I think I'm getting a new embarrassing special interest

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I know by know that most of my "embarrassing special interests" aren't actually embarrassing. I just think they're weird and pointless. I think I'm starting to have a special interest related Jewish people.

That special interest kind of started because my ex boyfriend is Jewish and my dad had a Jewish uncle. My dad likes to joke around a lot that uncle. I also had an online friend who claimed to be a sixteen year old Jewish girl from NYC. She turned out to be a catfish, but that's a whole other story.

I've also been reading some weird stuff about Jewish people online. Not enough to be a special interest or obsession, but that stuff seemed to stand out to me.

Last night I had an extremely weird dream. I was in an orthodox jew store. I decided that I wanted to dress up as an orthodox jew for Halloween. I bought the clothes and the people in the store thought I was converting. I pretended to convert and I ended up converting for real. That was just a very weird dream. No idea why I end up there to begin with.

Why do you consider an interest in Jewish people to be embarrassing? Are you afraid you might offend them in some way by virtue of your "fascination"? I'm sure if I were Jewish (or any other religion for that matter), I'd be happy knowing that others took an interest in my religion, even if they didn't share it. There are worse things to be interested in (scatology; the study of animal faeces comes to mind!)

I'm mostly scared of weirding people out. Especially Jewish people. I can act pretty weird and intense. I also always get embarrassed about new special interests. I'm also prepared to do drastic and unpredictable things related to my new special interest.

I'm scared that I'll do something weird like convert to Judaism or something. Mainly because I'm spiritual but not religious right now. I have no interest in converting right now, but I might in the future.

It happened with my accordion special interest. At first I had no interest in playing or even listening to on purpose. Until my dad listened to this accordion song from some compilation CD. I thought it was catchy so I decided to listen to it on YouTube. I got kind of addicted to listening to that song so I searched for the whole album.

I eventually found it and then I had to find more albums by her. I then got more obsessed and eventually started playing. This happened in a period of three years. I think this Jew special interest started sometime during the summer. I'm not entirely sure my special interests take a long time to develop.

I have become obsessed with figuring out ways with almost no expensive tech other than trash you could safely deal with an ebola patient at home.

I think if my wife sees me again with used grocery bags over my arms and rubber bands she is gonna roll her eyes.

I've known several autistic people to study the nazi history, and I've known several to be particularly interested in the Auschwitz prison camp. It's all good and well, you should never feel ashamed to have a hobby you're passionate enough to learn more about it.

Yeah. I went through a phase like that, trying to figure out how the Third Reich had happened and why people let it happen. I wasn't very fun to be around during that time, needless to say.

Judaism is my mom's special interest. She's probably an Aspie, but she's also in total denial. She's a Christian, but she follows all the dietary laws and takes Saturdays off, among other things, and is pretty well fascinated by Israel and the Jewish religion. So, you're not the only one. At least you have the insight to know you're an Aspie and that other people aren't as interested in it as you are. My mom seems to believe that there's something wrong with anyone who doesn't share her fascination.

About ten years ago, an actor became my favorite actor at the time, and he happens to be Jewish. Well, because I had a huge crush on him, I became interested in the Jewish culture and history also. When you have feelings for someone, it often happens that you start to have "feelings" for things associated with them, such as where they were born, if they have a favorite sport one might suddenly start getting interested in learning more about the sport they love, etc. It's something that can sometimes happen.

So I felt a kind of affection for and interest in Jewish people and their culture and history. I know that sounds like it could be terribly patronizing, and I get where your coming from in worrying about that too. But when it's coming from a place of genuine care and interest and willingness to learn, I don't think there's anything wrong or patronizing in it.

If anything, being inspired to take an interest in something outside of one's own ken, and to learn all about it, is usually only ever a really really good thing, as it's fabulous to never stop learning, never stop being curious, never stop taking an interest in cultures and people and the history of human civilization; in how other people live if they are not your particular group, etc. Learning, curiosity, and the feelings of interest and even of affection for a culture, a grouping of people, etc that you didn't know as much about before, can never really be a bad thing when done in a spirit of true caring and joy in understanding (rather than a wish to destroy, infiltrate or condemn of course).

I'm Jewish (my mother's Jewish and my father's Catholic).

I'm glad you're getting into Jewish history and culture.

You'll learn lots about human endurance.

Again, I like your Flight Patterns, Birdie!

I had an obsession (as opposed to special interest, which for me is like the difference between infatuation and love).

I wasn't embarrassed by it when I had the obsession, but I am now, because I think it's weird to get that into a culture not my own, and knowing that it was likely just an aspie obsession, and not down to actual spirituality makes me feel bad about myself for how far I was willing to go. In my teens I thought I wanted to convert to Judaism.
It started with me getting interested in Holocaust at 11 because we learned about it in school, then at 12 I began to think about the meaning of life and seeking answers. Despite having been an atheist all my life I looked into different religions and became obsessed with Judaism, and in so doing also became obsessed with Holocaust, how and why it happened, the psychology behind it.

The latter is still an interest in the way that things like The Third Wave and similar are the kind of movies and books that impact me outside of my fave genres (horror, fantasy, sci fi).


Another embarrassing thing I had an obsession on once was adoptions (especially international ones) and how adoptees, adopters and the adoptive family's biological children viewed it. The good thing that came out of it was that I learned more about the different views which means I am better equipped to react right if someone brings it up at some point. Knowing better how to deal with people is always a good thing in my book.
Still, it was a really weird thing to be obsessed with, seeing as it doesn't have any bearing on my life at all. This is the only place I would even admit it.

I think, if I got into Chelonian culture, that it wouldn't be embarrassing in the least.

Hah, thanks kraftie!

And wow, one Jewish parent and one Catholic parent -- as the stand-up comics say, "A double dose of guilting!"

Yep...the guilt was spread out evenly

I've given up being embarrased a long time ago. If people think my interests are weird, let them.

I'm interested in that, too. However, people always think I'm racist and agree with them and stuff. But I'm only trying to learn.

As for being interested in other religlions, I've always been interested in Islam and Christian Orthodoxy. However that does not mean that I will ever convert. I would never leave Catholicism for anything.

We had a thread about incongruous special interests here on WP a couple years ago.

One person said that they had a fascination with the Popes- and the whole history of the Papacy even though the poster said he is "Jewish".

Another WP'er said that he "loved fossils, and studying evolution" even though he is a Fundie who "didn't believe in evolution".

So there are people like you, and some even worse off than you, with the odd interests that pick them.

Being obsessed with say: China, or Ancient Egypt, (distant in time and or in place) does seem to be more socially acceptable than to become obsessed with the culture of some your neighbors (for some odd reason).

Being into Judaism as an object of interests is not something that you need to advertise to everyone you know 24/7. So you don't need to offend individuals with it. And actually -I'm not sure how folks would be offended anyway.

As long as you dont do visibly odd things- like a girl I heard about who actually was ethnicially Jewish but suddenly got more intense about Judaism than her family -but would do odd half-assed things like go around wearing a Yarmulke (when only men are supposed to wear Yarmulkes) that made her look stupid.

Last edited by naturalplastic on 27 Oct 2014, 12:50 pm, edited 1 time in total.

As long as no harm is done (or proposed), what harm is there in pursuing any Special Interest?