seekingferret | (no subject)

There's a line in the pilot of "The West Wing", and it's one of the lines that first won me over on Toby, made me ache for his every pain, glory in his every triumph, weep for his every family problem. Toby is sitting with Josh as Josh is apologizing to a Christian group for insulting their values. Josh is in the wrong, and he knows it, but the firebrand leader of the Christian group can't take the apology gracefully.

MARY: That New York sense of humor was just a...

CALDWELL: Mary, there's no need...

MARY: Reverend, please! They think they're so much smarter. They think it's smart talk. But nobody else does.

JOSH: I'm actually from Connecticut, but that's neither here nor there. The point is, Mary...

TOBY: She meant Jewish. [A stunned silence. Everyone stares at Toby.] When she said "New York sense of humor", she was talking about you and me.

I bring this up because of yesterday's Supreme Court confirmation hearing. Now, there's much anxiety about the religious makeup of the court, since for some reason the white Protestants who've made up the court and most of the country's government for the past two hundred years can't seem to get anybody on the court anymore, and some of them find this threatening.

Which leads us to Senator Lindsey Graham and the incoherent question he asked Elena Kagan.

GRAHAM: Now, as we move forward and deal with law of war issues, Christmas Day bomber, where were you at on Christmas Day?

KAGAN: Senator Graham, that is an undecided legal issue, which -- the -- well, I suppose I should ask exactly what you mean by that. I'm assuming that the question you mean is whether a person who is apprehended in the United States is...

GRAHAM: No, I just asked you where you were at on Christmas.

KAGAN: You know, like all Jews, I was probably at a Chinese restaurant.

The exchange, as I said, appears incoherent to me. It's not clear to me why Graham asked her what she was doing on Christmas. If he was trying to make a point about the Christmas Day bomber, I don't know what the point was. If he was just trying to humanize her, he couldn't have done it in a more insensitive way if he tried.

It's the aftermath that bothers me. This wasn't played in the media as an insensitively asked question and a defensive reply. There were no calls for Graham to apologize. It was played as Kagan showing off her sense of humor. Her New York sense of humor, if you know what I mean. Google "Kagan Christmas" and you'll find a host of news articles talking about how Kagan flashed her sense of humor in yesterday's hearings.

But that wasn't what I heard. I heard a Christian put a Jew on the defensive by reminding her that no matter how high she reaches, she still will be a minority in this country. I heard Senator Schumer, another Jew rendered uncomfortable by the question, jump in quickly to explain away the joke, to make sure it wasn't taken the wrong way. I heard a nasty question, inadvertent or not, handled with a reasonable amount of tact by way of a reflexive display of "New York humor."

And just once, I'd like to see this addressed for what it is. A minor but still noxious form of antisemitism. Jews are "allowed" to be funny. It's one of the designated defense mechanisms they haven't taken away from us. But they look down on us for it, sneer at the Jewish sense of humor and how nasty and edgy it is.

Bottom line: If you're Christian, think for a moment before asking a Jew what he's doing on Christmas. Or a Muslim. Or a Hindu. Or an Atheist. Not everyone follows your cultural paradigm, and it's rude to assume that we do.

EDIT I've been rewatching the CSPAN video over and over again, helplessly. It turns out that the worst part wasn't even covered in any of the news reports.

Graham: So you were with your family in a Chinese restaurant on Christmas?
Kagan: That's right.
Graham: That's great. That's what Chanukah and Christmas are all about.

No, Senator Graham. Chanukah is not about being with your family on Christmas.

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To me, that reads a lot worse than merely an insensitive question. That sounds to me like a deliberate attempt to publicly Other her, even de-Americanize her.

Which she dealt with gracefully, but the fuck. The wording of "Where were you on Christmas Day?" has what-is-your-alibi connotations to it, and that's even before you get to, "Well, if you weren't celebrating Christmas, then you are inevitably insensitive to the significance of a bombing on Christmas Day; you could not truly feel this particular attack against America, and that puts you, almost by definition, outside the experience of being American." That is a nasty move that Graham made right there.

...which is beside the point that you're making, about the news coverage. Which I thank you for pointing out, because while I well get that self-deprecating humor is the only response most of us are allowed to have to verbal attacks from the kyriarchy, I failed to realize that there is a very particular construction placed around Jewish defensive humor, which is coming into play here.

Yeah, I mean, I felt blindsided by the question when I heard it on the radio, but I felt even more blindsided by the radio coverage, where they were presenting it like it were a cute anecdote that lightened up the boring coverage of the boring confirmation hearing. (Which of course is a whole other issue. The stuff the Supreme Court says matters, as I'm sure I don't have to tell you, and the idea that even a perfunctory hearing for a Supreme Court justice is the kind of thing that needs to be lightened up with shtick is seriously broken.)

If you dig through my livejournal you'll probably find four or five posts about how uncomfortable I am being a Jew on Christmas in America. It's something I'm deeply insecure about, and this was a sucker punch right to that insecurity. And then you add the New York sense of humor bit (See here for a great example... Despite the laughter in the chamber, it was one of those “only in New York” references that might go over the heads of a few folks.) and... damn them all.

:: Despite the laughter in the chamber, it was one of those “only in New York” references that might go over the heads of a few folks. ::

Fuckers. They're not as awesome and broadminded and cosmopolitan as they're telling themselves they are.

Got here via acrimonyastraea. I caught some of the coverage yesterday, but missed this, and googling it now, you're totally right about the coverage being a cover-up. My fabulous Jewish sense of humor? Not fun anymore. Sorry.

Totally agreed--thanks for posting--it's a great post and, hey, not funny! (-;

Thank you. I know by now I should be used to this shit, but somehow it still hurts every time another one of these things happens.

Lindsey Graham is a total troll. It reminded me of the stories of him giving the McCain kids Mountain Dew to hype them up and make them annoy people on the plane in '08.

Bottom line: If you're Christian, think for a moment before asking a Jew what he's doing on Christmas. Or a Muslim. Or a Hindu. Or an Atheist. Not everyone follows your cultural paradigm, and it's rude to assume that we do.

Or that anyone should. Argh.

You said it.

Thank you for posting on this, it was sitting uneasily in my mind for the past couple of days. I suppose I just brushed it under the rug like I've done on other occasions when the prejudice was too subtle to provoke outright outrage. I think I'll share your post with a friend of mine, if that's OK.

Feel free to pass any of my public posts to anyone you want.

I'm here via Lavendertook, and this is well and truly said.

So I'm officially a huge dork, because I signed up just so I could comment here, haha! Since I've seen this covered several places and never from this angle, and this resonates so much with me as a member of a marginalized religion (heathenism - members of pagan religions also aren't so much part of the cultural norm either, right along with Muslims, Hindus, Jews, and atheists...). I obviously am not familiar with the "Jewish humor" aspect of it, which I had never thought about before...but I definitely know the discomfort that comes with the "What are you doing/did you do for Easter/Christmas?" question. Especially if it's in a situation where you DON'T know the person you're talking to, or if you're at work, or (insert any number of other awkward situations, of which I'm sure you've encountered your fair share).

I must admit that if I was in a similar situation my sarcastic tendencies would probably get the better of me and I'd say something like "Christmas? Oh, you mean Yule?" or "I don't know, where were YOU at Walpurgis?" but obviously that's not really an option for anyone who wants to maintain public face...one more reason I'll never be a politician!

Welcome to Dreamwidth, then! I have fun here.

I hope you weren't offended by my excluding pagan religions from my list of people you shouldn't ask what they're doing on Christmas. My list was necessarily nonexhaustive, but I intended it to be inclusive.

And yet inclusiveness isn't the only answer, I think, because as the discussion of the Jewish humor element of the story indicates, every minority group's narrative of struggle is different and has different cultural touchstones. This isn't something we can or should seek to erase from our consciousness.

I tend to respond to Christmas well-wishes with corresponding Christmas well-wishes, and on the day before Chanukah or Rosh Hashanah I wish everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, a happy holiday. I find nothing offensive about holiday season well-wishes, but the expectation that everyone has family Christmas plans is a different story. That is maddening.

Yeah, I wasn't offended! I definitely think you're right - I sometimes wish that issues that minority religions face were covered more on progressive blogs and stuff, but it seems like when it is covered it doesn't do the topic justice (since we all have different experiences as being part of a non-mainstream culture; and in the case of Muslims, Hindus, and Jews there's more often than not a heaping helping of racism involved as well). Our experiences are all different but still deserve to be heard.

I don't usually get offended by well wishes, but when people start inquiring as to plans I find it frustrating. Whether intended or not, it feels to me like some sort of...I don't even know the words; vetting process? to make sure you're "normal" and safe to be around. I seriously doubt most peoples' intentions are of that (though in the Kagan case, ehh, that's a different story) but that's how it reads to me, you know? Especially because if I answer honestly, something like "Oh, thanks, but I don't celebrate Christmas, my holiday is a few days ahead of it", people tend to act like you just bombarded them with too much information or like you just revealed you have an extra arm hidden away somewhere.

Growing up in a super rural fundamentalist Christian town probably put me on the defensive for the rest of my life, haha.