Embrace Life 1/24/24
It's been a minute since my last blog; ok, nearly a month, but I haven't been quiet. Tikkun Now has been churning out content for global media outlets in an attempt to temper the antisemitic vitriol in our news. If we have overlapping missions and you need content, contact me! For those who have previously asked, yes, please forward this blog to anyone. And for my media followers, while I appreciate your appreciation for my words, let's please remember to cite Tikkun Now…especially before you read it nearly verbatim on the news, FZ. We've heard enough about plagiarism this past month to last us a lifetime.
Tikkun Now has also partnered with over a dozen global Holocaust Museums to update their content. I spent three years working on a thesis and I want to do something meaningful with it! Long before October 7th, my question was simple: if we expanded the Holocaust Museum narrative to include Sephardic and Mizrahi stories, could we broaden people’s understanding of what it means to be a Jew? Could this understanding reinforce ties with historical allies while forging bonds with new communities? And could this better understanding of Jewish diversity help curb growing Antisemitism? And while it might seem early to memorialize October 7th, know that it only took three years after the end of WWII for formal Holocaust memorialization to occur. The discussions are well underway, but who knows what that experience will look like? One thing seems certain: it won’t be located in one of the Kibbutzim. People want to return to their homes, or the site of their former homes, and rebuild. Such is the strength of the Sabra.
I tell this story of my family's latest brush with antisemitism because I am immensely proud of my daughter’s composure and decision-making. As for the incident, it’s not related to my latest social media nastygram, or the Amazon driver who takes delivery pictures giving the middle finger to the Israel Flag on my balcony, but an incident with a rogue middle school referee who targeted my daughter Evie. She plays on the JV basketball team of her Jewish school. At the beginning of an away-game, the referee called both teams to center court and told the girls to huddle together to pray for Gaza. He knew our team was Jewish! The girls were shocked into silence. This ref said that if they didn't comply, he would make a formal complaint to their coach, report them as disrespectful and give them all a technical foul before the game started. These are 12-year-old girls. It takes a real hero to bully tweens. Without coordinating, and with a great deal of trepidation, the girls collectively took a step back out of the forced prayer circle. I am so proud of their judgment and strength.
Angered, the ref pressed further, telling them to remove their jewelry. It's a known rule, so the girls had already complied, except some girls were wearing a slim red thread on their left wrist. It's a Jewish symbol to ward off bad luck, which you wear until it falls off; you never cut it. It's religious, so the league allows it; they'd already played the entire season with it. Another ref finally intervened and told the girls to keep the bracelets. They were shell-shocked and still standing outside the tip-off circle when the ref, who didn't bother to blow the whistle, threw the ball up to start the game.
The girls channeled their frustration into a win, but the experience tarnished any sense of accomplishment. Our coach is diligent, but didn't know what transpired until after the game. The league fired the referee and apologized, but the families have created a rotating schedule of extra parent supervision for all games. It just reinforced my mantra about all things Jewish: “it’s all hands on deck.”
In the grand scheme of things, this is small potatoes. Our kids are home safe, not abused hostages in a dank tunnel for over 100 days, or celebrating their birthdays in captivity, like 1-year-old Kfir. But this feeling of being other, of being on the constant lookout, is insidious. Jews are 2% of the US population, yet we comprise 60% of the reported ethnic/religious hate crimes. Antisemitism is up nearly 400% since October 7th and that damn number will not abate. And that is just what's reported. What about the Jewish family that has their car windows beaten on by pedestrians at a red light because of a pro-Israel bumper sticker; or the Jewish mom that’s screamed at by strangers in the grocery store aisle that she supports genocide and is a "baby killer"; or the boys whose kippahs are ripped of their heads and taunted as they walk home from school? I have been added to a startling number of group chats since moving to Miami (that's a whole different issue) and the banter is surreal.
I try to avoid getting mired in negativity, but have recently found it difficult to engage in personal relationships outside of work, or even simple conversations at the dinner table. That's the insidious thing about hate: even when it operates on the periphery, it can still permeate your senses. It wages a battle against reason. But there is nothing productive about victimhood. If we don't persevere in our lives, then we have inadvertently handed Hamas another victory. My father recently quoted Rumi to me: "Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself." The real victory for humanity, not just Jews or survivors like himself, is to embrace life. Spend time with family. Continue to learn. Better your relationship with Hashem. Move towards the light, not the darkness. At 102, I think he’s earned the right to dispense advice–now, I need to do more than just listen.
Am Yisrael Chai