We need to talk about the Y word

[Legend10]

Clark who?

 

[Flashspur]

As a Roman Catholic with many Jewish friends , I have to say that the Baddiel article makes me sick to my stomach. Simply becuase of its convenient premise that ignores the facts of the situation and tries to weave a misrepresentated and might I say contrived argument to justify his pathetic view. How on earth can the use of Yid be a bad thing when its is used in defence of the persecuted??? His case is facile based on a rubbish argument that insults intelligent people and he needs to be held accountable.

How can anyone possibly infer that the victims use of a derogatory term as a validation of the victims right to BE is the victims fault . Apparently because it causes the perpetrator to become all excited and call us more nasty names. Really? Why dont you try to stop your fellow fans at Chelsea then David? Oh I see you cant because the poor dears have no self control because Spurs fans are egging them on. There they are minding their business being perfectly nice people until a nasty Spurs fan turns up and calls himself a Yid. Poor little dears cant cope with this shameless provocation that makes them become ugly racists through absolutley no fault of their own.

Yes David maybe no more than 5% of our fans are Jews. But they are our fellow fans and we wont have our fellow fans being subjected to racial abuse. The club has a long association with the Jewish community and we are proud of that whether we are jews, catholics, muslims, atheists or anglicans. We stand together and accept everyone at this club regardless of color or creed. Spurs are Yids whether you like it or not because we are united as one. We are not going to change just because it makes it convenient for you.

Now take your hidden agenda and shove it where the sun dont shine.

 

[sloth]

Another really good take on the issue, this time from Haaretz: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/1.547673

Two of my favorite people are Spurs fans. I try not to hold it against them. One is a much esteemed colleague and editor, which is never a problem since I very rarely write about football (soccer, for you Americans out there). The other one is a mate with whom I often watch Champions League matches in our favorite pub in London. But his lamentable loyalty is not a problem there either (and if you know anything about English football, I don't have to tell you why). Anyone who loves the game and passionately follows a team has to constantly remind him- or herself that you don't choose a team to support, it chooses you.

I like to congratulate myself that the reason I disdain all London teams equally – and Spurs just a little bit more – is because I am a discerning purist of the beautiful game. Of course, it was only a fortunate accident of birth that planted me on the right side of the great Manchester divide. So I have no problem admitting that you can be a decent person and still support a truly awful team. But for once, every straight-thinking Briton – indeed anyone who cares for English football – should stand squarely behind Tottenham fans.

I have written dispassionately in the past of the big Yid debate– whether or not there is a tinge of anti-Semitism to the proud nickname of Tottenham Hotspurs FC fans, or "the Yid army" as they insist on calling themselves. It doesn't concern me, of course, but in recent days following a miserable decision by England's Football Association, stupidly endorsed by the Board of Deputies of British Jews and by the usually level-headed Community Security Trust, it is no longer just a question of football terraces etiquette.

After lengthy deliberations, the association issued its ruling that the word "Yid" is "derogatory and offensive" and that “use of the term in a public setting could amount to a criminal offense, and leave those fans liable to prosecution and potentially a lengthy Football Banning Order.” I doubt that the association consulted with a Yiddish etymologist before their pronouncement, but if they had, they would have been told that the Yiddish word for "Jew" has always been entirely acceptable in our circles. Der Yid (The Jew) is even the name of a weekly Yiddish magazine catering to a mainly ultra-Orthodox readership, in publication for the last 60 years in the United States.

Some Spurs fans explain that, like the black community with the N-word or the gay community with the word "queer," they are "reclaiming" Yid in the same way. That isn't necessary – we have no need of reclaiming a word that was always ours. Actually, in other circumstances, Jewish supporters of other teams may feel aggrieved with Spurs fans for claiming Yid for themselves. But they have so little else to brag about, so let them at least have that. I certainly was happy to see thousands of them chanting this weekend at White Hart Lane, "We are the Yid army" and "We will sing what we want." And, just for once, I derived some grim satisfaction from their winning.

But the debate has put a spotlight on the often farcical depths that discussions of race and hate-speech descend to in Britain, along with the misplaced paranoia of parts of the Jewish community. Nowhere is that muddle more prevalent than in football, where one top Premier League team failed to demote its captain who abused a black player with a nasty racist taunt during a game, and another, slightly less prominent Premier League side, is managed by a man who has publicly professed his admiration for Italian Fascism. That the Football Association is wasting its time threatening to prosecute football fans for using a quaint nickname instead of tackling real problems – not to mention trying to fix the chronic failings of its national team – is preposterous. That two of the most important Jewish bodies in Britain have come out in support of such a frivolous exercise is no less than scandalous.

Back in the 1960s, Manchester businessman Marcus Shloimovitz pursued a long and lonely legal battle against the Oxford English Dictionary. Shloimovitz tried to get the most respected dictionary in the English-speaking world to drop two of its definitions for the word "Jew" – the noun: "Person who drives hard bargains, usurer" and the verb: "to Jew - cheat, bargain with (person) to lower his price."

The high court judge turned him down on a technicality, and the Oxford University Press' position that a dictionary is there to record the use of words and their history, not to keep language clean, quite rightly won the day. The OED kept the nasty definitions, but in subsequent editions noted that these were offensive and derogatory usages – not the word Jew itself.

One misses this English common sense today. How difficult is it to understand that when a team with a wide Jewish fan base and prominent Jewish businesspeople among its executives proudly call themselves Yids, there is nothing anti-Semitic about it. It would be even complimentary to Jews if it was a half decent club. But when supporters of rival Chelsea or Arsenal sing the "the Yids are going to Auschwitz," accompanied by the hissing sounds of gas, that is rank racism. You would think it was simple enough, but in England you need the prime minister to point out the obvious, as David Cameron laudably did Monday when he told the Jewish Chronicle that “you have to think of the mens rea. There’s a difference between Spurs fans self-describing themselves as Yids and someone calling someone a Yid as an insult. You have to be motivated by hate. Hate speech should be prosecuted — but only when it’s motivated by hate.”

Not having Cameron's Eton and Oxford education, I had to Google mens rea to understand exactly what he was on about. But I know anti-Semitism when I see it. There is too much racism and xenophobia around the world today for us to be wasting ammunition shooting at shadows. Call me a Yid any day – just don't call me a Spurs supporter.

 

[sloth]

A bit silly - and may have been posted before - but I read elsewhere someone making the point that the Chairman of the FA's last name is Dyke which is a derogatory word for a Lesbian and if it were used in the street towards a Lesbian could see the abuse giver arrested and charged for hate-speech.

In other words if it's only about the word and not the context, and if even the word used in a correct context can inflame the bigots, then Greg needs to consider changing his name!

 

[sloth]

Also if it is banned, and seeing as everyone's allowed to say "The Y-word", can we therefore sing "Y-Word Army!!" "Y-Wordo, Y-Wordo!"? Would it make a difference if everyone knew we were meaning Yid, but didn't actually say it?

And if a racist shouted "Fuck off you fucking Y-Word, I fucking hate the fucking Y-Words, tight fisted *****!" would that be ok, even though everyone knew what they meant was Yid?

 

[spurs-r-us]

I'm Jewish, and I think that I have the correct amount of authority to say that David Baddiel is a selfish bastard. I'm genuinely incensed, I've grown up in a world where being called a Yid, once a very vicious and harmful term, was nothing more than a term of endearment. Thanks to this wanker who can't tell his arse from his elbow, a whole new generation of people will be able to lick their lips and call me a Yid in anger, whilst those who try to be inclusive will be banned and fined and jailed.

Makes me genuinely want to cry .

 

[sloth]

I'm Jewish, and I think that I have the correct amount of authority to say that David Baddiel is a selfish bastard. I'm genuinely incensed, I've grown up in a world where being called a Yid, once a very vicious and harmful term, was nothing more than a term of endearment. Thanks to this wanker who can't tell his arse from his elbow, a whole new generation of people will be able to lick their lips and call me a Yid in anger, whilst those who try to be inclusive will be banned and fined and jailed.

SCUM.

Can you email him that? Or tweet him? Maybe not in such inflammatory terms because even if we disagree with him we should accept that he's got honest intentions...

 

[spurs-r-us]

Baddiel's contention, in a sentence.

"Ban the Spurs supporters who say Yid, because than the opposition supporters will stop saying it".

Living in la-la land, pathetic stuff.

 

[spurs-r-us]

Can you email him that? Or tweet him? Maybe not in such inflammatory terms because even if we disagree with him we should accept that he's got honest intentions...

I don't have a Twitter account, but I'd be delighted to send him a lengthy email if anybody knows where to direct it.

 

[spurs-r-us]

He said nothing like this at all but I thought the whole argument for using yid, is that we DO show off our Jewish history in racist and Nazis faces. These are Nazi thugs we're talking about, they are going to attack Jews or anything relating to Jewishness anyway?

Just don't tell or remind the Nazi's the Jews exist, and they'll forget all about the way they burnt my ancestors.

They say history repeats itself.

 

[heythisisjay]

Oh I see Clarke Carlisle was speaking at the signing of his new autobiography...

Clarke Carlisle YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELF.

 

[WalkerboyUK]

Just tweeted Mr Baddiel the following Youtube clip, wondering how he feels Spurs fans chanting Yid is wrong, but doing what he did is acceptable

 

[Mullers]

Another really good take on the issue, this time from Haaretz: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish-world/jewish-world-features/1.547673

Two of my favorite people are Spurs fans. I try not to hold it against them. One is a much esteemed colleague and editor, which is never a problem since I very rarely write about football (soccer, for you Americans out there). The other one is a mate with whom I often watch Champions League matches in our favorite pub in London. But his lamentable loyalty is not a problem there either (and if you know anything about English football, I don't have to tell you why). Anyone who loves the game and passionately follows a team has to constantly remind him- or herself that you don't choose a team to support, it chooses you.

I like to congratulate myself that the reason I disdain all London teams equally – and Spurs just a little bit more – is because I am a discerning purist of the beautiful game. Of course, it was only a fortunate accident of birth that planted me on the right side of the great Manchester divide. So I have no problem admitting that you can be a decent person and still support a truly awful team. But for once, every straight-thinking Briton – indeed anyone who cares for English football – should stand squarely behind Tottenham fans.

I have written dispassionately in the past of the big Yid debate– whether or not there is a tinge of anti-Semitism to the proud nickname of Tottenham Hotspurs FC fans, or "the Yid army" as they insist on calling themselves. It doesn't concern me, of course, but in recent days following a miserable decision by England's Football Association, stupidly endorsed by the Board of Deputies of British Jews and by the usually level-headed Community Security Trust, it is no longer just a question of football terraces etiquette.

After lengthy deliberations, the association issued its ruling that the word "Yid" is "derogatory and offensive" and that “use of the term in a public setting could amount to a criminal offense, and leave those fans liable to prosecution and potentially a lengthy Football Banning Order.” I doubt that the association consulted with a Yiddish etymologist before their pronouncement, but if they had, they would have been told that the Yiddish word for "Jew" has always been entirely acceptable in our circles. Der Yid (The Jew) is even the name of a weekly Yiddish magazine catering to a mainly ultra-Orthodox readership, in publication for the last 60 years in the United States.

Some Spurs fans explain that, like the black community with the N-word or the gay community with the word "queer," they are "reclaiming" Yid in the same way. That isn't necessary – we have no need of reclaiming a word that was always ours. Actually, in other circumstances, Jewish supporters of other teams may feel aggrieved with Spurs fans for claiming Yid for themselves. But they have so little else to brag about, so let them at least have that. I certainly was happy to see thousands of them chanting this weekend at White Hart Lane, "We are the Yid army" and "We will sing what we want." And, just for once, I derived some grim satisfaction from their winning.

But the debate has put a spotlight on the often farcical depths that discussions of race and hate-speech descend to in Britain, along with the misplaced paranoia of parts of the Jewish community. Nowhere is that muddle more prevalent than in football, where one top Premier League team failed to demote its captain who abused a black player with a nasty racist taunt during a game, and another, slightly less prominent Premier League side, is managed by a man who has publicly professed his admiration for Italian Fascism. That the Football Association is wasting its time threatening to prosecute football fans for using a quaint nickname instead of tackling real problems – not to mention trying to fix the chronic failings of its national team – is preposterous. That two of the most important Jewish bodies in Britain have come out in support of such a frivolous exercise is no less than scandalous.

Back in the 1960s, Manchester businessman Marcus Shloimovitz pursued a long and lonely legal battle against the Oxford English Dictionary. Shloimovitz tried to get the most respected dictionary in the English-speaking world to drop two of its definitions for the word "Jew" – the noun: "Person who drives hard bargains, usurer" and the verb: "to Jew - cheat, bargain with (person) to lower his price."

The high court judge turned him down on a technicality, and the Oxford University Press' position that a dictionary is there to record the use of words and their history, not to keep language clean, quite rightly won the day. The OED kept the nasty definitions, but in subsequent editions noted that these were offensive and derogatory usages – not the word Jew itself.

One misses this English common sense today. How difficult is it to understand that when a team with a wide Jewish fan base and prominent Jewish businesspeople among its executives proudly call themselves Yids, there is nothing anti-Semitic about it. It would be even complimentary to Jews if it was a half decent club. But when supporters of rival Chelsea or Arsenal sing the "the Yids are going to Auschwitz," accompanied by the hissing sounds of gas, that is rank racism. You would think it was simple enough, but in England you need the prime minister to point out the obvious, as David Cameron laudably did Monday when he told the Jewish Chronicle that “you have to think of the mens rea. There’s a difference between Spurs fans self-describing themselves as Yids and someone calling someone a Yid as an insult. You have to be motivated by hate. Hate speech should be prosecuted — but only when it’s motivated by hate.”

Not having Cameron's Eton and Oxford education, I had to Google mens rea to understand exactly what he was on about. But I know anti-Semitism when I see it. There is too much racism and xenophobia around the world today for us to be wasting ammunition shooting at shadows. Call me a Yid any day – just don't call me a Spurs supporter.

A few things, he talks about Terry being demoted for his remark to Anton. Demotion would be nothing more than a token gesture. Terry said the remark in the heat of the moment, if anything I'd be more inclined to punish him for lying about it. Terry now has to carry the stigma for the rest of his days, even when is career is over, he has also lost two friends he has known since growing up because of this one incident. That's punishment enough IMO. I know people will come back on this and say Terry is a racist **** and cite the incident with King as another example, I have seen the video, I can see why some people make the conclusion that they do, because Zokora and Chimbonda have a very angry reaction towards Terry, but nothing as ever been proven, Zokora and Chimbonda aren't two people that can be silenced, if Terry had said what is alleged they would have certain said something.

Secondly any song about going to Auschwitz is racist regardless of the word yid being used or not.

 

[Mullers]

Also if it is banned, and seeing as everyone's allowed to say "The Y-word", can we therefore sing "Y-Word Army!!" "Y-Wordo, Y-Wordo!"? Would it make a difference if everyone knew we were meaning Yid, but didn't actually say it?

And if a racist shouted "Fuck off you fucking Y-Word, I fucking hate the fucking Y-Words, tight fisted *****!" would that be ok, even though everyone knew what they meant was Yid?

This is a pet hate of mine, I really dislike this Y-word, N-word rubbish, I feel like I just want to shake the person sometimes and say FFS SAY IT! Again all this really confuses the issue, there is nothing wrong with saying these words in the context of an interview or discussion.

 

[Mullers]

I'm Jewish, and I think that I have the correct amount of authority to say that David Baddiel is a selfish bastard. I'm genuinely incensed, I've grown up in a world where being called a Yid, once a very vicious and harmful term, was nothing more than a term of endearment. Thanks to this wanker who can't tell his arse from his elbow, a whole new generation of people will be able to lick their lips and call me a Yid in anger, whilst those who try to be inclusive will be banned and fined and jailed.

Makes me genuinely want to cry .

And this is all because of Baddiel? I had no idea he had so much influence, does fantasy football thingy still come on the TV any more? Anyway I repeat I had used it against me as a slur growing up, just because I was a spurs fan, I wasn't even aware of their Jewish history when I started supporting them. First I was called a yid, I said what's a yid? Answer: Jew. Ok what's wrong with being Jew?
'well Jews are mean'

 

[Mullers]

Just tweeted Mr Baddiel the following Youtube clip, wondering how he feels Spurs fans chanting Yid is wrong, but doing what he did is acceptable

It can be a bit uncomfortable when actors black up but he was taking the piss out Jason lee because his form was so bad and because of the haircut, so yeah acceptable.

 

[Ossie'sAardvark]

Here's an interesting development - my eldest lad has just received an Email from Barclay's Fantasy Premier League saying he has to change his team name as it includes the words 'yid' (Spursuperyids or something is his team name).

He's blasted off a snotogram and will change the i to a 1 to see if that gets through their petty censorship, if not he'll change his team name to something like Spursuperjuden (he was born in Monchengladbach Germany).

Absolutely outrageous.

Tell him to change it to "Yom Kippur". And if they still say no......"Yummy Kipper"

 

[jambreck]

That is simply your own opinion and no not meaningless at all, as Cameron's statement has just entered this debate.

The point is that you've been wanking yourself silly over the Herbert - despite the fact that he is incapable of understanding the importance of context, the principle of Mens Rea or anything about football, it seems.

But the minute that Cameron lends his opinion to the debate, you're all over it like a rash, claiming that he has no right to stick his oar in (ignoring the fact that he was merely answering a question asked of him by a journalist). The irony is completely lost on you that the Herbert has no more right to stick his oar in - especially since no one ever asked him in the first place, the publicity seeking twat.

 

[jambreck]

It can be a bit uncomfortable when actors black up but he was taking the piss out Jason lee because his form was so bad and because of the haircut, so yeah acceptable.

BOOM!

There we have it...

Double standards.

 

[Ossie'sAardvark]

So are you really saying that IF i started a society for white lawyers i would not be called a racist, sorry but if that is what you are saying you are very naive.

Absolutely right, its very title excludes. If the argument is they have been called that since the 70's, we called ourselves yids way before that.

I've always found that Integration rather than Segregation is the best answer to racism.