The Star Walker

Original post can be found here.

Slide 1: White text on black background. White star of David in the corner. In all caps: “Why is it so Scary to be a Jew Right Now”

Slide 2: White background with a large Venn diagram. Top text reads: “There is hate coming from all sides right now and no one is even trying to hide it”

Below this text is a four circle Venn diagram.

Top Circle: “Nation of Islam: Louis Farrakhan and his followers who call us “satanic termites””

Left Circle: “Far Left: Anti-Zionists believe we’re all racist imperialists and blame us for the Israeli government”

Right Circle: “Far Right: White supremacists are “racist” against us (even though Judaism is not a race)”

Bottom Circle: ““Mainstream Antisemitism: your everyday bigot Holocaust deniers. “Jews control the world”“

The middle overlap between all four circles reads: “have openly said they want me dead” and the other overlaps repeat this same message but broken up to a couple of words per overlap.

Slide 3: White background with a bar graph. Top text reads: “We are grossly outnumbered" Text continues down the right side: “The combined IG followings of 5 of the most vocal celebrities spreading dangerous antisemitism this month outnumber the total US Jewish population by OVER 7 to 1. (Stephen Jackson, Desean Jackson, Ice Cube, Nick Cannon, Diddy). Ice Cube and Diddy alone have each spread antisemitism to more followers than there are Jews in the ENTIRE WORLD. We literally can’t do this alone.”

The bar graph to the left of the text compares the Instagram followings of the above celebrities (in red) with the world Jewish population (in grey).

Left column: “Four [sic] Vocal Celebrity Instagram Followings

Stephen Jackson 89.3K

Desean Jackson 1.4 mil

Nick Cannon 4.9 million

Ice Cube 17.8 million

Diddy 17.1 million”

(The column continues to the top of the slide, with Diddy’s follow count presumably running over the top)

Right column: “Entire World Jewish Population

Total US Jews 5.7 million

Jews of the Rest of the World 9 million

Total: 14.7 million”

(This column reaches less than half of the visible left column)

Slide 4: large red number and smaller white text on the red background.

“2107 hate crimes against Jews reported by the ADL in 2009. The highest # of hate crimes since they started recording in 1979.”

Slide 5: White background with two pie charts. Top Text reads: “Jews make up just 2% of the U.S. population...” Bottom text reads: “...But were victims of 57.8% of all religion-based hate crimes in 2018. (The next highest is anti-Islam at 14.5%)”

The pie charts are black with copper slices

Top chart: compares total US population with Jewish population using statistic above. “Jews” is a tiny tiny sliver of the larger “Rest of US Population”

Bottom chart: compares hate crime percentages from above. “Hate Crimes Against Jews” takes up more than half of the chart compared to “All Other Religion Based Hate Crimes”

Slide 6: Title is white text black background, rest is white background. Title reads: “If it’s such a big deal why aren’t more people talking about it?”

1. “They’re scared.

For non-Jews, vocalizing support of Jewish people feels vulnerable and unsafe. What will people think of me? Will it look like I’m taking away from another movement? Will it change how people perceive me politically? Will people think I don’t care about Palestinians?

For Jews, standing up for ourselves is vulnerable and unsafe. Will people believe me? Will my coworkers judge me? Will people equate me with the Israeli government? Will I lose friends, respect? Will people see me differently? Will people think I’m taking away from another movement? Will people think I’m being dramatic?

2. They don’t want to.

A lot of non-Jews don’t want to talk about it because it doesn’t effect them. Others don’t want to talk about it because they believe what they’re hearing is “the truth”. And some, frankly, just don’t care.

For Jews, talking about it can feel like a lost cause -- “They’ve hated us for thousands of years and are going to hate us anyways so why bother”. For others, it is simply too painful.”

Slide 7: Black background. Large white text reads “Honestly, I don’t want to talk about it either. But if I don’t call out antisemitism, who will? Sadly I am afraid to know the answer to that question. And that is exactly why it’s so scary to be a Jew right now.”

Slide 8: Red background. White text in quotation marks reads: “If we’re going to be outraged by injustice, let’s be outraged by injustice against anyone. -Kareem Abdul-Jabbar”

Slide 9: Red background. White title text reads “ What Can You Do?”

“Non-Jews: We’re not asking for much. Call it out. Make it clear you stand against all hate. Believe us. Be open to learning, growing, and questioning what you’ve been taught.

Jews: Speak up. While you’re standing up for everyone else, don’t forget to stand up for yourself. Very few others are.”

My fourth grade teacher thought it was wrong for my dad to be teaching me complex math because it fascinated me.

My elementary school music teacher hated the way my piano teacher taught me, and how I was more advanced than many of her students, and so told me, in front of my peers and my mother, that I was not good enough to participate in the state solo festival. She would not give me the form. We had to procure it from the district instead. She also hated how I excelled at reading and playing music for the recorder, and so she refused to give me my “belts” (colored beads to signify our level) and humiliated me in front of the class repeatedly.

My eighth grade algebra teacher used to fail me on take home tests because I didn’t solve problems exactly the way she showed us in class; I used methods that we had learned for other types of problems that also applied to these. She took points off my tests because I didn’t bring a calculator even though I got 100% without it, because I was able to do it by hand. I had to call my father, who is an engineer, down to the school to shout her down and give me back my A in the class.

My 10th grade Spanish teacher yelled at me in front of the class numerous times because she didn’t like the way I took notes; she thought that since I didn’t write every word off the slide, I wasn’t getting it all down. I had to explain to her that people who have taken advanced courses, like AP or IB classes, know that in a fast-paced learning environment you need to take quick shorthand notes that contain the necessary information rather than wasting time writing every word. She almost gave me detention.

My 11th grade English teacher gave me a poor mark on my first short essay because she believed that I was looking up unnecessarily complex words in a thesaurus to try and get better marks. The phrases in question: “laced with expletives” and “bombarded”. She wouldn’t hear any defense from me.

My 11th grade history teacher failed me on an essay about the 1950s because I misread the prompt. Except the prompt wasn’t words; it was a political cartoon. One of the figures was clearly president Eisenhower, but the other I couldn’t place. My teacher would not tell us who it was. I labelled him as the governor of Little Rock Arkansas during the integration period, and wrote an essay about that subject. My teacher said that no, it was Joseph McCarthy, and that there was a small picture of the man in our textbook and therefore I should have recognized him instantly. Half the class, apparently, did not.