Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2024 April 4

= April 4 =

Old tale set in Memphis
Hello, I remember from my childhood an old tale set in Memphis, U.S., about the bullying of a kid who finally manage to react. I can't remember the author or the exact title. Could you please help me? Thanks.-- Carnby (talk) 05:39, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Loukoumi and the Schoolyard Bully by Nick Katsoris (Dream Day Press, 2013) might fit, but is perhaps too recent (we don't know when your childhood was); Memphis by Tara M. Stringfellow (Dial Press, 2022) will certainly be.
 * How about The Land by Mildred D. Taylor (Scholastic, 2001), or another in her 6-book 'Logan Family' series? {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 151.227.130.213 (talk) 11:36, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Right, I was writing about a book published in the '80s.-- Carnby (talk) 11:40, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The Logan Family series began with Song of the Trees published in 1975, followed by Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry in 1976, Let the Circle Be Unbroken in 1981, The Gold Cadillac in 1987, and The Road To Memphis in 1992: The Land was a late continuation. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 151.227.130.213 (talk) 23:31, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Public intoxication in fin-de-siècle France and England (1890s)
I just ran across an interesting passage in Toulouse-Lautrec and the Fin-de-Siécle by biographer and art historian David Sweetman. He writes that in the late 1890s the treatment of people who were intoxicated in public in France and England was vastly different, with London police far more violent towards the public. Are there any particular historical reasons for this difference in law enforcement behavior? Viriditas (talk) 20:01, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Concern over public drunkenness has deep roots in England, perhaps the difference with France being down to Protestant values, which saw it as being directly linked to sin, disorder and crime (and still does to an extent). See:
 * Drunkenness and Responsibility for Crime in the Eighteenth Century (you can access the whole article through the Wikipedia Library).
 * You may be interested in this 19th century village lockup in Hertfordshire which has a sign saying "BE SOBER" over the barred window. Alansplodge (talk) 12:44, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thank you. I will read up on this. Viriditas (talk) 10:20, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Drinking in Victorian and Edwardian Britain: Beyond the Spectre of the Drunkard ("Conclusions" chapter) makes interesting reading. The whole book is online. See also Punishment or treatment? Inebriety, drink, and drugs, 1860–2004 (short pdf), Temperance movement in the United Kingdom, Intoxication and Criminal Responsibility in England, 1819-1920 - there's lots on the subject. Because of the poor quality of drinking water in Britain, small beer was a valid way of slaking your thirst since the Middle Ages: the contrast with the terrors of gin ("mother's ruin") were portrayed by William Hogarth in Beer Street and Gin Lane. In Scotland Beer in Scotland are still used. On the other side of the channel, Intoxication and the French Revolution shows that in France, with its vast domestic output of wine and spirits, drinking alcohol was much more acceptable than in Britain, and much cheaper as well. MinorProphet (talk) 22:09, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * This makes a lot of sense, actually. Are you aware that the same claim was made about early American colonists, and that IIRC, this is what gave rise to the temperance movement in the US?  There was a book that came out a decade or so ago on this, but I can't find it for the life of me.  It argued that in the early days of the US, virtually every man, woman, and even children, were drunk 24/7 because there was poor access to fresh water.  My understanding is that this isn't accepted and is considered somewhat fringe, but I don't know enough about the topic to comment with any certainty. Viriditas (talk) 10:20, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The Met were notorious for stealing pocket watches from drunks. DuncanHill (talk) 08:29, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Thanks, I will read this. Viriditas (talk) 10:20, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Do Jews follow other religions?
For context: Wikipedia talk:WikiProject Judaism

I want to ask really really age old question, do Jews follow other religions like Christianity and Islam too? SpinnerLaserzthe2nd (talk) 22:42, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Define "follow." In brief, one only "follows" (believes in) one religion at a time, though there certainly can be exceptions. DOR (ex-HK) (talk) 23:05, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Okay. Are there instances where there are Jews who don’t traditionally follow Judaism? SpinnerLaserzthe2nd (talk) 23:06, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Jews who have converted to Christianity or Islam are not recognized as Jews by the Supreme Court of Israel (for the purpose of Aliyah). See https://www.haaretz.com/2006-06-09/ty-article/aliyah-with-a-cat-a-dog-and-jesus/0000017f-dbcf-db5a-a57f-dbef42430000 Losing faith in Judaism is okay, converting to another religion isn't. tgeorgescu (talk) 23:19, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * This is discussed at our article on Who is a Jew? Viriditas (talk) 23:21, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * [Edit Conflicts] There are many people who are ethnically Jewish and even also culturally Jewish who (a) don't follow Judaism as a religion (they may be atheists; Isaac Asimov is one example I know of, agnostics, or completely indifferent to religion); or (b) actively follow another religion. Many Jews in Europe converted to Christianity in former centuries (sometimes under duress) and their descendents remained so, see for example Benjamin Disraeli and Felix Mendelssohn. In the present day I personally know of Jews who became Scientologists, and I'm sure there must be some who have adopted Buddhism, Wicca or various other belief systems or paths.
 * In asking such questions, you need to be clear about the differences between religious belief, cultural heritage and ethnic descent – "Jews/Jewish" can refer to any one or any combination of the three. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 151.227.130.213 (talk) 23:22, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, there are lots of Buddhists from Jewish families. Shantavira|feed me 08:17, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * See also Jews for Jesus and Converso. Alansplodge (talk) 12:25, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Jews for Jesus is a Christian group despite its deliberately misleading name. Kazamzam (talk) 22:30, 5 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The founder of the group came from the Hebrew Christian movement, which consisted of Jews who converted to Christianity. --Lambiam 13:31, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

People are often confused because Judaism is *both* a religion and an ethnicity. You can convert to being Jewish. You can be born Jewish. You can be Jewish by birth, and follow whatever religion you choose (or none), but your ethnicity hasn't changed. David Baddiel on Twitter (and in his book Jews Don't Count) will often mention that he is a Jewish atheist. He argues, correctly, that antisemitism is not religious intolerance, for example in the two minute video here.

On top of that messiness, you have things like those that Alan Splodge mentioned, where Jews adopt another religion or pretend to for self-preservation during oppression. Whether those people are to be considered religiously Jewish or not, depends entirely on viewpoint, but ethnically it's unambiguous that nothing changed.

Finally, there's an additional messiness, which is that the ethnic element also has a religious veneer. In the eyes of traditional Judaism, either a Jewish mother or conversion is required for someone to be 'Jewish', whereas many less traditional Jews accept patrilineal descent too. If you want to try to be scientific about ethnicity, it's rather hard, because it's a tough concept to be scientific about. You can see just how confusing this can be when considering Lenny Kravitz (patrilineal Jewish descent), and his ex Lisa Bonet (matrilineal), and their daughter Zoë Kravitz. --Dweller (talk) Old fashioned is the new thing! 08:41, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

Genocide Convention by Law - How to defend the Ukraïne?
Which actions would fulfill the international Genocide Convention of the UN for the defense of the victim Ukraïne? --176.4.140.126 (talk) 23:21, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * The Convention delegates the provision of effective penalties for persons guilty of genocide to the Contracting Parties – which will not be very effective for holding the guilty president of a Contracting Party to account, unless they are in the custody of another Contracting Party. The "competent organs" of the United Nations may decide to take such action under the Charter of the United Nations as they consider appropriate, and I assume the question is what action these organs could theoretically take. Theoretically, the UN Security Council could order Russia to lay down arms, but we know this is not going to happen. Russia cannot veto decisions by the UN General Assembly, so they could pass a similar resolution to Resolution 47/121 passed in response to the genocide in Bosnia and demand that the Russian forces immediately cease their aggressive acts and withdraw all elements of the Russian army and affiliated forces from Ukrainian territory as internationally recognized until the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea.
 * The UN Charter does not have any provisions for intervening, other than by "peaceful means", in a conflict between states, while it does also not explicitly exclude such intervention. However, I see no plausible mechanism for organizing an effective intervention. After the disaster of MINUSTAH and the ineffectiveness of its successor, MINUJUSTH, it is not clear that any attempts at intervention will improve the situation. --Lambiam 13:27, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Yes, - sry for nebulous wording - that was the question, "action to be taken".
 * that was the question, "action to be taken".
 * Isn't it now so, that this Convention against Genocide was conceived after WWII in order and with the intention to prevent what happened to ever happen again, regardless of any other secondary issues that there might then possibly be ( of political, economic, alliance's nature )?
 * Seen that "an international treaty that criminalizes genocide and obligates state parties to pursue the enforcement of its prohibition., and "[...] resolution by the General Assembly that [...] and called for the creation of a binding treaty to prevent and punish its perpetration.", and "binding on all nations whether or not they are parties." (e.g. NATO or not, UN member or not), and "The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has likewise ruled that the principles underlying the Convention represent a peremptory norm against genocide that no government can derogate." ( and not even the UN Charta can derogate, I wonder, thus mere self-defence and emergency relief have absolute priority even before the slow 'bureaucratic' procedure of ICJ ? )
 * are very strong statements with little room for compromise?! --‘176.2.138.199 (talk) 14:47, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * The problem is to define an action that is at the same time feasible, effective, and not ethically wrong. If you can think of one, you should let the world know. --Lambiam 17:26, 6 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Well, a wealth of options: provide the Ukraïne with defense weapons (patriot air defense), then artillery (MARS II), mortars, amunition, chars, tanks (leo 2a7, abrams, ceasars), jets, ... all that's [| already been provided], but much and many more, not just the crop & crap. There's tens and hundreds times those weapons in Europe and all over the world. So that the Ukraïne not only not gets short of the most necessary, but indeed gets enabled to fight back and free their stolen territory. +-02:31, 7 April 2024 (UTC)~ 176.2.128.212 (talk) 02:31, 7 April 2024 (UTC) [''edit':] ... and its people (being oppressed and tortured), thousands of hijacked kids & youngsters, soldiers and citizens in captivity. --_14:12, 7 April 2024 (UTC)~
 * Note that the Russian Federation has only been accused (by Ukraine) of genocide. However horrible the situation on the ground may be, and however unjustifiable the attacks on civilian targets may be, this appears, on the face of it, war business "as usual". One measure of prevention that has been advocated is as simple (and perhaps as ineffective) as naming and shaming, yet the Western powers have thus far refrained from labeling the "special military operation" as being genocidal. --Lambiam 03:24, 7 April 2024 (UTC)
 * >>only accused, not labeled as genocide<<. High time long missed to do so!? - I'm making this a query see below, "Proofs for russian genocide...", April 7 --_14:21, 7 April 2024 (UTC)~ 176.5.15.133 (talk) 14:21, 7 April 2024 (UTC)