#intra-jewish racism

[the-garbanzo-annex-jr]

By ZACH KESSEL

One recent college graduate, alongside her former professor, has created a documentary series aimed at educating people past the flashy signs and catchy slogans one might see and hear at an anti-Israel rally, toward a full understanding of what Zionism and anti-Zionism really mean. That series, “Zionism and Anti-Zionism: The History of Two Opposing Ideas” by Zoé Tara Zeigherman, had its Washington, D.C., premiere Thursday night. 

The series, a five-episode look at the varieties of both its titular subjects, covers Jewish history and the development of Zionism, the intra-Jewish debates that occurred before Israel’s founding in 1948, and various strains of anti-Zionism from post-1948 Arab opposition to Israel to Soviet propaganda.

Zeigherman, alongside her former Georgetown University professor (and former member of Israel’s Knesset) Einat Wilf, began formulating the idea for the series in 2022, well before anti-Zionism and antisemitism shot to the fore of public debate following the October 7 Hamas attack. Zeigherman thinks the problem was always there, but now that college campuses are under a microscope, the documentary series is even more relevant.

“I think that what a lot of Jews have experienced since October 7 is kind of waking up to this feeling that something is seriously wrong; seeing protests on October 8, they’ve been feeling that something is mobilizing against Jews, and they don’t really understand what’s happening.” Zeigherman told National Review. “I had that feeling in the Black Lives Matter protest era when antisemitism was erupting online and I couldn’t understand where it was coming from.”

“If it can just help one young Jew the way Einat’s course helped me, that’s enough,” she told NR. “But I would really like to see it be part of something bigger, where Jews aren’t afraid to be Jews anymore — where we stand taller and prouder and go on offense as opposed to constantly defending ourselves and apologizing.”

Zeigherman initially came up with the idea for the series during her time as a Beren Summer Fellow with the Tikvah Fund, a nonprofit organization that promotes Jewish leaders and ideas, in 2022. While a fellow, she worked with individuals both inside and outside the Tikvah Fund to determine how to bring her vision to life.

[unbidden-yidden-deactivated20240]

I have a bunch of thoughts related to your recent post on lefty antisemitism, but I don't want to dump a big long thing in your inbox - let me know if you want me to send it, other than that just know you're not alone trying to wade through the messiness of it all.

I know leftist antisemitism is alive and well, I know Jewish perspectives/experiences/identities are not valued, and I know there’s a load of misinformation out there when it comes to the conflict (though honestly, I don’t trust info from any side because everything is propaganda at this point). But I listened to a podcast episode (Joyous Justice - a Jewish racial justice podcast hosted by a Black & Cherokee Jew) that was a bit of a gentle kick in the pants.

To summarize some of the key thoughts: There is antisemitism in lefty spaces because there is antisemitism EVERYWHERE - and racism, sexism, transphobia, classism, ableism, and the like. Leftists are not immune to these things. And so when someone like me says “well I’m not going to engage with some progressive cause because I’m bothered by the antisemitism” it’s like, anyone else of another marginalized identity could have the same excuse for not participating because they will inevitably run into someone who is being shitty about their identity. It’s good that we have ways to process these harmful experiences, and we should try to hold people accountable, but it’s not a good idea for our self-defensiveness to stop us completely from engaging.

I’m not solidly feeling any of this right now, but I am trying to sit with it in the discomfort.

Hi there,

Look, I definitely see where you're coming from and where this podcaster was coming from at least in theory, but I don't agree.

Leftists absolutely have all the same problems any other group has, and obviously we all have to work on our biases and movements all the time to try and root these things out.

This is different and goes beyond that though, because the brand of anti-Zionism that is mainstream amongst American goyische leftist movements and individuals is deeply antisemitic as a part of the cause. Anti-Zionism as an intra-Jewish discussion need not be [internalized] antisemitism, and there are plenty of ways that one can critique specific actions of the Israeli government that are proportionate, fair, and necessary (yes, even as an outsider.)

However, calls for the literal dissolution of the entire country without a thought or care for the safety and well-being of the affected Jews or the Jewish people as a whole, combined with a deep suspicion (and frequently outright hostility) towards Jews who bring up antisemitism (especially as it pertains to rhetoric around Israel) and then adding your regular run-of-the-mill antisemitism on top, are common and accepted in leftist spaces. In short: antisemitism isn't just one unfortunate pimple amongst many other expected blemishes on the face of modern leftism - it's actually frequently taken up as one of the causes of leftism. This form of antisemitism is seen as social justice, and so arguing against it is seen not for what it is (begging for people to add even a little nuance and critically examine a belief system that leads them to call for the genocide of half the Jewish population worldwide) but rather as arguing for whatever terrible thing they want to paint Israel as this week, whether or not it's true and whether or not such a label could just as easily be applied to groups and nations that they will give a pass to.

Meanwhile, most of the goyim arguing in support* of Israel are frequently right-wing conservatives whose other views on human rights and moral progress I find rather repugnant and who frequently utilize standard conservative talking points about Israel's more strident critics to attack them on other levels. For example, I cringe basically any time I see any right-wing critique of, say, the very real antisemitism of Cori Bush or Rashida Tlaib, because I just know it's gonna be racist as hell.

(The * is because I don't honestly classify a lot of this as support for the Jews, so much as a handy vehicle for their anti-Arab racism, Islamophobia, and unfair painting of all Palestinians and/or Palestinian rights movements as terrorism. I would also be remiss if I didn't say that the same is frequently true of certain batches of leftists whose anti-Zionism is more of a handy vehicle for antisemitism than genuine, thoughtful, and helpful advocacy for Palestinians.)

But there are some conservative voices that do have genuine support for Jews and are pro-Israel in a way that is more nuanced and doesn't just use it as a tactic. And when I see that, and especially when I hold it up next to leftist comrades who would never in a million years advocate for policies that would wipe out half the world population of another minority group but will happily repeat those talking points against Jews as if it were a social justice cause, it makes me question the validity of everything else they're saying.

And so I re-run that calculus on every social issue I'm passionate about, to see if maybe I'm on the wrong side of it, and every time I conclude I'm still very much not. So then I go back to the drawing board and reconsider Jewish history, identity, and peoplehood, and the conclusions I've come to about Zionism from those things, only to return to the same position I was in before. I've heard the arguments. I've actively sought out and considered the other side on this issue, hoping to understand something new, and each new source I read solidifies my opinion.

So then I'm stuck with concluding that my best option is to seek out like-minded Jews and when outside allies or work is needed, just kinda go into it accepting that a significant portion of the people I'm necessarily aligning myself with for other important causes would likely leave me and mine for dead under the right circumstances, and view that as good and right and just.

And while I don't let that change my voting behavior or advocacy at a practical level, it also doesn't change the fact that it fucking hurts and that I'm morally right to be angry about it.

[ariel-seagull-wings]

Hey I got your response.

But it do want to know.

Which takes do you agree with and which ones do you disagree with?

I'm always down to get feedback and see from the perspective of another.

Mainly about the allegory aspect, I think there is more nuance about it:

Is more than just "white people want to imagine themselves as opressed" but rather, depending on who the writing team is and how the writing is done, it can be used to show that sometimes, in different periods,different groups that experience different kinds of opression can act in solidarity to one another, and other times be so insulated in their own opression that intracomunity solidarity becomes difficult and rare, which is a great tool for the opressor.

There are cases where gay people experience homophobia and are also racist and transphobic, jewish and asian people experience antisemitism and xenophobia and spout anti black racism, black people experience racism and are antisemetic and xenophobic, disabled and neurodivergent people experience capacitism that often isolates us from our POC and queer comunities and so forward.

So when well written, the mutant metaphor can be used to explore this complexity and be a call for intra comunity solidarity.

And while I understand that the X Men have potential to explore other themes besides the opression, for instance be a space opera in the Dark Phoenix Saga, or a comedy satirizing TV executives in the Mojo stories, one can't deny that it was the social commentary that put the X Men on the map: before 1975, when they were just five white american students fighting " evil mutants" that ocasionally were seen with the same level of distrust as Spider Man, they failled to avoid comparisons with the Fantastic Four and nobody cared for them.

After 1975, when the team was updated to be ethnically diverse and international, and the political commentary was put upfront, along with the epic and cosmic space opera elements, the X Men become the most relevant team of Marvel characters after the Fantastic Four.

You can't understate that aspect of those stories and characters, specially when you look at it from a non american perspective (I am a brazilian who was introduced to the X Men trough the Evolution animated show).

Before Claremont added the backstory involving the Holocaust, Magneto was seen as just another Doctor Doom wannabe!

And these are some of my takes to start, if you wanna know more of my specific toughts, feel free to ask.

@a-roguish-gambit

[professorspork]

the big 'Faunus worldbuilding in Newsbees' post

as requested by EVER SO MANY OF YOU (!!), I now embark upon a post to talk much more about the Shallow Sea Verses and about the Faunus culture and worldbuilding I did for Newsbees. I've talked about them a little bit before, and I'll try not to repeat myself too much there but there's gonna be some overlap.

I imagine when some of you asked me to say more about this, what you were hoping for was like a "here's all this great stuff I came up with for other traditions that I never got to use in the fic!" and that is--not what this post is, sorry. by virtue of the fact that this was, ultimately, a literary device very much devised to move this story forward, I didn't spend a lot of time thinking about in in ways that weren't plot-relevant. if you have prompts for, like, "how would they do/think about X" I'm delighted to give it a think, but it's not something I have just lying around.

instead I'm gonna talk about how it came about, why I did it, and what my priorities were

okay so I'm gonna take this in... I guess chronological order is the best way to make sense of it

from the outset of the fic's conception, I knew that I wanted it to be a reflection of my values. like. it's about unionizing a workforce, it's about socially-conscious community-building and class struggle and FUCK COPS. to disregard the minority oppression of the Faunus (which you'll note is something I always capitalize, for what I should think are now-obvious parallel reasons) in a world and a story like that just felt... not just insulting, but downright stupid. a missed opportunity. and I've always felt like this subject deserved much greater forethought and much better execution than canon provided, which I think can be described most charitably as "mostly serviceable" but is mealy-mouthed, inconsistent, and both-sidesy-whattaboutist at way too many points for me to feel like it merits any credit. like. if you're gonna do catgirl racism and intra-community disagreements over praxis, you gotta actually do catgirl racism and intra-community disagreements over praxis, you know?

(gee, I'm sure you're shocked Sienna is very much alive in Newsbees, wonder why that is)

ANYHOO

so that was thing one.

thing two is that this is perhaps the GREATEST ARGUMENT I HAVE for why I prefer writing everything in advance and then posting on a schedule, because I knew it was something I could then find my way into and then retcon back in, if needed, and that I therefore had the entire canvas available to paint on. and it's a good thing, too, because it saved my ass multiple times plot-wise and not just in this worldbuilding way.

to combine those two thoughts, the first time ANY of this actually came up in the drafting process was when I hit the Ilia scene in chapter 6. I knew what I wanted Blake to say to Ilia in that moment, which she absolutely couldn't say, which was: "I said the Mourner's Kaddish."

which: that's already a lot to unpack, so let's do that a bit! the first thing that drew me towards formulating my conception of Faunus culture around parallels to the diasporic Jewish experience is, of course, "write what you know." I'm not a racial or ethnic minority but I am Jewish, and so it was something I could use the 'draw from wellspring of personal knowledge and emotion' part of my brain for, rather than the 'radically and empathetically imagine the other' part of my brain. I've seen all sorts of fanon Faunus ideas where people drew on different and likely personal interpretations-- including things like the Faunus having their own language, Faunus interpolations of the Maiden myths and other Remnant lore having different values or being scaled more towards the God of Animals, Faunus having their own foods... if someone not-me had written this fic, this could have manifested in any number of ways. because the Faunus don't fit neatly into my (very American) notions of race, religion, or even X-men style "maybe we should regulate the people who have nukes for hands" minority/majority frameworks, I had the freedom to use the one that had the most personal meaning to me... and to deviate from that when it suited and felt appropriate. Neon's rightfully combative stance about Faunus mistreatment and how she reacts to it, for example, is far more aligned with the experiences of my friends and loved ones who are POC than it is anything I've personally gone through as a Jew.

so!

knowing, then, what my destination was (a Faunus cultural framework that would have specific death rites and rituals), I worked backwards from there. what makes a culture FEEL lived in is that people LIVE in it, that it relates to their everyday lives as well as its most significant moments-- what do we eat? how do we treat guests in our home? how do we handle life cycle events (birth/marriage/death)? without a country of origin, as the Faunus have none-- they made Menagerie, not the other way around-- and not wanting to go TOO explicitly religious by having there actually be some sort of dogmatic (har har DOG-matic) text about the God of Animals, I instead lit upon the idea of old poems whose metaphors have been transformed into material gifts. this felt intuitive to me probably largely because I'm Jewish (we're called the People of the Book for a reason lmao, we're all about interpretation and re-interpretation of text) but also, honestly, because the written word is WILDLY IMPORTANT in newsbees. they work at a newspaper! there's a reason the very last words of the story are Blake saying "for the record," which is a reporting pun. in hindsight, however, this is also sort of Sappho-y, which is also neat and, again, shows that ALL the ways I've experienced my own Otherness show up here.

having a text then gave me a scale of orthodoxy to work from, as in "very traditional people still recite these texts in a ceremonial way," but also a background radiation-level casual level of interaction, which is "yeah I leave shells at graves because that's what my parents taught me and I don't even really know why." this also means that all Faunus have the same sort of playbook to work from, regardless of where they're from geographically or what kind of Faunus they are.

once I had that in place, I immediately realized that whatever traditional Mourner's Verse there would be probably would feel kind of insulting re: what happened to the Amitolas, which is why I came up with the Traveler's Verse workaround. and the second I came up with that, I knew I could use it to connect Ghira and Kali back into the text at the end-- I'd been wanting to find a way to do that and hadn't come up with a method.

the first draft of that scene then promptly infodumped every thought I could possibly have about the Verses, immediately. @theseerasures teased me that it read like a Codex entry from Mass Effect, and she was 100% right-- and it totally interrupted the flow of the VERY EMOTIONAL scene with Ilia, which wouldn't do at all.

and that's where the 'writing it all before posting it' thing comes in. that infodumping then became the scene at Doc's in chapter 3. this also solved another problem I had, which was that in the VERY first draft chapters 3 and 4 were one very long chapter. I'd subsequently split them, which left chapter 3 quite short-- but at that point, the moment where Blake is upstairs getting her snack was only a brief explanatory paragraph. moving the Verses stuff back made the chapter a chapter, so it did a lot of heavy lifting for me. wanting the Verses to feel integrated, I also at that point went back and added the engraving on Tukson's door to the prologue, so that it would be seeded in from the start.

which is kind of to say that ALL WRITING IS CHEATING. we get to manipulate circumstances to best suit our needs! callbacks feel elegant and cerebral, but they're actually a very blunt and easy tool to use-- you get tons of mileage out of just establishing something and then bringing it up all the time. I'd already written the thing about Tukson being picky about book damage, and so I let that become a part of the Verses lore by saying it was a Faunus thing, and then doubled down on it with the "throwing the book at Ghira" anecdote.

as for what things mean what, the basic rule I gave for myself is that everything had to be common and easily-obtainable for a community often left impoverished and on the margins. that's why so many of them are food-based, because that's a very "even if we have nothing else, we have THIS" sort of thing. when coming up with the thing that would represent love, I lit upon honey BEFORE i realized "oh duh, lmao, bees" because... I'm an idiot, but luckily I figured it out after a bit. I was very enamored of the idea of it representing not just sweetness, but industry (as in "busy bees"), that love takes steady and determined work. the second I did think it up, the Velvet gag gift ("they're making fun of me") sprang to mind, though ironically it wasn't necessarily tied to the Mantle Bee yet, though that was also already a concept on the page.

probably the hardest thing to come up with was the NOT-honey gift for the epilogue (which ended up being nuts for growth), because I was like... is it a pen and paper for a first job? Is that too bougie? maybe a cute little desk succulent? but what would it represent?

and yeah, that's pretty much how I got there. it was a question of making something specific enough that it would feel authentic, but open-ended enough that I could make up whatever I wanted to suit the moment and have it all feel of a piece. from there, it was just about USING it-- keeping it in the back of my mind in Faunus-related scenes to see if there were ways I could weave it in somehow.

phew! okay I think that's pretty much everything. if anyone is so very enamored of the Verses that they'd like to use them for their own fics, you certainly have my permission to do so (with a link back to Newsbees for credit, please). I'm intrigued to see what you'd do with them! but also, like-- I love how multi-faceted and varied different interpretations of Faunus lore can be, and I'd love to see what y'all come up with for your own systems!

CONSIDER THE GAUNTLET THROWN. HAVE FUN OUT THERE.

<3

[tzifron]

Vision & Mission

Vision: A just peace in Israel-Palestine based on principles of equality and human rights.

Mission: To amplify the voices of Canadian Jews in support of justice in Israel-Palestine and at home.

Thematic areas

Palestine Solidarity: IJV was the first national Jewish organization to endorse the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. We continue to support and defend BDS as well as to hold Canadian organizations accountable when complicit in Israeli oppression of Palestinians.

Anti-racism and Indigenous solidarity: IJV stands in solidarity with Indigenous peoples and with all marginalized peoples in Canada against racism, settler colonialism and white supremacy. IJV also works to combat antisemitism and distinguish it clearly from critiques of Zionism and Israeli policies.

Justice-Oriented Jewish Communities: IJV believes that no one should have to choose between embracing Judaism or Jewishness and supporting Palestinian rights. IJV chapters and campus clubs organize meaningful ritual gatherings that centre justice and critical reflection.

IJV Basis of Unity

We are a group of Jews in Canada from diverse backgrounds, occupations and affiliations who share a strong commitment to social justice and universal human rights. We come together in the belief that the broad spectrum of opinion among the Jewish population of this country is not reflected by those institutions that claim to represent Jewish communities as a whole. We further believe that individuals and groups within all communities should feel free to express their views on any issue of public concern without incurring accusations of disloyalty. We have therefore resolved to promote the expression of alternative Jewish voices, particularly in respect of the grave situation in the Middle East, which threatens the future of Palestinians and Israelis as well as the stability of the whole region.

IJV Principles

We are guided by the following principles:

We affirm that human rights are universal and indivisible and should be upheld without exception.

We believe that all people living within Israel-Palestine have the right to freedom, equality, and to peaceful and secure lives.

We believe that the fight against antisemitism is undermined when principled opposition to unjust Israeli government policies and practices–including those that contravene international law–are branded as antisemitic.

We oppose all forms of racism, including antisemitism, anti-Arab racism, anti-Black racism, Islamophobia, and intra-Jewish racism, which marginalizes Jews of colour, Sephardi and Mizrahi Jews.

We stand in solidarity with the Indigenous peoples of Turtle Island (North America) in their efforts to overcome the impacts of European colonization both past and present.

We seek direction from the communities with whom we stand in solidarity and follow their leadership at every opportunity.

We strive to be inclusive, justice-seeking, democratic, and open to diverse ideas and practices.

We believe that true security requires justice and solidarity.

We hereby reclaim the tradition of Jewish support for universal freedoms, human rights and social justice. The lessons we have learned from our own history compel us to speak out.

These principles are violated when we allow an occupying power to trample the human rights of an occupied people. Palestinian inhabitants of the West Bank and Gaza, living under Israeli occupation and military blockade, face appalling living conditions, with desperately little hope for the future. At the same time, Palestinian Israelis are subjected to a range of discriminatory laws and regulations and are consequently unable to enjoy the same rights and freedoms that are enjoyed by Israeli Jews. This institutionalized discrimination has led increasing numbers of people around the world to identify Israel an apartheid state. We therefore declare our support for a properly negotiated peace between the Israeli and Palestinian people and oppose any attempt by the Israeli government to impose its own solutions on the Palestinians. Furthermore, we support full equality for Palestinian Israelis. To these ends, IJV supports the 2005 call issued by the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) National Committee for an international campaign of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions to compel the State of Israel to comply with international law and support Palestinian Israelis’ human rights by

Ending its occupation and colonization of all Arab lands and dismantling the Wall;

Recognizing the fundamental rights of the Arab-Palestinian citizens of Israel to full equality; and

Respecting, protecting and promoting the rights of Palestinian refugees to return to their homes and properties as stipulated in UN resolution 194.

[emily84]

Reposting this because I didn't want to derail OP but, and here's just a thought, I don't think this is a conversation we as outsiders can have, or have lightly.

This feels like an intra-community conversation between Jewish people (and, yes, Israeli Jews) that we can only be admitted to by explicit concession.

Just like it's not my place as a white person to police matters relating to colorism in the Black community, or to word police discussions within the trans community. I can acknowledge those issues, and talk about them, but not use them as pieces in my arguments just because I want to have the upper hand. Or convince myself my two cents about racism on X of all places can silence or "counter" words by people who are actually Black, or trans.

This is not just about weakness and ableism and if you say you disagree you're being disingenuous. This is a delicate conversation about (inter)generational trauma and survivor's guilt and a thousand other corollary issues that Jewish people have been grappling with, at length, for decades (centuries), academically, privately, publicly, in literature, in art, and within their diasporic communities and with gentiles as well. It's not new or surprising, actually. Just because it wasn't on your "bingo card" when you suddenly learned about this yesterday, it doesn't make it new or surprising.

And just because you don't like Israel or its politics, you don't take this very painful thing that concerns Jewish people everywhere, not just in Israel, and make light of it, and label it "white supremacist". I see it done all the time here in Italy. This is exactly the kind of language that makes Jewish people distrust us goyim.

[whumpster-fire]

Obligatory I-Hate-To-Give-TERF-Wizard-Series-Any-Attention-But, however in a fictional universe where the following are true:

Magic Exists

The ability to use magic is something you're born with, you need study and practice to control it and use it effectively but it's not like it's an "anyone can learn to shoot lightning bolts with dedication and intelligence, the knowledge is kept secret to control who can do magic" situation

Being able to use magic is mostly inherited

Magic users are a tiny minority of the population

The magical society being focused on arose in conditions of medieval or pre-medieval Europe which was... kind of known for its superstition and persecution / exploitation of minority groups.

I think the issue at hand is not "people would want magic solutions to their problems" it's "what are people willing to do to get magic solutions to their problems" and how ready are people to accuse magic users of "withholding help" and start a riot when they see people with magic powers having actual lives instead of devoting every waking moment to fixing their problems, by the exact thought process described in the OP (and not everyone necessarily knows shit about how magic works, the magic community may not have the resources to deal with everything, etc).

Like... I'm by no means an expert on this subject and I apologize if I'm getting this wrong, but I think most of Europe spent the last 1500 years or so going doing a vicious cycle of "Exploit Jewish people for specialized labor that is useful/necessary but the church interprets religious teachings as forbidding Christians from doing, such as charging interest for loans" -> "Get mad that Jews are earning a living by charging for their labor, accuse them of exploiting the population e.g. 'Usury' and also scapegoat them for other stuff like the economy being bad," -> "Start a pogrom." One can only imagine how medieval Europe would treat a cultural minority that actually had supernatural powers.

On the other hand because magic is mostly inheritable you could end up with shit like eugenics programs trying to breed more magic into the population, or nobles trying really really hard to force arranged marriages that introducing magic into ruling bloodlines and/or trying to restrict peasants from getting married to magic users, and straight up magocracies. Like, there are all sorts of horrible fucked up dynamics that could arise from "you're either born with magic or you're not, and only a few people have it."

I'm not going to bother confirming this but if I remember right HP does have some brief glossed-over mentions of some of this fucked up shit happening in the ancient past and the state of affairs in the novels being more or less a result of wizards going "Fuck it, enough of this shit, the only way to prevent some sort of oppressive caste system from arising is complete separation and isolation of our society" except then it led to Wizard Eugenics and Wizard Supremacist Fascism.

Where Rowling failed as an author (other than the general racism, body shaming, ableism, lazy worldbuilding, and so on) was (A): glossing over or ignoring all the compelling conflicts of "is isolationism a good idea, is it necessary, does nonmagical technology catching up to many of magic's capabilities make the 'stay isolated because otherwise people will try to exploit us or persecute us out of fear' attitude outdated or do all the technological force multipliers make secrecy even more necessary because now the normies have guns and bombs and are more effective at mass murder than a guy with a magic wand" in favor of making the plot about intra-magical-community bullshit, (B): not handling the parallels with real life oppression in a sensitive way, (C): "The magical community is secretive and isolated because people would demand magical solutions to all their problems / would try to oppress magic users out of fear" isn't an inherently bad bit of worldbuilding but Rowling then proceeded to write a shitty magic system that has very few limitations or costs that would make fixing everyone's problems not possible and made persecution from 1000 AD European Society not actually a credible threat, and (D): Let's be honest anyone who goes "The children yearn for the Upper Class British Boarding School Experience" probably just has no business trying to write a story about systematic oppression because the result will probably be horribly tone deaf.

(but also that specific character interaction is not just a guy explaining things to a child, it is specifically a guy explaining things to a child who has just been removed from an abusive household where he was feared and hated for being born with superpowers, so giving a sanitized answer that doesn't go into details that might be triggering is not necessarily bad)

tl;dr a story where there's a secret society of magic users that stays secret because people would either oppress them out of paranoia or would demand they make diseases and world hunger go away forever and then get mad and breaks out the torches and pitchforks when they're told magic doesn't work that way is not a bad premise, Hairy Potty is bad because Rowling refused to explore that premise and expected everyone to take "the secrecy is good and necessary" for granted while also writing a magic system that undermines "okay magic can't actually make world hunger go away" argument as well as the threat of persecution in the times when the Wizard Separatism supposedly became a thing.

I know I'm a bit late to saying this but frankly if I found out a secret society of magic-users were just playing nonsense sports and making up slurs for the rest of us instead of helping us out with famines or leukemia I think I'd apply for a job with my local witch hunters

[captainjimothy]

i dont recall who said it originally, but someone drew the parallels between america and cardassia, and i've been chewing on that ever since. it's so good. i made a whole new group of OCs about it and i've been giving them the horrors in my mind.

however, as a result of this, i've decided i can simply add traits to cardassian life that i am currently experiencing in my american life. so today i'm adding the food safety deregulations we got under trump, which are now resulting in millions of pounds of food recalls :) congratulations cardassia, you have a population that is regularly seriously ill and often dying for Mystery Reasons (the reasons are food poisoning) and everyone blames those damn liberals who care about food safety.

--hang on, i've had a different thought, the post is about this now. is there a jewish analogue on cardassia? (like aside from the bajorans, i mean.) is there intra-cardassian racism? the obsidian order's gotta be full of white supremacists, there's no way it's not, the whole point of the original analogy was that cardassians are nazis

obsidian agent: yeah yeah the shadowy cabal trying to overthrow the government, we've all seen it

leftist citizen: .........you mean the obsidian order?

obsidian agent: what? no no you see THAT secret network of powerful agents that go around killing and torturing ppl is GOOD. i mean there's another one. wayyyy more secret. and they're why The Order has to keep doing all of this, i mean, otherwise, you'd be totally at their mercy! you should be grateful you have us here to protect you!

leftist citizen: well, that doesn't sound right, but i don't really know enough about [the jewish analogy] or my own government to dispute it. boy i sure am glad i have you here to explain things to me, tumblr user obsidian-agent. wait, why did you say "us"

obsidian agent: don't even worry about it kitten

leftist citizen: okay <3 yayy <3

[transsexual-divine]

NO MINORS! UNDER 18 AND/OR NO BIO AGE GETS BLOCKED!

Hello! Welcome to my Pagan sideblog! I use this space primarily to keep records of my Craft and things I’m studying and/or interested in. I also use this space for devotional work and sharing my own twist on magick!

My mainblog is at @lyriuum - it is mostly for gaming! If you find a gaming blog following and liking you, but a Pagan blog reblogging you … that’s probably me!

Here is a bit about me! -

Leo ☀️ - Taurus 🌕- Aquarius 🌅

Queer (Trans Male, Bisexual, Biromantic)

Eclectic Pagan (Wiccan, Celtic, Eastern European, British, Norse - Lokean, and Indigenous practices are my influences/main areas of study and/or worship)

Adult

He/Him pronouns only

American

BYF … -

I don’t share donation posts that aren’t benefitting trans people (either as a personal fund or as an organization) and/or is helping trans people flee and seek refuge.

I don’t approve of gatekeeping areas of practice, nor do I gatekeep anyone from a practice and/or from an area of study. I don’t support this, and actively rally against this behavior in the witchcraft community.

I am proudly and openly trans, and I put that into my magick and into my Craft. I am also proud of my ancestry, and actively look for ways to add it into my life.

I am newish to Paganism! I’m still learning, but I appreciate all good-faith and good-matured advice.

DNI -

MINORS!

Bigoted individuals of all stripes. This includes transphobia, homophobia, anti-Pagan beliefs/ideas, anti-Wiccan individuals, classism, and racism.

If you don’t believe that trans genocide is real and happening, if you aren’t fully in support of transgender individuals and their campaigns for equal rights intra-and-extra the Queer community, and if you are hateful of any type of trans identity. I don’t support truscum/transmeds or the rats that call themselves “feminist.” Leave my page.

Christian, Jewish, or Islamic witchcraft and/or witches. Also, no non-Pagan/Wiccan religious blogs in general.

Anti-Wiccan people or people who are overly critical of Wicca while ignoring the same issues in their Pagan faith.

Those who gatekeep areas of practice or study … this is anti-Pagan in nature! Knowledge is key!

Sideblogs! -

@lyriuum — main blog & gaming blog!

Blessed be!

[returnofthejudai]

I unequivocally condemn Rabbi Yosef’s anti-blackness and demand his immediate resignation. We in the Jewish community, must work to stamp out racism and bigotry in our own ranks and it’s unacceptable for us to stay silent on this issue even if talking about it risks giving us negative attention. I apologize for not bringing it up sooner. 

[jewish-privilege]

To any non-Black Jews who, for whatever fakakta reason (read: it’s the anti-Black racism!), don’t believe Black Lives Matter is important and we shouldn’t or don’t need to support anti racism, this is who you’re siding with:

These are the people you’re joining. Do you think they see you as equal? Do you think they see you as someone to be respected? Do you think they see you as human? Do you think that if you hate or ignore Black people and their pain enough they’ll overlook our Jewishness and stop hating us?

You are a chillul haShem, you are a shande, and you are an embarrassment to our ancestors who struggled, survived, and who were killed for being Jews (which we still are!).

Shame on any Jew who chooses these people who would rather see us dead and eradicated over the idea that Black people must be treated with dignity and respect, should not be killed for being Black, and should be free to live without fear.

[dataanxiety]

Trifecta

Yes, she's black, Jewish, and female. And she feels VERY oppressed! In actuality, she is the winner of the grievance lottery, a trifecta, as one can infer from this excerpt that I LEGALLY reproduced here from the increasingly left-leaning (Jewish) Forward. They don't like to call themselves the Jewish Forward anymore. Kind of like the Jewish Anti-Defamation League is now the ADL and defames Jews regularly unless they are woke enough.

Note that emphasis is mine in what follows. I could have included exasperated comments, but you'll get the idea.

"Can Jews Be White?"

by Nylah Burton, July 02, 2018

A couple of nights ago, I was walking to my apartment in my aggressively white neighborhood. This particular night, my noticeable blackness could have been deadly. There were helicopters flying above my apartment and police stationed at a couple of streets right by my front door. Police can punish anyone who fits the suspect’s description, which is usually black. My friend and I felt both terrified and relieved: terrified of me being questioned or shot from above, and relieved that she could use her whiteness to shield me.

It made me reflect on a topic: Can Jews Be White? After Alma published the Jews of Color roundtable discussion, I encountered a lot of indignation from “white-passing” Jews who took great issue with our use of the terms “white Jew” and “whiteness” in describing the intra-community racism we had experienced. I was pretty furious. Policing the terminology and feelings of Jews of Color was pretty much the antithesis of all we had discussed. And furthermore, many Jews actually are white.

For the record, I strongly feel that de-assimilation and the dismantling of whiteness is critical to both the eradication of racism and the survival of the Jewish people. But here’s the salient point: White Jews aren’t white passing. They are functionally white.

“White-passing” implies the need to hide. For example, a white-passing Latinx person may be deported if their immigration status is revealed. A white-passing black person may get some privilege due to their appearance, but will still be subject to systemic economic disparities. Most systemic benefits of whiteness will not be taken away from white Ashkenazi Jews who possess them if someone discovers their Jewishness. No doubt, prejudice and anti-Semitism may remain, but their loan rates will stay the same and the police won’t be more likely to pull the trigger.

This is not to say that being Jewish isn’t incredibly dangerous in this country. But at this point in time in America, anti-Semitism is not comparable to systemic racism. All Jews will be a target of white supremacists, but many Jews may not ever experience racism. White supremacy is an extreme ideology that asserts the superiority of Western European Christian whiteness with violence and murder. It can spread like wildfire, but it is rarely coded into every aspect of our lives. Racism is.

In this country, to access the benefits of whiteness, different European immigrant groups had to shed parts of their individual cultures and seek shelter under the big tent of “white” culture. But this is an empty existence, for white culture has no value beyond power and privilege. Being willing to acknowledge when whiteness applies to us isn’t assimilation; it’s an acknowledgement of a fucked up system.

The views and opinions expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of the Forward.

[a-queer-seminarian]

Edited March 30, 2020

__________

currently thinking about how Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem was hailed and celebrated by the people -- how they shouted “hosanna,” an exclamation of adoration and praise; how they waved palms and spread their cloaks for his arrival........and then turned on him. let the Romans take him and torture him and brutally execute him.

and how because this happened to Jesus, he knows intimately what it feels like when similar things happen to us. when we are welcomed at first and then, when we fail to meet expectations, we are vilified and thrown out -- Jesus gets it. God really, truly, has been there.

a Black woman is employed by a church as part of a diversity initiative, and is welcomed by all -- until she starts pointing out things that need to change, pervasive issues of racism and misogyny and cissexism that should be addressed. excitement sours into resentment, openness into anger; she is ostracized, treated rudely, isolated until the environment becomes so toxic she leaves. she is blamed for the way things “didn’t work out.”

parents promise their son their love is unconditional; he grows up hearing the promise to “love him no matter what.” but these parents are also not quiet about making their anti-gay views known. he has to wonder -- will that unconditional love survive him going out?

a trans person comes out to their loved ones, who express support, a willingness to learn and a promise to work on the new name and pronouns. but months pass by and those loved ones are still misgendering them and growing more and more frustrated, not at themselves but at the trans person -- “Why are you making life so hard?” “Why can’t you just be normal?” “Why would you even want to change your body like that?”

a congregant comes out to her pastor and some of the elders of the church, who respond with compassion and a promise that she’ll always be welcome at the church. the congregant is relieved, and even emboldened to bring her girlfriend to church a few weeks later. but the pastor and some church members confront her, horrified -- “you can’t hold hands with another woman in a place of God!” “This is not okay! If you’re going to act on your desires, we will have to take severe action.” She realized that when the pastor promised her welcome, he’d assumed she would remain “celibate”...she goes home disillusioned brokenhearted. Church will never feel safe again, she tells her girlfriend.

i and people i love dearly have lived through some of these scenarios, and that kind of pain seeps into your psyche and nests in your bones.

but i do find comfort in knowing that my God has been there too -- that the God who throughout the scriptures professed to know, really know the pain and suffering of Their people (e.g. Exodus 3:7) did experience it firsthand. it breaks my heart that Jesus, whom i love, knows this pain too....but it also brings me comfort. because he gets it -- he really, really gets it.

and the God who knows, who sees, who feels with us, is a God whose power is compassion, suffering with and being moved to act -- God does not leave us alone when faith communities abandon us; God shares our pain when others afflict us; and God will act to make things right.

as we enter Holy Week, i plan to meditate more on Jesus’ pain -- the pain of rejection, of having loved ones turn on you, of being handed over to torture and death -- and offer my deepest gratitude for that ultimate act of solidarity with all whom the world rejects and tortures.

thank you, Jesus. you share our suffering always -- give me the courage to try to share your suffering with you, so that i may be moved to act for all who suffer today.

________________

So. I wrote this little reflection during Holy Week last year. We are now approaching Holy Week once again. I will be preaching (via the internet) at my home church this Palm Sunday, and so naturally I remembered, “Oh, I wrote a little something about Palm Sunday before, let’s dig that up and see if it was any good!”

I re-read what I wrote below, and was aghast. embarrassed. ashamed.

Because what I wrote has the same kind of antisemitic tinge to it that has enabled hate crimes against Jewish communities across the centuries.

“But I didn’t say ‘the Jews killed Jesus’ -- I made it clear that Romans are the ones who executed him!!” Sure, but I clearly imply that his Jewish community “let” the Romans kill him; I literally used the language “they turned on him” and rejected him.

When I wrote this piece just last year, I was so sure I was a Good Christian who Knew About The Dangers of Antisemitism In Christianity -- I patted myself on the back for knowing that the Romans are the ones who actually tortured and crucified Jesus. But I wrote this! Even while checking over everything I wrote and thought about Passion Week in particular, being aware of the horrific violent history of this week, this not-even-subtle antisemitic thinking completely flew past me.

What antisemitism continues to lurk in my theology, unchecked?

I think I’m ~so good~ at noticing antisemitism and other dangerous bigotry embedded in my beliefs and language. Clearly, I’m not.

This post spoke to a lot of people, you can see in the comments on it. Last year, I was happy to have moved them with my words. Now, I blush, knowing I let antisemitic thinking spread.

Now, I have no clue how to rethink the Passion narrative that is so central to my faith but so corrupted by antisemitism. How do we read the stories of Jesus being handed over to death without being antisemitic? We can remind the listeners that “The Jews” of Jesus’s days don’t = the Jewish communities that came after them and that continue today. We can remind the listeners that Jesus and his friends were also Jewish, and his was an intra-community struggle. But I don’t think that’s enough.

I have to preach in just six days about Palm Sunday -- a Triumphalist passage if there ever was one! How do I preach it without indicting “the Jews”? Especially now, in this time of pandemic, when people will be expecting my message to be about that very immediate crisis, rather than the timeless crisis of antisemitism in our scripture.

If anyone has articles for me, thoughts for me, I’m all ears. Here are a couple resources I’ve got so far:

I just downloaded an ebook called Jesus Wasn’t Killed by the Jews: Reflections for Christians in Lent

An article about the “Moneychangers in the Temple” that Matthew’s Gospel shows Jesus “driving out” directly after the Palm Sunday scene

A church’s reflection on Passion Week

“A Note on ‘The Jews’ in Palm Sunday’s Passion Reading”

I especially appreciate any Jewish person’s perspective, but don’t expect it -- I know y’all don’t owe me anything. I am deeply sorry for my role in perpetuating antisemitism, and I’m going to be working on doing better.

[unbidden-yidden-deactivated20240]

Good questions @lab-labrava!

So here's the thing: creating a space that is actively welcoming to Jews is going to require some extremely uncomfortable conversations that I don't think many center-to-left folks are prepared for.

The first major thing, and the elephant in the room, is Israel discourse.

Here's the thing: your space doesn't have to be actively Zionist, but it must have nuance, which means it can't be actively anti-Zionist either. Non-Jews (and even plenty of disconnected Jews) often don't really understand what those terms mean, so let me explain. Zionism is literally just the belief that Jews have the right to self-determination in our ancestral homeland, which is the land of Israel. The right to self-determination in one's own ancestral homeland is one that center-to-left leaning folks will at least pay lip service to (if not fiercely defend) in most groups, especially most indigenous groups. (Not erasing the racism I've seen in various movements, but a lot at least have a policy of supporting this right on paper, even if they suck in reality. That's what I'm referring to here.) Meanwhile, many if not most leftist groups actively deny Jews this same right, deny Jewish indigeneity and even provable history in the region. This goes so far that it often leads to soft (or hard!) Holocaust denial in these spaces. Most center-to-left polical groups refuse to understand Jews as a nation, a tribe, a people, and flattten Jewish history and identity into simply a religion with various levels of belief.

And so then they don't see the problem with uniquely denying Jews the right to self-determination and peaceful living in our homeland, which is what anti-Zionism fundamentally is for non-Jews. (It's a little more complicated for Jews; honestly I'd prefer if non-Jews stayed out of it and didn't try to identify as either Zionist or anti-Zionist, because it's inserting themselves in an intra-Jewish conversation.) Additionally, it is frequently associated with calls to disband the entire country and pairing it with genocidal phrases like "from the river to the sea." Even if we took everything that goyische 'anti-Zionists' said at face value, you'd still have the problem that mass displacement of Israelis into the diaspora (which is unequivocally what would happen in that scenario, for the ones that lived) is going to be a death sentence for many. Even the United States isn't a paradise of Jewish acceptance, and other countries are worse. Nearly every country in the world has a history of expelling and murdering Jews en masse or complicity in doing so. We are literally less than a hundred years removed from a genocide so horrifying that our population numbers are still less than they were beforehand and there are still a handful of perpetrators living comfortably.

Now. You don't have to love the Israeli government - fuck, a lot of Jews (Israelis included) are Not Happy with their current government. (Although it's worth noting that keeping up with what is happening isn't easy, because recently elections have been happening at a clownshoes pace, and it's only been somewhat recently that a full on right-wing coalition has taken power. Not that most non-Jewish Americans know this, though.) But since when did we judge all people - citizens, non-citizens, and ex-pats alike - by their government? I sure hope there aren't any Americans angling for that as a standard lmao. And including diaspora Jews in that is even more of an idiotic stretch.

And you can and should actively support Palestinians, too. They are people with human rights, many of whom are being subjected to terrible living conditions in Palestine. There are a ton of reasons for this, and they should be called out, including those issues caused by Egypt, Syria, Lebanon, and their own governments, in addition to Israel. There are plenty of Zionist Jews who are also pro-Palestinian, and the idea that wanting self-determination in one's homeland is antithetical to supporting the human rights of another group is honestly kinda antisemitic on its own.

The second major thing is the completely unchecked and unquestioned cultural Xtianity of most of these spaces in the anglosphere.

There are several sub-issues here, but the main ones are (a) people assume that they know Judaism because they learned about pre-Xtianity in their church growing up, (b) they especially associate Judaism with Xtianity, because Xtianity came from* Judaism, (c) they hold all religions to Xtian standards, including ignoring ethnoreligious groups like Jews, and (d) a generalized antagonism to all religions and religions practice (based on their bad experiences with Xtianity) or at minimum a tolerance for that sort of behavior and rhetoric.

One could write an entire book on each of these topics, but the bottom line is that: (a) most non-Jews don't know the first thing about Judaism, Jewish history, or Jewish peoplehood. (b) Closely related, too few non-Jews have disengaged their understanding of both Xtianity and Judaism from each other. Judaism is not only completely separate from Xtianity and has been for 1900 years, but has been brutally persecuted by Xtians throughout that time and associating us with Xtianity because they happened to appropriate our texts and history is lumping us in with people who have mass-murdered and oppressed us. (c) and (d) are deeply intertwined, but basically, Xtianity is weird as a proselytizing religion and has very specific values and world views that do not generalize to most other religions, especially ethnoreligions.

A third major issue that is closely tied to both the first and second, is a failure to correctly learn to identify and then unlearn antisemitism. Cultural Xtianity is steeped in antisemitism (see: 1900 years of brutal oppression and murder came from somewhere) to the point where most non-Jews don't even realize certain phrases, images, and ideas are actually blood libel or ZOG conspiracy theories. Leftists especially need to learn the history of leftist antisemitism, including within many communist movements. It's great to call out antisemitism wherever you see it, but I've noticed that Leftists have a tendency to only see, recognize, and speak up about right-wing antisemitism and ignore left-wing antisemitism, making it more of a rhetorical device than a matter of justice for Jews.

Worse - non-Jews are exceptionally bad at listening to Jews when we point these things out. It's honestly fine to not know something (especially if you're making an effort to learn), but it's not fine to shout down the effected people because you don't like the answer. Jews are rarely allowed to be the experts on antisemitism, and when we are, it's usually cherrypicked voices that already correspond to that person's viewpoint.

Tl;dr: (1) Israel/Palestine is a massively complex situation so either develop some nuance that values the lives and safety of everyone, or just stfu about it, (2) Judaism is not just Xtianity without Jesus ffs; commit to identifying and unpacking culturally Xtian ideas including but not limited to that, (3) commit to identifying and unlearning antisemitism. Call it out within your own ranks and be accountable for your own antisemitism, just like you would for any other -ism; and, most importantly, (4) defer to Jewish voices when learning about antisemitism - and not just the ones that already agree with you. We very rarely all agree on issues with each other - there's a reason the phrase "two Jews, three opinions" exists - and so make sure you get a diversity of Jewish opinions on any topic. I'm sure there are plenty of Jews who would fight me on some or a lot of what I've said here, and you should listen to them, too.

Edit: How could I forget - make your spaces accessible to religious Jews! I can't tell you how many times I've had to pass on a protest or class or speaker because it's on Saturday across town, and I'm shomer Shabbos. If food is an integral part of the event, make sure it is kosher. Etc.

Please reblog to get a wider sample size!!

[schraubd]

Some Nuanced Thoughts on Protecting Jews via Police

NBC News, which as a mainstream media source Is Not Covering Violence Against Jews(tm), has an interesting article up discussing how the Jewish community in New York is assessing calls to increase police presence in Orthodox Jewish neighborhoods as a means of combating rising antisemitic violence:

Audrey Sasson, executive director of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice, or JFREJ, a left-wing "movement to dismantle racism and economic exploitation" based in New York City, said deployment of more police would be an understandable reaction — and one that would worry her. "Of course, we all need to feel safe. That's fundamental, and there is no arguing with that," Sasson said. "But how do we get there?" Sasson said that her group is multiracial, as is the Jewish community at large, and that many Jewish people wouldn't feel safer with a greater police presence.  

"Right now, the tools we have for safety [are] more police and more guns," Sasson said, "but the question for me is how can we build other tools?" 

Those tools, according to Sasson and JFREJ, include making sure the Jewish community is in a coalition with other targeted communities, having a better system for reporting violence that doesn't rely so heavily on police, creating community-led transformative justice projects and implementing non-punitive and restorative-oriented approaches to violence. 

Sasson acknowledged that the vision is a long-term one, and she does not discount the desire for more police from people living in fear after "the whole holiday was marked by attacks." [emphasis added -- DS]

This is good, and I dare say snaps my long streak wherein everything I've ever read from JFREJ is neither bad nor good but "meh" (Mazel Tov!). The reason I like it is because:

(a) It does not disparage those Jews who desire police protection in the immediate term, or suggest that it reflects a failure of solidarity on their part to desire this solution;

 (b) It acknowledges that viable alternatives to police protection need to be built -- that is, they do not exist now -- and that this construction project is has a long-term time horizon attached to it.

Those twin acknowledgments are, I think necessary if the critique of "more police" is to have ethical traction. Without them, the objection to more policing sounds like a demand that Jews place our lives in the hand of vague feel-good bromides about "community building" or some such that have all the practical bite of a consciousness-raising bed-in project -- and if we don't accede to the demand we're basically giving into our inner-fascists. I think Sasson is read properly in tandem with Eric Ward:

"You can't tell a community that is being physically assaulted that they can't increase law enforcement response but then offer them nothing in response," Ward said. 

Still, Ward, who has studied anti-Semitism extensively, acknowledged that it's not that simple. 

"We know increased policing brings increased racial profiling," he said, adding that high police presence to protect Jews "is likely to be seen as feeding into black and Jewish tension."

Ward is, I think, making the same point as Sasson, just with the opposite emphasis. Telling Jews "how dare you ask for more police" when there isn't any practical, immediate-term alternative isn't going to be received well, and reasonably so. That's true even though, as Ward also points out, there are real costs to the "increased policing" proposal -- including costs along the very dimension its nominally supposed to help (tamping down on intra-group tensions and hostility). There's legitimate space to critique the "more police" response -- but it has to come with enough humility to acknowledge that there's ample reason to be skeptical of the existence of viable alternatives in the short-term. Ultimately, my view on this is basically that of Batya Ungar-Sargon: Whatever my intuitions are on the wisdom of this strategy, I should defer to the people on the ground. Of course, the people on the ground will themselves often have divergent takes. But one suspects the consensus that will emerge will lie somewhere in between "abolish the NYPD" and "send in the National Guard." via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/2ZzQCHP

[miairviin]

Icb liebe dich, Berlin

Happy Belated Valentine’s Day to all! Yesterday was the start of my second intra-European adventure: Berlin, Germany!

I arrived later last night and met up with a couple of my friends from Greece who had arrived earlier that day. After successfully navigating Berlin’s public transportation system, we headed to the hostel. From there, we went just a few doors down to a restaurant called Aufsturz for some authentic German food. My first meal was jägerschnitzel and Berlin truly came out swinging in regard to its culinary wonders. The jägerschnitzel was thin breaded pork with a mushroom cream sauce over a bed of German noodles. It was the perfect meal for someone who had just gotten off of an airplane.

The next day, the four other girls who came to Berlin with me woke up at 9 am for a free walking tour the hostel helped set up for us and some of its other guests. We began our tour in the city center of Mitte at the beautiful Brandenburg Gate, a place I had been looking forward to visiting since I first booked my flight. This gate has had a very long and very tumultuous past. It has come to represent a changing Berlin. The gate was one of many just like it, and they were all commissioned by the Prussian King Frederick William the II in an attempt to make Berlin “the Athens along the spree.” This explains why so there are so many elements of Greek architecture throughout the city. There have been two world wars, including Hitler’s dictatorship, bombings, battles, and political demonstrations galore. All of the other gates have since collapsed, but not the Brandenburg Gate. Though it has undergone a few alterations, the Brandenburg Gate stands tall, a symbol of pride and resilience which has come to define Berlin.

Our next stop was the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. I knew that Berlin was a city that was rich in history, but I was not prepared for the beautiful ambiguity of this particular site. The artist who designed the memorial refused to give an explanation as to what the meaning of the 2,711 cement blocks of varying heights set up in a grid could be. In fact, the memorial takes up an entire city block downtown. That is how much importance the German government has placed on educating the world on its history. Our tour guide encouraged us to walk through and draw our own conclusions, to decide what message it was trying to send to us. As I meandered through the blocks, I felt so many different things. The blocks began short, just below my waist. There was even a humble bouquet of flowers resting on one of the first few blocks a visitor must have left. But within a few seconds, the blocks were high above my head and I could not see to my left or to my right, only forward. You were always visible from the outside of the memorial to the passing foot traffic, but in the memorial I felt anxious. Within a few minutes, I lost my group and it was just me and the seemingly endless rows of cement blocks. Though terrifying and at times frustrating, this really gave me time to consider my tour guide’s challenge to decipher the meaning for ourselves. I decided that the memorial was trying to tell us about the Jewish people during the Holocaust. Even if the lesson only lasted a few minutes and came nowhere near the intensity of the real Jewish experience. Much like the memorial’s blocks did not begin tall, the Holocaust did not happen over night. It was a gradual process of dehumanization beginning with boycotting jewish shops and ending with genocide. Though at times it felt like the Jewish struggle was invisible, it wasn’t. Other Germans knew, other countries knew, and other people knew of the atrocities being committed against the Jewish people and yet no one ventured into the grid to help. When you’re in the memorial, it’s easy to get lost, to lose your friends, to lose your bearings, to feel anxious. I cannot pretend I am able to even imagine the anxiety and fear that was felt by sisters separated from brothers, children from parents, and wives from husbands during this incredibly dark and irrationally evil time period. Our tour guide added to my analysis by saying that there was a quote describing the Holocaust as a bureaucratic duty rather than a truly insidious endeavor carried out by insidious people. Perhaps it is harder to rationalize this idea of someone being so brainwashed by their government they are willing to sentence millions to death in the name of patriotism. Either way, I felt as though it was an interesting point to include, especially in today’s growing political unrest. The memorial is just one of the many ways Berlin has refused to let its dark past define the city. Rather, history is embraced alongside the present and the two combine to form the ever changing Berlin.

Our next stop was a perfect example of how Berlin has handpicked what history it has decided to preserve and what to ignore. In a humble car park, about eight meters below our feet was the bunker where Hitler killed himself after realizing the war was lost. Just outside the bunker, children and old men fought to protect a dying Germany but not because they still believed in it; because they were literally fighting for their lives. Conversely, Hitler, who was on a wild cocktail of drugs, was busy committing suicide because he knew, like everyone else, the Germany he was fighting for was long gone. It was interesting to see the Berlin reaction to dealing with this bunker was to turn it into a functional space: a car park. Again, this is one way Berlin has selected the history they want to breathe life into and remember forever versus the history that deserves nothing from us. If not nothing, than a car park.

We continued on to places like Checkpoint Charlie, where West Berliners were eventually granted access to the East. There was a part of the Berlin Wall standing outside a cafe we stopped at. Berlin has a subtle tribute to the old wall in the form of a narrow strip of cobblestones running across the city along the same line where the Berlin Wall once stood. Another example of a memorial in plain sight are the golden stumbling stones that make appearances all over Germany. These stumbling stones became a part of Berlin when a citizen independently began installing golden plaques in between cobble stones on the sidewalk. The stones are meant to signify the last known residence of Jewish families that were taken away during the Holocaust. Each stone is engraved with a name, a year of birth, and if known and applicable, the location and year of their death. The head rabbi of Munich refused the installment of these stumbling stones. Her rationale is that people will step on them and that would be incredibly disrespectful. Our tour guide offered the interpretation that they force you to stop, and bow your head to not only to read the information on the stone, but also in reverence. It’s chilling and disorienting to think that today I was walking the same street as someone who decades ago, was being torn from a life they knew intimately and thrust into a world of terror and uncertainty. It’s impossible. Absolutely impossible.

We ended our tour, and stopped in for some more authentic German food. I dined on a sausage in curry ketchup and for dessert, apple strudel, a Berlin experience just as high on my list as the Brandenburg Gate. It was DELIGHTFUL. The cream was sweet, the apples were crisp, and the dough was soft. I know I will think of that dessert often. I can only hope I can find something like it back home when I return to the states.

We ended our night with a stroll along the East Side Gallery which displays murals commenting on social and political themes on what was once the east side of the wall. If it wasn’t for the cold, I could have spent hours walking along this open-air art gallery. Each mural had so much to say, and I felt so lucky to listen to whatever message the artist was trying to deliver. I also felt grateful they were able to share it with me. For so long, east Berlin had been subjected to communist rule where any misstep outside the party norms could mean death. Here, artists were able to express so many things from love to the disdain of racism to history to female empowerment to intersectionality to the need for environmental consciousness. The East Side Gallery had no shortage of conversation pieces or thought provoking images.

I close this entry with icb liebe dich, Berlin because there are no other words. I love you, Berlin is the only thing on my mind as I write this. The energy of the city is so youthful, so vibrant, so bold. Just like it’s food, people, architecture, and history. The energy is tangible here, racing through the streets like a pulse and heartbeat. Everyone seems to be moving, but moving towards something great importance. There’s a purpose. They’re here for a reason. I cannot wait to see what tomorrow brings in this truly mythical place.