Gender and Sexuality
Instead of Being Silent
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What does love look like in the wake of violence I cannot grasp?
General News
President Obama & Hiroshima: A Pathway to National Atonement
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President Obama, as leader of the nation, and inheriting a morally corrupt military system that came into existence long before he assumed office, may not be able or willing to publicly call upon the American people to atone for the war crimes of our own time: above all, the crime of using money and instant social stature to entice financially and emotionally vulnerable young adults into fighting wars in the name of the entire nation, as the rest of us play golf and download our new apps. But today,Friday, May 27, 2016, he has created the emotional space for all of us to put down the blinders of cheap and idolatrous nationalism, and to pray for the moral enlightenment necessary to end the sin of unjust war, of which a pay-incentivized soldiery is its most basic staple.
Culture
The New Anti-Semitism: Islamophobia
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The new anti-Semitism extends far beyond darkened movie theatres to the spotlight shining on Donald J. Trump, the presumptive nominee of the Republican Party. What if Trump had substituted “Jew” in his diatribe against Muslims? What if he told enraptured followers that: Jews should be banned from entering the country until we can figure out what’s going on. And imagine: He’d require Jewish-Americans to register with a government database, and mandate special identification cards. Warrantless surveillance of American Jews and their places of worship would become the new normal.
Culture
Nazi Policy and Black Victims—Before, During, and After the Holocaust—from Africa to Berlin to North Carolina
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In recent years, too many in the African American community have expressed a disconnect to Holocaust topics, seeing the genocide of Jews as someone else’s nightmare. After all, African Americans are still struggling to achieve general recognition of the barbarity of the Middle Passage, the inhumanity of slavery, the oppression of Jim Crow, and the battle for modern civil rights. For many in that community, the murder of six million Jews and millions of other Europeans happened to other minorities in a faraway place where they had no involvement.
GMP
Creating a Better World
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As a veteran of World War II who has celebrated his 90th birthday, I’m not often moved reading current events and commentary. But the consistent and hopeful writings by Tikkun and Rabbi Michael Lerner are a refreshing contrast to news that ignores contexts and heartfelt analysis. The first act of the American Revolution began in 1776. I think it remains for us to write the second act and perform it. This second act would truly bring liberty and justice for our world, for each human person, created in the image and likeness of God. This second act would be non-violent, courageous, imaginative, and comprehensive. Tikkun advocates that the U.S. implement a form of the Marshall Plan that would bring security to Palestinians, the Jewish people, and others in our uneven world. Instead of joining our allies in an effort to control our enemies, wouldn’t it be better to work together with all nations to promote human rights, an inclusive world economy, common security for all? Now we tend to exaggerate the faults of our enemies and minimize our own faults and the faults of our allies.
Hinduism
For Hindu Americans, Long-Term Hopes for Pluralism About More Than Just Days Off
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At a time when our struggle for civil and human rights seems daunting given the vitriolic political climate, one of the most striking lessons from history is that movements for social change never go smoothly. In fact, one of the lessons many of us fail to appreciate from the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s is how many internal struggles there was among the various groups and leaders that were calling for change. Ava DuVernay’s masterful Selma captured some of these struggles from the perspective of the Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., but there were many ideological, geographical, cultural, and religious fault-lines that hindered attempts to articulate a unified message for full equality and suffrage. After the passage of the Civil Rights Act, some of those tensions remained, even as groups such as the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, and NAACP continued to try to impact long-lasting change. Today, new battlefronts in the call for civil rights have emerged, most notably for recognizing the rights of religious minorities in a rapidly diversifying country.
Empathy
For many Jews, anti-Arab racism hits home
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Following the devastating attacks in Paris, right wing forces have been fanning the frightening flames of anti-Arab racism, Islamophobia and xenophobia. There have been calls for increased surveillance of Muslim communities, unconstitutional registration of American Muslims, and religious tests for Syrian refugees seeking safety in the United States. I am Mizrahi. I’m a Jew, and like many Mizrahim, I’m also an Arab. We Arab Jews have a unique perspective to offer on the Syrian refugee crisis, and on the Islamophobic and anti-Arab backlash that we are seeing in this country and across the globe.
Inter-Culturalism
Open Letter to Dr. Ben Carson
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You, Dr. Carson, in fact, appear to practice the same sort of despicable tactics as Donald Trump (as well as many others with whom you share the debate stage and the clown car as you all drive down the path toward the presidential primaries). I see an underlying philosophical trend among many of you Republican candidates, whether on issues around immigration, issues of equity between genders and sexual identities, and issues of religion.
General News
Help Wanted to Pressure US Embassy Official
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A plea for legal advice for a friend of mine, Eritrean-American journalist Michael Abraham, who is without means of subsistence in Nairobi because a US Embassy official will not give him the proof of his US citizenship that he needs to work as foreign correspondent or obtain emergency assistance after losing everything in the bloody South Sudan war.
Inter-Culturalism
KKK Posing as Victim of “Cultural Genocide”
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Let’s be clear here: the Confederate battle flag no more represents white Southern culture anymore than the swastika flag represents Gentile German culture. What these flags do have in common, though, is that they both symbolize Christian white supremacy, terrorism, treason, separation, exclusion, enslavement, murder, and in the United States, yes, cross burnings.