Friday, December 17, 2004

THE CONSERVATIVE CASE FOR ASSIMILATION

In a column entitled "The Jewish Grinch Who Stole Christmas" Burt Prelutsky, a Jew himself he says, complains about other Jews who don't treat Christmas with the proper respect and adoration it deserves.

What follows is the fisking Prelutsky deserves:

I never thought I'd live to see the day that Christmas would become a dirty word.

Probably because you don't daven. The rest of us, in the Alaynu, and elsewhere, pray three times daily, for Christmas and Christianity to disapear.

You think it hasn't? Then why is it that people are being prevented from saying it in polite society for fear it will offend?

Being prevented? Let's look at your examples:

Schools are being forced to replace "Christmas vacation" with "winter break" in their printed schedules.

Yes, because schools are public institutions. Why should a school that belongs to everyone, exclude students who don't celebrate Christmas?

At Macy's, the word is verboten even though they've made untold millions of dollars from their sympathetic portrayal in the Christmas classic, "Miracle on 34th Street."

Macy's does anything it wants. Macy's is a private company. I thought you uber-Conservative types believed in the free market?

A major postal delivery service has not only made their drivers doff their Santa caps, but ordered them not to decorate their trucks with Christmas wreaths.

Private postal delivery services also get to do whatever they like. Remember: you're a Conservative. You're supposed to like it when private companies proceed with little or no interference from the government.

Although it seems a long time ago, it really wasn't, that people who came here from other places made every attempt to fit in. Assimilation wasn't a threat to anyone – it was what the Statue of Liberty represented.

Are you arguing that Jews ought to assimilate? Is that why you think Christmas is so neat? Because it encourages Jews to lose their distinctivness? Earth to frum Jews: Liberals are our enemy??

That has changed, you may have noticed. And I blame my fellow Jews. When it comes to pushing the multicultural, anti-Christian agenda, you find Jewish judges, Jewish journalists, and the American Civil Liberties Union, at the forefront.

Gee whiz, Burt. If you were a liberal, it would be ok for me to call you a self-hating Jew, right? So what's the convention when the person dissing Jews is a conservative? Is it still ok to hurl the "self-hating Jew" epitaph, or is there another phrase, I should use instead? Oh, and the "anti-Christian agenda" is right there in the Torah.

Being Jewish, I should report, Christmas was never celebrated by my family. But what was there not to like about the holiday?

Um... it celebrates a lie? It glorifies a faith and a culture that's caused untold Jewish suffering? The music sucks?

The Jews voice no concern when a Bill Clinton or a John Kerry makes a big production out of showing up at black Baptist churches or posing with Rev. Jesse Jackson because they understand that's just politics. They only object to politicians attending church for religious reasons.

Well, this Jew only objects when politicians utter inanities in the name of religion. That happens very often when the religion is false, as in the case of Christianity, but what can you do?

My fellow Jews, who often have the survival of Israel heading the list of their concerns when it comes to electing a president, only gave 26 percent of their vote to Bush, even though he is clearly the most pro-Israel president we've ever had in the Oval Office.

B.S

You may have noticed, though, that the ACLU is highly selective when it comes to religious intolerance. The same group of self-righteous shysters who, at the drop of a "Merry Christmas" will slap you with an injunction, will fight for the right of an American Indian to ingest peyote and a devout Islamic woman to be veiled on her driver's license.

Apples and oranges. And, because you know better, it is a dishonest argument besides. The ACLU only objects when it is government sponsoring the Merry Christmas, and you can be sure injunctions would follow if government were sponsoring the peyote or the veil. Private people can say Merry Christmas all they want. In fact, you just wrote a whole column about it. Did you receive a summons? Get slapped with an injunction? I doubt it.

I am getting the idea that too many Jews won't be happy until they pull off their own version of the Spanish Inquisition, forcing Christians to either deny their faith and convert to agnosticism or suffer the consequences.

Well, yes. That's the Jewish view, though we're content to let Moshiach handle the dirty details.

I should point out that many of these people abhor Judaism every bit as much as they do Christianity.

Not me. I adore Judaism. I daven three times daily, and am kovea itim, etc. That's why I object to Christianity. Not because I am a multi-culturtalist, but because I pay attention to the prayers and to the Torah subjects I study.

I say it behooves those of us who don't accept Jesus Christ as our savior to show some gratitude to those who do, and to start respecting the values and traditions of the overwhelming majority of our fellow citizens, just as we keep insisting that they respect ours.

It is not in me to respect falsehoods. Sorry. Can't do it. If you had an ounce of intellectual integrity, you'd stop apologizing for Christianity, too.

No comments: