Juana Hernandez

Mr. Cornejo

English 251

12 September 2017

Stereotypes of Jews

According to “Myths and Facts about Muslim People and Islam,” “Islamophobia- the

fear, hatred and discrimination of Muslim people-is manifesting itself in personal biases,

rhetoric, education, politics, hate crimes, and more.” This is related to how the Jews felt against

the Nazis because they were stereotyped and seen as greedy, evil, good with money and much

more to the German Nazis, but in reality they were just like any other person. Most of

the Stereotypes that the anti-Semitic Germans made, was what led to Holocaust and many

deaths upon that, this could possibly happen to the Muslims if they continue to be stereotyped as

the way they are now.

Muslims and Jews are both related to be stereotyped for something that they probably are

not. Muslims are stereotyped as being violent due to many terrorist attacks and Jews were

blamed for why bad things happen to the Germans. The main Nazi Party leader, Adolf Hitler,

created anti-Semitism which meant hatred against all things Jewish. Anti-Semitism was one of

Hitler’s steps that led to what was led to a horrific event of history, known as the Holocaust.

Hitler made many stereotypes to make the Germans hate Jews. He first made Nazi Propaganda to

show how Jews were bad and that Germans were the superior race, mainly the blue eyed, blonde

haired Aryans. The Nazi Propaganda posters, as shown on the right hand corner of this page,

shows that the Jew is holding money which represented their greed. The Jewish man is also

holding a whip in his hand that shows they look, and are evil. All of the posters posted showed
how Jews looked in the eyes of the Germans. The Jewish males were mainly shown in the

posters that they made. They had beards, black longs coats, most were ways shrugging and

looked non trustworthy. Adolf Hitler picked on the Jewish population because he wanted to drive

them out of Germany to make it Jewish free, so that Germany was a strong nation full of only

Germans and no other race. Germans started teaching kids at school about anti-Semitism. A

“popular” book called “The Poisonous Mushroom,” went around talking about how it is hard to

tell which mushroom was good, Germans, and which one was bad, the Jews. The Germans also

compared the Jews to mushrooms because both were known to spread rapidly.

To add, Jews were forced to identify

themselves by wearing the Star of David, and the same goes to the Muslim women that live in

certain countries that are forced to wear a hijab. We assume that all Muslim women are forced to

wear a hijab only because of the certain countries that force the women to wear them, but the

truth is that many choose to wear the hijab, it is their decision. In fact in the article, “Myths and

facts about Muslim People and Islam,” stated that “Many women choose to wear a hijab, niqab,

or burqa on their own and do so for a variety of reasons including a sense of pride in being
Muslim, a collective sense of identity or a sense of self-control in public life,” this proves that

they are not forced to wear the hijab, it is all done by choice.

Still today there are some people that stereotype Jews for how good they are with getting

and handling money. These stereotypes like that have followed them for centuries. In Dan Pine’s

article “Jews and Money: The Stereotype, the history, the reality,” he stated that “A 2008 Pew

Forum Institute study found that Jews are the nation’s wealthiest religious group, with 46 percent

earning $100,000 or more a year, compared with 18 percent of the overall population.” Although

it is true that many Jewish people are rich, only 46 percent are, and the other 54 percent are not.

Due to many Jews being rich, people tend to hate all Jews because of their financial success. In

Pine’s article, he mentioned that a “23-year-old Jewish Frenchman was kidnapped, tortured and

dumped in a suburban Paris park in 2006. The thugs who killed him were sent to prison.” In the

article the “thugs” kidnapped the Jewish Frenchman because they believed that he was wealthy

but in reality he was not, he was just an average person working as a cellphone salesman. Many

people would actually make the same mistake in believing that all Jews are rich. The thugs in the

article were hoping to receive money from the Jewish Frenchman because they believed he was

rich, they later realized that they were wrong, but it was too late to take things back, the Jewish

man was already dead.

In addition to the stereotype of Jews having a lot of money, some people believe that

Jews are easy to identify by the size of their nose. Because of this, many Jews tend to go under

the surgical procedure to minimize the size of their nose to make it seem “normal” only to fit in

with others and to not be picked on by others who will judge them. Things have changed over

the past century because there are fewer amounts of procedures being done today. Some Jews

may still go under the knife many are against and would rather show their pride and not care of
what others think. Rita Rubin’s article “A Nose Dive for Nose Jobs,” shows how the number of

procedures have gone down by stating that “In 2011, according to the American Society of

Plastic Surgeons, 37 percent fewer Americans got nose jobs than in 2000,” she also states that

““nose reshaping,” saw one of the sharpest drops among all procedures, from 389,000 in 2000 to

244,000 in 2011.” Many Jewish parents supported their children getting nose jobs because they

wanted to do anything for their child so that they didn’t get picked on for looking different, even

if that meant they would go under the knife just to give some satisfaction to other people. If they

do agree on doing the procedure, it is only because they want to feel better about themselves, but

they also do not want to look “less Jewish.”.

As a result of the stereotypes that the Germans made about the Jews, many of them were

murdered in the event that was called the Holocaust. Many of the stereotypes included how

greedy Jews are, how it's easy to tell who is a Jew just by the appearance. If stereotypes like this

continue, then more chaos will come about. It may not just be by murdering each other, hating

each other in general can lead to stronger resentment towards one another. This still goes on

around the world, it may not just be here, but in other places it still happens. If it continues, then

the resentment toward one another will never end. This hurts EVERYONE and if it continues

then there will no longer be a human race due to the fact that we all need each other to contribute

to each other’s lives in order to survive.

 Works cited

Pine, Dan. “Jews and money: The stereotype, the history, the reality – J.” J., 4 Apr. 2017,

www.jweekly.com/2013/04/12/jews-and-money-the-stereotype-the-history-the-reality-jccsf-

series-explores/.

Rubin, Rita. “A Bridge Too Far: Jewish Teenagers Are Saying No to Nose Jobs.” Tablet Magazine,

www.tabletmag.com/jewish-life-and-religion/101732/a-nose-dive-for-nose-jobs.

"Myths and Facts About Muslim People and Islam." Anti-Defamation League,
www.adl.org/education/resources/tools-and-strategies/myths-and-facts-about-muslim-people-
and-islam.