Ukraine Football (and the inevitable stream-of-conscienseness NSR)

I don't have time to answer that post right now, but I will at some point today. And to respond, no, that's not the reason I say nasty mean things about Russia. Its not because I'm desperate to forge a new identity from a place I left when I was 9 years old.
The remains of my Russian identity are:
1)bi-monthly trips to Brighton Beach to buy Russian chocolate
2)work with Russia when my firm requires Russian speakers
3)Reading some Russian literature in vernacular, and;
4)Following Russian politics slightly more closely than, say, Italian politics, because its easier since I understand the language.

Now if you'll pardon me, I have to pre-order the Simpsons 5th season on DVD, which is my fundamental cultural grounding.

P.S. And number 3 is quite shaky, since my Spanish is getting better, and I hope to be able to read Spanish literature in Spanish too. I also like tapas, and have done work with colleagues from Spain. All I'd need to do is have a Spanish girlfriend to whom I can speak in Spanish, and I'd match my Russian cultural heritage.

 

Thank you for illustrating my point beautifully. You are American. Fully and completely, thanks to the wonderful fenomena of statehood and language. With references to Jewish and Russian culture, of course, but American first and foremost.
I left the Cold Country a more established individual, being in my late teens, and I earn my living with the Russian language. Both of these things keep me primarily Russian.

Ah, the sweet, sweet common ground!
My package will also include Seinfeld and LOTR-3 as well and will form my wife's and mine mutual Novyi God presents.

 

Man that was a long post

You are approaching this from the wrong end, though. The fact that I identify myself as Jewish needs to be the starting point. What you're doing is kind of like saying that a great football team must have a pair of 6'3" centre-backs, a brilliant playmaker in the middle, and be great at set pieces. Okay your knowledge of football might tell you that that's the recipe for success, but if you come across a superb Barcelona team that doesn't match that description, then maybe you need to modify your theory.

Of course, the lack of statehood has not prevented the Jews from self-identification in dispersion.

Well, I happen to be moderately observant. But many Jews with very strong self-identification are not at all religious. That's a self-evident fact, you'll agree. Being culturally Jewish has much more to it than adherence to Judaism.

There are several things here. One is that you implicitly reject the possibility of diversity among Jews. It is perfectly okay to be a Russian, or Yemenite, or Moroccan, or Ethiopian Jew, with each culture leaving a very strong impression upon you. After all, it is okay to be a Mississippi American and a Massachussets American -- or a Moscow Russian, a Khabarobsk, or a Prostakvashino Russian.

So, what unites diverse peoples into the same broad group? One is a subjective feeling. As you said, you may not have any Russian blood in you, or you no one else might consider you Russian, but if you self-identify as such, then all the power to you.

Then, there's the extremely important part of collective history and intellectual heritage. We are, undeniably, a product of our histories, and Jews share millenia of history together -- even in diaspora, due to shared challenges and mechanism of communal survival (reliance on rabbinic law, and rabbinic responsa, for example). Of course, having a shared history relies on having strong families with appreciation of such history that would make it a point of passing it on.

 

Why is that monstrously stupid? The super-stupid Russians had a state to defend themselves with, the not-so-stupid Jews didn't. Figure that.

I am positive about Russia - being Jewish did not harm my Jewish side of the family -maybe, 'cos they were mostly p*ss poor back in the day. Besides dismissing Russia as pathetic alcoholics is somewhat ridiculous in my part-Russian eyes.

Russia beat Hitler not because of Stalin but despite him.

 

You'd think so, but...........its not true. I'm an American here because everyone is happy to call me one. And I am happy to consider myself one. However, in Russia, I'd have been Jew who happened to live in Russia. My father, who left at the slightly more fully formed age of 39 neither reads Russian books, watches Russian TV, or eats ham. Nor do we put up Noviy God trees, and never have upon leaving. He doesn't even like vodka!

Well, that's your choice to self-identify with that. I got an email a second ago about a Russian matter on which I'll be working because finding fluent Russian speakers is hard. (Our Moscow office is always surprised to hear non-accented Russian coming back at them.) However, nearly all the work will be in English. Nor are most of my friends Russian - they are a polyglot mix of Russians, Jews, non-Jews, high school, college and etc. friends.

You're not even waiting for the extended LOTR-3 version?

 

Yes, they did well. But whose fault was it that they had that silly revolt? IMHO Monty Python's "Life of Brian" sovers the Jewish revolutionaries during Roman rule rather well.

 

Yup, Jews are pretty stupid for not having their own country.......brilliant reasoning. Because they meant to lose it in the first place. Yes, weren't those Indians stupid too for agreeing to treaties with Americans? Morons.

Such is your opinion. As someone whose family was pretty seriously affected by being Jewish, its not a surprise we have a difference of opinion. I take it none of your relatives ever spent a decade in solitary for "undisclosed crimes against the state"? No?

Russia beat Hitler because it had more tanks in June 1941 than the Wehrmacht, and neither Hitler, Keitel, Jodl, Paulus, Guderian nor anyone else was aware of that fact.

 

Brrr... how can you take any period of history in isolation? Remind me of the leaders of the October Revolution again.

 

Or it would, if there were actually any Jewish revolutionaries in Judea at the time.

 

What about them?

 

I do it because I care. Why, I cannot tell you.

No, I don't see this as such. You are missing my underlying point: it is not what you identify yourself as, but what you actually are.
You can call yourself Jewish simply because both of your parents were, but if your cultural makeup is entirely, say, Latvian, that's who you actually are. Most likely, due to language or statehood, or both.

It's not necessary to have all three. Many Russians are non-religious and Americans and Australians speak a borrowed language (though, enriching it through their own cultural identity, achieved with statehood). All of these factors are strong enough to cause ethnic identification all by themselves. A Moroccan Jew, for example, has nothing in common with a Bobruisk Jew, unless both practice Judaism.

The Jews had religion and religion-inflicted isolation to preserve their self-idetification. Up until very recently, at least.

Of course. See above.
What you are describing is an atheistic, Russian-speaking Misha Shkolnik from Novgorod who has a strong self-identification as a Jew. And who happens to be wrong in thinking that he is Jewish first and Russian second. Mainly because there are no strong factors tying him to the Jewish culture. All he's got is the superficial manifestations of his parents' self-identity.

In a word, no.
A Prostokvashino Russian and a Khabarovsk Russian have two things in common: language and statehood. Possibly, three, if both are observing Orthodox Christians.
The same is true for a Mississipi American and a Massachusets American. They will recognize each other as one of the same due to these factors.

There is nothing in common between nicephoras and a Yemmenite, unless nicephoras abandons his agnosticism for any branch of Judaism. They will always belong to two different people, with cultural sets completely different in every important aspect.

This is actually a good point. However, the rabbinic law has very little effect on the current generation of diaspora-born atheists, Yiddish hasn't gotten past our parents' generation and communal survival (a miniature substitute for statehood) has gone the way of the mestechko.
Now, all there is that ties the said Misha Shkolnik from Novgorod to a Sasha Rifkin from Rostov is the entrance in their father's passport and the abuse dished out by anti-Semites. Should these be considered desiding factors in identifying their cultural belonging? I don't think so.

 

Bitterness is not the same as cultural rebirth. However, if he's achieved one, more power to him. Not easy to do in his age, but there you go.
As for yourself, you are American simply because there are more important factors tying you to America than both to Russia and Anateevka.

Not quite a choice. It's simply the willingness to embrace the facts.

Now I see that you really ARE crazy.
Of course I am! All three will be ordered together.

 

Well, chin up to the Jews!!! They decided to fight Rome. Brilliant reasoning.

I know half a dozen RUSSIAN families who had folks executed and GULAGed for the same reason (yeah, and spying too). Do they hate Russia? Do they **********? For sHure, they hate commies.
No, we were too poor to be affected.

It did not matter how many tanks we had in 1941 as many of them were stuck without fuel (reading too much Suvorov without a reality check is dangerous) and many were not very useful in defensive warfare. We won 'cos the industries were set up rapidly and 'cos we had an awful lot of people willing to fight/die/kill Germans. There were many those unwilling but forced by circumstances.

 

Oh, I assure you, the Life of Brian is a great lesson in history. Every Jew should watch it.

 

I had a bird once - she spoke fluent Spanish with an Andalucian accent (despite being English) and I am kicking myself for not using her for the language. Spain is a quality place. My bird is Russian,so I am sticking to Russian for the time being.

 

You do understand, nicephoras, that being itelligent also requires at least some degree of objectivity?

Many Russians did too. My Jewish uncle and my Tatar grandfather-in-law have this one thing in common.
Besides the language and statehood, of course

You are entirely not fair. The Germans had all the advantages under Moscow and in Stalingrad, yet were beaten. Please, do not diminish the heroism of the Soviet military, as by doing this you are not only being wrong but also severely offending me and any individual whose family lost a member in the war. Which will account for a great majority of Russia, likely including yourself.

 

Interesting old argument here, plenty more to say but I shall continue tomorrow as now I am off to visit the local Jewish club - Tottenham Hotspur take on my beloved Reds.
PS Nicephoras, please watch more live football.

 

And visit this forum!
I have Napoleonic plans abuot its future, you know.

EDIT: The same goes for DK_USA. Put yer football where yer Yushchenko is, man!

 

It's a bit hard to discuss Dynamo Kiev and such here as none of us actually sees them in action too much Although I did get UEFA MatchPass this season, but it's pretty boring to sit and watch by myself as there's no commentary

 

Sigh. Do we need to get into the ancient history discussion here? Because I can, including a nice discussion about the prior 15 years of Roman rule (unpleaseant) politicla situation in the empire at the time of rebellion (unstable) and supposed foreign help coming from abroad (Parthia). Would I have rebelled? Nuh uh. But I wouldn't just call it stupid. Judea took a chance to end the suzerainty of Rome. They failed. I suppose everyone is stupid if we use failure as a criteria.

Good for you, I guess.

Yes, but unfortunately, my words come from reading Guderian, not Suvorov. The Germans drastically underestimated the expanse of the Russian war machine, and in the end, geography and Hitler's stupidity were more to blame for their defeat than "Russian resolve", which was likely no greater than French or English resolve. Russia had too many people to spare and too much land to retreat from to lose. As Napoleon and Swedish Charlie found out.

That too, but I think that hardly makes Russian special. I don't think the French are really any less valorous. They just didn't have millions of square miles to fall back on.

 

This stops none of us!

 

Oh gimme a break. I had relatives who fell in the war too. However, God is on the side of the stronger batallion, as Voltaire once said. Its to the Russians' credit that they were constructing better tank chassis in the 30s than anyone else, basing them off a maverick American design, while Americans were stuck using crappy Shermans. Its to their credit that they were better prepared than anyone thought, despite Stalin's absolutely ludicrous direction of the war. It is to their credit they were able to move factories as RS mentioned. However, heroism is all well and good, but heroism doesn't stop Tigers and Panthers.
However heroic Stalingrad and Moscow were, was the German resistance any less heroic? If you're going to talk about objectivity, where is it?

 

I have a feeling it was for different reasons, and I have a better feeling that your Tartar (mmm........tArtAr sauce) grandpappy wouldn't have been implicated in the Jewish doctor plot, knowhamean?

 

A bit myopic, if you ask me. This way you can devalue any military victory. Of course, if you subscribe to Tolstoy's opinion, they are all due to chance and an individual's qualities don't matter at all.
The Russians (with Ukies, Belarusians, Tatars and an occasional Yid) showed plenty of resolve in WWII. Probably more than any country before.

 

Isn't it more myopic to ascribe military victory to heroism? Bullets kill heroes as well as they do cowards.

No one is "devaluing" anything. The struggle of the Russian people was a proud one, but heroism doesn't kill the enemy. People with guns do. And someone's gotta make the guns, and the Katyushas, etc. By ascribing the Soviet victory to heroism, are you suggesting that Russians out-heroed the Germans?

No one's saying they turned tail and ran. However, who's to say the Germans showed less resolve? Like at Berlin, for instance? You don't win the war by out-resolving the other guy. Supposedly Belgian troops fought like demons in WWI. They didn't retreat because of a lack of resolve, however.