In a January essay in the New York Jewish Week titled “The Anger, and Allure, of Jewish Guys”, Abigail Pickus presents a discouraging view of relations between Jewish men and women. Of one male friend’s attitudes she wrote, “His litany against the fair daughters of Israel goes something like this. Jewish women remind Jewish men of their mothers. They’re smothering. They’re demanding. They’re materialistic. Their families are too pushy and invasive and just plain, well, loud. In short: they’re too Jewish. (And probably also too short.)”
The article saddened and baffled me. The ill will between Jewish men and women sounds so foreign and implacable. I grew up in a small town in far south Texas with no exposure to the experiences and stereotypes driving this rancorous divide in the Tribe. I knew no Jews outside my family, itself a heavily intermarried clan. My awkward teen passions focused on Christian girls with names like Christie, Raynell, Tammy, Angie, Dorotea, and Maria Luisa.
Maybe I was lucky. I got to discover Jewish women completely afresh with no wonder-years baggage distorting the view. Perhaps my experiences bring an outsider’s view on how to break through the barriers that keep our hearts divided.
My gentile lust abruptly ended in the fall of 1976 when I was a freshman at Princeton University. Beginning with my crush on a classmate named Debbie on a pre-Freshman Week camping trip, my attention turned, as if drawn by an irresistible Yiddishe magnetic-estrogenic force field, toward Jewish women. Adios, mi amor prohibida Maria Luisa, sholom aleichem, shayneh maydelehs Esther and Janet and Sharon, Adina and Amy and Ilana, Ana Gilda and Ana Lucia, Celia and Sarah and Sandi.
The names tell the tale: the instant Jewish women glided into view; they swamped my interest in gentiles. The few times I tried dating non-Jewish women since then, I felt a woeful lack of connection (note to self: check if Lucy Liu is Jewish).
What’s the deal? Why, after zero exposure, did I turn to and stay with Jewish women? Something about them clicked with me on a deep level. I once described a woman as “smart, vulnerable, and shtetl-lovely.” That’s my highest praise for the appeal of the Jewish woman’s mind, heart, and body. They are all allure, and if they freshen their lipstick over a sushi dinner, I’ll follow them anywhere - and I have. A Jewish man who dismisses such women as a group is, in technical terms, meshuggenah.
Article comments
1 - Ali
I find your article disgusting. "Angry"? Really? That's a attribute you want to label all Jews with? And borderline relatives? What are you even talking about? Anyone whose fetish has become fixated on a specific race/creed needs to get their head checked. Hoping from Jew to Jew on JDate because you get your rocks off on 'the women and the culture' makes you sounds like a pathetic loser. Someone should write a treaty on middle aged, divorced Southern men who have un-appealing racial obsessions. Oh wait, no woman would do that because any self described connasuir is a fucking joke. (Excuse me I need to go puke now).
2 - CM
Excellent article. The best line was when you pointed out that someone who is anti-Jewish women is probably using superficial criteria to pick women in general. Jewish women, like all women, have a wide range of passions, traits, and desires. Anyone who refuses to date them based on stereotypes is self-hating. Great essay!!