Haters Gonna Hate

Of course, me being me, I choose to become more outwardly Jewish at the same time anti-Semites are choosing to become more public with their hate. I mean, why should being Jewish be easy, right?

When the FBI released its annual report on hate crime statistics for 2016, it showed that 54% of religiously motivated hate crimes were aimed at Jews. We're obviously not alone on the list and sadly, coming in at second, Muslims are victims of over 24% of reported hate crimes with the dubious distinction of increasing by 19% from the last report.

It always stuns me that there is so much hate for us when we barely make up less than 2% of the United States' population and 0.2% of the world's population. The total population of Jews on planet Earth has not yet reached its pre-Holocaust number.

Sometimes it's as if remembering that we Jews are still here and hated makes the mainstream uncomfortable. When the Nazis marched in the streets of Charlottesville there was far more emphasis on the anti-Black hate than the fact torch-bearing Nazis marched down US streets chanting "Jews will not replace us." Please don't take that as me trying to diminish Nazi hatred of African Americans, it appears Nazis have enough hate to go around. But it seems that anti-Jewish hate, for the most part, takes a back seat despite the hate crime statistics that show we are not forgotten by the haters.

The media has noticed a few instances of politicians with their passive anti-Semitism. From disgraced former judge in Alabama, Roy Moore, whose wife basically went with the old-time favorite of some of our best friends are Jews when she proclaimed at a political rally, "One of our attorneys is a Jew. We have very close friends that are Jewish." Granted it was later revealed the "Jew" she referred to was actually a messianic Jew, so there's that.

More recently, District of Columbia Councilman Trayon White made a stir. First, by claiming the Rothschilds control the weather after a surprise snow flurry in mid-March, and again a month later while visiting the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and making some questionable comments. The story seems to be in progress as some are claiming his comments came from a place of honest ignorance and a desire to learn that were manipulated into a "gotcha" moment by a Washington Post reporter.  While that may be the case in the second event, it doesn't explain his recent donation to Louis Farrakhan and the Nation of Islam for an event where Farrakhan made his own recent anti-Semitic remarks. Granted, it should come as a surprise to no one that the Minister Farrakhan holds anti-Semitic views, considering his track record on the subject.

My hope is that Councilman White's disturbing comments come from his honestly not understanding anti-Semitism, but if that's the case it's troubling for other reasons. A recent survey revealed that two thirds of millennials didn't know what Auschwitz is, and 22% said they hadn't heard of the Holocaust or weren't sure if they had.  Those are disturbing numbers but explain why so many young people, like Mr. White, don't understand why this is such a big deal.

I get it if it's an honest moment of "I didn't know that" but my gravest fear is that it become, "I didn't know that and I still don't believe it."

The FBI hate crime statistics referenced at the beginning of this post were for calendar year 2016 and were released in November 2017. It will be interesting to see the numbers for calendar year 2017 when they are released this November. 2017 was the first full year of the Trump administration being in office. Sadly I expect the bad numbers to go up for everyone.

A Rosenstein by Any Other Name

Some days are better than others. Most days I don't even think about it, but then it gets shoved in my face and that's all I can think about. I'm talking about my surname, in all of it's Scots-Irish McGlory.

Invariably when introducing myself to a group of strangers there will always be one person who notices the disparity between my kippah and surname. Without fail I will get one of the following:

• Raised eyebrow (usually the minimum) 
• "Where do you daven/go to synagogue?" (more rare, but I think it's to check if I'm actually Jewish.)
• "Oh, is your mother Jewish?" (Not that I know of. Why, what have you heard?)
• "Oh, I didn't know that was  Jewish name." (Yet here I am.)
• "McSurname? What's with the yarmulke?"(Jews wear kippot, I'm a Jew.)
• "McSurname? Where'd the yarmulke come from?" (The Sisterhood gift shop at my shul.)
• "Did you convert to get married?" (No, actually my ex-wife converted after I did.)
• "Oh, so you're not really Jewish." (!קוש מיין אידישע טאָכעס)

I've thought about changing my legal name for many years. Recently I came across the name "Meyer" and it seemed like the perfect surname for me. I am of Scots-Irish and German heritage and "Meyer" is the one magical name that appears in Irish, German, and Jewish families. I'm sure I'd get past the bologna jokes eventually, but best of all I'd stop getting conversion shoved in my face and being made to feel "less than". 

I've mentioned this to my kids and ex-wife and they're of the mind to ignore the haters and keep my last name. I guess in a sense they are right. My issues with my name are mine and I shouldn't care what people think. But should and do are different words. I do let it bother me and I don't know how to get past it. On one hand I want to be bold and have a "deal with it" attitude. Any problem with my last name is your problem, not mine. While on the other hand, I feel like changing my surname would be the final step in shedding off my old life, albeit a quarter century after the process started. It would be the final embrace of my faith and people. 

But tomorrow I will wake up with the same name as today and I'm sure someone will raise an eyebrow or two and I'll still be Jewish at the end of the day.

And so it goes.

Stalled Journeys

Another year, another Pesach. It has been well over a year that I have been trying to reconnect with my Judaism. As can be witnessed by the dates of the posts here, documenting the journey hasn't gone that well either.


I've been wearing my kippah every day since Hanukkah 5777 (December of 2016, in case you don't want to check hebcal.com). This year my self-challenge was to start wearing tallit katan every day. That has been more of a challenge, but oddly enough it has had more to do with laundry and body heat than presenting as Jewish. Granted I generally tuck-in and don't wear the tzitzit out yet, or at least not out when I'm out. That's still a point of trying to avoid מַרְאִית עַיִן (marit ayin) and me doing something un-Jewish with my tzitzit out. Unlike covering my head with a baseball cap and going incognito, having a bunch of white strings tangling at your waistline is a little more obvious that something is up.




As for reconnecting with my community, I tried to start going to morning minyan again. You may recall last Pesach Sheni I decided to try to make the jump back into regular attendance. I spoke with the rabbi about rejoining the congregation and things seemed to be going okay, up until the next festival. Shavuot is a major festival on the Hebrew calendar but, from what I've ever witnessed in the local Conservative synagogues, it's not one of the "popular" holidays. It should be up there with Pesach and Sukkot. It celebrates G-d revealing the Torah to the nation of Israel at Sinai. I made a point to attend services that day and I regretted it.




I felt so out of place the entire time. It started out well enough I got a good seat, I got to be the magbiah and lift the Torah. Then, like an idiot, I accidentally mansplained what page we are on to the lady sitting next to me. Which wouldn't be so bad except I recognized her from my conversion classes 18 years ago. She and her husband had been friendly with my ex-wife and I back then but I guess we all drifted apart after my family moved away for awhile. I wanted to eat my shoe. 




After the service, I stepped back into the minyan room to grab my jacket and accidentally overheard the rabbi speaking to the elderly couple who run the daily minyan about how to handle a situation with a schnorrer. Were they talking about me? Were they talking about one of the other families who had joined us from a nearby smaller congregation? I had attended about a month's worth of morning minyanim but I had not yet spoken to the synagogue office about renewing my membership. I had been sure to drop a ten dollar bill in the tzedakah box each morning I attended (when most folks were dropping a dollar or a five spot at most). I felt mortified. 


At the luncheon after services I was relegated to sit with the other oddball non-member families at the table farthest from the rabbi. I had an overwhelming sense of not belonging. All of this on top of recently being outed by the rabbi as being a convert. To him it appeared to be an off hand comment, a fond memory from my conversion. We had joked at the time this was Conversion 2.0 as I had previously converted through the Reform movement and this was the "upgrade". But that was almost twenty years ago and I still hated being reminded of my conversion. 




It is my understanding that you shouldn't bring up a convert's past in general conversation. I'm stuck with a very obvious Scots-Irish surname that already causes plenty of people to raise an eyebrow and say, "I didn't know that was a Jewish name." To which I generally reply, "It is now" or "it's always been my name" as a deflection. I hate how I am immediately treated differently by Jews and non-Jews when it gets out that I converted. "Oh, so you're not really Jewish" has been heard from both sides and I honestly can't say which one bothers me more. 


Instead of addressing all of this with the rabbi, I did what I usually do and retreated inward. I just stopped going to minyan. I never called the front office about membership. I retreated back to my home version of Judaism. I have spent the last year watching videos about Jewish observance and reading as much as possible. I have two bookcases overflowing with Jewish reference books that I used to dig into every week. I'm thinking more and more about starting Daf Yomi and kick myself for not having this rejuvenation of Judaism before the current cycle started (August 3, 2012). I know I want to study Talmud, but I'm not sure if doing Daf Yomi isn't just an excuse for me to buy the Talmud set. (Side note, the set sold by Artscroll would look beautiful on my bookshelf but for $1800 I will likely just keep using Sefaria.)


But all of that and I haven't been back. I feel like I am a huge disappointment to the rabbi but at the same time I'm scared about my status as a convert. When he retires or (G-d forbid) passes away, who will remember that I am a Jew? Who will count me at a minyan? Will I be counted as a Jew in any other congregation I visit? I'm already worried enough that I'm pretty sure I can't make Aliyah to Israel due to the requirement of being active in a synagogue or community for the past year. Not that I am thinking of making Aliyah anytime soon, but it has always been a little reassuring knowing we have a safety net. 


Long story short (too late) I want to be more engaged in my Judaism. I am progressing in my daily observance at home. I took offense at a statement that probably wasn't about me and let it wreck my year. 


Now what?