My fellow white Jews: We cant sit this one out. – Forward
Posted By admin on June 22, 2020
I want to speak to my fellow white-skinned Jews. You may be among the majority of us who are generally liberal and definitely do not think of yourself as racist. You may be more politically conservative and feel ambivalent about where racial equity fits in your political identity. Or you may be a single-issue voter around Zionist causes and feel this is not your fight.
Please understand, though: White Jews cannot sit this one out.
This moment of racial reckoning has directly to do with us with both our Jewishness and also with our whiteness.
In the past, Ive had a hard time checking white on forms requesting my race because I am Jewish, and in our history, white were the people who oppressed mine. But I also know that I get to pass as white on streets, in schools, and in business. We must reckon with that privilege and how it affects our lives and the lives of others.
Our history of suffering cannot be an excuse now. And its not just our Jewish empathy with oppression that should move us to action; its also our whiteness.
Here are some steps that have helped me try to take account of my white privilege and its interplay with anti-Semitism and Jewish identity. I humbly offer them to you and hope they may be helpful.
Put aside notions that you have to become an expert on policy and historical facts or march in the right protest. Some of us are able to do this and more but for many, this is not feasible, or leaves us feeling paralyzed by what we must eventually admit we do not know.
Start by confronting whiteness and how it operates in your congregation or community. Do the stock photos in your publicity feature exclusively white faces? Do your adult-education classes focus solely on a Euro-centric, Ashkenazi culture? Does your Hebrew school curriculum feature a significant exploration of Sephardi, Mizrahi and other Jewish histories and religious experiences?
Does your library feature authors and faces of color? Does your nursery school have dolls and toys of a variety of complexions?
If one of your responses, even inside your own head, is Well, we are trying to pick things that look Jewish, interrogate your assumption that Jews are white. Jews look like everyone.
Whether we are Ashkenazi, Sephardi, Mizrahi; European, North African, Southeast Asian, Ethiopian, Chinese, Yemenite, Caribbean, Persian, mixed-race; Jew-by-choice or Jew-by-birth; we are a multiracial people.
If you are upset by stereotypical portrayals of Jews in culture and media, let that extend to critiquing the portrayal of Jews as exclusively white whether by non-Jews or within our own communities. When you ask that Jewish diversity be respected, include skin color and ethnic heritage. Its inconsistent at best to say Jews arent white! when accused of white privilege and simultaneously deny the centrality of Jews of Color in the Jewish story.
If you are a white-skinned Jew, you know the ways your community, and likely your own family, assimilated after arriving in North America: name changes, hair straightening, nose jobs, dieting away those peasant hips, elocution lessons.
But it was not just assimilating to fit into America or Canada. Every act of assimilation white Jews have done has been to become more white because white meant belonging, protection, access, success, and acceptability.
And it still does. That is white supremacy at work; weve internalized that white equals desirable and have mostly succeeded over the generations to become white. Our non-white or less-white or less-passing fellow Jews cant. Sit with this.
White Jews are not ignorant of oppression. Our people have been refused work and entrance to restaurants, universities, hospitals, clubs and whole towns for being Jewish. We have been beaten and shot and burned and made into soap for being Jewish. And we have been slaughtered while praying in our synagogues.
But right now, in this moment, white Jews arent followed in stores, systematically purged from voting rolls, assumed to be janitors, murdered by the police while sleeping in our beds or by vigilantes while jogging in our neighborhoods. Thats what we mean by white privilege: the way were visually categorized in a split second by the power structures of our society.
You can be Jewish and the child of Holocaust survivors and still benefit from white privilege a privilege that accrues to you whether youve chosen it or not. White-skinned Jews are now visually classed as white almost all the time. Somewhere in us a voice protests, How can you say that I and the people who murdered my people are the same!? But in a society that values white skin above all other skin, this is indeed the case.
White supremacy is founded on anti-Semitism. Recall that in Charlottesville, they chanted, Jews will not replace us.
In white-supremacist and white-nationalist ideology, the success of non-white-led movements for equality is attributed to Jews. They believe we are the chaos-agents who have spawned all efforts to tear down the white way of life. Jews are seen as sneaky interlocutors seeding the race war and inciting black, Indigenous, and other people of color to rebel against white control. (Consider as a mild example the recurring conspiracy theory that George Soros, a white Jew and Holocaust survivor, is paying protestors by busloads.)
Black and Jew are uttered in one breath by white supremacists. This is essential to understanding our linked history and our place in it right now.
A common Jewish response to emergencies is to try to direct the action for the outcome we want. This has historically served us well, as we couldnt really rely on anyone else to ensure an outcome that protected us. This is why when we arrived in a country or city, historically, we erected entire parallel civil society institutions; we take care of our own because we dont trust anyone else to do it for us.
In this case, though, white-skinned Jews are absolutely not the center of this fight. We need to step back, to listen more than we direct, to amplify the voices of black, Indigenous, and other people of color, and especially in our own communities the voices of Jews of Color. We need to educate ourselves about how white privilege operates, and not impose on people of color to explain it to us.
But just because we are not the center doesnt mean its not our fight. We must, however imperfectly, find our way by understanding how we both benefit from and are damaged by white supremacy and anti-black racism, by taking a hard look at ourselves and our history, and by finding our own individual role to take one more step towards justice.
Rabbi Julia Appel lives in Toronto and is the founder of Bina Community Circles. She leads progressive training workshops about anti-Semitism for universities and Jewish community organizations, and is grateful to her many teachers about equity and anti-Semitism, including Yavilah McCoy, Cherie Brown, Eric Ward, and the Facing History and Ourselves team.
The views and opinions expressed in this article are the authors own and do not necessarily reflect those of the Forward.
My fellow white Jews: We cant sit this one out.
Go here to read the rest:
My fellow white Jews: We cant sit this one out. - Forward
- Is There a Jewish Link to Cancer? - Atlanta Jewish Times - January 18th, 2021
- Early elections increase indicators of an existential threat to Israel - Middle East Monitor - January 18th, 2021
- For the first time, a Jew of color will lead pathbreaking diversity group Be'chol Lashon - JTA News - Jewish Telegraphic Agency - January 18th, 2021
- For the first time, a Jew of color will lead Jewish diversity org Be'chol Lashon - The Jewish News of Northern California - January 18th, 2021
- Being a Black Jewish woman in America on Jan. 6 - The Jewish News of Northern California - January 18th, 2021
- New South Philly Shop Pays Homage to Traditional Jewish 'Appetizing Stores,' Features Artisanal Smoked Fish - Jewish Exponent - January 18th, 2021
- Is a Jew Allowed to Eat Synthetic Meat & Then Drink a Dairy Coffee? - Yeshiva World News - January 18th, 2021
- Beyond Chopped Liver Cookbook Gives Jewish Food a Healthy Makeover - jewishboston.com - January 18th, 2021
- Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi will not run in Gantz's party - Haaretz.com - December 30th, 2020
- MK Cotler-Wunsh quits Blue and White, says shes committed to continue serving - The Times of Israel - December 30th, 2020
- TV report: Gantz, Ashkenazi considering departing politics - The Times of Israel - December 29th, 2020
- Common and rare variant prediction and penetrance of IBD in a large, multi-ethnic, health system-based biobank cohort - DocWire News - December 29th, 2020
- Thoughts on the attack on North Shore Hebrew Academys website - The Jewish Standard - December 23rd, 2020
- How can Israels left-wing parties win more Mizrahi votes? - The Jerusalem Post - December 23rd, 2020
- What will Israel's next government look like? It depends on us! - The Jerusalem Post - December 23rd, 2020
- Jon Ossoffs Letter to the Jewish Community - Atlanta Jewish Times - December 23rd, 2020
- Jews of color exist and heres why it matters - The Jerusalem Post - December 23rd, 2020
- Is Pakistan seeking to normalise ties with Israel? Here`s what new report says - Zee News - December 23rd, 2020
- 'Esau' Puts New Twist on Biblical Brotherhood - Jewish Exponent - December 23rd, 2020
- Treasures of Judaica From the Sassoon Family Collection - The Wall Street Journal - December 12th, 2020
- TV chef brings Mexican latkes and jalapeno matzah ball soup north of border - The Times of Israel - December 12th, 2020
- What are the ties that unite Spain and Israel? - opinion - The Jerusalem Post - December 12th, 2020
- Rapid and ongoing evolution of repetitive sequence structures in human centromeres - Science Advances - December 12th, 2020
- Morocco agrees to normalize ties with Israel in exchange for U.S. recognition of Western Sahara sovereignty - Haaretz - December 11th, 2020
- Ehud Olmert to 'Post': Women need to take on leadership roles in Israel - The Jerusalem Post - December 11th, 2020
- Author Joseph A. Levy's new book Forbidden Love is a moving story about love, friendship, and family for two New York professionals from different... - December 11th, 2020
- Israeli, Jordanian foreign ministers meet, with plenty of issues on their agenda - Al-Monitor - December 11th, 2020
- Ashkenazi: Netanyahu didn't mention budget once in his remarks - The Times of Israel - December 5th, 2020
- What Does the Jewish Last Name Epstein Mean? - Chabad.org - December 5th, 2020
- Films From a Vanished World - The Wall Street Journal - December 5th, 2020
- Israel and Jordan aim to thaw relations with secret meeting - Axios - December 4th, 2020
- Chanukah Foods From Around the World - Jewish Exponent - December 4th, 2020
- Bahrain minister to visit Israel, meet Netanyahu, Ashkenazi - The Times of Israel - December 4th, 2020
- Looking to the future from Izmirs glorious Jewish past - The Jerusalem Post - December 4th, 2020
- It's time to end the farce of this government - The Jerusalem Post - December 4th, 2020
- Fear of peace - Daily Pioneer - December 4th, 2020
- Becky with the good hair: Colorism and power in the Jewish community - Campus Times - November 17th, 2020
- Israel's Netanyahu Scared Fellow Countrymen Will "Misbehave" in the United Arab Emirates - Paddle Your Own Kanoo - November 17th, 2020
- Israeli FM: Biden Will Sign Amended Nuclear Deal with Iran and We Must Be Involved - The Jewish Press - JewishPress.com - November 17th, 2020
- Researchers Suggest Breast Cancer Screening in Black Women be Initiated by Age 40 - Cancer Network - November 17th, 2020
- Malawi to be first African nation to open embassy in Jerusalem - Cleveland Jewish News - November 5th, 2020
- Malawi to be first African state with embassy in Jerusalem - The Jerusalem Post - November 5th, 2020
- Will a possible Biden win have an influence on EU-Israel relations ? - European Jewish Press - November 5th, 2020
- Great non-fiction on tap at upcoming Arts, Books & Culture Festival - Jewish Community Voice - November 5th, 2020
- Rabbis volunteering in Philadelphia encounter the unexpected: Peace and optimism - The Times of Israel - November 5th, 2020
- Comprehensive Genomic Analysis in Some Patients With Breast Cancer Reveals Rare, Pathogenic TP53 Variant in Families of Ashkenazi Jewish Descent -... - October 25th, 2020
- Spiced, stuffed, and skinless Jewish sausages - The Jewish Star - October 25th, 2020
- Jewish Organization Sharsheret Helps Women with Breast and Ovarian Cancer During Pandemic - Jewish Journal - October 25th, 2020
- Why Israel's anti-Netanyahu protests will not change the system - Middle East Eye - October 25th, 2020
- Cleopatra's Golden Rule - or, she who has the gold, makes the rules - Neos Kosmos - October 20th, 2020
- Maybe its true Israels Jews are incapable of sovereignty - Haaretz.com - October 20th, 2020
- In an Ashkenazi world, I'm struggling to connect to my Bukharian heritage - Cleveland Jewish News - October 18th, 2020
- Shtetl-inspired sweatshirts are creating controversy online but is shtreetwear really beyond the pale? - Forward - October 18th, 2020
- Redefining the Diaspora: The Jews of Latin America and Beyond - jewishboston.com - October 18th, 2020
- Vegetarian cholent and kishke with a side of Shabbat mysticism J. - The Jewish News of Northern California - October 18th, 2020
- Talking to Your Kids About Breast Cancer - Dan's Papers - October 18th, 2020
- HBO Max Swoops On Global Rights To Israels Most Expensive TV Series Valley Of Tears In Deal With WestEnd - Deadline - October 18th, 2020
- Is this the end of the Chief Rabbinate in Israel? - The Jerusalem Post - October 14th, 2020
- Germany would share Europe-only COVID vaccine with Israel, citing special relationship - Forward - October 14th, 2020
- Its not Gal Gadots ethnicity that's the problem - TRT World - October 14th, 2020
- Blue and White finally see red over cynical Netanyahu - Arab News - October 14th, 2020
- Israel's pact with the UAE is not about peace. It's a business deal - The Guardian - October 14th, 2020
- New exhibit in Germany highlights the Rhine's medieval Jewish history - The Jerusalem Post - October 14th, 2020
- Prince Andrew portrayed as a scarecrow but the reason for it isn't Timur Kulibayev and Goga Ashkenazi connection - EconomicInform - October 14th, 2020
- Gantz and Ashkenazi the former IDF chiefs who are politically AWOL - The Jerusalem Post - October 4th, 2020
- Pandemic Temporarily Silences Violins That Survived the Holocaust - Smithsonian Magazine - October 4th, 2020
- We dont know if rotation will happen says FM amid political tension - The Jerusalem Post - October 4th, 2020
- The Holocaust-Surviving Violins That Were Quarantined Beneath a California Stage - Atlas Obscura - October 4th, 2020
- 'The Chicken Soup Manifesto' features hundreds of recipes from around the world - Jewish Telegraphic Agency - October 4th, 2020
- Iran busts sanctions by using other nations to get WMD - German intel - The Jerusalem Post - October 4th, 2020
- Realizing his party is on verge of collapse, Gantz resorts to diversion tactic - Haaretz.com - October 4th, 2020
- Awaiting a Return to Israel, Hand in Hand - The New York Times - September 29th, 2020
- EGRMC: Breast Cancer Screenings Should Not Be Delayed Due to COVID-19 - All On Georgia - September 29th, 2020
- Jewish penicillin: This soup is the cure for what ails you - Gaston Gazette - September 29th, 2020
- Cancer 'previvor' Ali Rogin sets out to fill in the gaps for other women - Jewish Insider - September 29th, 2020
- Why are Haredim hated and envied? - Haaretz.com - September 29th, 2020
- Bruno Mars: Everything you need to know - Free Radio - September 29th, 2020
- Victor Center for the Prevention of Jewish Genetic Diseases Now Serving New York, New Jersey and Maryland - PRNewswire - September 23rd, 2020
- Likud, Blue and White spar over protests as infection soars - The Jerusalem Post - September 23rd, 2020
- FM Ashkenazi hails US declaration that UN sanctions on Iran in force - The Times of Israel - September 23rd, 2020
Comments