I’ve experienced antisemitism at the SRJC, from another student, and a teacher, and witnessed swastika shaped “art” pieces on display in the main SRJC library. (I’ve also experienced a kind of self-hating ?jewish? teacher who would shriek to anyone listening, that zionists have seized control of campuses around the country.)

There is a serious problem in America, with antisemitism, and in our community as well.

Yes, institutional traditional overt antisemitism is not an official policy anymore (but quotas still exist, in the admission policies that rewards minorities but excludes majorities — but classify jews as part of the excluded, unfavored majority (really, this is ridiculous, admission should be merit based)).

However, outside of our sick public higher education system, racism is alive and well, and I’d argue that its undercurrents drive much of the political extremism in our community, as well. I find the *officially sanctioned* and allowed lawlessness and threats of the Occupy movement to be very scary, and see them as very easily morphing into a group that smashes the windows of Jewish business, just like mobs did in Nazi Germany. In fact, antisemitism is a well recorded problem in some of these these huge mob gatherings.

I happened upon your post while doing research for a young adult novel I am writing, and I have to disagree with your notion that contemporary anti-semitism is a “benign form of prejudice.” Perhaps it is different in the South, where I live, but the incidents that my children, my husband, and others have experienced just in the last few years, have been far from harmless. When a seven-year-old is told that “being Jewish is stupid” or a 7th grader is called a “Jew-fag,” there is harm done. Though not sanctioned by any body of authority, or causing physical harm, or a loss of income, this type of anti-semitism degrades, scars, and chips away at the human spirit.

In my years as an educator, I have seen, heard, and felt the sting of anti-semitism. Just last week, one of my colleagues asked me to speak to one of her students. They had just started reading Livia Bitton Jackson’s Holocaust memoir, I Have Lived a Thousand Years, when one student threw his book on the floor and put his head down. When she asked him to bring her the book, he picked it up between his thumb and index finger, holding it at a distance. She asked what was wrong with the book, and he replied, “It reeks of Jews.”
Would you consider this a “benign” act?
His comment “reeks” of poison–the kind that can spread and lead to other acts that might not be so benign.

Sincerely,
Randi S.

Thanks for your thoughtful response. It has been very interesting to hear and read folks response to this blog. After hearing so many people question the degree to which anti-semitism is no longer a serious issue in America, I am beginning to wonder if my comments were/are off the mark. I do think that in many college campuses the anti-Israel activity morphs into anti-semitism with little or no response from University officials. A number of other people have told me some pretty hard stories causing me to question whether anti-semitism is more of a problem in the States than I thought.

Thank you for your thoughtful article on anti-semitism (it pains me to dignify the word with capital letters, so I try not to.)

I feel that Jewish people in America have become too complacent and far too comfortable. It makes me think of the stories my Mother-in-Law would tell me (she and her family escaped Nazi Germany). She would tell how people would say to her father, who by the way, fought in the German Cavalry in WW1, “Erich, why are you taking Elsa and the children so far away, we’re Germans and this will all be over by the spring.” (We all know how that idea turned out.)

I think the acceptance, that we, as Jews in America, have experienced have led us to be less than cautious. I know I sound paranoid but I grew up in an era where there was still overt anti-semitism, and though on the surface things seem to be “hunky-dory”, I believe that ,unfortunately, anti-semitism is still very much with us – particularly in the face of all the economic unrest.

Sincerely,

Ellen Samuel

I grew up in a home where there were no Jewish connections except for celebrating Hanukah. We didn’t light Shabbat candles nor participate in a Pesach seder. My parents did not join a synagogue until I was in the 7th grade. Even then, our family practice did not change. While we did not mix milk with meat (some vestige of my mother’s own upbringing stayed with her), we ate everything else.

It was while dating my first husband, who grew up in a Modern Orthodox household and whose father was a rabbi, that I first experienced kashrut. It was only with mild curiosity that I noticed what we ate or did not eat when we were at his house. However, when we got married and stayed in the same community, we decided it was important for his parents to be able to eat in our home, so we started keeping kosher.

It made sense to me from the beginning and I took to it like a duck to water. I proudly told everyone we kept kosher and defended the decision against my parents’ comments. I kept the 4 sets of dishes and 4 sets of silverware separate from each other (everyday meat, everyday milk, Passover meat, Passover milk). I knew that anyone could eat in our home, and they did.

After my divorce from my first husband, my mother asked me if I was going to continue keeping kosher. “After all”, she said, “it doesn’t matter anymore. Who will care?” My oldest children were 9 and 6 at the time. I told my mom that this is what they knew and that it was important to me to continue the way we had been living.

Fortunately, my second husband agreed that kashrut was important, although he did not previously keep kosher. We continue to this day to separate milk and meat, abstain from anything that is not kosher and carefully read labels. It doesn’t matter to me that we are in the minority among the Jews here in Sonoma County as it is something I passionately believe in.

I’d be glad to teach anyone about kashrut!