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The Jewish Press

(Founded in 1920)

Margie Gutnik

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Annette van de Kamp-Wright

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Richard Busse

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Margie Gutnik, President; Abigail Kutler, Ex-Officio; Seth Feldman; David Finkelstein; Ally Freeman; Mary Sue Grossman; Les Kay; Natasha Kraft; Chuck Lucoff; David Phillips; and Joseph Pinson. The mission of the Jewish Federation of Omaha is to build and sustain a strong and vibrant Omaha Jewish Community and to support Jews in Israel and around the world. Agencies of the JFO are: Institute for Holocaust Education, Jewish Community Relations Council, Jewish Community Center, Jewish Social Services and the Jewish Press. Guidelines and highlights of the Jewish Press, including front page stories and announcements, can be found online at: www.jewishomaha.org; click on ‘Jewish Press.’ Editorials express the view of the writer and are not necessarily representative of the views of the Jewish Press Board of Directors, the Jewish Federation of Omaha Board of Directors, or the Omaha Jewish community as a whole. The Jewish Press reserves the right to edit signed letters and articles for space and content. The Jewish Press is not responsible for the Kashrut of any product or establishment.

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A small but hopeful spark

ANNETTE VAN DE KAMP-WRIGHT

Jewish Press Editor Remember how a few weeks ago I wrote about gratitude for those who stand with us against antisemitism? At the time, I wasn’t so sure that I felt grateful just because people showed some basic decency. Then, this happened: singer Taylor Swift announced 27 tour dates, all of which but one were either on Shabbat, or too close to it. “Essentially, this excluded any Jewish fans who are shomer Shabbat,” Evelyn Frick wrote for HeyAlma.com, “meaning that not only would they be attending Shabbat services during concerts, but also that they are prohibited from doing activities that require labor (i.e. driving or riding in a car, spending money or even clapping and dancing, according to some). In all likelihood, this would also affect Jewish fans who are not strictly observant, but set aside Shabbat as a time to be with family and unplug from the rest of the world.” Shabbat-observant Swifties (that’s what her fans are called) complained, and Swift immediately “added eight more shows to the U.S. leg of her tour on Friday, all on weeknights, in cities such as Philadelphia, Seattle and Los Angeles.” (JTA.com) To be honest, I don’t know much about Taylor Swift. I don’t listen to her music, and I can’t name a single song she has to her name. What I do know is that she is well-known and has a robust following and a platform: “Swift’s Midnights album sold over a million copies in its first week, and she is now tied with Barbra Streisand as the female artist with the most albums to top the Billboard chart.” (JTA.com)

I also realize she did not have to do this. Adding extra dates just to accommodate the Shabbat-observant is mostly unheard of. It’s above and beyond, so yes, I am pleasantly surprised, and I’m grateful— even though I do not intend to go to any Taylor Swift concerts, or buy her albums, or otherwise engage with her music. I don’t belong to her fandom—and that’s okay; I can still be grateful. Writer Evelyn Frick called it “an easy fix,” but I am not so sure that accurately describes what happened here. An easy decision to add dates, yes, it should be, but for most people, it isn’t. Touring is expensive, and although Swift’s albums sell well, who knows whether these additional shows are financially viable? Live shows are tough on artists, can she physically handle eight extra performances? Can all the other people who make live concerts happen? What about security, background dancers, the venues? There is so much that goes into live performances, making a decision to add extra dates for the shomer shabbos crowd can’t have been easy. Still, the Swift people made it, and they made it fast. Let’s be honest, most artists would either ignore the criticism, make excuses, or maybe at best issue a lukewarm apology. So, this is nice. It’s not earth shattering, it’s not going to change our reality. But it’s nice. It’s a tiny hopeful spark in an otherwise tiresome and hateful landscape—and for that, yes, I am grateful. It’s also an example of a non-Jewish artist who realizes we are here, not as scapegoats or as people to discount, hate on or mock, but as people who deserve some special consideration for living life differently.

Kanye West’s hate speech awakens my ‘triple consciousness’ of being Black, Jewish and American

KENDELL PINKNEY

JTA When I read the news about Kanye West, I didn’t know whether to turn off my phone, or throw it. I knew it would only be a matter of time before the emails and texts began rolling in: What do you think about Kanye? What’s to be done about antisemitism in the Black community? You must agree that Ye is challenging systems of power, not being antisemitic! Have you read this article by Black person X? Have you read this thought-piece by Jewish person Y? You know Heschel and other Jews walked with King at Selma; what would it take to get back to that!? Here’s the reality: I am Black, I am a rabbi and I am a theater artist who frequently makes work that probes the intersections of Black and Jewish identity. So yes, I get why any number of people reached out to get my “take.” But to be honest, I find the Kanye saturation of this moment to be more exhausting than instructive, harmful as his incessant flow of antisemitic bile is. The reason for my exhaustion is that moments like this more often result in stale public rehearsals of facts-and-figures, rhetorical whataboutism and, in my case, private requests for explanations or defenses. In cases where there’s a public apology, we might get a heavily staged meeting between a symbolic Black person and a symbolic Jew, but no one really thinks that such a “coming together” does the real work of forging understanding. In short, events like these tend to result in panic and punishment, not in introspection. Lest I be misunderstood, let me state a few points clearly: • Kanye is antisemitic, and, like his equally egregious anti-Black and misogynist statements, his statements about Jews are appalling and deeply harmful. • Despite the number of books on such topics, Black antisemitism is not a thing, just like Jewish anti-Blackness is not a thing. Rather, antisemitism and anti-Blackness are longstanding structures of social prejudice that all peoples and societies fall prey to. • Regarding Black-Jewish civil rights solidarity, while it is worthwhile remembering the intrepid Jewish leaders who walked with Dr. King and other Black civil rights leaders in Selma, that act of righteous resistance from nearly 60 years ago will only take Black and Jewish communities so far into their shared futures. Inhabiting a Black and Jewish identity in contemporary America can be maddening. It is like navigating a rhetorical funhouse: You know that your lived experience is fully coherent, but the reflections you encounter along the path distort, disfigure and “invisiblize” your reality. More precisely, as a Black Jew you are forced to consider your identities from the perspectives of others, very few of whom have given any thought to your particular existence. If this idea sounds familiar, well, it is. It’s actually quite old. In his seminal 20th century masterpiece, The Souls of Black Folk, the eminent Black polymath W.E.B. Du Bois addressed the conundrum of living in a society where the structures of racism force Black people into a split consciousness. “It is a peculiar sensation,” Du Bois writes, “this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of [white] others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his twoness, — an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings...” While I have reservations about aspects of Du Bois’s broader worldview (e.g. his intra-Black elitism, his romantic view of nations and peoplehood) I find deep resonance in his observations on “double consciousness.” I have been in countless situations where I have simply sought to follow my interests, only for my Blackness to be the cause for minor and major slights. I have also endured antisemitic aggression and witnessed anti-Jewish religious sentiment up close. What is more, I have experienced the above in Jewish communities and Black communities, respectively. I am not alone in this. Many Black Jews can attest to the same. To live as a Black Jew in America means to live with an awareness of just how precarious group belonging can be. In the case of hate speech, it also means an unfortunate familiarity with the frequent

intersections between anti-Blackness and antisemitism. Such experience would lead me to believe that Black Jews might have something unique to say in this moment. And yet, predictably, what

“To live as a Black Jew in America means to live with an awareness of just how precarious group belonging can be.”

Credit: JTA illustration has happened since Kanye’s recent spate of antisemitic tweets is that Black Jews have been functionally overlooked in the public discourse — our voices relegated to small or parochial news outlets, niche podcasts, newsletters or Twitter feeds. To me, this phenomenon places Du Bois’s observations in greater relief. Namely, being Black and Jewish in America is more than an act of “double-consciousness,” it is an act of “triple-consciousness.” In this configuration, I know by virtue of my Black, Jewish and American identities that I am an integrated being who embodies a way forward for our society, but I am often made to contend with the fact that my communities, and society in general, can only grasp my identity in its discrete parts, not as a whole. In case you think this “triple consciousness” is theoretical, let me give a few concrete examples. To live with “triple consciousness” is to notice that there were relatively few calls beyond those of Black individuals to condemn and boycott Kanye when he trafficked in white supremacist, anti-Black ideology. To live with “triple consciousness” is to argue with non-Jewish acquaintances that pointing out the number of Jews in finance and media does not a keen observation make, nor does it provide evidence of a powerful cabal.

See Kanyne West’s hate speech page 9

ANDREW SILOW-CARROLL

JTA A powerful revival of Parade, the 1998 Broadway musical about the 1915 lynching of the Jewish factory manager Leo Frank by a Georgia mob, is wrapping up a short-term engagement at New York’s City Center. The show is stirring and moving without trivializing or exploiting one of the worst antisemitic incidents in U.S. history. And yet I couldn’t quite shake my discomfort that this lavishly orchestrated, heart-tugging musical about the post-Reconstruction South was focused on the lynching of a white man. Alfred Uhry, who wrote the book, and Jason Robert Brown, seem to have anticipated this. They include a song, sung by two Black characters, noting that the Frank case would not have gotten half the attention it did if Frank or the girl he allegedly killed were Black. For all the glorification of Black and Jewish cooperation in the civil rights era — some of it exaggerated, much of it deserved — the two communities have long been locked in this kind of competitive suffering. Black leaders have questioned Jewish claims to victimhood — especially when Jews accuse other Black leaders, such as Louis Farrakhan, of antisemitism — and have accused Jews of amplifying the power and reach of Black antisemites for their own ends. Jews, meanwhile, resent being told that, as a community that tends to be seen as white, successful and politically influential, they can’t be regarded as victims of bigotry, especially when it comes from a disempowered minority. Both dynamics have played out in the case of Kyrie Irving, the Brooklyn Nets star who shared a link to Hebrews to Negroes: Wake Up Black America, a 2018 film that contains a host of antisemitic tropes and that is based on a book that, no doubt thanks to Irving, is now a bestseller. In defending his decision to share the film — and giving it perhaps the widest platform it ever enjoyed — Irving downplayed his own sizable Twitter following and influence. “You guys come in here and make up this powerful influence that I have … [and say], ‘You cannot post that.’ Why not? Why not?” he asked reporters. The canards shared in the film — especially the notion that Blacks are the “real” Jews — are rooted in the idea that “the greatness of Black men is being hidden or stolen from them,” as Jemele Hill, a Black sports journalist, explains in a piece in the Atlantic. What dismays Hill and other critics of Irving — Black, Jewish, both and neither — is that this understandable impulse to promote Black empowerment draws on a history of classic antisemitism: The film cites Henry Ford’s antisemitic opus “The International Jew” and denies the Holocaust. It claims that Jews have used falsehoods to “conceal their nature and protect their status and power.” Writes Hill: “Irving has joined a troubling club of high-profile Black male celebrities — also including the rapper Kanye West — who have stubbornly embraced conspiracy theories, particularly anti-Semitic ones, under the pretext of seeking a deeper truth about their own origins.”

Some white liberal Jews are uncomfortable about calling out certain forms of antisemitism by prominent Blacks precisely because of a perceived power imbalance between Blacks and Jews, or because the ideas come from a place where ignorance meets legitimate grievance. Some Black leaders have similarly excused the long history of antisemitism and bigotry by Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam because the group has been seen as a force for good in impoverished Black communities. Kyrie Irving in a home game at Brooklyn's Barclays Center on Nov. 1, 2022. Credit: Dustin Satloff/Getty Images And still others have suggested that Ye, with a history of mental illness, and Irving, who often dabbles in conspiracy theories, should not be subjected to the blunt outrage used to combat white supremacy and anti-Zionism. Or that none of us should be in the business of “policing the expression of Black athletes,” as the sports journalist Shireen Ahmed put it (before condemning Irving, it should be said). These attitudes are patronizing, and it’s important to note that few if any influential Jews or Black commentators went there this week. West and Irving had few defenders for the antisemitic things they said or shared (although there was some Twitter “what-aboutism” suggesting the NBA was more concerned about a Black man’s antisemitism than China’s treatment of the Uighurs — a sticking point for a league that does major business in China). On the left, Dave Zirin of The Nation writes about the link between racism and antisemitism and the far right: “What terrifies me about the current moment is that Kyrie’s politics are migrating and finding a sick alliance among Nazis, fascists, nationalists, and all manner of white supremacists who have long promoted these notions but wanted no part of Black politics unless it was about expressing common separatist ideas.” As Zirin suggests, the canards West and Irivng are sharing are hardly unique to the Black community. Antisemitism and racism are social prejudices “that all peoples and societies fall prey to,” is how Kendell Pinkney, who is Black and Jewish, put it in a JTA essay (see previous page). JEWISH PRESS READERS If you do business with any of our advertisers, please tell them you saw their ad in the Jewish Press. It really helps us!

The Jewish community doesn’t have the luxury of condescension when celebrities, however troubled, insert insidious ideas into the social media ecosphere. On Thursday, as the Nets, Kyrie, the NBA and the Anti-Defamation League were going back and forth on how to defuse his behavior, the FBI warned New Jersey synagogues of a credible “broad threat” against them, apparently from a man, so far unidentified, who holds “radical extremist views.” Jews are vigilant about diehard conspiracy theories, political dog whistles and online harassment not because they want to “protect their status and power,” but because they have seen spasms of deadly violence inspired by garbage shared online. Late on Nov. 3 night, Irving at last apologized for his tweet, writing, “I posted a Documentary that contained some false anti-Semitic statements, narratives, and language that were untrue and offensive to the Jewish Race/Religion, and I take full accountability and responsibly for my actions.” His statement came after the Nets suspended him for a minimum of five games. It’s not clear what other acts of contrition he might undertake, but I suggest he read up on the Leo Frank case, in which a Jewish man was falsely accused of murder by the same bigots who enforced Jim Crow. He might learn that when it comes to confronting hate and bigotry, Jews and Blacks have more to gain by listening to one another than tweeting about each other.

Andrew Silow-Carroll is editor in chief of the New York Jewish Week and senior editor of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency. He previously served as JTA’s editor in chief and as editor in chief and CEO of the New Jersey Jewish News. @SilowCarroll

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.

Kanye West’s hate speech

Continued from page 8

To live with “triple consciousness” is to carry the distinct, lived histories of two peoples in your heart and mind at all times. To live with “triple consciousness” is to know in the most intimate way that anti-Black rhetoric hurts Jews, and antisemitic rhetoric hurts Black people, because there are many of us who carry both identities and cannot disentangle them one from the other. Finally, and most personally, to live with “triple consciousness” is to wonder whether my mixed Jewish child will grow up in an America where she feels compelled to closet aspects of her identity because society cannot hold the wonder of her complexity. I cannot solve the issue of “triple consciousness” — after all, I did not create the strange reality underpinning it. Such a feat calls for a tremendous amount of work, honesty and humility. It also requires a critical willingness to interrogate how multiple oppressions are interlinked, rather than to dismiss such language as performative and overly “woke.” I am not interested in virtue-signaling, much less ideological purity. Rather, I want what everyone wants, what Du Bois wanted: the simple dignity to be myself — Black, Jewish and American, “without being cursed and spit upon.”

Kendall Pinkney is a New York based theater artist, producer and rabbi. He is the Rabbinical Educator at Reboot and the founding Artistic Director of The Workshop, an arts and culture fellowship for BIPOC-Jewish artists.

The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.