If you’re with a woman who doesn’t appreciate you for the mensch you are, then maybe you need a new woman.
Hey boy. I see you there. With your black-rimmed glasses, putting on some hand sanitizer. With your cute little yarmulke covering your cute little bald spot. With your headphones blasting Dave Matthews or Wu Tang Clan. I see you there, Jewish boy, and I just got to say hey.
I don’t need no muscle man, no lumber jack, no cowboy, no bad boy, no thug. I like a man who knows what he wants, and makes a restaurant give it to him no matter what’s on the menu. A man who respects his mom and expects a woman to be terrifying. A man who doesn’t need to know how to work on his engine because he can pay someone else to do it.
Ryan Gosling? Bitch, please. I’ll take Rahm Emanuel over that pretty-boy any day. Don’t worry boy, I got fingers enough for the both of us.
Because a Jewish guy doesn’t need to fire a gun or wear wife beaters and tats to show he’s a man. He knows he’s a man because he had to read Hebrew in front of a bunch of people when he was thirteen, and then it was so. He didn’t spend the rest of his life trying to prove it to anybody. He just got on with his sweet ass, studied hard, and made something of himself. HOT DAMN.
So here’s to you, Jewish man, sexy as hell and Lord knows you ain’t trying. The swing of your axe is the power of your mind. You’re 6 feet tall at 5”6. You make me laugh, and you make me breakfast. You probably weigh less than me, but that’s ok.
And if your woman doesn’t appreciate you for the mensch you are, show her the mezuzah! You can do butta!
Read More “In Praise of” pieces:
Mark Radcliffe’s In Praise of Small Breasted Women
Josh Bowman’s In Praise of Large Breasted Women
Collin Slattery’s In Praise and Appreciation of Women
AP Photo
About Laura Bailey
My girlfriend everyone!!! Does it make sense now?
Also…for the record, I’m 5’8 AND A HALF. And I have tattoos. But they’re nice tattoos.
Ok, makes more sense with the relationship, but not the putting it on the internet in public. Keep it to your circle of friends.
Facetiousness and this type of humor doesn’t translate into print. This just seems like rude prejudice and nonsense.
Hahahhaaha! Love it!
I gotta show this to my hub, who is Jewish, of course!
This was pretty entertaining. *high five*
reading Hebrew isn’t even that hard…
אתה דפוק בראש? למישהו שמעולם לא עשה את זה, זה קשה מאוד
תודה על הכתבה, תודה לאל שמישהו מעריך אותי!
Am I screwed in the head? I was joking dude (that was what the “…” were for). I know it’s difficult to go from an alphabet to an abjad for many people, but honestly it wasn’t really for me.
אני מצטער, בישראל, אנחנו אומרים את זה בצחוק.
Ok, I am not from Israel nor am I Jewish. I did take one semester of Hebrew at university level. Though I did learn several words from looking up etymologies of names in bible concordances
I meant to say I mostly learned from the concordances
Word. I’m in love with the dark-haired, bespectacled, brainy Jewish boy trope. And don’t even get me started on Jewfros. (P.S. I may be blond but I’m Jewish!)
“I don’t need no muscle man, no lumber jack, no cowboy… I like a man who… expects a woman to be terrifying.”
No wonder I can’t get a date.
I’ve always had a soft spot for Jewish guys.
..black horned glasses..yum.
you couldn’t pick a better man for the picture?! you had to pick rahm emmanuel – a crazy greedy power-hungry lunatic?! How about jon stewart? At least Jon is a sensible man with ethics.
*you couldn’t pick a better man for the picture?*
No way, just based on looks, Rahm is hot as all hell! He’s also passionate, intelligent and authentic person,
I’m not Jewish, but whenever the term has been explained to me, ‘mensch’ didn’t mean ‘one of the biggest a-holes on the planet who is universally reviled by just about everyone on the political spectrum outside his local party machine’.
But hey, living language and all that.
You know, I spent time in Israel and have known Jewish men. I had no idea that people had some issues or stereotypes with them. I just thought that was a problem my people had to deal with. Who hates Jewish men? Nazi gangs or Mel Gibson. Y’all just ignore them.
I know you’re a comedian and thus are allowed some leeway in the use of stereotypes, but seriously.
Talk about damning us with faint praise. You didn’t praise Jewish men in this article, you twit. You insulted us. A lot. You certainly insulted me, a muscle bound 6’3″ brute who is Jewish to the core, thank you very f’ing much.
We are not scrawny wimps outside your prejudiced little imagination. Am I going to write a GMP article that says “I don’t want a good driver or a math whiz: I want a real woman.”???
Am I then going to call that article “In Praise of Women?” No, I’m not. But then, I’m not you.
I am also Jewish. I thought it was hilarious. Laura wrote this in part as a reaction to an article I wrote about big boobs. The joke is that my article, which was satirical, objectified big breasted women, and then this article objectified Jewish men. Of course, not all Jewish men are short and balding, just like not all large-breasted women are like Mon’ique. The idea behind the articles was to explore the idea of having a kind of essentialized “type” through humour. I know it may not seem this way, but these articles are meant to poke as much fun at us as anyone else.
If I know anything about being Jewish, it is that we have used humour for centuries to combat oppression and deal with turbulent times. The article us meant to be light hearted.
Z, it’s all jokes, but I can see how you’d be offended if taken at face value. It is a satire in the vein of the “In Praise of Small-breasted Women,” in which such women were “praised” for character traits the writer pretty much invented for them. And my boyfriend’s response “In Praise of Large-Breasted Women,” which also satirized justifying your fetishes by alligning them with character traits.
Creatively, the challenge of writing this was to think of stereotypes to play on. The truth is, I have dated many Jewish men over the years (current bf included) and the only through-line was that I thought they were all really, really, ridiculously good-looking.
Yeah… nice try. I read “in praise of small-breasted women,” and it’s not satire as you say. Rather it’s exactly what the title says it is, an article in praise of small breasted women (and their breasts, of course).
There’s no stereotyping in that article of an ethnic group as being particularly physically under-endowed. If you had really written an equivalent article to that one, you’d have written an article saying you were attracted to shorter men, or skinnier men, or men who didn’t fit the “cowboy” ideal, and the word “Jewish” would have been left out entirely.
That’s not at all what you wrote.
Well if it makes you feel better your description of yourself and the strength in the tone of your was certainly a turn on for me.
And I don’t do weak men. Besides REAL women appreciate strong Jewish men. So don’t even worry about it.
Logan Lerman is the best looking guy ever, and he’s 100% Jewish, so I guess you have a point!
I pay attention to Jews because I grew up with enough of them to know we have a lot in common.
IMO, Jewish guys have some carte blanche not to live in the man-box and still be cool. But they do still have to live in the Jew-box to do this. New Yorkers get a plus; material ambition, plus; social conscience, plus; nose, hair, speech of the proper type, all plusses.
And Jewish women are never gonna get equal time. Forget it. You find smart sexy funny ones like (say) Jessi Klein and then bam!, off the radar. They vanish! The culture doesn’t want to hear about them unless they push the stereotype button. That’s why Sarah Silverman (who is sexy as hell but lives in the Jew-box while sorta-kinda making fun of it) is so popular.
I’m a christian woman dating a Jewish man…typical Jewish man..big heart..love and respect him so much…but still trying to understand how he thinks. Works too much..very scheduled…very sexual…idk…any advice?