With so much cross-gentrification and intermarriage going on everywhere, it’s hard to tell who’s Jewish and who isn’t just by looking. Sure, there’s the obvious curly head of hair commonly known as the “Jew-fro” or the stereotypical big nose (not so tenderly referred as the “Jew-nose”). Today, the most unobvious people you think aren’t Jews, end up being Jews. Conversely, it’s the ones you’re absolutely, positive have zero Jewish blood in them turn out to be Jews in the flesh – or in the case of males, right down to their missing piece of flesh called foreskin.

More so today than ever, there are Asian-looking members of the tribe, black ones, Sephardic mixed with Ashkenazi type mulattos, you name it, they just might be a Jew. As it seems, we’re as diverse and colorful a religion as Christianity but alas, Jewish underneath.

Much in the way a truly devout Catholic would want to marry a Catholic or an Arab would want to marry another Arab, it’s not a completely unheard of concept for a Jew (like myself) to want to wed another Jew. Like the saying goes, “birds of a feather, stick together.” Now, far be it for me to deduce a reason as to why “birds of a feather stick together”. Let’s face it – everyone has their own explanation for why religion is important to them. Personally, for me it’s about being guaranteed a circumcised penis, someone who recognizes why a glass of milk alongside an Angus steak is a no-no and finding someone who speaks enough basic Yiddish to make me laugh. But I digress. It’s not just about me here.

When any Jew (like myself) signs up to meet a mate on JDate, they should expect to meet another Jew, right? Clearly, this is the same line of reasoning followed by a black person who posts their profile on Blackplanet.com – they’re out looking for some African American love. It’s a pretty straight forward anticipation that should be a sanction, really. Given the fact that enlisting in any particular dating service involves forking over cash, this precise transaction is done under the auspice that the type of person one is looking for has been filtered down. Otherwise, for me, if dating were a free-for-all, why wouldn’t I just go out and meet any old random non-Jews at the bar or laundromat or wherever?

The real kicker is this: there are so many free dating websites out there like PlentyOfFish or OkCupid and so forth. If I wanted to meet just anyone, religion aside, I’d be all over that free shit – after all, I am a Jew. But in order to find a Jew to love and marry, I had to pay for it. Therefore, after paying for it, I plan to date, meet and marry another Jew, no question about it.

So when “Chris” portrayed himself on JDate as a “reform” Jew who “never practices”, I thought to myself, “Hey, I prefer a guy with somewhat of a bigger attachment to Jewish practices and at the very least, someone who observes the high holidays but maybe if he were around someone like me, he’d find a reason to get into Judaism a little more.”

This theory of mine would work splendidly if “Chris” were in fact a Jew, but no. As the first five letters of his name indicate, “Chris” is Christian. He’s a “liberal Christian” as he explained to me on our web chat and he’s “someone who doesn’t really care about religion all that much.”

Naturally my question to him was this: “If you don’t care about religion, then why did you pay and sign up for a Jewish dating site?” His answer: “I like Jewish girls. I always have.”

What is it about Jewish girls that “Chris” likes so much? He says he doesn’t know and quite frankly, his unknowingness has me stumped because I haven’t been able to figure it out either.

I asked a good female friend of mine why she thinks a non-Jew would fancy a Jew in particular. She said to me, “Don’t take this the wrong way but I find Jewish men have more drive and ambition than non-Jews. And they tend to make more money.” How could I take this the wrong way when I’ve heard it my entire life? It’s a fairly well-known stereotype but it still didn’t answer my question. Why would a young, non-Jewish guy “really like” a Jewish girl?

I get the whole male stereotype of “rich Jew” from the female perspective but for the life of me, I can’t understand why “Chris loves Jewish girls”. The only stereotypes of Jewish girls I’ve ever heard people use are “JAPS” as in “Jewish American Princesses” who are “high maintenance” and inconsolable “whiners”.

I asked “Chris” if he would ever consider converting to Judaism to which he replied, “No way. I love Christmas too much.” That’s when I had to end the conversation. If the only reason “Chris” sticks to Christianity is because “Christmas rocks” and the only reason he wants to go out with Jewish girls is because he “likes them for no reason”, I was wasting time and he was wasting everyone’s time on the site. I told him this and I even wished him luck. And what did “Chris” do? He called me a “stupid bitch”. I asked him if he thought that’s something Jesus would have done or said and he exited our little chat bubble conversation thingy right then.

And I didn’t feel bad one bit for probing “Chris” with questions. Why? Because I wanted him to realize it’s waste of time to try to make a “square peg fit in a round hole” as the age-old saying goes.

It’s like this: When I go to the supermarket to buy skim milk, I don’t want 2% or homo. I want skim milk. I don’t want a 2% carton that wishes it were skim yet would never undergo the fat-to-skimming process. Likewise, I’m not into homo milk that was once 2% and now wants to become skim. I want skim milk pure and simple without any complication. I figure, if my life is here in America and day-to-day, I can’t live in the Holy Land aka the “land of milk and honey”, then at the very least, I just want my milk the way I like it. Is that too much to ask?

Given the billions of people living in this world, each with his or her own kind of preference, it’s not absurd that I have my own desire to marry a Jew. As such, I totally respect and highly value everyone else on Earth’s preferences in selecting their life mates too. Now that all is said and done, I wish everyone a little mazel (“luck”) on the way to finding true love.

Still, I wonder… Is it really all that unreasonable for me to expect to meet a Jew on JDate?