Is "Zionism" a word corrupted by the way many people use it? I don't hear proud declarations, "I'm a Zionist!"

[Silent3]

There are, for instance, many Christians hesitate to label themselves "Christians" because of the way zealous right-wing Christians have co-opted that word.

Another word largely co-opted by the right wing is "patriot". You might love your country, in a more clear-headed and mature way than MAGA types, but you probably won't go around calling yourself a patriot or sticking American flag stickers all over your rear bumper because you don't want to sound and look like a right wing loon.

It seems to me that I seldom here the words "Zionism" and "Zionist" except in the "anti-" context, and usually from antisemitic sources. This doesn't seem to be balanced out by people who want to support Israel and who embrace referring to themselves as Zionists.

[LexVegas]

1. Anti-Zionism is antisemitism. nt

[Silent3]

2. I disagree with that claim of a complete overlap. n/t

[hlthe2b]

3. I think most posters use Zionism as the "right for Israel to exist" so to be "anti-" would imply the latter.

So, in that, I'd agree that Anti-Zionism equates to Antisemitism.

But we need a separate word for opposition to Netanyahu specifically, (OR any future government then overseeing Israeli policy) and that can't be Anti-Zionism. Interestingly, the world can be opposed to the US administration and I don't think most of us would see that as being anti-American people. But there seems to be a conflation of such critique of the Israeli government or governmental policy or the Prime Minister specifically as being anti-Israeli or worse, anti-Jew. And that latter has only gotten worse since October 7.

But, I'd agree that the term "Zionist" has some shades of complexity to it such that in some instances it might reflect a use that is not dissimilar to the word "Nationalist" or sometimes "Populist" among Americans (and here I am not conflating Christian Nationalists necessarily). It merely reflects a priority above all else.

[wnylib]

20. Can you explain why instead of just saying that you disagree?

Are you familiar with the historical background of the word? It has always been somewhat controversial, even among Jews. Not a recent development.

Zionism began in the 1800s as a movement for a political state as a Jewish homeland. It was promoted by Theodore Herzl because of anti-Semitism everywhere that Jews lived. He was not totally committed initially to the Middle East as a location and considered any place that Jews could settle into a place of their own. But the geographical location of the old kingdom of Israel, where Jews had continued to live throughout the ages even after conquests had destroyed Judea and Samaria, and had gone to when exiled from Spain and Portugal, was preferred.

European support for the idea developed in some circles as a convenient means of ridding their countries of Jews. Others objected to the idea. Even many Jews initially considered it a fringe political idea.

It got more support after the Balfour declaration and also in Russia under the czars, where pogroms and the exile of Jews from villages and districts were becoming more frequent, as depicted in Fiddler on the Roof. They needed a place to go.

One thing that many non Jews do not realize is that Jewish identity is not only a religion. It is a culture and ethnicity. Being a Jew is matrilineal. You are a Jew if your mother is Jewish. I can relate to that although I am not Jewish. I have Seneca ancestry through my grandmother. But it is my father's mother and membership in the Seneca Nation is matrlineal.

Judaism as a religion goes back to its origins in a tribal society known as Hebrews which evolved into a kingdom. Religious customs and practices are both historical and spiritual rather than an ideological religion, although there are beliefs within Judaism. That's true of many Native American tribal nations, too. It's why Native Americans tell non Native people who try to copy their religious practices and turn them into an ideology that they don't know what they're doing. It's why there is no single Native American religion, even when some of their spiritual beliefs overlap.

So it's possible to be culturally and ethnically Jewish but not religious. It's why Jews can be atheist and still be Jewish. Jews can follow another religion and still be Jewish. If they later leave another faith and return to the religion of Judaism, they do not have to "re-convert." That's why there are secular Jews and religious Jews.

It's possible for non Jews to convert to Judaism as a religion. Then they also have the cultural identity of being Jewish. But, as with other ethnicities and religions, there are rules to follow in becoming Jewish. There are also sects within the religion of Judaism, so some are more fundamentalist and literal than others. Some sects will not religiously recognize the conversion ceremonies of other sects. There is some tension between sects on political and cultural issues in Israel, just as there are political divisions in many countries.

The word Zionism is sometimes associated with early Zionists who were more political and cultural than religious. Some early Zionist settlers from Russia who established kibbutzim in Israel were socialist and atheist. But some people embrace the word Zionist in very religious terms.

So, there's some disagreement on what it means to different people. But, in general, the word Zionist means someone who supports a nation state for Jews.

[Silent3]

23. For a simple start, the two words have different definitions

Of course, one can say "X is Y" (but not necessary "Y is X" ) if two words have different definitions, but Y is a totally inescapable result of X.

You say, "...in general, the word Zionist means someone who supports a nation state for Jews".

So, is not wanting "a nation state for Jews" only possible if you if you hate all Jews? Is that an inescapable consequence?

Given the history of antisemitism, it is of course a reasonable solution for the safety of Jews to have a retreat in this world where they can feel safe from persecution. I myself support this.

But I can easily see someone who has no hatred against Jews disagreeing that the creation of a Jewish nation-state is a good or proper solution to the problem. It is even easier to see how someone can object to the particular choice of Palestine as the location for that nation-state.

The easiest thing to see, of course, if you allow for the fact that not everyone uses words by strict definition, but rather by loose association with ideas, is being against Zionism because you associate Zionism with the particulars of how the Israeli government has gone about acquiring and defending the plot of land upon which Israeli now sits.

[RedArkGuy]

6. A question

How do you define Zionism?

[TheRealNorth]

16. So being against Jewish Nationalism....

Is being anti-Jewish? If I disagree with Black Nationalists, does that make me anti-Black.

They want to make it a crime to say that the West Bank is occupied territory (and that is where they are trying to move the Overton window to)

[Marcus IM]

4. I read several declarations right here on DU. n/t

[Silent3]

8. I don't doubt you, but I haven't run into that myself...

...either here on in any of the news I read or watch. I can't be that common to do.

[Marcus IM]

9. I agree. Not that common in general.

If one were in Jamaica, one would hear lots about Zionism from the Ethiopian Zion Coptics.

[BannonsLiver]

5. The use of it in the context you mention is a "tell".

And it is rampant here.

[Silent3]

10. My question then is what makes it so hard for many people to use Zionism in a positive, embracing context?

Do you think, as it seems to me, many people who are Zionists have been scared off from self-labeling that way?

[Sympthsical]

25. Because too many people who use the word

Are reaching for it as a substitute for the words that really want to use towards Jews but cannot in polite society.

Note, I didn't say all the people who use anti-Zionist. But it's an awfully, awfully big chunk. Note how Zionist is used as a shorthand for any Jew - particularly American Jews - who may not have even stated any public position about Gaza and Israel.

The telling is in the use.

And a lot of people tell on themselves.

[Ping Tung]

7. Patriotism is the passion of fools and the most foolish of passions. Arthur Schopenhauer

Religion and nationalism sometimes go hand in hand. And, nowhere is it more apparent than the Middle East. Too many people believing their version of God is different and therefore better than the other Gods doing business in the area.

A cruel God makes a cruel man. Thomas Paine

[Marcus IM]

11. I've always liked that Paine quote.

And I thought that inverting it has just as much meaning ...


A cruel man makes a cruel god.

[Silent3]

13. I think there is such a thing as a positive form of patriotism...

...when it doesn't become strident nationalism and blindness to the faults of one's country.

[yorkster]

12. It seems to me that Zionist has come to mean

more than just believing in an ancestral home for the Jewish people. It now seems
to have morphed into something more like
Israel right or wrong, or at least Netanyahu
right or wrong.
It pains me to say this, as in the past I thought I could say I was a Zionist. OTOH I've always thought 2 state solution was the only way forward still feel that way.

Not Jewish but follow Israeli politics a bit, read Ha'aretz occasionally, etc. Just wish Gantz and Lapid could "re-coalesce" and force elections. Netanyahu is the last person who should be in power.

[Silent3]

14. Yes, the whole idea of "Okay, we'll deal with Netanyahu when this is over" is terrible...

...since that gives Netanyahu a huge anti-incentive to help end this bloody conflict.

[ripcord]

15. Zionism is the desire for a Jewish homeland

Since they have that homeland most don't refer to themselves as Zionists.

Remember that Anit-Zionists are opposed to a Jewish homeland.

[TheRealNorth]

19. The real question is....

Do you include the West Bank, Golan Heights as part of that homeland. Because from where I stand, the people that make a big deal about anti-Zionism are the same ones that regard the West Bank as part of Israel.

[ripcord]

21. Then they are defining it wrong

Maybe they would get their point across better if they were accurate.

[marybourg]

17. The same as what happened to the word "liberal ".

Its foes corrupted it.

[marybourg]

18. Here's a well known Jewish Women's organization

that is not avoiding it: https://www.hadassah.org/about/our-mission

[ForgedCrank]

22. Just a general statement:

Language manipulation in this manner is dirty pool in my opinion, and it erects too many barriers for information seekers. Look around, there is always a campaign to "stop calling it this, and call it that". It's a really lazy way of addressing grievances in my opinion. Do we not want people to read our opinions? Do we google search for "orange menace" or "TFG" to find information about Trump and what stupid thing he has said today?
I'm no where near being a wordsmith, but I do insist on speaking in proper form and going by dictionary standards as much as I am capable of. Changing words with popular culture does everyone a disservice in the end, and so does making up funny little names as we go along. I'd rather people not think I'm a simpleton if I can avoid it, even if I am one. Otherwise, my opinions are nothing but a joke to someone else and are never taken seriously.
Listen to a Trump speech then tell me what you think his intellect level is, and if anything he just said should be taken seriously. I'd rather be considered at least slightly more intelligent than Trump when someone reads my words.
There are also a LOT of people (myself included) who don't really follow along with trends very much. So half of the crap we see people referring to makes no sense whatsoever. We never know what word will get us banned from somewhere, even it it was considered
proper English 3 months ago.
I realize that I got off in the weeds there, but this general topic is one that bugs me.

[Beastly Boy]

24. It is not being used as often because it has been rendered meaningless

by endless repetitions of the term in different contexts by different Jew-haters to mean whatever they want it to mean except what it actually means. Among Jews it is still being used as originally intended, but such usage of the term is being discouraged and derided by various antisemitic elements.

There are other terms, like apartheid, genocide and ethnic cleansing, for example, which are being arbitrarily applied as derogatory terms of fuzzy connotations toward, depending on who uses them to purposely obfuscate their intended meanings, Zionism (already a corrupted term), Israel, Israelis, Jews, or those who sympathize with either one of the above.

These terms, primarily but not exclusively applied to anything associated with Judaism, have become placeholders for whoever and whatever an interested group decides to derogate or belittle.