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| High school student that suffered years of anti-Semitic harassment. (NYT) |
The letters stretch over 30 feet, written into the sand on a beach in New Jersey. The teenager in the photo rests casually on his side above the words, smiling, his head propped up in his hand. “I h8 Jews,” the words read.
The anti-Semitic picture, taken on a school trip and texted to a group of classmates at a high school on the Jersey Shore in 2018, was portrayed to the group as an edgy joke.
“Yearbook cover,” the boy in the picture texted.
“Oh yea,” responded one girl, active in the yearbook club, adding that she had already submitted the photo to the faculty adviser. “Its gonna be great.”
I think it’s fair to say that this is a classic case of bullying. Only this time it is based on antisemitic bigotry. The victim in this case was not observant. There was nothing about her that was identifiably Jewish. But she was proud of being Jewish and that led to several incidents. With the above being the most blatant.
I have been saying for a long time now that this country is not inherently antisemitic. I still believe that. At the same time there is a fair amount of soft bigotry against Jews among Americans that do not come into direct contact with us. I believe it's based on antisemitic memes passed down generationally from an era where Jews were considered 'the other' and not quite American.
'The other' - because they did not worship in the same way. We were seen as rejected by God for killing his 'son' and not accepting him as our savior.
All kinds of ridiculous accusations evolved out of that - spinning tales about Jews killing Christians so that they use their blood to bake Matzah. Or being accused of being cruel usurers - seeing us all as unscrupulous bankers in the spirit of Shakespeare's Shylock. Or as an evil Cabal with a plan to dominate world and subjugate the rest of mankind.
It's hard to eradicate centuries old antisemitic memes. Even in a country that prides itself in a religious tolerance enshrined in the Constitution. Those memes do not automatically disappear. They get pushed into their subconscious mind - only to reappear in situations like this. If a parent makes an antisemitic joke in his home – even if it only to promote a negative but harmless stereotype – it plants a portrait to their children about Jews being inferior to them. Who bring that with them to school which comes out in situations like this.
These kids probably never saw a Jew. (Although they actually did without realzing it - if they go to the movies or watch television since a lot of prominent actors and actresses are Jewish.) So they have no clue what we are like.
But now they found ‘live one’. And they decided to have some antisemitic ‘fun’ at her expense. So they went to the beach and wrote ‘I h8 Jews’ in the sand in large letters, took a picture of it with themselves in it and texted it to a group of classmates - thinking it was funny.
Bullying is a real problem in many schools these days. It isn't only Jews that get bullied. Anyone that is even slightly different from the mainstream has that kind of exposure.
But in this case the difference wasn’t physical. When there is a family history of soft antisemitic bigotry it creates the perfect storm where bullying like this can take place.
The 2 boys that perpetrated this are no doubt from privileged homes. They are probably very popular. A lot of high school kids want to fit in them. Sometimes they will overlook common decency and think it's no 'big deal' to laugh at that picture. All for purposes of identifying being accepted.
Those lines in the sand were a very ‘expensive’ joke. Far more expensive than those boys could have ever imagined when the dreamed it up. It was also expensive for the school and an official whose insensitivity added to the pain the victim suffered .
That generated a backlash from other parents that did not want the reputation of the school to be destroyed. Many in that community actually felt sorry for those boys. Turning their anger at the victim and blaming her for being a snitch about what they saw as a ‘stupid joke’. Here is what happened. From the NYT:
At the end of the school year, Paige’s parents filed a complaint with the state attorney general’s division of civil rights, saying that she had been subjected to anti-Semitic conduct and then reprisals after reporting it.
In its investigation, the attorney general’s office found that while Mr. Moore appropriately addressed the beach incident, he never filed a bullying report about the shunning, nor did he investigate her other anti-Semitism allegations.
“It does not appear the school took any broader actions to discern the extent of anti-Semitic behavior at the school, or to address the reported concerns beyond the beach incident,” the report, issued last October, stated.
Instead, Paige says, Mr. Moore recommended she worry less about friends at school and find friends in her synagogue.
After their suspension, the two boys returned to class. They won school awards and were accepted into Cornell and New York University.
In their senior year, nearly a year after the beach photo incident, the two boys had their college admissions rescinded.
That their academic lives were ruined is well justified. Despite the fact that few parents and sudents said that the victim had blown way out of proportion.
But she didn’t. It was bullying at its worst.
Does this mean that America is antisemitic after all?
Not at all!
The government does not look the other way when things like this happen it can generally be counted upon in to do the right thing. What about the American people themselves? Well it is the people that elected that government. So that even after an event like this, I have faith in the basic goodness my fellow Americans. I still believe that the vast majority of Americans have rejected antisemitic memes and do not have an antisemitic bone in their body. That is reflected by a variety of factors I have mentioned on my blog many times. I will not repeat them here.
I remain convinced that those factors are still in play despite the fact that antisemitic bullying in some schools is still a problem. It's a problem because some Americans have retained those memes - and are transmitted subliminally to their children. So yes, they exist. But I believe they are a relatively small the minority.