Re: Kinky Jewish Music

[Ari Davidow <ari...>]

>And for the record, "They Don't Make Jews like Jesus Anymore" has nothing to
>do with phony cop-out terms like "Chanukah is a Jewish Christmas."  It is a
>strong song AGAINST antisemitism and racism.  While I don't have a direct
>personal connection to the Holocaust, I believe that "Ride Em Jewboy" is one
>of the best and most sensitive songs I have heard in English dealing with the
>tragedy.  If you can't get beyond Kinky's use of the word "Jewboy" or hate
>country music then you will not appreciate the song.  But I suspect others may
>disagree, not on the basis of Jewish defense politics, but on the basis of
>songwriting.

It's worth adding to Gideon's defense of Kinky Friedman just how much
it meant, as Jewish adolescents in the late sixties/early seventies, to
be seeing this Texas would-be cowboy with a group called the "Jewboys"
being in-your-face Jewish in a world where, at least in Dallas, antisemitism
was rife and Jews were supposed to be pushovers. 

The music didn't have to be good (and some, admittedly wasn't), but just
having a band singing songs like those was every bit as empowering as
the idea that Israel represented Jewish machismo, but at a remove.

I'm happy to have outgrown a need for that machismo (per my self-image,
at any rate); even for surrogate machismo, but this was in the heydey
of the JDL, when that organization meant not Jewish racism, but Jews
defending Jews in unfriendly neighborhoods. This was a good thing.

In fact, the first editorial I wrote in newspaper I was publishing on
campus in Hebrew U. during the '73 war mused on what might happen if
Friedman toured Israel with his band. 

I have to join those who disagree with Simon on this issue. Just as
there are contexts in which African-Americans will refer to one another
as "niggers," or use the term to counter racism in the lighter-skinned
world, there are also times when it is appropriate, or at least a
meaningful, non-antisemitic statement, to shake things up with "Ride
'Em Jewboy." (I never liked that song--loved Kinky's voice, but 
thought that it was the most confused attempt at meaningful lyrics
I had encountered since psychedia.)

Context matters a great deal.

Imnsho (in my not so humble opinion).

ari

Ari Davidow
The klezmer shack: http://www.well.com/user/ari/klez/
owner: jewish-music mailing list
e-mail: ari (at) ivritype(dot)com

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