NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA

A Facebook conversation from February, 2013

Catherine Yronwode:
Well, if you ever wondered why i hate Wikipedia, here's why: Read the Wikipedia article on Jean Goldkette, then read what a real scholar has written here, in Vintage Jazz Mart Magazine:

http://www.vjm.biz/new_page_7.htm

Notice what's missing? (Massive head shake.)

Charles Porterfield::
*places a hand over his mouth and feigns ignorance* Why, no... whatever could be missing *huffs and shakes his head and starts towards a chair* Oy! Someone left a bucket of -whitewash- over here! Wonder who it belongs to *grumps*

Debbie David:
Is all this stuff real about him? Sounds like a wacky soap. I love his "Sunday"... but that's all I know of him.

Bri Saussy:
This is why I buy Encyclopedia Britannica - I just gave up on Wikipedia about two years ago - still getting over the disillusion.

Valerie Rankin:
You're preaching to the choir here about wikipedia. Sad. Just sad.

Catherine Yronwode:
Debbie David -- I have no reason to doubt that Jean Goldkette was Jewish. Vintage Jazz Mart Magazine is a highly respected research journal and this all fits in with comments about Goldkette made by his band members, which i recall from their various autobiographies and memoirs. None of his colleagues quite understood his background, but they generally acknowledged his musicianship and showmanship, and some also noted his training as a classical pianist.

Catherine Yronwode:
I grew up in a family that worshiped at the altar of Bix Beiderbecke and the Hot Jazz movement of the 1920s, a cult in which Goldkette was seen as the mistakenly discarded saviour-ally to the doomed Beiderbecke ("If only he had stayed with Jean Goldkette!"). The photos of Goldkette have always screamed, "short, bespectacled, Ashkanazi Jew" to me -- which is why i went to Wikipedia, figuring that, hey, maybe my hunch was right, and after all these years, someone would have researched the whole story. LITTLE DID I KNOW!

Charles Porterfield, your term, "Whitewash," is so fucking appropriate! Not that Goldkette helped matters much, of course. He was obviously under deep cover. Even the Vintage Jazz Mart Magazine author, Anthony Baldwin, can't figure out the death certificate of the SECOND "Constantin Goldkette, bandleader." A cousin? A twin?

Catherine Yronwode:
And don't you just LOVE the two men practicing the circus act with their monkey in the walled courtyard?

http://vjm.biz/images/baptiste%20&%20franconi%20&%20monkeysmall.jpg

William Albert Baldwin:
Have you tried editing any of the wikipedia stuff?

Catherine Yronwode:
William Albert Baldwin -- Yes i have. I am a regular writer and editer there.

Mention of a person being Jewish is regularly removed from biographies at Wikipedia. The topic is an ongoing issue between warring editors, some of whom require "proof" that a person self-declared as Jewish in a published venue, a step that few of our ancestors felt was a requirement for being a Jew.

Without that published self-declaration, these editors re-write biographies of famous Jews into strange and twisted formations, claiming, for instance, that "we cannot know" why a person with a well-known Jewish surname emigrated to America, say, in 1938. I have seen some editors claim it could just be a "coincidence" that the Nazis were imposing restrictions on Jews by then, even going so far as to state that "for all we know, the emigration might have been motivated by a search for a better job, because we have no published self-declaration that this person was a Jew."

It is sheer madness, and an attempt to cover up Jewish identities at Wikipedia. The Jean Goldkette Wikipedia article is an example of this sort of racism in action.

Stella Waldvogel:
That's just...*shudders* Needs to be more widely known that they're doing that. Mind if I share with attribution?

Catherine Yronwode:
Please share!

Stella Waldvogel:
Thank you.

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
Wikipedia is a threat to history.

Catherine Yronwode:
Just for the record, i have edited Wikipedia articles about my own Jewish family members and come back to see the word "Jewish" removed by other Wikipedia editors. And these are my FAMILY MEMBERS, whom i know to have been Jewish.

One common ploy used by these editors is to substitute a phrase such as "born to Jewish parents" for "Jewish." If contention arises in the article's discussion pages about the matter, the hostile editors will usually claim something along the lines that "there is no evidence that he attended a synagogue" or say, "we have no proof that he self-identified as a Jew, so the word 'Jewish' must be removed from the article as speculation."

Stella Waldvogel:
It is sheer madness, and an attempt to cover up Jewish identities at Wikipedia. The Jean Goldkette Wikipedia article is an example of this sort of racism in action."

Ruth Stefanowitz:
ohh, (said with heavy sarcasm) i guess in 1938 they might have come across the pond for a shopping spree or something... *sigh* but, honestly, i didn't notice that, usually it is explained, unless someone went to great lengths to hide their roots (in which case i respect their decision).

Anyway, there you go Stella, no way out, we must dress like Polish nobles from 19th century and communicate exclusively in Yiddish so not to be written off (and Catholic Orthoox people must revert to Old Greek & wear distinctive clothing, and our Roman Catholic brethen shall speak Latin exclusively & wear Roman sandals, so there is no confusion :))

Ryan Devenport:
This manner of censorship confuses the shit out of me. What do they stand to gain?

Stella Waldvogel:
They've changed things she wrote about her own family members. I don't think they stand to gain anything. They're just racists being racists.

Stella Waldvogel:
Time to stop linking to them as much as possible.

Ryan Devenport:
I still find it difficult to withstand and accept the fact that assholes are assholes purely because they are assholes. Really I should have learnt that from high school, but it still stalls my search for reason among humans.

Ruth Stefanowitz:
that's vile... my article on our writer's union was refused by Wikipedia - because it stated the union was formed initially as a resistance movement against politics of Slobodan Milosevic (fact ); BUT Wikipedia does have a lot of info, most of it is correct and it's free, so i guess - two sides to every story, as it goes...

Catherine Yronwode:
Example (this is my mother's first cousin):

"Franz Theodor Reizenstein (7 June 1911 – 15 October 1968) was a German-born British composer and concert pianist. He left Germany for sanctuary in Britain in 1934 and went on to have his career there, including teaching at the Royal Northern College of Music and Boston University, as well as performing."

He is not JEWISH, of coure. They removed that. But "he left Germany for sanctuary." WHAT THE FUCK DOES THAT MEAN? Just, you know, everybody was doing that...?

Stella Waldvogel:
Reason is kind of a rare commodity these days. I appreciate it when I do find it.

Stella Waldvogel:
Racism always ends up sounding incoherent.

Ruth Stefanowitz:
REIZENSTEIN can't pass for anything else but JEWISH, even if they re-write the whole history of the world... We need to write a petition then - let us go ballistic on them, i really wasn't aware the assels do it, but if there are more cases like this - then they are worse for us than bloody mor(m)ons with their post-mortem baptisms of Jews!!!

Catherine Yronwode:
Later in the same article, having removed the fact that Franz was Jewish (and thus making NON-sense of his having "left Germany for sanctuary") they state that "The family was Jewish." Again, what the fuck? The "family" was Jewish and Franz "left Germany for sanctuary." Uh.... do these two ideas not go together? Not related in any way? According to Wikipedia, no, they are non-connected ideas in different parts of the article. A young reader would have to know the "secret decoder language" that would allow them to tie together the date of emigration and the random comment about the family.

Ruth Stefanowitz:
yeah, yeah, born of Jewish mother in pre WWII Europe, he was an apolitical hipster & preferred not to disclose his ethnicity, he choose to cruise overseas, you know ... other option being Buchenwald (no words, really)

Stella Waldvogel:
I wonder if we could get some organization involved? The ADL, maybe?

Ruth Stefanowitz:
no more linking to wiki, f*** em, can't believe this really... thank you for going public with it. i am sure there are more people like me who weren't aware!!!

Stella Waldvogel:
Thank Cat, I hadn't noticed before. Making people disappear "on paper" is still a genocidal act.

Ruth Stefanowitz:
hmm, i am not sure they'll get involved with wiki, it's not, like, a serious/credible institution ... but we need to write a report with facts, proofs and all and let them decide what to do. they did get involved with that idiot David Icke, they might try to do something here too, we need to try!

Stella Waldvogel:
Now that wikipedia's been around awhile, people are starting to take it seriously, I always hear how "well vetted" it is.
Yeah, right.

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another example, not my family, but, again, i knew the man. He attended synagogue. This is from the Wikipedia biography of Will Eisner, a comic book writer and artist:

"Eisner was born in Brooklyn, New York City, the son of Jewish immigrants."

Also,

"Eisner continued with a string of graphic novels that tell the history of New York's immigrant communities, particularly Jews."

Again, according to Wikipedia, Eisner himself is not Jewish, but he is the "son of Jewish immigrants" and he wrote about "immigrant communities, particularly Jews" -- as if he were an anthropologist or ethnographer. Will EIsner always spoke openly of being Jewish as part of his self-identification. But as far as Wikipedia is concerned, he is not to be "Jewish." Only his parents are.

Ryan Devenport:
Is there a chance they are echoing the fact that many people avoided openly identifying as jewish in order to avoid persecution? It would obviously be illogical, but it would also be applying a logical method to records of these figures being of jewish heritage).

Catherine Yronwode:
Here is MY OWN BIOGRAPHY on Wikipedia. For the record, Ryan Devenport, i am Jewish and openly have published and declared that fact in print and on the radio, but according to Wikipedia,

"her mother, Liselotte Erlanger, was an Ashkenazi Jewish refugee from Germany."

In other words, according to Wikipedia, i am NOT Jewish, but my mother is!

Ryan Devenport:
Ashkenazim are the ones who escaped Egypt, right?

Ruth Stefanowitz:
Ashkenazim are the European Jews

Ryan Devenport:
I agree that the holocaust could happen again, but I don't think It will happen to the jewish peoples again, I think it will be someone else (this/next) time. It only takes whipped up ignorant passion, I learned a lot of from the old greek people in my neighbourhood.

Stella Waldvogel:
Wikipedia isn't splitting hairs over where people were bar-mitzvahed. They seem to be doing this across the board.

Catherine Yronwode:
Another example. Here we have the famous Marx Bothers comedy team. Jewish, right? NO! Acccording to Wikipedia, they are NOT Jewish.

"Born in New York City, the Marx Brothers were the sons of Jewish immigrants from Germany and France."

They are the "sons of Jewish immigrants." They themselves are NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.

Ruth Stefanowitz:
F*** wiki, really, but those of you who are in US and native speakers, pls compose a petition, i am signing and forwarding.

Stella Waldvogel:
THE MARX BROTHERS? Oh FFS.

I imagine if you deal with wikipedia directly there would be a lot of goalpost moving ("It's a race" "It's a religion" etc.) and logical fallacies just like with any other horde of unreasonable trolls. Petition is the way to go.

Ryan Devenport:
Of the two remaining (of 12) tribes, which is the "dark" tribe? It's pretty damn hard getting ahold of jewish lore, btw, and as a celt it is bloody confusing when different people say different things.

Ruth Stefanowitz:
Ryan Devenport, none is, that's nonsense

Stella Waldvogel:
Ryan, Jews are basically Ashkenazic, Sephardic, and Mizrachi, plus a few smaller groups. Not a bunch of lost tribes.

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another example: Albert Einstein, well known physicist, and you probably thought he was Jewish, right? Nope. he is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. Here is what is said:

"He was visiting the United States when Adolf Hitler came to power in 1933, and did not go back to Germany, where he had been a professor at the Berlin Academy of Sciences."

HUH? What? Oh, later in the article we learn about his PARENTS again -- not him, just his family:

"The Einsteins were non-observant Jews."

But Albert, no, not him. He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA -- just a guy who took a vacation to the United States.

Stella Waldvogel:
And he had SO MUCH FUN, he never went back to his job and family. Right.

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another example, also a relative of my family:

"Heinrich Bernhard Oppenheim (July 20, 1819, Frankfurt – March 29, 1880 in Berlin) was a German publicist and philosopher concerned with the ideas of liberalism, free trade and international law. Oppenheim was son of a Jewish family of bankers in Frankfurt."

He was NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. His parents were ... but he was not. (Except, of course, that he was.)

Stella Waldvogel:
I'm searching for Jewish people there just off the top of my head and NONE of them are Jewish in Wikipedia.

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another example, another relative of mine:

"Maximillian Oppenheimer (6 May 1902, in Saarbrücken, Germany – 26 March 1957, in Hamburg, Germany – known as Max Ophüls – was an influential German-born film director who worked in Germany (1931–33), France (1933–40), the United States (1947–50), and France again (1950–57)."

Well, isn't it interesting how he moved around from 1933 - 1950? But is he Jewish? Nope. He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. His parents, of course, are Jewish in Wikipedia:

"Max Ophüls was the son of Leopold Oppenheimer, a Jewish textile manufacturer from Saarbrücken and owner of several textile shops in Germany, and his wife Helen."

But Max himself? Jewish? No-no-no! He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. Just another German guy who took an extended vacation in the 1930s and never returned home to Germany.

Catherine Yronwode:
Oh, Stella, please feel free to quote me and to use my name. I suggest the title "Not Jewish in Wikipedia" as short, catchy, and to the point. I will continue to pull up examples. Anyone can! It's fun! It's educational! It's fucking insane!

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another example, from the Wikipedia biography of Erich Salomon:

"Erich Salomon (28 April 1886 – 7 July 1944) was a German-born news photographer known for his pictures in the diplomatic and legal professions and the innovative methods he used to acquire them."

He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. There is a hint of trouble (not JEWISH trouble, God forbid!) in this line from his biography at Wikipedia:

"After Adolf Hitler came to power in Germany, Salomon fled to the Netherlands with his wife and continued his photographic career in The Hague. Salomon declined an invitation from Life Magazine to move to the United States."

Hmmm... wonder why he "fled" from Germany? Let's read on! According to Wikipedia,

"He and his family were trapped in the Low Countries after Germany invaded in 1940. Salomon and his family were held in the Westerbork Transit Camp, then for almost five months in Theresienstadt concentration camp and were deported from there to the Theresienstadt Family Camp in May 1944. He died in Auschwitz on 7 July 1944."

Gee, that's too bad. Hey, i wonder what he died of! Okay, reviewing our biography, we now know that we have learned the life-history of a man named Erich Salomon. He "fled" Germany at some point in time for unknown reasons, he was "trapped in the Low Countries after Germany invaded" there, and he died in some place called ... hmmm, what was it? ... oh, yes, "Auschwitz" ... of unknown causes. Too bad for him, but not really our concern, it was just some "German thing," i guess, because Erich Salomon was NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.

Catherine Yronwode:
Now, to be fair to Wikipedia, here is a counter-example: At Wikipedia we learn about Pavel Haas:

"Pavel Haas (21 June 1899 – 17 October 1944) was a Czech composer who was murdered during the Holocaust."

Of course, lots of folks were "murdered during the Holocaust," including Gypsies, Catholics, and political activists. Was Pavel Haas Jewish? Well, his parents were, it seems, for, according to Wikipedia,

"Haas was born in Brno, into a Jewish family. His father, Zikmund, a shoemaker by trade, was from the Moravian region; while his mother, Olga (née Epstein), was born in Odessa."

So his parents and possibly some other relations (such as my own Epstein and Haas relatives, no doubt!) were Jewish, and, eventually the truth comes out in this statement:

"In 1941, Haas was deported to the Theresienstadt concentration camp (Terezín). He was one of several Czech-Jewish composers there, including Viktor Ullmann, Gideon Klein and Hans Krása."

So ... Pavel Haas IS JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. At least for now.

Stella Waldvogel:
Those last ones...words fail me. Thanks, Cat. This is getting spread around as soon as the nausea passes and I can think a little more clearly. Yes.

Charles Porterfield:
*head desks hard* Ok.. ok *holds up hands* I'm in... I just can not... of all the... excuse me I'm going to go outside and cuss loudly now.

Bozanfè Bon Oungan:
Sadly its not the first time people feel they can control what others think by removing traces of the past or editing out peoples lives.

Disgusting, isnt it?

Charles Porterfield:
Very, as it always is, for all people. It seems Carl Sagan is still a Jew, and Sandy Koufax... For now. This is very troubling for me considering the current exodus from Hungary, the increase in violence in France, and many other factors too numerous to list here. I know that on the internet hyperbolic rhetoric reigns supreme, but I am quite serious when I say "I know this tune... and it's a nasty tune. I thought the band wasn't going to play -this- one again."

Joe Cosby:
We've always been at war with Eastasia. I love Big Brother.

Ryan Devenport:
This manner of censorship confuses the shit out of me. What do they stand to gain?

Joe Cosby:
Ryan Devenport, I'm only guessing, but my guess would be it's part of holocaust denial.

Holocaust deniers in general try to deny that there was any large-scale persecution of Jews. This of course is pretty quickly made nonsense of by the huge amount of known first-hand accounts through family survivors. And, people who fled the Nazis. (Among a vast weight of other evidence, but we'll let that rest.)

So, maybe, they are systematically going through and trying to "tone down" these first-hand accounts. Suddenly, there aren't millions of Jews fleeing Nazi Germany and Nazi-occupied Europe! No, they just decided to traipse on over to America.

And it sounds like a consistent, organized effort, from what I'm reading in this thread.

They don't need to prove a specific point, just to undermine a general perception (one which happens to be real).

Nagasiva Yronwode:
Ryan Devenport, this is not censorhip; technically it is bad (corporate) editing at Wikipedia.

In September of 2008 my adorable wife, catherine yronwode, reflected on discussions which she and i were having about the social dynamics within hotly contested topic areas of Wikipedia. These pertained primarily to religious and esoteric themes, and to perceived cabals assembled within Wikipedia to efface and bury certain topics.

The standards for Wikipedia have in part been dealt with here previously:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Self-ref/Cultural_Struggle_Surrounding_Esoteric_Topics_in_Wikipedia
User talk:Self-ref/Cultural Struggle Surrounding Esoteric Topics in Wikipedia.
en.wikipedia.org

Ryan Devenport:
All these misrepresentations appear to happen when Jewish peoples were persecuted. I still think Wikipedia is using official records. Some of these people may have actively wished to part with their heritage, a prime example being Albert Einstein, who appeared to use jewish wisdom in his publicised views (in regard to life itself, not physics) without ever (appearing to be) practising the religion. It's obviously a sensitive issue which requires pursuit, but I can only assume there would be situations where Wikipedia's case is invalid.

Joe Cosby:
Ryan Devenport, I'm sorry but that's just mistaken, Einstein was not a religiously-practicing Jew, but he definitely identified himself culturally and racially as a Jew, as did many of the people Cat is talking about. Here:

"If my theory of relativity proves to be correct, Germany will claim me a German, and France will claim me a citizen of the world. However, if it proves wrong, France will say I'm a German, and Germany will say that I'm a Jew."
- Albert Einstein

It's true that racial pogroms go on all around us between other racial/ethnic types besides the Jews. If you want to be exposed to a lot of examples at once in a very tangible way, I recommend Diamanda Galás's album Defixiones, Will and Testament. If you do, follow along in the booklet that comes with it (it's impossible to follow otherwise).

But, there are plenty of people who think that Jews are inherently evil, and would love nothing better than to see another holocaust.

There's the Middle East, of course. Then also, a lot of Christians believe that Jews are inherently evil. It really is written very clearly and explicitly in the Christian Bible that the Jews are responsible for the death of Jesus, and the implication is that they are inherently evil. Who but a race of demons could kill God? I know not all Christians believe this, but an amazing number do. I talk to quite a lot of Christians (I'm not really sure why), and many of them do seem to tacitly accept that the Jews are accursed by God, and that's why there is a new Covenant.

Few of them are actually actively looking for a holocaust. But I think if one began, the ones who believe deep down, although they don't talk about it, that Jews are inherently evil and accursed, would do nothing to stop it. And would participate to some extent. These are people you see around you every day. They don't talk about such a thing day to day, and I doubt they even think to themselves "I think Jews should be destroyed". But the logic is there, lying latent. To some of them at least, it's a part of their religion to believe that Jews are inherently evil and accursed.

There are a lot of Mel Gibsons out there. He's just more loud-mouthed than most of them.

I'm also often amazed to see how much antisemitism revolves around the things people I know personally say about Israel.

Now, before I say that, I want to point out, I do not necessarily think the state of Israel is beyond reproach, that everything they do is right, or that they don't do things that are very wrong. But I see people who would never dream of being racists go completely insane about Israel.

It's not just that they are opposed to the policies of Israel, they get really hateful, they talk about hoping to see everybody in Israel dead, demonize all those "Zionists" ... I doubt 99.99% of people who talk about "those evil Zionists" have the foggiest idea what Zionism even is, it's just a replacement for "those evil Jews". The people doing it don't realize it.

In fact I've spent quite a lot of time looking into conspiracy theories, and the people who propagate and believe them. It's because I've seen it so many times that I recognize it when I see it. When somebody who's a friend and really isn't racist by nature starts talking about how The Evil Zionists are in control of the American Government behind the scenes, manipulating public opinion, to further a policy which is simply pure evil, they don't realize they are just repeating back the same conspiracy theories that have been going around since The Protocols of the Elders of Zion. But to me it's obvious, it's word for word the same, but maybe with "Jews" replaced with "Zionists".

As far as what Wikipedia is doing here being part of a general standard-of-proof, I really don't see any arguments going on about a person claiming they are, for instance, Scottish, or attempts to define Scottishness. Admittedly though, I haven't looked for such a thing ... but I'm going to guess it isn't happening.

Stella Waldvogel:
I think Joe Cosby has the correct motorcycle: "I'm only guessing, but my guess would be it's part of holocaust denial."

Stella Waldvogel:
Oh look, wikipedia has a separate list ghetto for entertainers! They're not Jewish on their pages but if you know where to look, you can see who's Jewish! CYA, wiki! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jewish_American_entertainers#1880s

1880s - List of Jewish American entertainers - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia en.wikipedia.org Persons listed with a double asterisk (**) are producers who have won the Tony Award for Best Musical and/or the Tony Award for Best Play. Those listed with a triple asterisk (***) have won the Tony Award for Best Direction of a Musical and/or Play. Those listed with a quadruple asterisk (****) have... [etc.]

Catherine Yronwode:
Stella -- this is an artifact of edit-wars at Wikipedia. Here's how it works.

An author (who, in Wiki-Speak, is termed an "editor") writes a biography of a famous person. The author may or may not note that the person is Jewish in the text. Then someone (either the original author or a passing editor) adds category links at the bottom of the page which compile the person's name into category-pages such as the one you found.

Meanwhile, all new pages and all biography pages are on editorial watch-lists, so when a new page is created or a change is made to a biography, one or more editors are alerted to look at the page. At this point what appears to be an intentional program of Jewish effacement leads an admin or bio editor to remove any mention that the person is Jewish in the text and to substitute one of several stereotypical catch-phrases about the person's parents ("born to Jewish parents" etc.) that distances the person from Jewishness.

However, rather than draw attention to the programmatic effacement of Jewish identity, or due to inattention, the category-link at the bottom of the page is left in place, so that anyone who knows how to use category-pages (which most users of Wikipedia do not) can locate the person as a Jew. However, if the category-link was not made -- and in many cases it was not -- there is NO reference to the person being a Jew at all.

Stella Waldvogel:
Ah, it's a kind of bone yard. Thanks.

Stella Waldvogel:
Anne Frank is Jewish on Wikipedia for now. That's what, two people?

Charles Porterfield
Don't even look at Carl Laemmle's entry in Wikipedia. *shakes his head and sighs*

Catherine Yronwode:
Oh, Charles, LET"S LOOK! Ah, yes,

"Carl Laemmle (January 17, 1867 in Laupheim, Germany – September 24, 1939 in Los Angeles, California) was a pioneer in American film making and a founder of one of the original major Hollywood movie studios – Universal. Laemmle produced or was otherwise involved in over four hundred films."

But although

"Laemmle was born on the Radstrasse just outside the former Jewish quarter of Laupheim"

-- guess what? Carl Laemmle is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.

Catherine Yronwode:
And look! Peter Lorre!

"Peter Lorre (26 June 1904 – 23 March 1964) was a Austrian-American actor."

Of course, he was NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA (i mean, what did you expect?) Instead we learn that

"Lorre was born László Löwenstein on 26 June 1904, as the first child of Jewish couple Alajos Löwenstein and Elvira Freischberger."

Again, his parents were Jewish, but he was not. According to Wikipedia,

"When the Nazis came to power in Germany in 1933, Lorre took refuge first in Paris and then London."

I wonder why? Could it be? No ... no ... no. Absolutely not. Peter Lorre is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.

Catherine Yronwode:
Ah, Joe Kubert, comic book artist. According to Wikipedia,

"Joseph Kubert (September 18, 1926 – August 12, 2012) was an American comic book artist, art teacher and founder of The Kubert School."

and you MIGHT think he was Jewish if you had known him, but not so! Although, of course, his parents were Jewish.

"Kubert was born September 18, 1926 to a Jewish family in a shtetl called Yzeran (Jezierzany), in southeast Poland (now Ukraine). He was the son of Etta (née Reisenberg) and Jacob Kubert. He emigrated to Brooklyn, New York City, United States, at age two months with his parents and his two-and-a-half-year-old sister Ida. Raised in the East New York neighborhood, the son of a kosher butcher, Kubert started drawing at an early age, encouraged by his parents."

So, his parents were Jewish, as is the custom in Wikipedia, but Joe Kubert was NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. I think this would have surprised him.

Catherine Yronwode:
Another example: Mort Weisinger:

"Mortimer Weisinger (April 25, 1915[1] – May 7, 1978) was an American magazine and comic book editor best known for editing DC Comics' Superman during the mid-1950s to 1960s, in the Silver Age of comic books."

Sure, you probably thought he was Jewish (and i think he thought so too), but according to Wikipedia, he was not. In fact, Wikipedia gives us a very strange glimpse into his life, for, with no provocation, his parents apparently raised him as the son of Jewish people! Here's how it is worded:

"Weisinger was born in the Washington Heights section of New York City, New York and raised in the Bronx as the son of a Jewish businessman in the garment trade."

What chicanery led his parents to raise him as the son of a Jewish businessman?

And so it goes. Another person i know well to have been Jewish is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.

Catherine Yronwode:
Oliver Sacks, the medical author? You knew already, didn't you?

"Oliver Wolf Sacks, CBE (born 9 July 1933), is a British-American biologist, neurologist, writer, and amateur chemist known as the professor of neurology and psychiatry at Columbia University"

-- and he is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. Oddly enough, like many non-Jews in Wikipedia, he had Jewish parents! Such a mishegos! But look!

"Sacks was the youngest of four children born to a North London Jewish couple: Samuel Sacks, a physician (died June 1990), and Muriel Elsie Landau, one of the first female surgeons in England."

Ya see? His parents were Jewish, but not him. No way!

Catherine Yronwode:
Mel Blanc the voice actor is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.. I love this one! First we learn that "Melvin Jerome "Mel" Blanc (May 30, 1908 – July 10, 1989) was an American voice actor and comedian. Although he began his nearly six-decade-long career performing in radio commercials, Blanc is best remembered for his work with Warner Bros. as the voices of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Porky Pig, Tweety Bird, Sylvester the Cat, Yosemite Sam, Foghorn Leghorn, Marvin the Martian, Pepé Le Pew, Speedy Gonzales, the Tasmanian Devil and many of the other characters from the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies theatrical cartoons," And then we get the obligatory statement that his parents were Jewish: "Blanc was born Melvin Jerome Blank in San Francisco, California, to Jewish parents Frederick and Eva Blank." NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA himself, Blanc gets the last laugh on the racism of effacement. His tombstone is shown in his biography at Wikipedia. There's a HUGE Star of David (that's a Mogen David to all you wine-loving goyim) right on the tombstone! But Mel Blanc is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. It is to laugh. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Mel_Blanc_4-15-05.JPG

File:Mel Blanc 4-15-05.JPG - Wikimedia Commons commons.wikimedia.org 11 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another: "Fritz Löhner-Beda (24 June 1883 – 4 December 1942), born Friedrich Löwy, was an Austrian librettist, lyricist and writer." How surprising to learn that "In mid-March 1938 Fritz Löhner-Beda was arrested and deported to the Dachau concentration camp on 1 April 1938. On 23 September 1938 he was displaced to the Buchenwald concentration camp." Why? Was it because he was Jewish? Not according to Wikipedia. NO EXPLANATION IS GIVEN. Then, later in the article, it is stated that "On 17 October 1942 he was deported to the Monowitz concentration camp near Auschwitz" and there he was beaten to death. But ... no mention that he was Jewish. None at all. According to Wikipedia, he is just another person who somehow, inexplicably died at Auschwitz. He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. 9 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
And another: "Jerome David Kern (January 27, 1885 – November 11, 1945) was an American composer of musical theatre and popular music," says Wikipedia, noting that "His parents were Henry Kern (1842–1908), a Jewish German immigrant, and Fannie Kern née Kakeles (1852–1907), who was an American Jew of Bohemian parentage." Jewish parents, again, but Kern himself? Nope. NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. 8 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
And look, again, here's Eddie Cantor, the comedic singer: "Eddie Cantor (January 31, 1892 – October 10, 1964), born Edward Israel Iskowitz,[1] was an American "illustrated song" performer, comedian, dancer, singer, actor and songwriter." Well, we all know the drill by now. His parents were Jewish (and with a name like Iskowitz, this comes as no shock!) We llearn from Wikipedia that "Cantor was born in New York City, the son of Russian-Jewish immigrants, Meta and Mechel Iskowitz. His mother died in childbirth one year after his birth, and his father died of pneumonia when Eddie was two, leaving him to be raised by his beloved grandmother, Esther Kantrowitz.[3] As a child, he attended Surprise Lake Camp.[4] A misunderstanding when signing her grandson for school gave him her last name of Kantrowitz (shortened by the clerk to Kanter)." Interesting information -- but that's his mom and dad and granny. THEY were Jewish; Eddie Cantor is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. 8 hours ago

Charles Porterfield:
Cat, I sent you a IM here in Facebook. Hope you got it just sent it a we moments ago.
8 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Mel Brooks? NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. "Mel Brooks (born Melvin James Kaminsky; June 28, 1926)[1] is an American film director, screenwriter, composer, lyricist, comedian, actor and producer." As is common, his parents were Jewish: "His father's family were German Jews from the Baltic Sea port of Danzig (the modern Polish port of Gdansk); his mother's family were Ukrainian Jews from Kiev.[4]" But Mel Brooks? NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
8 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Carl Reiner-- same deal as Mel Brooks."Carl Reiner (born March 20, 1922)[1] is an American actor, film director, producer, writer, and comedian" whose "parents were Jewish immigrants." But he's NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
8 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Here's another:"Larry Simon Gelbart (February 25, 1928 – September 11, 2009)[1] was an American television writer, playwright, screenwriter and author" and, as usual, "Gelbart was born in Chicago to Jewish immigrants Harry Gelbart ("a barber since his half of a childhood in Latvia")[2] and Frieda Sturner, who migrated to America from Dombrowa,[disambiguation needed] Poland." But Larry Gelbart is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
8 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Laughing my ass off now. Here's Stephen Sondheim: "Stephen Joshua Sondheim (pron.: /ˈsɒnd.haɪm/; born March 22, 1930) is an American composer and lyricist known for his contributions to musical theatre. " and the semi-obligatory, "Sondheim was born to a Jewish family in New York City, Etta Janet "Foxy" (née Fox) and Herbert Sondheim.[4]" -- but he himself is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
8 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
"Benjamin David "Benny" Goodman[1] (May 30, 1909 – June 13, 1986) was an American jazz and swing musician, clarinetist and bandleader; known as the "King of Swing" -- but he is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. His parents, well, that's another story, because, "Goodman was born in Chicago, the ninth of twelve children of poor Jewish immigrants from the Russian Empire,[1] who lived in the Maxwell Street neighborhood."
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
"Henry "Henny" Youngman (original Russian surname Yungman;[1] March 16, 1906 – February 24, 1998) was a British-American comedian and violinist famous for "one-liners", short, simple jokes usually delivered rapid-fire. His best known one-liner was "Take my wife—please."" -- buy, oy vey, when we get to his parents, the oddities begin: "Youngman was born to a Jewish[1] family in Liverpool,[dubious – discuss] England." "Dubious-discuss"? Really? Well, in any case, he's NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
"Leonard Bernstein (Listeni/ˈbɜrnstaɪn/ US dict: bûrn′·stīn;[1] August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) was an American composer, conductor, author, music lecturer, and pianist." And yes, "He was born Louis Bernstein in Lawrence, Massachusetts, the son of Ukrainian Jewish parents Jennie (née Resnick) and Samuel Joseph Bernstein, a hair-dressing supplies wholesaler originating from Rovno (now Ukraine).[4][5]" But Leonard Bernstein, NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
"Sidney Joseph Perelman, almost always known as S. J. Perelman, (February 1, 1904 – October 17, 1979) was an American humorist, author, and screenwriter" -- but he didn't even have "Jewish parents" or "aJewish family,"according to Wikipedia. He wrote scripts for the Marx Brothers, who, like Perelman were NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
"Joseph Heller (May 1, 1923 – December 12, 1999) was an American satirical novelist, short story writer, and playwright." and yes, "Joseph Heller was born in Coney Island in Brooklyn, New York, the son of poor Jewish parents, Lena and Isaac Donald Heller,[4] from Russia.[5]" But he got over it, i guess, because Joseph Heller is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
"Adam Richard Sandler (born September 9, 1966) is an American actor, comedian, screenwriter, musician, and film producer." Of course, "Sandler was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Jewish parents,[3] Stanley, an electrical engineer, and Judy Sandler, a nursery school teacher.[4]" but he himself is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
7 hours ago

Jellyfish Rising:
Wow...I wish I was still in college (or do I??), and could show this thread to my class! So many people used Wiki for school reports and the information was so incorrect! I think this thread really shows how inaccurate it is!
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
If you do a site-specific search at Wikipedia on the phrase "born to Jewish parents" you get about 300 biographies. It is a catch-phrase. The search term is site:en.wikipedia.org "born to Jewish parents"
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
A site-specific search at Wikipedia for "grew up in a Jewish family" gives about 50 biographies. The search term is site:en.wikipedia.org "grew up in a Jewish family"
5 hours ago

Bozanfè Bon Oungan:
What Im still lost on is what possible purpose is really served by stripping away the religions of people who have articles written about them? It just seems so awfully strange to deny who these folks were/are... for what?
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Aha! I have found the motherlode of Jewishness-Denaial-Euphemisms at Wikipedia. And the winner is ... "born to a Jewish Family"! Yes, a site-specific search at Wikipedia for "born to a Jewish family" pulls in 750 biographies! INCREDIBLE! The search is site:en.wikipedia.org "born to a Jewish family"
6 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Okay, we have cracked the INTENTIONALITY of Wikipedia's coded language. 750 biographies at Wikipedia contain the phrase "born to a Jewish family" and 300 biographies contain the phrase "born to Jewish parents" -- and none of these biographies mention that the subject is Jewish! There are too many of these biographies with EXACTLY THE SAME WEASEL WORDING to be accidental or coincidental.
7 hours ago

Nagasiva Yronwode - Perhaps the difficulty is more blatantly stated than one might expect by diversity of content even in the site?

In the disambiguation for 'Jew' it says: "A Jew (Hebrew: Yehudi יֵהוּדֹי) is a member of the Jewish people, or one who practices Judaism."

Jews - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org
Predominant spoken languages:Hebrew ·English ·Russian · the vernacular languages of other countries in the diasporaHistorical languages:Yiddish ·Ladino ·Judeo-Arabic ·othersSacred languages:Biblical Hebrew ·Aramaic
6 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Another catch-phrase euphemism is "the son of Jewish parents" -- this yields 30 biographies at Wikipedia. The site-specific search is site:en.wikipedia.org "the son of Jewish parents" -- and the converse term "daughter of Jewish parents" yield 7 biographies, among them Edith Head, Gilda Radner, and Elaine May. The site-specific search is site:en.wikipedia.org "the daughter of Jewish parents"
6 hours ago

Stella Waldvogel:
And "Jewish ancestry":
"Curly Howard was born Jerome Lester Horwitz in the Bensonhurst section of the Brooklyn borough of New York City. He was the fifth of the five Horwitz brothers and of Lithuanian Jewish ancestry. Because he was the youngest, his brothers called him "Babe" to tease him. The nickname stuck with him all his life, although when his older brother Shemp married Gertrude Frank, who was also nicknamed "Babe," the brothers started calling him "Curly" to avoid confusion.[4] His full formal Hebrew name was "Yehudah Lev ben Shlomo Natan ha Levi."
20 minutes ago

Stella Waldvogel:
Oooh, Cat, look at this: "Bob Dylan was born Robert Allen Zimmerman (Hebrew name שבתאי זיסל בן אברהם [Shabtai Zisl ben Avraham])[17][18] in St. Mary's Hospital on May 24, 1941, in Duluth, Minnesota,[19][20] and raised in Hibbing, Minnesota, on the Mesabi Iron Range west of Lake Superior. His paternal grandparents, Zigman and Anna Zimmerman, emigrated from Odessa in the Russian Empire (now Ukraine) to the United States following the anti-Semitic pogroms of 1905.[21] His maternal grandparents, Benjamin and Lybba Edelstein, were Lithuanian Jews who arrived in the United States in 1902.[21] In his autobiography Chronicles: Volume One, Dylan writes that his paternal grandmother's maiden name was Kirghiz and her family originated from Kağızman in north eastern Turkey.[22]

"Dylan's parents, Abram Zimmerman and Beatrice "Beatty" Stone, were part of the area's small but close-knit Jewish community."

But Dyan HIMSELF is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. 11 hours ago · Like Stella Waldvogel:
"Art Spiegelman was born to Polish Jews Władysław (1906–1982) and Andzia (1912–1968) Spiegelman. His father was born Zev Spiegelman, with the Hebrew name Zev ben Avraham. Władysław was his Polish name, and Władek (or Vladek in Russified form) was a diminutive of this name. He was also known as Wilhelm under German occupation, and upon immigration to the U.S. he took the name William. His mother was born Andzia Zylberberg, with the Hebrew name Hannah. She took the name Anna upon her American immigration. In Spiegelman's Maus, from which they are best known, the names of the two were spelled "Vladek" and "Anja", as Spiegelman believed those spellings would be easiest for Americans to pronounce accurately.[2] The surname Spiegelman is German for "mirror man".[3]

He had one brother, Rysio (mistakenly spelled "Richieu" in Maus) who died before Art was born,[1] at about the age of five or six.[4] During the Holocaust, he was sent to stay with an aunt, with whom it was believed he would be safe. The aunt poisoned herself, along with Rysio, and two other minor family members kept under her guidance, so that he wouldn't be taken to the death camps by the Nazis. After the war, his parents, unable to accept that he was dead, searched orphanages all over Europe in the hopes of finding him. Spiegelman talked of having a sort of sibling rivalry with his "ghost brother"—he felt unable to compete with an "ideal" brother who "never threw tantrums or got in any kind of trouble".[5]

But I guess he managed to put all that behind him, since he's not Jewish in Wikipedia.See Translation
11 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode -- Stella, thank you. I am thinking of compiling these into a web page. Of course Wikipedia can always change them later, but a list of them "as found" with access-dates, may make the point clearly.
9 hours ago

Stella Waldvogel:
No problem, Cat.
Even if they change them, it's one more headache for them. And they can always be compiled in places where the wiki editors can't do anything, of course.
9 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode shared a link.
8 hours ago near Forestville

This discussion page among editors at Wikipedia sets the boundaries of their racism forth pretty clearly. The article is for editors who are working on the page about Germans. In the editorial discussion, a group of editors seek consensus to remove images of Albert Einstein and Karl Marx from a group-image of Germans. The question is "Should Einstein and Marx be mentioned in an article on Germans?" and the first post in response is "Remove both ... First of all, both Einstein and Marx were of Jewish ethnicity." It is really a glimpse into Wikipedia's stance on politics, race, ethnicity, religion, and history to read where a Wikipedia editor states, "do not include Jews to this article anymore, EVER!" Here is the URL for those wishing to read the entire discussion (and contribute to it).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3AGermans#Einstein_and_Marx_attempt_for_resolution

Einstein and Marx attempt for resolution - Talk:Germans - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

http://en.wikipedia.org

What a giant hypercane shitstorm! -- Therefore, my proposal: Remove the word "nation", as well as the images of Marx and Einstein and/or any other Jews -- and for all the wonderful arguments given, do not include Jews to this article anymore, EVER! - also remove the part of Jewish assimilation in th...

nagasiva, Jeremy Weiss and 3 others like this.

James Friel:
I'm not sure that the issue is so much anti-Semitism as it is confusion: the problem the people having the discussion seem to be having is that some of them are confusing ethnicity with nationality, while others of them understand that the two things are separate. It's further confused by "German" being used as a descriptor in both categories, in a way that "Jewish" or "American" could not be. ("Jewish" is potentially confusing, too, since it can be used to denote either a religion or an ethnicity--but not a nationality...)
7 hours ago

Carlos Froggy May:
The quote is not a Wikipedia stance. It is the opinion of a user calling themselves "User:Guitar hero on the roof". (Who I notice has since been indefinitely blocked.)
7 hours ago

James Friel:
I don't find ethnicity to be a very useful concept myself, but it seems important to a depressing number of people.
7 hours ago

Carlos Froggy May:
Wikipedia/Wikimedia, really has an official stance on very few issues. Many decisions such as those on that discussion page are delegated to active editors. Of course some editors form cliques to promote their adgendas. 7 hours ago · Like James Friel:
Yeah, Wikipedia "editors" are pretty much anyone who wants to contribute. At one time, for example, without asking anyone, I edited, corrected, and extensively rewrote the whole article on the Direct Market simply because I knew more than anyone who had contributed to it before. 7 hours ago · Like Catherine Yronwode:
Carlos Froggy May:
-- Your comment,"Of course some editors form cliques to promote their agendas" is true in my experience as well. What i meant by "Wikipedia's stance on politics, race, ethnicity, religion, and history" is that the organization's entire stance consists of "let the lunatics run the asylum." I speak as one who has seen many such edit wars at Wikipedia and participated in a couple of them. 7 hours ago · Like Catherine Yronwode:
And really, the proof of the pudding is in the tasting, and the proof of interference in Wikipedia biographies must be hinted at in the frequent use of stock phrases that displace a bio subject's Jewishness onto his or her parents. That, my friend, is the real issue. 7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Again: Here are the most common terms of effacement to replace mention of a famous person being Jewish that i have found on Wikipedia so far. The full search would always be (at google, using boolean search capacity) site:en.wikipedia.org plus the search term in quote marks, and as a wild card, an asterisk (*) which could stand for any adjective, such as "wealthy," "poor," "German," Polish," etc.

"in a * Jewish family" 54,700 results.
"the son of a * Jewish" 38,800 results.
"born to a * Jewish family" 29,600 results.
"of * Jewish parents" 20,600 results.
"in a Jewish family" 6,370 results.
"the son of a Jewish" 3,170 results.
"of Jewish parents" 1,410 results.
"born to a Jewish family" 750 results.
"born to Jewish parents" 300 results.
2 hours ago

James Friel:
Sorry, I came in late. So your contention would be that someone has been systematically either deleting simple assertions of Jewishness and either leaving these weasel-ish phrases alone or substituting them. Looks likely from the numbers involved.
7 hours ago

Elizabeth Marie Tanous:
Interesting artilce discussing the issue of race and genetic similarities as dispersed among those who are Jewish and their in the context of their country of origin.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC18733/
Jewish and Middle Eastern non-Jewish populations share a common pool of Y-chromosome biallelic haplo

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Haplotypes constructed from Y-chromosome markers were used to trace the paternal origins of the Jewish Diaspora. A set of 18 biallelic polymorphisms was genotyped in 1,371 males from 29 populations, including 7 Jewish (Ashkenazi, Roman, North African, Kurdish, Near Eastern, Yemenite, and Ethiopian)… 6 hours ago

Roy Kirkland:
Damn them. The only stuff I've seen there I've liked were bits of indisputable information (despite the lack of important information that could be irrelevant to racists etc.) that really doesn't matter...
4 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
James Friel -- exactly. The sheer weight of numbers accruing to these specific "weaselish phrases" and their consistent placement in the first non-lead paragraph in each biography would seem to indicate the systematic use of templates at Wikipedia which result in, to quote you, "deleting simple assertions of Jewishness [...] or substituting them." Yup.
2 hours ago

James Friel:
One wonders why. For racists, being descended fom Jews (or members of any other group) is the same as being a membr of it onesself, so what's the point?
about an hour ago

Catherine Yronwode:
7 hours ago near Forestville
Here are the most common effacements for being Jewish that i have found on Wikipedia so far. In practice, these strange locutions always appear below the lead; that is, the biography subject is or was not Jewish, his parents were.

nagasiva and 5 others like this. Catherine Yronwode:
For those unfamiliar with boolean searches who might not fully understand the above, let me explain that the full search at google on Wikipedia pages would always be site:en.wikipedia.org plus the search term in quote marks, and as a wild card, an asterisk (*) which could stand for any adjective, such as "wealthy," "poor," "German," Polish," etc.
7 hours ago

Pearl Whitecrow:
This is really interesting. Why in this day and age would being Jewish be left out of someones biography?
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Here are the less common effacements for being Jewish at Wikipedia, as compiled through google searches

"born to * Jewish parents" 70 results.
"the son of * Jewish parents" 54 results.
"the daughter of a * Jewish" 53 results.
"grew up in a Jewish family" 50 results.
"family were * Jews" 46 results.
"parents were Jewish immigrants" 37 results.
"father was a * Jew" 35 results.
"the daughter of a Jewish" 32 results.
"grew up in a * Jewish family" 30 results.
"the son of Jewish parents" 30 results.
"the child of a * Jewish" 30 results.
"parents were * Jewish immigrants" 27 results.
"family of * Jewish immigrants" 25 results.
"father was a Jew" 21 results.
"mother was a Jew" 19 results.
"family of Jewish immigrants" 18 results.
"mother was a * Jew" 10 results.
"the daughter of Jewish parents" 7 results.
"the daughter of * Jewish parents" 5 results.
"family were Jews" 5 results.
"family were Jewish immigrants" 5 results.
"raised by Jewish parents" 4 results.
7 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Pearl Whitecrow -- well, see the post below in which we see clear evidence of contention at Wikipedia, in a discussion in which editors try to get the names of Albert Einstein and Karl Marx removed from the Wikipedia entry on "Germans" because even though both men were born in Germany and were German citizens, "both Einstein and Marx were of Jewish ethnicity." Also note that one Wikipedia editor suggests that the online encyclopedia should "not include Jews to this article anymore, EVER!" My only guess is that what we are seeing here is evidence of race-hatred. I dunno, what do YOU think? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk%3AGermans#Einstein_and_Marx_attempt_for_resolution Einstein and Marx attempt for resolution - Talk:Germans - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia en.wikipedia.org What a giant hypercane shitstorm! -- Therefore, my proposal: Remove the word "nation", as well as the images of Marx and Einstein and/or any other Jews -- and for all the wonderful arguments given, do not include Jews to this article anymore, EVER! - also remove the part of Jewish assimilation in th... 7 hours ago

Aida Severini Excuse my language BUT.....WTF? That's shocking.
7 hours ago

Pearl Whitecrow I just read though it. It seems that they are having issue differentiating between nationality, religion and genetics. This is ridiculous.
7 hours ago

Epona Fyrefly is it somehow shameful to say so-and-so "is a Jew"? that seems like veiled racism to me.
7 hours ago

Pearl Whitecrow So if Einstein and Marx are not included in an article on Germans due to their racial heritage (even though their families had been living in Germany for generations) should every notable (Non-Native) person born in America be assigned to the country in which their gene set originated?
7 hours ago

D'vorah Joy For me personally, this is all very painful and hurtful. On more practical level I am hoping this situation is not a foreboding of what yet may develop in a more aggressive form of delegitimizing the Jewish people as a whole. This whole Wikipedia situation smacks of the type of anti-Jewish propaganda that began in Germany in 1933 and we all know what that led up to. Miss Cat you did amazing research, although the results are most disconcerting to say the least.
7 hours ago via mobile

Jeremy Weiss Wow!
7 hours ago via mobile

Elizabeth Marie Tanous It almost reads as if these personages "overcame" being born to Jewish parents or at least religiously observant families as they themselves are not simply referred to as being Jewish. It is commonplace biographically to say for example, that X personage was born to poor AA parents but had such a powerful ability at science that she or he was admitted to MIT at the age of 18 despite having been born with crippling challenges of economic injustice, racism and no access to a library. These entries read the same way as if there IS a defective genetic marker that they overcame. It is disconcerting at least and nightmarish science at worst. Ugly.
6 hours ago

Jeremy Weiss Seems really, really newsworthy. (Seriously) Cat, send out a few press releases.
6 hours ago via mobile

Nagasiva Yronwode - Pearl, that is the obvious (and illogical, biased, stupid, probably racist) answer, yes. The issue is complicated by the comparably more recent decimation of natives in the Americas and "pioneering" by European immigrants. As someone of mongrel background i have to admit that the issues of ethnicity, nationality, culture, and genetics had me stumped (raised to disregard it all and probably with good reason) until i began to consider peoples disenfranchized from ownership of land, displaced to other realms, or wiped out of existence/appearance by those who sought to use it all for themselves.

Comparisons across cultures, ethnicities, nationalities, and peoples, within Wikipedia, would be the proper consideration as to its character.

For example, these pages and their likes could be explored for those who were listed there and the identification styles compared:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Ethnic_groups_in_Europe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:English_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Flemish_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Irish_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Ethnic_Turkish_people

For example, the page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Moore

"Robert Frederick Chelsea "Bobby" Moore, OBE (12 April 1941 – 24 February 1993) was an English footballer."

which has 'English" right in the lead.

or the page
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sting_%28musician%29

"Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner[1] CBE (born 2 October 1951), known by his stage name Sting, is an English musician, singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, activist, actor and philanthropist."

which has "English" right in the lead.

Then compare this page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christine_Ohuruogu

"Christine Ijeoma Ohuruogu, MBE (born 17 May 1984) is a British athlete, who specialises in the 400 metres; the event for which she is the former Olympic, World and Commonwealth Champion." after which they then explain in the Bio: "Born to Igbo Nigerian parents[2][3] in Newham, east London,[4] she was raised less than one mile from the 2012 Summer Olympics stadium in Stratford.[5]" So 'born to X parents' is a convention relating to some (national, ethnic, etc.) characteristic of the person's origin. Category:Ethnic groups in Europe - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org
5 hours ago

Aida Severini:
I know that I would be pretty pissed off if this was about Cuban people. So, I give cat a lot of credit for stepping up to the plate.
5 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Elizabeth Marie Tanous -- Charles Porterfield:
and i were discussing this very issue last night as we worked through these biographies. The implication is invariably that although the biography subjects were "born in a Jewish family" or "born to Jewish parents" they somehow got over it or put it behind them, leaving only Jewish parents as remnants of what their lives might have been like, had they remained Jews, which they did not. Stella Waldvogel also touched on this issue when she said that the Art Spiegelman biography left the implication that he had put all that "Jewish family" stuff behind him. The impression is made again and again that these people are American, Czech, German, English, or of some *nationality*, which is invariably cited in the first sentence in the lead paragraph, and that this defines them, despite the fact that they were "raised in a Jewish family" or were born "of Jewish parents." The message is clear and loud: In Wikipedia, if you are famous, you become a goy (literally, someone of "the nations") and you are no longer a Jew.
3 hours ago

Pearl Whitecrow Ah okay Catherine that makes sense. Nagisavi I did not mean to come off as racist, bigoted etc. I was trying to understand their line of reasoning not advocate it. My apologies.
3 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
A further comment on nationality as a substitute for ethnicity: Charles Porterfield:
and i also spent some time looking at the Wikipedia biographies of inhabitants of Israel -- and they are called "Israeli." We found that for many of these "Israeli" people, there is no mention that they are Jewish. In other words, "Israeli," when it can logically be applied, is not an addendum to "Jewish," it can function as an avoidance or effacement of the words "Jewish" or "Jew." Examples will follow.
3 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Example of "Israeli" effacing "Jewish" or "Jew": "Avner Dorman (Hebrew: אבנר דורמן) (born April 14, 1975 in Tel Aviv, Israel) is an Israeli-born composer of contemporary classical music." The words "Jew" or "Jewish" appear nowhere in the biography. He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
3 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Another example of "Israeli" effacing "Jewish" or "Jew": "Reuven Rubin (Hebrew: ראובן רובין; November 13, 1893 - October 13, 1974) was a Romanian-born Israeli painter and Israel's first ambassador to Romania.[1] ... Rubin Zelicovici (later Reuven Rubin)[2] was born in Galaţi to a poor Romanian Jewish Hasidic family." In this case he was born in Romania and became Israeli, leaving behind a trace-memory of "a poor Romanian Jewish Hasidic family." He is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA.
3 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
A third example of Israelis who are not Jewish in Wikipedia: "Dani Karavan (Hebrew: דני קרוון, born 1930 ) is an Israeli sculptor best known for site specific memorials and monuments which merge into the environment. Daniel (Dani) Karavan was born in Tel Aviv. His father Abraham was the chief landscape architect of Tel Aviv from the 1940s to the 1960s.[1]" And although Dani Karavan designed "a memorial entitled Passages for Walter Benjamin constructed between 1990 and 1994 in Portbou at the Spanish-French border in Spain where the German-Jewish author died in September 1940" Dani Karavan himself if NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. 3 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
And, for now, here is a fourth and last example of an Israeli personage who is not Jewish in Wikipedia: "Yaacov Agam (Hebrew: יעקב אגם (b. 1928) is an Israeli sculptor and experimental artist best known for his contributions to optical and kinetic art. Yaakov Agam was born Yaakov Gipstein on 11 May 1928, in Rishon LeZion, then Mandate Palestine. His father, Yehoshua Gibstein, was a rabbi and a kabbalist.[1]" That's correct -- his father was "a rabbi and a kabbalist" but Yaacov Agam is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. 3 hours ago

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
This is almost as puzzling as it is disgraceful. What are they actually trying to achieve? 3 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Clifford Hartleigh Low -- i would venture to guess that they (and by "they" i do not mean the Wikimedia Foundation, but individual and/or allied groups editors and administrators) are trying to efface the presence of Jewish people from their corner of the internet, to wipe them out of existence, and that they are specifically doing so by relegating "Jewish" identity to the parents of famous people both living and dead, and removing "Jewish" identity from the famous people themselves, thus reducing "Jewishness" to a historical curiosity, something that happened to people long ago, but is no longer a part of a famous person's self-identification. 2 hours ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Further to this, Clifford Hartleigh Low, i will add that Charles Porterfield:
and i last night identified a strange (and predictable) outcome from this policy of displacing Jewishness back by one generation. When a famous person is NOT JEWISH in his own biography, his parents often are. However, if the famous person has a child who becomes famous in his own right, the parent then BECOMES JEWISH on the famous child's biography, and the famous child is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. Example to follow -- 3 hours ago

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
I think it's a big deal, but it is possible that the people doing this are just confused about definitions of Judaism. It is a religion, but it's also an ethnicity and arguably a nationality. What I think is problematic is requiring positive proof a person considered themselves Jewish rather than proof they converted to a different system of belief *and* no longer identified with the identity of the Jewish People.

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
Of course, it could be a sinister motive masquerading as confusion as well-- and regardless, this obviously needs to be addressed.

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
In my own case, I don't consider myself of the Jewish faith but I'm rather proud of having a Jewish ethnic identity. If I ever warrant a wikipedia entry someday, my life experience or public efforts simply cannot be understood without an acknowledgement of my cultural background and the faith I was raised in, regardless of how much of a heretic and apostate I am now.

Catherine Yronwode:
Here is a clear example of the persistence of the backward displacement of Jewishness by one generation: Mickey Katz is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA: "Mickey Katz (June 15, 1909 - April 30, 1985) was an American comedian and musician who specialized in Jewish humor. He was the father of actor Joel Grey and grandfather of actress Jennifer Grey. Mickey Katz was born Meyer Myron Katz on Sawtell Court in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Johanna (née Herzberg) and Menachem Katz. [...] Katz hired a manager in Los Angeles, and in 1947 he performed in Los Angeles' Boyle Heights, a largely Jewish- and Mexican-American neighborhood." Got that? Mickey Katz performed "Jewish humor" in "a Jewish- and Mexican-American neighborhood," but he is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. Now let's look at his famous son, Joel Grey: "Joel Grey (born April 11, 1932) is an American stage and screen actor, singer, and dancer, known for his role as the Master of Ceremonies in both the stage and film adaptation of the Kander & Ebb musical Cabaret. Grey was born as Joel David Katz in Cleveland, Ohio, the son of Goldie "Grace" (née Epstein) and Mickey Katz, a Jewish actor, comedian, and musician.[1][2]" You see? In Joel Grey's biography, Mickey Katz is suddenly "Jewish" -- because he is the parent of famous Joel Grey. Next we come to the granddaughter, Jennifer Grey: "Jennifer Grey (born March 26, 1960) is an American actress known for her roles in the 1980s films Ferris Bueller's Day Off and Dirty Dancing, the latter for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award. Jennifer Grey[2] was born on March 26, 1960 in New York City, the daughter of stage and Academy Award-winning screen actor Joel Grey and former actress/singer Jo Wilder.[3][4] Her paternal grandfather was comedian and musician Mickey Katz. Grey's parents both came from Jewish families.[5]" See? Now Joel Grey's family and Jo WIlder's families are both Jewish. Jeniffer Grey herself, however, is NOT JEWISH IN WIKIPEDIA. Crazy, huh?

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
I think you should contact some Jewish organizations, maybe the ADL, and see what they think.

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
Because Wikipedia's upper hierarchy are going to listen if the ADL threatens to declare their policy as Antisemitic.

Catherine Yronwode:
Clifford Hartleigh Low -- feel free to share this. I am a researcher, not a fighter. I hope to place this information on a web page and to see what others think about it. I have been aware of the bizarre Wikipedia locutions that efface Jewishness for about five years now. I am generally methodical and calm, but somehow the Jean Goldkette biography outraged me sufficiently that i was finally willing to express my anger and pain. Right now i am simply supplying examples of what i have been looking at for the past several years, in the hopes that others will also see what is going on and spread the idea around the internet.

Catherine Yronwode:
And, on a personal note, i dreamed last night that Joe Kubert came to visit (i knew him in life, so this was not as far-out a dream as it might seem) and in the dream he mentioned my "fighting spirit." Well, if i have learned anything about fighting, it was certainly from Joe Kubert!

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
Let me tag a few people who might be interested and have an idea about how to proceed. Karen Enfield, Jack Cate, Bram Cohen, Deborah Zaccaro Hoffman,Daniel Stern, Abram Stern.

Catherine Yronwode:
Thank you, Clifford Hartleigh Low.

Stella Waldvogel:
We could kick it to a bunch of Jewish newspapers and see if anybody runs with it. Try to make it snowball.

Clifford Hartleigh Low:
I think I may be able to help in that way, Stella. I have some relatives involved with http://www.jstandard.com/ and I've given them a poke.

The Jewish Standard
http://www.jstandard.com

The New Jersey Jewish Standard provides the Jewish communities of Bergen, Hudson, Passaic, and Rockland counties with an indispensable newspaper that will present local, national, and world news of Jewish interest.

Catherine Yronwode:
Here is a revised, updated list of Wikipedia terms of effacement. This replaces previous versions:

Here are the most common effacements for being Jewish that i have found on Wikipedia so far. The full search would always be (at google, using boolean search capacity) site:en.wikipedia.org plus the search term in quote marks, and as a wild card, an asterisk (*) which could stand for any adjective, such as "wealthy," "poor," "German," "Polish," etc.

Due to the large numbers of identical phrases, these term-sets are probably scripted from templates, whether written or mentally internalized. Note that some of these set-phrases may include the text of others (e.g. "a family of Jewish" is a subset of "family of Jewish" but only "family of Jewish" is a subset of "family of * Jewish" ).

"family of * Jewish" 84,600 results.
"in a * Jewish family" 54,700 results.
"the son of a * Jewish" 38,800 results.
"into a * Jewish family" 38,300 results.
"born to a * Jewish family" 29,600 results.
"of * Jewish parents" 20,600 results.
"to * Jewish immigrants" 15,100 results.
"of * Jewish immigrants" 15,100 results.
"in a Jewish family" 6,370 results.
"the son of a Jewish" 3,170 results.
"of Jewish parents" 1,410 results.
"into a Jewish family" 1,080 results
"born to a Jewish family" 750 results.
"parents were Jewish" 523 results.
"born to Jewish parents" 300 results.
"family of Jewish" 275 results.
"a family of Jewish" 175 results.
5 minutes ago

Catherine Yronwode:
Again, a revised and updated list that replaces earlier versions:

Here are the less common effacements for being Jewish at Wikipedia, as compiled through google searches. Due the low number of instances for each phrase, it would seem that these phrases are probably not scripted from templates.

"parents were * Jews" 89 results.
"parents were * Jewish" 88 results.
"a family of * Jewish" 81 results.
"born to * Jewish parents" 70 results.
"to Jewish immigrants" 65 results.
"the son of * Jewish parents" 54 results.
"the daughter of a * Jewish" 53 results.
"grew up in a Jewish family" 50 results.
"family were * Jews" 46 results.
"parents were Jewish immigrants" 37 results.
"father was a * Jew" 35 results.
"the daughter of a Jewish" 32 results.
"grew up in a * Jewish family" 30 results.
"the son of Jewish parents" 30 results.
"the child of a * Jewish" 30 results.
"parents were * Jewish immigrants" 27 results.
"family of * Jewish immigrants" 25 results.
"family of * Jewish origin" 24 results.
"parents were Jews" 22 results.
"father was a Jew" 21 results.
"mother was a Jew" 19 results.
"family of Jewish immigrants" 18 results.
"in a Jewish neighborhood" 12 results.
"in a * Jewish neighborhood" 12 results.
"mother was a * Jew" 10 results.
"the daughter of Jewish parents" 7 results.
"the daughter of * Jewish parents" 5 results.
"family were Jews" 5 results.
"family were Jewish immigrants" 5 results.
"raised by Jewish parents" 4 results.
"raised by * Jewish parents" 4 results.
"family were * Jewish immigrants" 2 results.
8 minutes ago