I have put forth the idea of returning to the word “antisemitic” replaced, which IMO is more accurate-

Judenhass

I'm basically monolingual, unfortunately. I imagine the other languages have similar word choices for the infection.

but not anti semitic or jew hater ?

I'm old school in that sense. Using phobia as only "fear" gave it clarity, learnability, and communicative strength, and makes it much easier to talk and write, in my humble opinion

I personally avoid terms like "homophobia, " although I realize perfectly well that it's probably too late to quibble about that departure from the language structure that I grew up with (which would literally make the term mean something like fear of sameness). If I'm talking about someone who is anti-gay, I use "anti-gay." If they're afraid of gays, I might actually say something like "gay-phobic."

But fear can go directly to violence, for one thing. Arachnophobia, for example.

And hate, anger, etc., can come from frustration and never involve fear. Alarm clocks, for example.

can you give example of what you would consider phobia send not hate ?

I think AntiSemitic can be all encompassing- if you are against something, you can possibly hate, merely dislike, fear or some combination of the three. It’s a spectrum of antagonistic feelings. Jew phobic would just mean Jew fearing to me. Some people are not friends of Israel but are not threatened by Jewish people or faith. Some people hate or fear Jews but love Israel as a place of their Christian faith and Armageddon ideas.
I don’t have any answers about what is the best way the characterize these feelings because there is a very broad range of feelings here. I think I would just stick with antisemitic myself.

I use "Jew hating" or "antisemitic" when I'm trying to be more clinical.

Whatever works for the intended audience

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_people

It came from old racial "theories", some of which led to the radical policies of the German Nazis. The term "Semitic" might have referred to many different ethnic groups in the Middle East, including Arabs -- which makes it a little jarring to hear Israel-hating Arabs referred to as "Antisemites".

I guess ignorance is bliss in some circumstances.

And did include Arabs and Jews. The term antisemitic however didn't appear until about one hundred years later and not used to broadly refer to "Semitic people" but specifically to Jews.

It was considered softer than the common term used then of Judenhass, lit. "Jew hatred"

Those who claim the word "antisemitic" includes Arabs and other "Semitic" people are trying to force a meaning onto the word that never existed.

Then it becomes a stand alone word with a specific meaning that doesn't have anything to do with bigotry aimed at people using semitic languages, it means just hating Jews.

I've been using "antisemitism" for years now, so when you see people using that way, it's not because they are too lazy to add the hyphen.

Hamas did not choose the word hamas out of thin air, they know it is racially explosive.

so I looked it up - an acronym for "Islamic Resistance Movement" that is also "zeal" in Arabic: https://irp.fas.org/world/para/hamas.htm

Why is that "racially explosive"?

Semite is a pseudoscientific term relating to race; the opposite of Semitic was Aryan. It is also an obsolete linguistic term.

Jew is both a racial term, referring to descendants of the ancient Jewish people, and theological I.e. those who profess Judaism

Hamas is an acronym, not an Arabic word so I fail to see how it is racially explosive

I know what the phrase is, but I will not produce it here. Rest assured, it is racial, and not the opposite of arya(n). I could certainly be wrong about the word jew/Jew, as I've always thought it was condensed from Jehoshaphat (phat=Ptah). Maybe, I just have a strange way with words, like when I see menorah, I see Amon-Ra. Or, when I see Netanyahu, I see Yahunathan/Jonathan. Or when I see al-Qaeda, it looks like catholia/catholic (olah akedah/al qaeda). That's why I could see the acronym Hamas as being word trickery from an ancient racial debacle, that is still unfolding today.

And "Jew"/the "Jud-" words come from "Judah", the ancient nation, with an apparent earlier derivation from "celebrated":

That includes Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, and Aramaic.

Hamas is an ancroym , it stands for "Harakat al-Muqawama al-Islamiyya", the "Islamic Resistance Movement".

Jews are an ethnoreligious group whos ancestral and current homeland is in the Levant, hence Jews are Levantine and speak a semitic language which sprung out of Aramaic thousands of years ago.

I dislike the "need" to use other words because many, especially non-Jews, treat the word with disdain. The attempts to "redefine" it are nothing more than an anti-Semitic microaggression. I use the traditional American spelling, but I have seen it as "antiSemitism" , based on the German translation, antisemitism, no hyphen to discourage those bigots who try to pretend the bigotry in anyway is about any group other than Jews and there is Judeophobia.

"Phobia" as a suffix means "fear" when used as a psychological term (arachnophobia, hippophobia), but among sociologists, "-phobia" represents "dislike" (homophobia, Islamophobia). In legal circles, it represents "hate". The suffix can cause confusion, but it usually is pretty understandable given context.

But as suggested above, perhaps we should go old-school all call it Judenhass, JEW HATE!

You do recognize that there has been a departure from the linguistic pattern of using the word "phobia" only for "fear." I reluctantly accept that usage defines a language, of course. It's not my cup of tea to have a popular departure from a fairly beautiful etymological history and usage pattern happen in my time, I guess.

People who hear the word "phobia" and think only "dislike" in select cases such as "homophobia," I would think were once rare. But now, that's basically the accepted understanding. Still, a lot of people can misunderstand that there's an implication of fear, and that comes along with a pejorative connotation that doesn't help mutual understanding.

When I hear "antisemitism," I hear a lot of emotions. I automatically translate the word into a description of an attitude that tempts people to self-defeating weakness, paranoia, and spiraling to criminal-mindedness if they don't manage to bump into some wisdom on the way down.

I trust that you know that using German won't work as a way to talk about it with people who don't know German. In a related way, people who have a hard time accepting that people they befriend or, worse, that they themselves have the capacity to hate someone who isn't evil might not truly hear the phrase "Jew hatred." I don't know if it's superstition, though, but I do think I'm seeing a lot more deep reading from some of these young people. So maybe they'll figure it out.

Of course I do, which is why I said:

"Phobia" as a suffix means "fear" when used as a psychological term (arachnophobia, hippophobia), but among sociologists, "-phobia" represents "dislike" (homophobia, Islamophobia). In legal circles, it represents "hate". The suffix can cause confusion, but it usually is pretty understandable given context.

Regardless if it is your 'cup of tea' or not, usage does create and redefine words. Sometimes, for ill, sometimes as culture or time dictates the need for new usage. The Holocaust wiped out almost 2/3rds of the Jews in Europe. But it would not be odd to hear someone say: "The Nazis decimated the Jewish population of Europe, and even its world population." The word "decimate" literally means "to remove 1 in 10". That is obviously not what happened, as more than 10% of Jews in Europe (almost 70%) and almost half of the world Jewish population were gone. I am guessing you know what this is:


The name of the animal is hippopotamus. The literal translation: "River horse" . It is obviously not a horse, but there it is in the name.



The issue is education and not catering to ignorance. While defining anti-Semitism and acts related to it can create gray areas, the definition should not be, and I, and others, do see the attempts to change it to as distraction, dishonesty, and often, just plain old bigotry. "Anti-Semitism" is "prejudice, discrimination, or hostility directed at Jewish people." PERIOD! It is NOT "prejudice, discrimination, or hostility directed at people who are 'Semetic or speak Semitic languages' nor does the definition make caveats for who are NOT anti-Semites, a common bullshit tactic I see from some who claim; "Palestinians can't be anti-Semitic because they are Semites!" So what?! Let's pretend that the definition really was about "Semites" it still wouldn't mean they are excluded from being bigots because they belong to the targeted group. For some, this will be a newsflash; Jews can be anti-Semites too! Just like non-white folk can be racist, gays can be homophobic, old/young people can be ageist, and women can be sexist.

Trying to redefine the word to ease the tsuris of people who take issue with Jews is a fool's errand because no matter what word is chosen, the same bullshit game-playing will take place. It is also stupid to pretend that "transphobia" really means "fear of crossing". I am guessing such a "redefinition" of that word in such a way, especially to excuse or mitigate an act of transphobia, would not be tolerated here.



I admit I don't understand that paragraph in the least.

I will end with: anti-Semitism (antiSemitism, antisemitism) is prejudice, discrimination, or hostility directed at Jewish people. Anyone trying to make it out as if it is not, well, their motives are the ones who need to be changed, not the definition of the word "anti-Semitism" or however one chooses to spell it.

I probably should have used the word "prejudice." I have a sort of inherent lack of faith in the impact of the word. As you note so well in your post, the concept itself has somehow come to be complicated and subjective and riddled with arbitrary exceptions. You can't put a screw in it without a wall anchor.

I try to drill down prejudice to more "bedrock" failures like weak-mindedness (including ignorance) and paranoia, and the risk they pose to a person of easily spiraling to criminal-mindedness (not the statutory kind but the general range from rude nuisance to evil).

I do see it as an education issue, but I take it down a step to a wisdom issue. Appealing to a lack of education on someone's part has become ineffective I would say. Referring back to your post title about words as weapons, "Educate yourself" has been used by ineffective (to put it kindly) speakers too often "as a weapon." I think "wisdom" still appeals to people.

They are not interchangeable.