== Cast & Crew Sightings ==

== David Jenkins ==

June 17th is the anniversary of Flight of the Conchords episode 1! Dad was sending some love out to Bret, Jemaine, and of course our captain Rhys.

Source: David Jenkins Twitter

== Taika Waititi ==

Taika and Rita are in another silly tiktok video-- good news, you dont need a login to see it, just mark yourself as guest!

Source: RIta Ora's TikTok

== Vico Ortiz ==

This Friday, Vico is back with Them Fatale PRIDE edition. June 21st at the First Congregational Church of LA. Doors open at 6 PM and show starts at 7:30! In the area? Stop on by! Tickets available here.

Source: Vico Ortiz' Instagram Story

== Con O'Neill ==

Con's got some new merch up on Stands! Please visit ShopStands for some awesome OFMD Shirts, and pins, and to help a good cause!

Source: Con O'Neill's Instagram

== Guz Khan ==

For those of our Muslim friends celebrating the end of Ramadan, Guz is sending out a loving Eid Mubarak <3

Source: Guz Khan's Instagram

== Samba Schutte ==

Samba is also sending out a lovely Eid Mubarak! As well as sending some more family photos with Aria and the little one.

Source: Samba Schutte's Instagram Stories

== Lindsey Cantrell ==

Our fabulous Set Designer Lindsey Cantrell has been working on this short film Watching Walter, if you're so inclined, please check it out when it's out! CW: Holocaust/Nazi's/Violence

Source: Lindsey Cantrell's Instagram

== Zine Fundraisers ==

There's a new OFMD Fan-Led fundraiser to benefit Gaza out! Please follow @ofmdaction on tumblr for more information! Artist and Writer sign ups are now live! Carrd | Twitter | AO3 Collection | Daily Click for UNRWA

Source: OFMDAction Tumblr

== Articles ==

Source: Adopt Our Crew's Twitter

== Fan Spotlight ==

== Cast Cards ==

Some fun new cast cards from @melvisik today! "As fate would have it (did not plan this, it just happened in sequence) OFMD writer Simone Nathan" had her second season of Kid Sister just drop in the last few days! The previous night's cast card was Don A! aka "Swampy Town Folk"!

Source: @melvisik's Twitter

== Our Flag Means Fanfiction ==

New episode of Our Flag Means Fanfiction! This time a mini-sode read by Baby Kraken Podfics! Listen on your favorite platform here!https://linktr.ee/ofmff

Source: Our Flag Means Fanfiction Instagram

== Never Left Podcast ==

"This week is discussing Violence in OFMD! "Episode 22 is OUT! This week we’re continuing our discussion on physical and emotional violence!" CW: Gun and knife violence Listen on your favorite platforms here: https://linktr.ee/neverleftpodcast

Source: NeverLeftPodcast's Instagram

== Love Notes ==

Hey there Lovelies! I hope the week hasn't started too crazy or you! I know sometimes it's hard to see our impact, but take a look at those Tell-Tale TV results! Sure, it's a silly TV awards, but it 100% happened because you all were steadfast in voting! Just remember that while all our efforts don't always come to fruition in the way we want, you do make an impact <3

Img Source: PositivelyPresent Tumblr

== Daily Darby / Today's Taika ==

Today's theme is Flight of the Conchords since it's the 17 year anniversary of the first episode airing!

Gifs courtesy of the absolute legends @celluloidbroomcloset and @fandomsmeantheworldtome <3

#ofmd daily recap #ofmd #our flag means death #rhys darby #taika waititi #rita ora #david jenkins #chaos dad #lindsey cantrell #our flag means fanfiction #never left podcast #guz khan #samba schutte #con o'neill #vico ortiz

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i-cant-sing · 7 months ago

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I can marry Baldwin all I like. We’re both catholics I think. But what if I was Muslim? The church didn’t permit interfaith marriages back then. And if you did marry then the church would demand that the children would be christian

*evil laugh* Do you think i have not thought of that? *laugh* I am so glad i had to teach a kid on "Crusades" because THIS IS HELPING ME SM i love absorbing historical events like a sponge, u best belive i had already thought of yandere baldwin like a year ago when i was tutoring kids

Anyways, im writing part 2 and youll see how this problem will be an issue as well

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yjhariani · 8 months ago

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Since the fast has just started and I’m obsessed with your Muslim ghosts au , I was just thinking about ghost and reader breaking their fast together

Iftar date with Muslim!Simon? Yes, please.

Frankly, when Simon said that for once the two of you should both go out for iftar, you thought he would just take you to a restaurant.

The journey started with a motorcycle ride. Instead of towards the places you both would usually go for dinner, he drove somewhere more serene. He took you somewhere with fewer people and more trees. You both eventually reached a higher altitude.

No matter how many times you asked where you were going, Simon gave you only a response, but not an answer. You’ll see. Or Just wait. Or We’re almost there.

Simon eventually stopped atop a hill. He turned his engine off and without getting off the bike, offered you a hand to help you get off the bike. Once you did, you removed your helmet and put it on the backseat of the bike.

Whilst Simon got himself of his steed, you looked around the rocky plateau area where you stood. It was spacious and it served quite the scenery. The sun was in the process of retiring into the nearby lake.

“Mind giving me a hand, love?” Simon asked.

When you turned to face him again, Simon was getting some stuff out of the saddlebags. Thermos, food containers, a blanket, and more.

From there, the two of you set up a little picnic area. Simon started a small campfire and soon enough after, the two of you sat next to each other, facing the sunset. Steaming tea had already been poured out of the thermos, food was readied, prayer mats were available nearby for later, a lantern was set aside in case of need.

Simon took his phone out and glanced at the time.

“Two minutes to go,” Simon said. “We should probably check where the qibla is as well.”

“We’ll pray here as well?” you asked, rather excitedly.

“We could probably find somewhere indoor if you want that,” Simon said.

“That’s probably going to push it so close to Isya,” you said. “This is nice.”

“Yeah?” Simon said.

“Yeah, I can’t believe you’re doing this,” you chuckled.

Simon only looked at you for a moment, a thin smile on his face. He, then, looked back down to his phone.

“It’s this way,” Simon stated, facing a direction.

With so, you rotated the folded prayer mats to face that direction.

“How many minutes left?” you asked.

Simon glanced back at his phone briefly.

“Still two minutes,” Simon answered.

“It was two minutes some time ago,” you said.

“Still two minutes,” Simon repeated, shrugging, looking at his phone as the time finally shifted. “One minute now.”

“One minute,” you nodded.

“Less than,” Simon said before gesturing at the sun that was almost completely swallowed by the lake. “I mean, we’re also witnessing Maghrib in real life.”

“Waiting for Maghrib while watching Maghrib,” you concluded.

“If we’re in Morocco we’d be in Maghrib as well,” Simon said.

“Like the same word?” you asked.

“Yeah. Maghrib means something that’s related to west, I think. Morocco is in the western part of the continent, sun sets in the west,” Simon explained.

“Ah, I see,” you hummed. “Morocco and Maghrib is kinda far, though.”

“I believe the word Morocco came from the name of a city there called Marrakesh,” Simon said.

“Oh, that makes sense,” you commented.

Just then, both of your phones went off, alerting that it was time for iftar. After turning them off, you and Simon looked at each other.

“Let’s just wait a bit more, just in case,” Simon said.

“That’s what I’m thinking,” you said.

However, Simon still handed you a cup of tea that you both prepared earlier and held the other in his hand. After a moment or two, you both started breaking your fast.

“You know,” you said after your first sip, “if we camp, we could do this for suhoor as well.”

“You actually wanna do that?” Simon questioned.

“Only if you think it’s a good idea,” you said.

“What if I told you I brought a tent?” Simon asked.

“No way,” you scoffed before gesturing at his bike. “I know that a tent won’t fit in those bags.”

“I said what if, love,” Simon said.

In response, you playfully shoved him.

“Fine,” Simon said before he picked up a datefruit. “It’s a date, then.”

“I broke my fast, I could curse you out right now, Simon,” you pointed out.

Simon huffed out an amused air.

#simon riley x reader #ghost x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley #ghost

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multiplicity-positivity · 17 days ago

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Here’s some positivity for systems whose lives are affected by the genocide happening in the Levant!

War and genocide are always devastating and can have widespread, horrible effects. Our hearts go out to every system and singlet whose lives have been affected or irreparably altered by the genocide and war waged by Israel against Palestine and recently Lebanon and Syria at this time. If you are a Jewish, Muslim, Arabic, Palestinian, Lebanese, Syrian, or Israeli system who is struggling to cope with these atrocities, both inside and outside the Levant, this post is for you.

🕊️ Shoutout to systems who have recently faced a lot of Islamophobia, antisemitism, racism, or xenophobia, even by those within their community who they trust!

☮️ Shoutout to systems who have been regularly attending protests and standing up for Palestinian, Lebanese, and Syrian liberation!

🕊️ Shoutout to anti-Zionist Israeli systems who feel lost, trapped, terrified, or hopeless about their current situation!

☮️ Shoutout to systems with families or who themselves have had their homes destroyed, lost loved ones, or have been a victim of war in Palestine, Lebanon, or Syria!

🕊️ Shoutout to affected systems living outside the Levant who wish there was more they could do to fight against the current ethnic cleansing!

☮️ Shoutout to Jewish systems who are tired and dismayed of their own people’s history and generational traumas being used as an excuse to commit another genocide!

🕊️ Shoutout to systems who wish now more than ever people from all sorts of different backgrounds could come together to make peace and look after each other!

☮️ Shoutout to systems who regularly wear or display keffiyehs, Palestinian, Lebanese, or Syrian flags, and other symbols of resistance!

🕊️ Shoutout to systems who do their best to stay informed about Israel’s genocide in the Levant, even when it’s exhausting, disheartening, or difficult!

☮️ Shoutout to systems who share fundraisers, donate, and otherwise do their best to help struggling victims of this genocide financially however they can!

🕊️ Shoutout to systems who have never given up hope for a free Palestine and the end of Israel in our lifetimes!

☮️ Shoutout to the systems who believe in resistance, believe in peace, and believe that “never again means never again, for anyone!”

Friends, there is so much we can say here, and we’re not sure where to begin. Our hearts go out to those living in the Levant who are victims of this genocide. We are praying for your safety and the safety of your families, friends, and loved ones. We are praying for the swift end of this genocide and the end of the state which has brought it about. We are praying that those displaced may one day be able to return to their homeland. We are praying for peace, happiness, and fulfillment in your futures.

To those of us who are not directly affected, let’s work harder than ever to stand up against racism, Islamophobia, antisemitism, and xenophobia whenever we see it. Remember, zionism is not Judaism, and you can and must fight back against both this genocide and the antisemitism that threatens our Jewish friends and allies, today and every day. Learn how to recognize hatred and bigotry in your spaces, and call it out whenever you see it. It is possible to band together, to uplift each other, and to fight for liberation together, regardless of background!

If there is anything at all we can do to be better allies to Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians, other Arab folks, Muslims, or Jews, please let us know. We may not be directly affected by this genocide, but genocide impacts us all! When one of us is at risk, we are all at risk. None of us are free until all of us are free! Know that we want to fight for you, we want to be a better ally and stand up for you, we care about you and we want to see you through to safer times. Please do your best to take care of yourselves and each other, and know we are keeping you in our thoughts and in our hearts. 💖🇵🇸🇱🇧🇸🇾💖

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