May 2, 2008
COMMENT:
Antisemitism at Ridgefield High School
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You always remember exactly where you are at the important times. You might blink your eyes, or shake your head. You might say “what?” or “no” or “why?” or “how?” You might say nothing.
I didn’t say anything the first time. Or the second. Or the third.
And I kept not saying anything until it become more habitual than a conscious choice, and so each time something happened, it would no longer be important to me, it would just be.
• • •
For the longest time, I was OK with this, with this philosophy of ignorance. I was OK because I know, and knew, wholeheartedly, that self-preservation in Ridgefield High School is so much more important than being “cool,” or a “jock” or any other adjective high school cliques tag individuals, because “not saying anything” would draw absolutely no attention to oneself, and that’s exactly what I wanted, to not draw attention to myself.
Until yesterday. Yesterday, my normal bathroom routine (once before second period and once after seventh period) was ruined by eight perpendicular lines intersecting at the base of each other. My bathroom routine was ruined by a swastika.
This isn’t the first time I’ve seen a swastika in the Ridgefield School District, and it won’t be the last. Four years ago, in East Ridge Middle School, someone drew with red sharpies the now hated “Roman symbol of prosperity” on lockers, doors, and fire extinguishers.
In our own high school, the symbol appears almost religiously within the confines of boy’s bathrooms all over. An ongoing joke the students of the school library share with each other is that the cubicles are organized in swastikas as a discreet symbol of hate. Although they absolutely are not, it doesn’t stop the kids from talking.
And talk they do, for I’ve heard a countless number of scholars casually toss the word “Jew” around, when someone refuses to spare a dime. Or make a reference to “air being free.” Or just hold intangible grudges with people wearing a “Magen David” in general.
In my English class, a fellow student who sat across the room from me said, quite naturally, “Jews tend to treat everything with kiddy gloves.”
Mr. Kiddy Gloves learned that I am a wicked debater. He also learned to stay away, far away, from generalizations that make him look like a bigot. Kiddy Gloves doesn’t speak as much as he used to in class.
But, provoking remarks aside, I never addressed the strong current of anti-Semitic remarks flowing out of Ridgefield’s own public school. I never addressed it until yesterday.
• • •
The swastika was intended to symbolize hate, but instead elicited a laugh. Five inches away from my face stood a backwards swastika, and although it meant to scream “Third Reich,” it was translated into “I’m an idiot.” And I laughed.
It’s not every day you get dyslexic Nazis, and, to be quite honest, if Hitler sympathizers are that uneducated, it’s no wonder they hate minorities. Or sympathize with Hitler.
But this incorrectly drawn tic-tac-toe board does mark a dawn on a new day, a day when haggling Jewish people is socially acceptable. A day when being made fun of because of religion will be the same as poking fun at someone because of height. Or hair color. Or clothes.
Each ethnicity goes through a climax such as this, and each one has to struggle with the hypocrisy of their own race. Take African Americans, for example. If African Americans can call themselves the derogatory “n” word, how come every other ethnicity can’t?
And yet I can’t answer that for you, I have neither the experience nor ethnic baggage attached to that word to qualify me as a credible commentator. So I will “DQ” myself from that question, and instead, I’ll put it in terms I’m more familiar with.
If Sacha Baron Cohen has a right to make fun of Judaism, how come every other ethnicity can’t?
And with those two unanswerable questions, the dams of “social correctness” come crashing down in a high school bathroom by a sound that can best be described as a toilet’s flush.
• • •
Where are the boundaries? When does one disregard the humor in hate jokes, and hold their tongue, despite the almost acceptable atmosphere?
I still don’t have an answer for you. The only semblance of a response I can muster for you is the satisfaction that I get, knowing, with quite certainty, that my friends, my true and real friends, don’t joke about swastikas. They don’t make penny remarks, or snide contemptuous comments about “Heebs,” or any other religion, for that matter. Because the question above, although it’s directed at an ethnicity, it’s a personal matter.
I must be the only one in high school who thinks “Borat” isn’t funny. And that’s because I know people. I know people who actually believe in Jewish discrimination, and people who use “Borat” as their vessel of hate. Their “Borat” quotes and seemingly harmless quips hide something deeper, something that Mel Gibson can associate with very well, and that’s why it’s not funny. At least for me, hate jokes aren’t funny.
• • •
High school is a tough place for a kid to be at. Anything that sets someone apart also targets that someone for mockery. You could say I waited so long to write this article because I saw the backwards swastika and was deeply offended by the embarrassment to the Nazi party (if you’re going to hate someone, do it right).
Or you could say that I needed time to hone my “literary cannon” into a “piercing laser” to cut through the issue at hand.
Or you could say the truth, which is that if I had released this article as a freshman, or sophomore, or anything but the second-semester senior I am right now, I wouldn’t have been able to deal with the isolation.
That’s what high school kids do to outliers, they isolate.
And while I am preaching to you about standing up to adversity, especially religious adversity, it is 100% true that I didn’t. I made it my habit not to. I closed off my eyes. I closed off my ears, and I especially closed off my mouth.
And I was wrong.
Although “witch hunts” happen in schools worldwide, you need to stand up to religious persecution. And when you do, you need to do it the right way.
Anti-Semitism, and hate jokes, aren’t going to go away any time soon, and it’s useless to fight every passing remark, so don’t. Pick your battles. Don’t be the “ready with statistics;” jump-the-gun Jew, itching to protect his honor. Trust me when I say, “It doesn’t help.”
Instead, do what I do. Hang out with people who don’t use religion to define your character, but your character to define you.
Not everyone’s that respectable. And so my remedy for the ignorant people who aren’t is to wait, wait and have patience. Wait for the moment. That divine moment when justice can be served swiftly and appropriately in front of an enlightened adult, or teacher, or through an unbiased crowd, and let go.
And when that moment happens, you need to be ready. Because when you step up to the plate, and when you finally have a level playing field, you’re going to want to own the conversation.
• • •
My moment of reckoning came in an English class, when I addressed Mr. “Kiddy Gloves.” He didn’t know what was coming, and if he did, he would have shut up.
That’s my words of wisdom to everyone. Pick good friends with concrete social boundaries, and wait for the right moment to show your true colors.
I didn’t say anything the first, the second, or the third time. But I did say something. I said something on a Wednesday, third period, English class. You never forget the important times, and although I don’t forget the times I said nothing — I remember the time I said something.
Please don’t joke about religion, Ridgefield High School.
© Copyright 2008 by Hersam Acorn Newspapers
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