Antisemitism
It's been a while since I even thought of this topic, but Perl Weekly brought up Antisemitism not only once, but twice recently, so it's hard not to think about it.When I read what Gabor wrote about antisemitism I became sad and astonished at the same time. Since both of those feelings have their own reasons, I try to write about both of them.
Sadness
Maybe I lived too much under a rock or I was just lucky in the subset of hacker culture I experienced, but antisemitism wasn't of much concern in the people I encountered in the last two decades. I learned to know people from all over the world not only on conferences or meetings, but also as co-workers or customers. The common ground we always shared was some kind of being the tech people, no matter what our world views or religious beliefs looked like. I learned a lot from people that had very different backgrounds from mine, and many of those people also learned stuff from me. In the end, both sides were winners of our working together, so it really makes me sad to learn that there are subsets of the hacker universe that still feed antisemitism or other forms of hatred. It's so sorrowful to see that those things are not only still alive, but seemingly even growing in some areas. I don't even know what to say - it's just sad.
Astonishment
The one thing I'm really astonished by every time I encouter it is people that call themselves Christians and still are antisemites. I just don't get it. There is literally not a single way how someone can seriously claim to be a Christian and following the King of the Jews (which is one of Jesus' titles) while at the same time hating jews. They claim to follow the guy who said we should not only love one another, but even love our enemies - there is literally no reason to claim you're a Christian if there are still people you hate. On the other hand I get it - there are too many people out there that don't behave like they are Christians even if they claim they are. Maybe that's the reason. Maybe people are too quick claiming to be Christians while in reality not even knowing what it is all about to be one. Still it astonishes me when people call themselves Christians and still can be antisemites.