Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I had a huge crush on a Jewish guy I dated in my twenties. He shared with me early on that his grandmother made him promise on her deathbed that he would marry a Jewishwoman.

I felt that was an unfair pressure/guilt trip to instill in her young grandson.

Lol sorry his commitment to his blood relatives wishes trumped your twenties crush.

The prior poster was commenting on the grandmother’s behavior, not the grandson’s.

(Your kneejerk response makes you sound bitter and threatened.)

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love it, binged over the weekend. My mid 40s daughter also loved it. We have no preconceived notions about Jewish people so it's all new to us, plus with the generally low quality of sit coms and rom coms we'll tolerate some stereotyping and stretches of reality.

Overall, A+

Then you must be the intended audience. This felt like a Jewish primer in different places. I have Jewish in-laws (not my direct in-laws, my DH was the product of an interfaith marriage) and I have learned a lot of small things from them. However, I knew what a shiksa, Shabbat, etc. were before ever being married. Defining everything felt pedantic.

Super cute though!

Probably needed for a subset of viewers.

I remember being shocked when, as a grad student in Ann Arbor, our neighbor (another grad student, but from Michigan) said that my roommate was the first Jewish person she had ever met.

I grew up in the middle of nowhere and only knew two Jewish kids growing up. And plenty of people from my hometown knew zero -- it was random that the two Jewish families with kids in school wound up having a kid in my grade.

However even if you don't grow up around Jewish people you still learn about Jewish culture? Most of the Yiddish I knew as an 18 yr old I learned from Seinfeld and movies or books. So many TV shows, movies, and books are set in and around NYC and therefore even if the main characters aren't Jewish they will feature some Jewish culture. I knew what shabbat was (or at least vaguely that it was a meal/celebration Jews had on Friday), the words shalom and mensch, what the concept of kosher is (and that not all Jews keep kosher), etc. And this is with pretty limited exposure to actual Jewish people.

The idea American people in 2024 would have ZERO exposure to Jewish culture reminds me of some of my extended family who grew up very sheltered and uneducated Catholics. Some of my cousins thought Scientologists and Christian Scientists are the same, that most Christian churches are "sects" of the Catholic Church, and were surprised to learn that there are nearly as nearly 2 billion Muslims in the world-- not that far off from the number of Christians. It's not about growing up in a place that isn't diverse (they grew up 90 minutes from NYC) -- it's about being sheltered and incurious and then not reading or learning about the world.

So that's kind of how Bell's character comes off to me-- just historically incurious about people different from her in a way that seems uneducated and very shallow. I also find it very hard to believe that her new age mom wouldn't have gone through a "Jewish mysticism" phase, especially in LA. Though that probably would have produced even worse understanding of Jews, so I guess for the best!

Do you think being called a Karen is offensive? "Shiksa" is similar--could be disparaging, could be less so. But no, it's not just a gentile woman, it has connotations of sluttiness and stealing Jewish men.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love it, binged over the weekend. My mid 40s daughter also loved it. We have no preconceived notions about Jewish people so it's all new to us, plus with the generally low quality of sit coms and rom coms we'll tolerate some stereotyping and stretches of reality.

Overall, A+

Then you must be the intended audience. This felt like a Jewish primer in different places. I have Jewish in-laws (not my direct in-laws, my DH was the product of an interfaith marriage) and I have learned a lot of small things from them. However, I knew what a shiksa, Shabbat, etc. were before ever being married. Defining everything felt pedantic.

Super cute though!

This was weird to me too. How do you live in a large coastal city and not know a lot of Jewish people and be familiar with some basic Yiddish and the central Jewish traditions. I am not Jewish and didn't marry in but I've been to plenty of Shabbat dinners and attended Jewish weddings and know what shiksa and goyim and other common yiddish words mean. Just like I also know what baby hairs are and some basic things about black hair care even though I've personally never needed that info for myself. I thought that this was just common knowledge if you live in a reasonably diverse community.

The Jewish population is 0.2% of the world and 1,8% in the US.
Its unreasonable to think that the remaining 98.2% of the US would be familiar with Yiddish words/phrases and traditions- exception would be dense enclaves in coastal cities but many of those enclaves are insular. Black people are 12.4% of the US population and there is more intermixing so yeahhhhh these are ridiculous comparisons.

She's from LA though. A girl raised in Sherman Oaks would have had some Jewish kids around. I think not hearing of shabbat or the word shalom is very very weird. Yiddish words not so much.

Asking a rabbi what they mean doesn’t mean she hadn’t heard them before.

I didn't like the ending. I don't believe he would give it all up for her. Not someone who made being Jewish their career and said they wanted to be a rabbi since they were a boy. I did think it was very funny and binged it over one weekend. I would watch a 2nd season but its hard to root for a couple you know just aren't going to work out.

Anonymous wrote:I really disliked this show. Every single Jewish women character was a one dimensional caricature

Not the rabbi.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kristen bell has something weird with her mouth - it’s the same issue due to filler or something that Christa miller has from scrubs.

The actors are good looking 40yo who are playing young 30s and it doesn’t work.

A worldly woman who grew up in Sherman oaks does and does not know what Shabbat is or anything about Judaism is not believable.

The emigration timeline for his parents does not really work with history, but whatever. Nor does the promotion politics of his job with the senior rabbi.

Seth cohen is beautiful.

I didn’t know who he was before this so I just looked him up. He’s attractive in this one but WAY more attractive without the beard.

He was in the OC. They should have cast Marissa as the flaky sister.

Never watched that. Millennial show?

Anonymous wrote:I'm watching it. Adam Brody is adorable and saves the show. Kristen Bell is grating, so is her mean sister. I can't believe how many times they have used the word shiksa so far. It's a slur, fine if you want to use it once, but getting old, repetitive and rude. The show started to go majorly south when he brought her to the retreat, then barged in on her work dinner to light shabbat candles after sundown?!!

Are you Jewish?

I am a Shiksa, and don’t consider the term to be offensive.

Does the meaning differ from gentile (other than referring to females)?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m half Jewish and the stereotypes really bugged me. Along with Bell’s aforementioned lip issue.

On the other hand, I think Adam Brody is really cute and see that in real life he’s a secular Jew.

“Secular Jew” is more offensive than most of the clearly intentional stereotypes in the show. You can’t be a “secular Jew.”

It’s a religion.

I think PP meant that he does not practice it, but he is ethnically Jewish. So, there are many secular Jews. Just like there are religious Jews.

I’m told calling someone a “cultural Jew” is very offensive. Is that different from a “secular Jew” the way you explain it above?

- Christian married to a non religious Jew

Why are you asking this anonymous poster?

Like they are the arbiter of such matters, for all other Jews!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m half Jewish and the stereotypes really bugged me. Along with Bell’s aforementioned lip issue.

On the other hand, I think Adam Brody is really cute and see that in real life he’s a secular Jew.

“Secular Jew” is more offensive than most of the clearly intentional stereotypes in the show. You can’t be a “secular Jew.”

It’s a religion.

A large percentage of Jews, including myself, are atheists.

Thank you for teaching OP that she was never elected to represent all Jews.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I love it, binged over the weekend. My mid 40s daughter also loved it. We have no preconceived notions about Jewish people so it's all new to us, plus with the generally low quality of sit coms and rom coms we'll tolerate some stereotyping and stretches of reality.

Overall, A+

Then you must be the intended audience. This felt like a Jewish primer in different places. I have Jewish in-laws (not my direct in-laws, my DH was the product of an interfaith marriage) and I have learned a lot of small things from them. However, I knew what a shiksa, Shabbat, etc. were before ever being married. Defining everything felt pedantic.

Super cute though!

Probably needed for a subset of viewers.

I remember being shocked when, as a grad student in Ann Arbor, our neighbor (another grad student, but from Michigan) said that my roommate was the first Jewish person she had ever met.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I’m half Jewish and the stereotypes really bugged me. Along with Bell’s aforementioned lip issue.

On the other hand, I think Adam Brody is really cute and see that in real life he’s a secular Jew.

“Secular Jew” is more offensive than most of the clearly intentional stereotypes in the show. You can’t be a “secular Jew.”

It’s a religion.

It is also a culture.

Anonymous wrote:Did not like it. At all. I mean- not one redeeming factor.
1. Every line and character is a cliche- everyone- his parents ( who acts like this, calling her a shiksa at the synagogue,
and later with the intervention), the over the top ladies at the shul trying to get their daughters married off. The main character and his brother, oh god the brother is the worst character, are just basically 8th graders with mommy wives. Old Jewish stereotypes, come on. Very cringey.
2. The juxtaposition with a "rabbi" and she's out there talking about sex, dildos, shopping for dildos, and running into members of the congregation, holding the product, and she , the shiksa is found in sexual gear, etc.
3. Seriously bad writing. Sooo bad.
And yeah, Kristen Bell looks weird. Everybody does a filter and thinks they look good. They do not. She always plays the same character.

Zero stars.

Unfortunately, pop culture in the US does not Target Rhodes Scholars. It targets young adults with very short attention spans, who are probably on their phones when they are watching the series. The jokes are very obvious and exaggerated, not nuanced. I can see past this, but it is one reason foreign movies can put ours to shame .

I’ve been watching a bunch of reels with Kristen and Adam and Kristen mentioned her character was 38.

They are both 44 so probably 43 when they filmed this so that tracks. They can both pass for late 30s.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kristen bell has something weird with her mouth - it’s the same issue due to filler or something that Christa miller has from scrubs.

The actors are good looking 40yo who are playing young 30s and it doesn’t work.

A worldly woman who grew up in Sherman oaks does and does not know what Shabbat is or anything about Judaism is not believable.

The emigration timeline for his parents does not really work with history, but whatever. Nor does the promotion politics of his job with the senior rabbi.

Seth cohen is beautiful.

I didn’t know who he was before this so I just looked him up. He’s attractive in this one but WAY more attractive without the beard.

He was in the OC. They should have cast Marissa as the flaky sister.

Justine Lupe is perfect at the sister. She is hilarious.

Yeah she’s great. Another thing that’s funny about her character in this show is that she actually played an overzealous Jewish convert wife on the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel - which I think was her funniest role ever - but here she plays such a wasp.

Yes already mentioned