December 5, 2007
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Just an update on the Tuesday post. I had SOOOOO many votes come in, it was hard to keep track! In the end though, I gave $40 to 2 of the guys in the league and $20 to a food drive we are having at work. The guys that I gave the money to were very surprised and even touched. One of them said it was "very noble" of me. Wow. Can you believe somebody called ME noble? And all I had to do was pay him!
So today is the Jewish festival of lights, also know as Hanukkah. Or Chanukah. Or even Hanukah. This to me is a total mystery. Why so many different spellings? Was the Jewish person who came up with the holiday feeling a bit indecisive that day? After all, we don't spelling Labor Day that way and then Labour day. See, that's a bad comparison, because in all honestly, it would be the same pronunciation. Whereas Chanukah would be a totally different pronunciation. I guess it would kind of be like calling the 4th of July the 3rd of July. Or Memorial Day Smemorial Day. And what is even worse is that not only does nobody know why there are different spellings, all spellings seem to be accepted and ok. Geez, how open minded is that? I mean, could you imagine how America's biggest pompous ass, Bill O'Reilly would react if we all of a sudden added another spelling of Christmas and started calling it HChristmas? Instead, the Jews just accept all 3 spellings and move onto the 8 crazy nights of gifts. By the way, is the term Jew a racial slur? Honestly, I'm gonna have to plead ignorance on this one. I mean, if it is a racial slur to shorten the term Japanese, than it probably should be a slur to shorten Jewish. That being said, I often hear people casually use the phrase Jew to describe the Jewish people. Kind of like "Well, the Iranians really hate the Jews." Would that be considered a slur? Then again if they are so carefree to allow people to have multiple spellings of the festival of lights, than shortening the term is probably acceptable. Still, I challenge somebody to come up with the reason for the different spellings. Shit, I can't even come up with a good, funny bullshit story about it either. Oh, and if you happen to find out if Jew is a slur, please feel free to help me out with that one as well.
Comments (3)
I, too, have wondered about the different spellings of Hanukah, and I've always assumed they come from different traditions. For example, I wonder if Orthodox Jews, who tend to be more "old world" in their traditions, are responsible for Chanukah, while the Reformed Jews, who tend to be much more Americanized, gave us Hanukah and Hanukkah. Maybe the Conservative Jews gave us Hanukkah, and the Reformed Jews gave us Hanukah. I don't know.
I've also wondered about the circumstances under which the word "Jew" is a racial/ethnic slur. The word "Jewish" almost sounds like it means "Jew-like" in the same way "gay-ish" means "gay-like," or "man-ish" means "man-like." It must depend on context as to whether "Jew" is a slur. I know it's a slur if you say, "I Jewed him down and saved fifty bucks." But I don't think it's a slur if you say, "I'm not a Jew; I'm a Catholic." It's not a slur if I say "Mike is gay," but is it a slur if I say "Mike is a gay?" Can I say, "The gays should be allowed to marry?" Or do I have to say, "Gay people should be allowed to marry?" I'm glad to know other people in the world (namely, you) think about this kind of stuff, too. My wife and most of my friends think I'm crazy when I talk about stuff like this. Happy Chanuka/Hanukkah/Hanukah.
Way to complicated for this time of the year.
Hmmmm what can ya do...
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