Don't shun Diaspora Boy: He needs your kindness Less than a month ago, Eli Valley's instant classic "Israel Man and Diaspora Boy" made nonsense of "Negation of the Diaspora" philosophy. Somebody in the Israeli government must be reading, because lo and behold:

A new government strategy to redefine ties with the Diaspora to be "less patronizing and more humble" will be unveiled on June 22...

While "aliya is an important Zionist goal that remains important in our value system," [cabinet member Ovad] Yehezkel said, "we have to move away from a dynamic based on money and aliya. We have to add more values, to establish cooperation. Israel has to take responsibility for Diaspora issues as well, such as Jewish identity, education and continuity."...

Israel stood at "a complex crossroads," Yehezkel said. If it failed to "completely redefine" its relationship with the Diaspora, "we will find ourselves, God forbid, dividing again into Judah and Israel. There will be a Jew of Israel and a Jew of the Diaspora, and they will be more different than they are alike."

The new relationship, Yehezkel said, must have "a whole different purpose. We have to change the language we use when speaking to the Diaspora and even the tools with which we communicate."

QED.

It is the question. It is the reason for Jewcy. The question's celebrated and undeserving cousin -- What will become of Judaism? -- gets all the attention and money. It's surely not as important, but its tacit implication of crisis has just the right pizazz, creates just the right amount of fear, to get the checkbooks out.

Confronting the question of what value Judaism will offer its adherents and the world at large is too complicated, creating so much fear that questions start getting asked while the checkbooks remain closed.

Judaism's rasion d'etre surfaced in an online forum of that shadowy and exclusive Jewish non-profit, Reboot (it's really quite innovative and filled with fine folks). Everything Judaism seems to be about these days - intermarriage, antisemitism, who qualifies as Jewish, the silly political machinations of this or that denomination - is so uninspiring. Tell me, the questioner pleaded, that there will be something more.

What exactly that addition will be strikes at the heart of this transitional, and one hopes transformational, moment in Judaism's history; a moment encapsulated by the shift of the central question facing the non-Ortho Jewish community of the last 100+ years from how to why be Jewish.

I'm optimistic. From monotheism to civil rights to socialism, you'd be hard-pressed to identify a social movement that Jews weren't somehow involved in or directly responsible for, including the American evangelical movement of the last 20 years (see Jewcy's story, The Jewish Jihad for Jesus).

In those movements, in the advent of monotheism itself, I see the answer in Judaism's utopian imagination. We need to reignite that imagination - on a conceptual level, in the conversations we have communally, and on a practical level in how we live our lives. We need to apply that imagination from 30,000 feet - creating movements or getting behind existing ones -- and then, on increasingly granular levels -- to our country, our states, our neighborhoods, our homes, and in our selves.

The challenge will be to get beyond the organizational rot that has made many of our institutions useless; to get beyond the scarcity of effective leadership, religious or otherwise; and finally, get to a place where we can revive Judaism as a viable conceptual technology that provides the tools and language to make good on those utopic impulses.

The Jewcy candidateSome people in the Jewcy community are understandably concerned that creating a shirt that supports Barack Obama's presidential candidacy will alienate some of our readers. Here's why we're going to make one anyway.

We make a big case of saying that a primary principle of ours is that we're not partisan so much as polypartisan. In practice, that means we work toward integrating the views and opinions of unorthodox voices across the continuum (right, left, Gentile, Hindi, and so on). This sets us distinctly apart from the rest of Jewish media, as does the knowledge that such inclusion makes for the best conversation.

'Polypartisanship' doesn't mean that Jewcy won't take a stand, or that we don't work towards articulating a specific worldview and a shared set of values. The brand's origins stem from an incredibly polarizing shirt, "Shalom Motherfucker." "Shalom Motherfucker" was a passionate and strong announcement of a very particular and new kind of J ewish identity, one that repulsed a significant segment of the Jewish community. We're not a news organization. And we're not unbiased.

In our editorial objectives, we've stated that:

for all the prosperity America Jewry has enjoyed -- its charities, its new temples, its countless organizations -- the community is in a moment of transition where the outcome is far from certain. Much of the Jewish establishment is unsound at its roots, built on ugly ethnocentric, parochial values, mortified of change, riddled by hypocrisy, resistant to criticism and prone to empty self-congratulation, and completely out of touch with the needs and desires of a new generation of Jews. We've had enough; it's open season on these pretenders, phonies, and purveyors of intellectual, communal, and spiritual snake oil. At the same time, there is an emerging new community with its own legitimate heroes and heroines, its models and mentors. We'll set out to identify the values of these people who are creating change, leading lives, and building organizations that embody them.

And:

With a sense of imagination, we will undermine the distinctions and blur the boundaries between what is and isn't considered Jewish. In an effort to recreate a Jewish culture that feeds the soul, that enervating both intellectually and creatively, we need to transform the community from one based solely on ethnocentric, tribal, belonging....Choosing either modernity or religion is a false choice

 

The point is, we can take a stand on Obama because we're not just a media outlet (though it's worth noting that newspapers do endorse candidates). We're attempting to create a new community. We're attempting to create the largest, most intellectually engaging Web-based discussion about how to be a hyphenated American in the early 21st century, and more specifically, what it means to be Jewish in America now.

Jewcy's take on what it means to be Jewish in America will be tempered, and tested, by the alternative viewpoints we include in the discussion and by you, our readers, who will have the last word on what works for you.

Over the last year and a half, Jewcy's proudest editorial accomplishments have all articulated a well thought out bias that provoked both those who agreed with us, and those who didn't, into action. I'm talking about provocative topics like our confrontation of the ADL over their policy of genocide denial,our debate about the future of Jewish peoplehood with Jack Wertheimer, our editorial on why Israeli assholes should be a source of Jewish pride, our argument that writers should stop mining the Holocaust for material, and our debate between Sam Harris and Denis Prager, which arguably established the template for the rest of mainstream media on how to cover the growing Atheism phenomenon.

Action is the best case scenario (we want participants, not just readers). And hopefully, as we do better and better work, the aggregation of all those biases will constitute a somewhat unified, clear vision of the world that does more than ask what it means to be a Jew now, but actually provides a compelling and persuasive answer to a growing amalgam of Jews and other Americans disenfranchised and alienated by the institutions and leaders that once provided them with a sense of community and meaning.

As for Obama, our coverage has made it clear that he's the Jewcy New Jew candidate for a hundred different reasons, not least because of our reaction to the extraordinary racism, xenophobia, and dirty tricks employed by the Jewish establishment to discredit him.

So, yes, an Obama tee would alienate people in our audience. Precisely, and perfectly, in the same way our Shalom Motherfucker Tee did a couple years ago, and still does today.

We're interested in hearing your take. And if you have design suggestions, email our art director Tara Rice at tara@jewcy.com.

Dinner with friends: We saved you a seat!This weekend is Shabbat Across America, a yearly outreach effort aimed at increasing participation in Jewish life and community. If you don't have plans for tonight, here are a few last minute resources to help you find a dinner or service.

• Check out SSA’s official website, which also features a handy guide that locates synagogues in your area.

• Find a real or virtual Shabbat table at Shabbat Across America 2.0.

• College students can contact Hillel to find out what's happening on campus.

• I’ll be having dinner with some folks from the community service program Livnot U’Lehibanot. Here’s a list of dinners they're hosting around North America, as well as their “Shabbat in a Box” guide.

• Prefer to DIY? Jewcy’s own Tamar Fox offers how-to guides on hosting a Shabbat dinner and performing a havdallah ceremony.

• Some extra Shabbat basics from My Jewish Learning.

• Finally, you can celebrate “Secular Sabbath” ala Mark Bittman of the New York Times by spending 24 hours unplugged from modern gadgets.

 

Religion in Israel: Too black and white?It may only take an hour to get from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv (provided your bus doesn’t break down), but the two often feel more like different planets than neighboring cities. In Israel, the animosity between secular and Orthodox is palpable and growing, but according to an article in yesterday’s J-Post, the emerging Jewish Renewal movement is targeting even the most “hard-core” secularists, and attempting to bring Jewish traditions back into modern Israeli life by finding the gray areas within religion.

The ambivalence about Judaism in Israel became clear to me one night as I sat drinking in an alleyway bar in Tel Aviv with my Israeli friend Omer. Omer has been studying abroad in Germany for the past few years, and admitted that he felt disconnected there, and had started attending a Friday night dinner with other Jewish students. “My father would disown me if he knew I was lighting Shabbat candles,” said Omer guiltily. “We come from a long line of staunch Tel Aviv atheists.”

In order to counteract this deep rooted aversion to religion, the Jewish Renewal movement (different from the 1960s American movement of the same name) takes a more flexible approach, focusing on ritual, tradition and spirituality rather than outright faith. While the term “secular synagogue” may seem like an oxymoron,to proponents of Jewish Renewal, it’s the basis of their ideology.

Dr. Asher Cohen, a senior lecturer at Bar-Ilan's Political Science Department who recently wrote a paper on the failure of the Reform Movement to muster a significant following in Israel, said the movement lacked many of the drawbacks of Reform Judaism.

"First of all, there is no God," said Cohen. "Jewish Renewal is not a religion. So it does not turn off adamantly secular people."

Though the Jewish Renewal leaders identify their movement as distinctly Israeli, it’s hard not to sense that the trend mirrors the ever evolving definition of American Jewish identity. The search for cultural connections has taken many Americans beyond their local congregation or JCC. It is the reason why Jewcy exists, why small alternative congregations like Romemu are springing up across the country, and why birthright is quickly becoming the new bar mitzvah. For many, the search for meaning no longer revolves around the existence of God; it's about the need to find a comfortable, inclusive community.

 

Congratulations! You’ve managed to get through the first 2.5 weekdays. To help you get through the second half of your week, Jewcy is happy to present you with Hump Day Art. Think of it as an opportunity to devote your attention to the more cultural things in life, or at the very least, to zone out at your desk for a few minutes while you look at some pretty pictures.

Can't get enough of Jewcy's most recent featured artist Patrick Winfield? Here's a few more works from his portfolio of mosaic-like Polariod composites and eerie "appropriations." Click on the images for a larger view.

Blue Marble, 2006

 

 

Powerhouse, 2006

 

 

Odalisque, 2007

 

 

For more on Winfield and his work, take a look at this recent interview, in which the artist talks about his technique, his love for Polaroids, and what he likes to stash in his fridge.

Jewish Living Magazine has just released their list of "Hip Hebraic Homepages" and tipped me off once the list was ready. For reasons quite obvious once you reach the end (kvell, kvell, kvell), I just had to share. Taken straight from Jewish Living:

SHUL OF ROCK

www.jewsrock.org Chaim Witz, Perry Bernstein, Jeffrey Hyman. Half the fun of Jewsrock is finding out the given names of pop icons like Gene Simmons, Perry Farrell, and Joey Ramone, respectively. You can also tour the rock ’n’ roll “Challah Fame” or take the “Jew or Not?” quiz. Between the lines, there’s a serious message about pride in Jewish accomplishments, and a dedication to smashing my-son-the-dentist stereotypes. Alas, the Web site appears to have gone static, but is no less rockin’ for it

KOSHER COMEDY

www.bangitout.com When a site bills itself as “kosher comedy for the circumcised,” expect few sacred cows. Part gimlet-eyed news digest, part Onion-like satire, and part self-tweaking Jewish social club, BangItOut mashes raucous headlines (“New Book Helps Rabbis Stay Away From Hot Widows”), amusing photos (the Barbie menorah is a favorite), and see-it-to-believe-it videos (don’t miss the hilarious “jPhone” commercial). As their site promises, “If something’s funny and Jewish on the Internet, it’s either on here or linked from here.”

COME ON, FEEL THE “OYS”

www.klezmershack.com As this site points out, “klezmer is a popular music form that is no longer exclusively Jewish.” Likewise, KlezmerShack isn’t just about klezmer anymore; it’s blossomed into a one-stop shop for news about Jewish music, hot cultural events worldwide, reviews, even music videos grabbed from YouTube (you haven’t lived until you’ve heard “A Hard Day’s Night” in Yiddish). Webmaster Ari Davidow—an online strategist for a Jewish nonprofit by day—oversees the festivities with charm, wit, and infectious joy.

COOLEST JEWISH RECORD LABEL ON EARTH

www.jdubrecords.org If your knowledge of Jewish music stretches from “Hava Nagila” to… “Hava Nagila,” expand your horizons at the online home of JDub, the coolest Jewish record label on the planet. You’ll impress your kids with casual references to ultrahip bands like Golem, Balkan Beat Box, Socalled, and the LeeVees. Then the whole family can download inimitable JDub videos and songs (like all four segments of Socalled’s mystical sci-fi, hip-hop Claymation opus “500-Pound Planet”). Who says parents and kids can’t agree on music?

SCHMOOZE, SHVITZ, SHOP

 www.jewcy.com What began as a retailer of risqué rags (the “Chai Maintenance” T-shirt was a fave) has become the center of Jewish hipsterism’s new wave. The shirts are still there, but so is smart original reporting and opinion, a vibrant social network, and much discussed blogs such as “The Daily Shvitz” and “Faithhacker.” Brains, attitude, and sheer chutzpah make Jewcy a daily must-read.

 Good Shabbes, all. Mwah.

I've been with Jewcy since April, 2006 -- before there was a Jewcy, and before the worst stain that you could attach to the name Michael Weiss was that he landed on his ass at the Winter Olympics, or made an unconvincing Pretender on NBC.

I'll be leaving these parts in mid-January to become Pajamas Media's new New York and D.C. editor. Rollicking Peloponnesian days with Victor Davis Hanson, wild Dylanesque nights with Ron Rosenbaum. Or so I'm told.

One wants to avoid sentimentality at times like these ("I'll miss you all terribly. Except you, Craig. I never liked you and your lunches always smelled.") but it's an uphill battle, really. I've had the privilege to work with some of the funniest, most talented people in journalism -- not ghettoized Jewish journalism, mind you, but journalism. We will all answer to Izzy Grinspan in a matter of years. Tahl Raz took a vague idea, borne of the hash and decadence of Amsterdam, and made it material. And I'm actually sticking around another couple of weeks because I want to see Joey's unkept mug one last time in person before I hop it. At the very least, Leinoff needs more schooling at Ping-Pong.

I don't plan to be a complete stranger to Jewcy or to the Cabal. I'll still post my glowering neocon screeds from time to time. And I hope friendly antagonists like Ismail, and not-so-friendly ones like that creepy asshole who keeps telling me I'm not a real Jew because my mother isn't, follow me wherever I go. I could use the comic relief.

It's been real. Now here's a picture of my English Cocker Spaniel in front of the Christmas Tree. Just for you, creepy Jewish chauvinist commenter (my squeeze is Korean, too, just like Noah Feldman's. Viva la intermarriage!):

"The Hills" may be the ultimate in guilty pleasures. With all the fights, gossip and fashion, how could you resist? Apparently, the New York Times can't resist either. Their style blog got a hold of Whitney Port and sat her down for an interview, during which they offered her a job after she commented that she was getting "too old" to be working at Teen Vogue. Gawker didn't seem too happy with the Times blogger's gushing affection for Whitney, or his spontaneous job offer, but I say, why not? If starring in a reality TV show gives her enough cred to be called a "style muse" then why shouldn't she move on to a more prestigious gig? And if that doesn't work out, she can always come work for Jewcy!

This week we salute Uriah’s comment on the Megachuch and taxes post.

If these megachurches are making money from shopping malls, movie theatres, and sporting events, and not having to pay taxes, then the separation of church and state has gone too far.  How much of that money is actually being used for something other than cushioning the pockets of Elders, Deacons, and Reverends?

Big Butter Jesus: totally treyf

 And, no, I wouldn't shop at a place I knew was owned by a Christian religious organization.  I also wouldn't patronize anyplace I knew had anything along the lines of sweatshops involved in the making of their products.

Big business is big business, not big jesus.  If I'm not running around my restaurant with my Tanakh under my arm proclaiming jesus as a heretic and a fake, they shouldn't be running around the movie theatre shouting about jesus as the true creator.  It's ridiculous.  

But actually, all of the comments made on that post were really interesting and provocative, so I salute everyone who threw in their two cents.  This has the potential to become a really big problem both for the government, and for Jews who are trying to decide where to shop and spend time.  The discussion in the comments is exactly why I love Jewcy—varied and intelligent and didn’t involve anyone making comments about me and my cuntocracy. 

Too many of you readers aren’t commentators.  And I know you’re smart.  Show me some lip, people.   

The death of Pulitzer Prize-winning author Norman Mailer has cast attention back on some of his early essays, including “The White Negro,” an influential piece that first appeared in Dissent magazine in 1957. Written during a period he described as "the years of conformity and depression," Mailer's essay focused on the hipster—"the urban adventurer. . .who drifted out at night looking for action with a black man's code to fit their facts"—as a hero capable of providing the antidote to America's stultifying postwar culture.

"The White Negro," and the hipster lifestyle it details, remind us that white Americans have looked to blacks not only as a group upon which they could project the negative aspects of their society, but also as an object of longing: Whites fantasize that the African American embodies the expressiveness and sensuality with which they as whites have lost touch in their self-styled "march toward progress." Bristling under the confines of postwar culture, Mailer admired the hipster as white man who, like his imagined black counterpart, could free himself from "the sophisticated inhibitions of civilization," divorce himself from society, and relinquish "the pleasures of the mind for...the pleasures of the body."

Although Mailer did not explicitly mention his Jewish background in "The White Negro," the essay was undoubtedly shaped by the symbolic importance African Americans and their culture have long held for American Jews. Mailer himself was a product of the urban streets where Jewish youth of the 1920s, 1930s, and 1940s often listened to "race records," formed their own jazz bands, and occasionally made evening excursions to Harlem and other African American neighborhoods. Not only were many of the leading white interpreters of African American music during the interwar period Jewish, but so was the original hipster, Mezz Mezzrow (né Milton Mesirow), a clarinetist who declared himself a "voluntary Negro" and devoted himself—in his own words—to "hipping the world about the blues the way only Negroes can."

Continue reading...

I'm looking for someone who wakes up far earlier than I to do two posts a day for The Cabal. These posts will be smart, witty news round-ups or "Must Read" links to major stories pertaining to national and international affairs. You should have a good grasp of what we cover on this site, and -- just as important -- a sense of humor.

The first post needs to go up by 9 a.m. The second (sort of a that's-all-folks wrap-up) by 4 p.m. See Wonkette's Daily Briefing for an idea of what is entailed. 

Oh, yes. We'll pay you.

Interested applicants should email me at michael [at] jewcy [dot] com.

The good news for those you concerned with redoubling the X-chromosomes of The Cabal. We've hired a woman. The bad news for those of you typically concerned with such things: She's a rabid right-winger!

Actually, she's the kind of fun female conservative Ann Coulter bites the head off Ken dolls trying to embody.

Meet Karol Sheinin:

Born in the Soviet Union and raised on the mean streets of 1980’s Brooklyn, Karol Sheinin enjoys poker, hip-hop and freaking people out with her “I’m the NRA and I vote” button. 

Karol works as a publicist in New York, and blogs at Alarming News. She recently took on a 9/11 conspiracy theorist at Lolita Bar (even read his book!). Read all about that here. 

Cabals and manifestos. The two things have an affinity primarily in their common association with transgression. Transgression is the greatest vice and virtue of political thought and action; it is positive since desirable social and political change is by definition a transgression of the old order and negative since misplaced transgression often spells the downfall of progressive politics. Transgression is my preferred lens for thinking about a personal manifesto for this new Jewcy offshoot, The Cabal.

I don't speak for any of my fellow bloggers. We sign off on our posts individually for a reason. Writing is to each of us, I'm sure, something different, even if we most likely all agree on the virtue of free press to democracy, the joy of expression and other such well-worn yet true notions about why writing about the world outside matters. There would be no need to write, to discuss, converse or disagree if any of us believed we had a monopoly on the truth. There would be no need to do so, either, if truth were purely a matter of discursive formations, and power relations, of ideas relative to privileged cultural difference. At such a point all is solipsism and isolation—nothing but disconnect and separation. I write here out of the desire to connect. Not only to connect, but also expressly to clash—to watch brains meet with brains, making a dialectical mess out of which things grow like innovation, comprehension, and revision.

I count my opponents as first and foremost the superstitious, and superstition I find creeps into the political world primarily in the form of the false sense of superiority and entitlement. Messianic Jewish cults, Islamist murderers and their apologists, Christian theocrats and proponents of ID, Stalinists, and certain portions of academia each draw their strength from the belief that they possess arcane knowledge. The skeptic is always met with condescension—the reply that he or she did not read deeply enough, pray hard enough, or get felicitously born into God's tribe.

Nothing about me is Jewish save for my first name, and this has always been illuminating when writing for Jewcy. I've been labeled a self-hating kapo Jew, a gentile moron, and a neocon (just to name a few). Amazing what ethnic, religious, and ideological distinctions your name can win you. One's enemies are always as telling as their friends and I find that, since anti-Semitism is a distinctly pungent form of hatred, speaking about politics from an ostensibly Jewish publication always gives you an excellent chance to hear when your challengers are also bigots. As much as one may value conversation and the dialectic, in the 21st century it's safe to say that if somebody believes their race or religion entitles them to mistreat other human beings, they may as well be alchemists or astrologers—in other words, barely worth the time until they've got up to speed with the basics.

Writing for Jewcy about an argumentative dynamic, one that's fanned by sensitive topics. But why Judaism? First off, because Judaism can claim both the origin of monotheism and conspiracy theory. On monotheism, practicing Jews are my opponents. As the subject of the world's first conspiracy theory still trying to debunk it to the day, they are my allies. Jews also can claim a close association to the birth of left revolutionary and socialist politics as well as to its corrective impulses.

So many 20th century platitudes need to be housecleaned, as do old ways of defining oneself in the world. Technological and economic evolutions mean that identifying as 'left' or 'right' loses a great deal of meaning. The so-called Jewish experience emanates with the feeling of not-at-home-ness. If I've found myself writing for a political magazine that grew out of a magazine called Jewcy, it's most likely because I identify with this almost caricatured nomadic cosmopolitanism. Simultaneously at home everywhere and nowhere.

I hope The Cabal is more than an ironic catching of the joke before it's been made. Intrigue is generally associated with a cabal and I think that a spirit of intrigue will best animate new visions of our emerging world out of which new and more appropriate distinctions can be made. More so than outmoded paradigms, labels and party distinctions, that spirit is the key to exciting and productive political discourse. Intrigue is also key to the scientific imagination, to the drive to imagine what might be known, and to the motivation to find out. This is the opposite of superstition and the best kind of transgressions are borne out of knowledge so derived. I'm honored to share such distinguished company here and look forward to being intrigued.

"No Jew, he reflected, could see anything so straight, so clear; no Jew, if he was besieged by thoughts, could set the thoughts aside and leap, unhindered. A Jew, if he had any brains at all, had twice as much as anyone else; he saw all sides at once and so his hands were tied, his brain stood still, he couldn't leap here and he couldn't leap there.... A Jew said Magazine and he was content, dancing on the point of a needle for his life thereafter to investigate the concept of Magazine, to explore the function of Magazine, to dream the fulfillment of Magazine conveying the Idea... which he knew from the vantage point of his superior philosophical needle, could never be accomplished in the world."

-- Tess Slesinger, The Unpossessed

Jewcy has spent its infancy debating its purpose. Our masthead now reads: "A Magazine for New Jews and Other Riffraff," which is both as broad and as narrow as we're able to represent ourselves within a shade of recognizability. Luftmenschen. Neocons. Socialists. Zionists. Liberals. Idiots. We've been branded with these epithets (and many more) given our admittedly eclectic approach to foreign crises and domestic heartaches, the Jewish Question, art and literature, Israel and Palestine, and everything East of Suez and West of Zabar's.

But given that politics is the main preoccupation of our daily rigmarole, we thought a new blog -- a "Little Magazine" unto itself, really -- was in order. Welcome to The Cabal, an intellectual furnace for neo-everythings who can't agree to disagree. We've been proudly confirming Pat Buchanan's worst suspicions since noon today.

Our slate of contributors:

Michael Weiss, Associate Editor at Jewcy, chef d'blog of The Cabal.

Joey Kurtzman, Executive Editor at Jewcy.

Stephen Schwartz, expert on Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism and the history of Communism, author of The Two Faces of Islam and Is It Good for the Jews?

"Jimmy Bradshaw," nom de plume of a prominent English social democrat.

Ali Eteraz, contributor to Comment Is Free and Muslim reformist par excellence.

Jamie Kirchick, writer at the New Republic and Commentary's contentions, columnist for the Washington Blade.

Stefan Beck, former editor at the New Criterion and frequent contributor to the New York Sun and a host of other publications.

Abe Greenwald, fiction writer and political blogger; his work has appeared in the journals Confrontation and the Vincent Brothers Review.

Mr. Eugenides, popular Scottish blogger.

Josh Strawn, frontman for Blacklist, Jewcy contributor.

I've recently moved in with my girlfriend. She's Persian. I am not. She likes oriental carpets ("Do you know how much these carpets are worth?"). I do not. She likes French provincial furniture ("Do you have a version with more curlicues?"). I, well, you get the picture.

I grew up with Danish Modern furniture and my father's desire to paint walls white, if for no other reason than having fewer paint cans. Also, I once was nearly forced to rent an apartment in London that was owned by a Persian man with unrestrained decorating taste. There were mirrors on the ceiling, and the walls were covered with either deep blue or red velvet. ("I am sorry, I ran out of red velvet.")

Now we must attempt to find a way to match our styles. And I have made this suggestion. We get a mirrored panther. Possibly on a red velvet platform.

I think such an object would allow a concentration of all Persianess into a singularity of Orientalism. An entire opium den/Rubaiyat/Tehran airport in one fused mass. The challenge is, where to find a mirrored panther? The Internet will make this easy, no? No.

The first couple I find certainly have the potential to make me ill, but they are not three dimensional enough.

Mirrored Panther Take 1: (A little to Chinese?)

Mirrored Panther Take 2: (Cool Panther, Scary Lady)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Alas! I could not find a mirrored, tiled, panther anywhere! That includes an entire site devoted to mosaic sculpture on one very very very long page. However, lest you think that I am an idiot Googler ("Did you try putting it in quotes?") or that the world is not full of mirrored, mosaic animal sculptures, I present:

A mirrored horse: A little large for our apartment, but maybe for you?

A mirrored dolphin: What does a mirrored dolphin have to do with cancer research? Also, definitely too big for the apartment.

A mirrored catfish: Now we are talking.

So, what to do? Nu? After much Internet searching, I have found the answer. Something that satisfies the Persian in her and the Jew in me: A mosaic (although sadly not mirrored) Hamen. (As in hamentaschen!)

A mosaic Hamen: (But what about a hamen Moses?)

 

Every so often, the Jewcy editors and a few beloved contributors carry on a deranged email correspondence. Some of these eventually wend their sinuous way into the lead space as gussied up features or dialogues. Sometimes we discuss other people's articles and how a) we should have scooped them, b) we should get them to write for us, c) we should ask for reprint rights.

The following is more along the lines of c), but one comment in Arthur Waskow's Nation piece, "Why the Silence?", about the muted Jewish antiwar movement, struck us as worthy of its own thread. Was Waskow talking about Jewcy in his reference to an "online Jewish magazine" that impolitely asked him to keep mums on the Iraq war?

On Sep 21, 2007, at 2:28 PM, Eli Valley wrote:

Curious -- any guesses as to which "Jewish online magazine" Waskow is referring to? Are there any besides Jewcy that call themselves "online magazines"? Jewsweek.com doesn't seem too update much.

"And in my e-mail I receive, from the editor of a Jewish online magazine, her response to my submission of an article she had commissioned me to write. She had asked me to address what the High Holy Days might say about America's predilection for violence, at home and overseas. But now she demands that I revise my article: "I can't have an article taking sides in the Iraqi conflict." (I refused to revise it.)"

On 9/21/07, Michael Weiss wrote:

Not only did the Nation email me to offer us reprint rights for that piece, but they love my crazy neocon ways.

It's not us, though. Waskow's only dealt with Joe, and out of all of us, Izzy would be the last person to tell him to shy away from criticizing the war, don't-cha-think?

On 9/21/07, Izzy Grinspan wrote:

Yeah, definitely wasn't me. Not only wouldn't I have a problem with criticizing the (misguided) war, but can you imagine Jewcy asking someone not to take sides?

On 9/21/07, Eli Valley wrote:

I agree -- of all places, Jewcy would be the place that would print any view on the war. So then what's he referring to? A blog maybe?

On 9/21/07, Joey Kurtzman wrote:

Michael mentioned it to me the other day, I didn't think much of it, I just figured it was some bullshit Jewish site out there. But you know what, I actually think there's a chance he's talking about me. If so, he'd have to be pretty confused, but here's what he'd be referring to:

The Waskow/Bronstein dialogue was conducted during Jewcy's pre-launch phase, during Israel's quasi-war with Hizbollah. Waskow opened his first e-mail with a protracted ramble about the events of the previous day, I think an IDF bombardment of West Beirut. Then he got started on the e-mail proper. In one of his later e-mails he denounced the Iraq War and explained that it's important to love peace, or some such insight from the Prophetic tradition. When we finally ran the dialogue several months later, I kept in his stuff about Iraq, which was obviously still ongoing, but cut the months-old news report about the long-finished Lebanon conflict.

When I showed him the edits and asked whether there were any that he found intolerable. I had edited the shit out of some of his kaballah-influenced theological stuff, because it was, well, literally esoteric (Hey, that's neat) and ridiculous for a general publication. So I was expecting a fight over that. But instead he wrote back and said it was fine, but that he resented that I'd removed some of his comments about the Iraq war. I wrote back and said that I hadn't removed any comments about the Iraq war, only the stuff about Lebanon and only because it was dated. (You know what, I actually really do think he's talking about me.) He replied something right along the lines of "oh, okay, got it."

So there was no editing out of anything about Iraq, and of course no demand that he not write about Iraq. But the guy's getting old, and he's a self-styled teller-of-dangerous-truths, so maybe he's just rejiggering what happened so that it fits into his self-narrative.

Where would he get "she" from...maybe for the same reason Deepthroat was a chainsmoker but Mark Felt wasn't? Or he didn't remember my sex and "she" is his default pronoun? Or maybe he just assumed I was a she-male?

On 9/21/07, Joey Kurtzman wrote:

Check all that, just read his article, he's clearly not talking about me. I liked the idea of it, though, because the whole thing fit into my self-narrative as someone who catches people fitting events into their self-narratives.

On 9/21/07, Joey Kurtzman wrote:

I remember the time Arthur Waskow lied about my having refused to let him right about the Iraq war. God, that was fucking outrageous. Have I ever told you that story?

On 9/21/07, Joey Kurtzman wrote:

God, that was fucking performance art right there. People don't understand the idea of impromptu performance art, but I see openings for it everywhere. Okay, no more.

On 9/21/07, Eli Valley wrote:

More!!!

On 9/21/07, Eli Valley wrote:

...And for what it's worth, I've assumed you were a she-male since day one. You're not?

[Note: This is the official Jewcy press release about our upcoming protest of Abe Foxman at the 92nd Street Y. Please copy and paste what's below if you intend to e-mail any news sources or organizations about the event.]

Jewcy Protests Anti-Defamation League Director Abe Foxman at the 92nd Street Y

WHERE: Lexington Avenue at 92nd Street, New York
WHEN: Thursday, Sep 6, 2007 at 7:00 p.m. (The event starts at 8:15 p.m.)

As reported by Jewcy Senior Editor Joey Kurtzman, Abe Foxman has refused to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide of 1915. Weeks after Jewcy called for his ouster, Foxman issued a mealymouthed press release but did nothing else. He has not apologized to Armenians and the Jews he claims to represent. The ADL has not changed its position that it would be a “counterproductive diversion” to support the Congressional resolution affirming the Armenian Genocide.

Jewcy condemns Abe Foxman and the ADL. Our presence outside the 92nd Street Y will be to insist that he and his organization have robbed themselves of moral legitimacy. Foxman must be fired. The ADL must unequivocally recognize Turkey’s organized mass murder of ethnic Armenians and back the Congressional resolution that does so.

We invite anyone who shares our view to join us. We only ask that you respect the seriousness with which Jewcy approaches this issue. Our protest aims to be civilized and peaceful. No bullhorns or microphones will be permitted.

Placards and banners are encouraged, but please stick to the topic at hand.

For more information, please contact Jewcy Associate Editor Michael Weiss at 718-834-8873 or michael@jewcy.com

* Check our always up-to-date list of Jewcy's posts on the ADL/Armenian Genocide issue

I know she would be too modest to write this herself, but this Salon essay on the art of editing applies to Jewcy in the following way: It's a lung-filled tribute to our Features Editor Izzy Grinspan:

In any case, real editing is something different. It takes place before a piece ever sees the light of day -- and it's this kind of painstaking, word-by-word editing that so much online writing needs. If learning how to be edited is a form of growing up, much of the blogosphere still seems to be in adolescence, loudly affirming its identity and raging against authority. But teenagers eventually realize that authority is not as tyrannical and unhip as they once thought. It's edited prose, with its points sharpened by another, that will ultimately stand the test of time. There is a place for mayfly commentary, which buzzes about and dies in a day. But we don't want to get to the point where the mayflies and mosquitoes are so thick that we can't breathe or think.

The art of editing is running against the cultural tide. We are in an age of volume; editing is about refinement. It's about getting deeper into a piece, its ideas, its structure, its language. It's a handmade art, a craft. You don't learn it overnight. Editing aims at making a piece more like a Stradivarius and less like a microchip. And as the media universe becomes larger and more filled with microchips, we need the violin makers.

 

Kingsley: Lucky HimHernando de Soto was once asked why he'd named his two dogs Marx and Engels. "Because they're hairy and have no respect for private property." It was the work of a moment, then, upon adopting the handsome young gentleman at right this Sunday, and finding out that he was a) very funny, b) capable of holding his liquids, c) interested to an impeachable degree in the opposite sex (both human and non), that the only serviceable name was Kingsley.  The "Sir" has already been earned.

For those of you in the New York City area so inclined to adopt a pet, may I direct your attention to Abandoned Angels? Run by two devoted women -- Dolores and Ellen -- this organization has been exemplary in rescuing orphaned cocker spaniels and finding them either temporary foster homes or permanent ones like mine. I don't mean to fiddle on your heart strings overmuch, but Kingsley had a rough case of kennel cough and "cherry eye" (accounting for the redness you can still see), two highly treatable conditions which nevertheless had him slated for death. Abandoned Angels intervened, I made a phone call or two, and now he's got prewar digs in a rather posh area of Brooklyn Heights. 

If you're looking to take up that noblest of callings and become a pet owner, I suggest getting a rescue dog like the King. These guys haven't got it easy, and their time on earth can be pitiably short.

Ed. note: This request for questions is now closed. The interview with Noah Feldman has now been published, here.

 

Dearest Jewcers,

I'm in the middle of an e-mail interview with Noah Feldman, Harvard law professor and author of Orthodox Paradox, a first-person in today's NY Times Mag that is already ascending to the top of the Times's most e-mailed list and generating much online chatter, offended and otherwise.

I could ask Feldman questions endlessly, and am prepared to do so until his stamina gives out--however, if any of you have read the article and have a question you'd like him to answer, please post it in comments below and I'll try to get it in there.

Thanks!

Joey's dialogue with Jack Wertheimer has been read with interest by Gary Rosenblatt, the editor-in-chief of The Jewish Week:

[Kurztman] writes that he and the majority of the staff of Jewcy, a hip and thoughtful Jewish Web site, are the products of intermarriage who “half-jokingly” refer to themselves as “part of the first generation of Jewish-American mongrels, or Frankenjews.” As a result, they reject the traditional Jewish opposition to intermarriage and seek “new forms of religious expression informed by non-Jewish traditions” because “those traditions are our patrimony.”

Kurtzman asserts that “modern American life is the most corrosive acid ever to hit the ghetto walls” and that “the era of peoplehood has ended” — and good riddance. What is called for, he writes, is the reinvention of Judaism for modern life, a Judaism not threatened by universalism or diminishing Jewish numbers and willing to adopt other religions’ traditions.

Joey's the voice of a generation, y'all. Respek. 

There are lots of Jewcy readers in Chicago, not least of whom our Gallic contributor Francois Blumenfeld-Kouchner. He's expressed interest in organizing a Chicago-area Jewcy get-together. How do I know this? Because he emailed me:

I'm trying to organise a Chicago-area Jewcy get-together, any idea of how to advertise it on the site (I put it in my events, but I don't think that people will find it unless they're specifically looking for it)? 

While we beat Craig with a sand-filled sock to get him to simplify our events module, I figured I'd throw out an open challenge on the Shvitz to get you people to make nice with each other in person. You know who you are, ashprintzen, abnobel, etc.

So go get in touch, take pictures, cabal it up Leo Strauss-style, and report back to us. We'll even Flickr-ize the excitement vicariously for you. 

By hipster media standards, Jewcy's Tuesday Launch Party was a hit or perhaps, more a propos, it was hit. By those too-cool-for-school illustrious snarky scenesters over at Gawker.Com. Unfortunately, as I live in Boston I couldn't make it, but was able to live vicariously through the following post.

Here are some of jewels (sorry, couldn't resist) from the Gawker correspondent covering the event:

The scene at the Ars Nova penthouse (more on that later) was appropriately intellectual Jew-y, with some low-cut-dress-wearing shiksas thrown in for good measure.

As for ambiance:

I couldn't quite decide what the vibe was--on the one hand, it felt like a fancy cocktail party, and the top-shelf liquor was a nice touch (though my Jewish parents certainly never had Dewar's, much less Maker', on hand). On the other hand, the Asian DJ was playing some of the worst club music I'd ever heard. Also, the lights were too bright, thereby accentuating some of the not-so-young men's chest hair. Not a good look!

And for good measure, capitalizing on recent Regan activity:

We were looking for signs of a media and/or publishing cabal, and while we did spot many dorky writers, they could hardly be said to be cabalistic.

And once again Gawker outdoes themselves with their sassy photo captions...Btw, my friend wants to know who is the "hotter blonde" with the "dweeby guy"?

So part of Jewcy’s ethos is to be participatory, interactive, generally open source-y. We’d like our site users to help make Jewcy what it is, and for our editorial processes to be more-or-less transparent. So in that spirit, I’m submitting a current Jewcy staff dilemma to the floor.

On Friday our lead story will be the first of several dispatches from a young Iraqi-American Jew who is traveling in the Persian Gulf. His mother is a Baghdadi Jew, and our correspondent speaks fluent Iraqi Arabic. He identifies strongly with both Arab and Jewish culture.

The staff can’t decide on the headline for the article. One group thinks we should get the term “Arab Jew” in the headline, because most Ashkenazi Jews likely don’t suppose that such a thing exists, and indeed most Jews whose ancestry is in the Arab countries reject the term, too. But not our correspondent. So one possible headline is “An Arab Jew Travels Home.”

The alternative is “Adventures in Arabia," somewhat catchier and more concise.

Basically the disagreement revolves around whether the term “Arab Jew” is intrinsically interesting. If any Jewcy users care to express a preference between (1) “An Arab Jew Travels Home” or (2) “Adventures in Arabia” as headline for the story I’ve described, we’re all ears.

“For instance? Well, for instance, what it means to be a man. In a city. In a century. In transition. In a mass. Transformed by science. Under organized power. Subject to tremendous controls. In a condition caused by mechanization. After the late failure of radical hopes. In a society that was no community and devalued the person. Owing to the multiplied power of numbers which made the self negligible. Which spent military billions against foreign enemies but would not pay for order at home. Which permitted savagery and barbarism in its own great cities. At the same time, the pressure of human millions who have discovered what concerted efforts and thoughts can do…”
--- Saul Bellow’s Herzog (1964)

With What Matters Now as Jewcy's tagline, it might seem strange to reach back four decades for an epigraph that describes our intention to move forward. But though the world we live in has changed much since Saul Bellow wrote Herzog, the contours of the quest for meaning remain the same. It's as he described...only more so.

In the thick, messy context of contemporary American life, it’s a remarkable moment to be a Jew. There is unparalleled opportunity for people hell-bent on making a meaningful difference with their lives, but also an unprecedented uncertainty about the relevance of old traditions and institutions.

This much we know: we’re hungry. Hungry for meaning. For community. For continuity and clarity and inspiration. For intelligent, thoughtful analysis of consequential ideas and issues. Our affluence, our boundless access to information, our education and unprecedented acceptance into the cultural mainstream carry with them unlimited possibilities – and unlimited possibilities carry equal measures of hope and fear.

With all this in mind, we present Jewcy, an experiment in irreverence, humility, collaboration, and a journalism of ideas. We will chronicle both the people changing Judaism and those it is helping to change; we’ll challenge conventional wisdom and show impatience with people and organizations who think they've got it all figured out; we’ll reinvent and play with the ideas, shedding light on (and making light of) unquestioned ideologies, sloppy thinking, and agendas that help shape policy, culture, behavior, and belief.

Enough already. What is it?

Jewcy is basically an online ideas-and-culture magazine. But it’s a magazine born of and for a time when technology has made personal expression far easier and far more democratic. The site attempts to integrate original top-down editorial (hatched, crafted, and made pretty by terrific writers and editors and artists in the traditional production process) with content that users generate with the new tools of participatory media, such as blogs, comment sections, wikis, and forums.

We want users, not just readers. Our articles are only the first – not the last – wor