I Was Protested At Bard College For Being A Jew

[Mosby]

(THIS IS THE JEWISH GROUP!)

October 12, 2019 By Batya Ungar-Sargon


When I was asked to speak at last week’s conference on racism and anti-Semitism at Bard College’s Hannah Arendt Center, I think my heart actually skipped a beat.

Arendt, the German-born political philosopher who fled the Nazis in the 1930s and eventually settled in New York, is the thinker who has most deeply influenced me, and racism and anti-Semitism are two topics I think about constantly, the most pressing issues of our time. It was the perfect combination of topic and venue, and the list of confirmed speakers included luminaries whose work I had read, whose writing and thinking I deeply admired.

“I am so incredibly humbled to be included in this event and I accept with great honor,” I wrote back to Roger Berkowitz, the founder and director of the center and organizer of the conference.

I was invited to host a breakout session of my choosing, and I proposed a workshop on navigating other people’s opinions in the age of Trump – a topic of deep importance to my work as Opinion Editor of The Forward, where we insist on representing the full gamut of legitimate opinion. Ten days before the conference started on Thursday, I found out I would also be one of three people on a panel called “Racism and Zionism: Black-Jewish relations,” and moderator of another session, with Ruth Wisse, a Harvard professor of Yiddish literature and scholar of Jewish history and culture, and Shany Mor, an Israeli thinker who is affiliated with the Hannah Arendt Center.

https://forward.com/opinion/433082/i-was-protested-at-bard-college-for-being-a-jew/

[Mosby]

1. In case the link doesn't work

Link to tweet

[Mike 03]

2. DU needs a new emoji

An emoji for people who've just run out of words that says, "I read what you posted, I'm glad you posted it, I learned something that I didn't know before, but I can't find the words anymore."

[Collimator]

3. When I read these words. . .

“Why are you silencing Palestinians?” he demanded. “There should have been a Palestinian discussing anti-Semitism. They have many thoughts about it!”

I imagined a a panel on racism in America, and someone asking why no white people were on the panel. "They have many thoughts about it."

(Mind you, the writer alluded to an idea like this.)

Far be it for me to suggest that anti-Semitism wasn't at work in that situation. Another aspect to be considered, however, is the tendency of passionate, supposedly "woke" individuals to be self-righteous and one dimensional in their thinking.

This is the classic trope about making everything about themselves and their concerns.

[JudyM]

4. K&R.

An important vignette.

The red line she points to is certainly valid, even if blurry to many.

[Mosby]

5. She's pissed.

Link to tweet

[MosheFeingold]

6. Important article

I really hadn't appreciated how bad it is for Jewish people on college campuses until my youngest great grandchildren enlightened me.

One has moved from Berkeley (where she was physically unsafe as a frum woman) to University of Texas (which is OK and she'll probably stick it out), but is now seriously considering schools in Israel for medical school simply to escape.

I suppose that is what Israel is for. A last refuge.