9 upvotes, 2 direct replies (showing 2)
View submission: [Updated] Who runs /r/Holocaust? Each line represents a moderator overlap. [OC]
The social factors that led to Jewish success in America are essentially nullified by assimilation and modernity.
When Jews arrived in America, mostly in the early 20th century, they were in a sort of "sweet spot" of racism -- there was sufficient antisemitism to force the community to retain strong communal bonds, but since they were white (not all Jews are white, but this wave of immigrants were almost all ashkenaz) they were still able to more or less engage in public commerce.
This built on two long-term advantages:
1. Jewish culture places an extremely high value on education (for example, the Talmud teaches that all boys and girls are required to be literate, something that was basically unheard of elsewhere prior to the last 300 years or so).
2. For antisemitic reasons, Jews were excluded from the feudal systems in Europe. In the short-term, this was very bad for Jews because it basically means you couldn't farm at all. However, in the long-run, this led to an emphasis on trade and merchant professions.
So Jews arrived in America: with more drive to be educated; with cultural inclinations to become professionals or businesspeople instead of farmers; hated enough to force the community to stick together and build strong bonds and institutions; but accepted enough that they could participate in the economy.
However, in American today, things have changed. American Jews are more assimilated, to the point at which, one might have a hard time telling apart secular Jews from secular gentiles based merely on culture, language and mannerisms (as opposed to for example, Quebec Jews, who any Quebecor can spot as Jewish as soon as they start talking). The value of education is widely accepted throughout America, and the number of people employed in agriculture has significantly declined.
Comment by [deleted] at 23/07/2014 at 06:14 UTC
1 upvotes, 0 direct replies
Ugh, I really love seeing all of this true and wonderful context, but all I can think of when I see it is people being mass-downvoted in any number of subs for bringing this sort of thing up and messing up the wonderful little racist circlejerk they have going there. Hate perpetuates hate by creating solidarity, and there's nothing people *love* to *hate* more than somebody who's been driven together by being mistreated for being different.
Comment by [deleted] at 23/07/2014 at 04:44 UTC
0 upvotes, 1 direct replies
You're not wrong about the social factors that lead to Jewish success in America, but these factors aren't uniquely American. Similar social factors have played a part in Jewish success since the Jews migrated into Northern Europe a thousand years ago.[1] In fact, it's likely that these social circumstances are why Ashkenazi Jews have the highest average IQ of any ethnicity.