Covid is traumatic enough that I have no desire to retell the story annually, especially with an emphasis on my least favorite part, large group video calls. There seems to be a subset of people that find video calls really socially satisfying and a subset that’s about as large that gets very little value from video as a replacement for in person social encounters. I keep noticing that the people that like video calls project this enjoyment of video calls onto the people that just find them depressing.
Also Passover already occurs annually and happened at the peak of fear during the coronavirus pandemic. This holiday may be redudant anyway with the likely adapations of Rationalist Seder?
I certainly don’t think people who don’t like video calls should do anything like this.
(fwiw, I find most group video calls awkward, but found Seder not-awkward and meaningful, because it gave a sense of direction to get everyone warmed up for chatting.)
I do think it’s quite plausible that people who do like videocalls but don’t want to reflect on Covid should probably just focus on connection. (For comparison: Christmas has a set of stories and traditions focused on Jesus, and a set of traditions about presents and Santa Clause. This creates a natural opportunity for people who actually care about Jesus to focus on the former, and people who mostly want an excuse for the latter to just do that. I’m expecting a similar thing here.)
I wanted to tell all my friends “hey! Are you feeling lonely and disconnected? Try a Seder!”… but, well, I’m not Jewish, and most people aren’t Jewish, and… the story of Seder really deeply assumes “you are a part of Jewish history, or at least the people hosting the event are.”
Personally, as somebody who isn’t Jewish and doesn’t have Jewish ancestry, I would feel weird hosting a Seder or making one happen (where the feeling is that it would be the bad kind of cultural appropriation), and would also feel weird about it being a Rationalist holiday rather than a holiday for Rationalist Jewish people, just like I’d feel weird about Rationalists adopting Christmas or Obon as a Rationalist holiday, where the feeling is that religion is Actually Bad and rationalists shouldn’t have religious ceremonies be an important part of their communities if they can help it.
Covid is traumatic enough that I have no desire to retell the story annually, especially with an emphasis on my least favorite part, large group video calls. There seems to be a subset of people that find video calls really socially satisfying and a subset that’s about as large that gets very little value from video as a replacement for in person social encounters. I keep noticing that the people that like video calls project this enjoyment of video calls onto the people that just find them depressing.
Also Passover already occurs annually and happened at the peak of fear during the coronavirus pandemic. This holiday may be redudant anyway with the likely adapations of Rationalist Seder?
I certainly don’t think people who don’t like video calls should do anything like this.
(fwiw, I find most group video calls awkward, but found Seder not-awkward and meaningful, because it gave a sense of direction to get everyone warmed up for chatting.)
I do think it’s quite plausible that people who do like videocalls but don’t want to reflect on Covid should probably just focus on connection. (For comparison: Christmas has a set of stories and traditions focused on Jesus, and a set of traditions about presents and Santa Clause. This creates a natural opportunity for people who actually care about Jesus to focus on the former, and people who mostly want an excuse for the latter to just do that. I’m expecting a similar thing here.)
As the post says:
Personally, as somebody who isn’t Jewish and doesn’t have Jewish ancestry, I would feel weird hosting a Seder or making one happen (where the feeling is that it would be the bad kind of cultural appropriation), and would also feel weird about it being a Rationalist holiday rather than a holiday for Rationalist Jewish people, just like I’d feel weird about Rationalists adopting Christmas or Obon as a Rationalist holiday, where the feeling is that religion is Actually Bad and rationalists shouldn’t have religious ceremonies be an important part of their communities if they can help it.