A Non Religious Jew in a Post October 7th America

This blog is charged, this blog is real, this blog is my point of view. Please read with an open heart and open mind. There is only one picture, there is not frills. There is just my words, my heart, my mind. Please remember when you speak so casually about this subject there are actually people around you that live it daily.

Well here it goes.

I am a non religious Jew. What does that mean? My father was Jewish, my mother was catholic, I was raised christian. If you know anything of Jews it takes your mother being Jewish to be considered a Jew. We found out before my mother passed away that she had Ashkenazi Jewish blood background. Meaning I have Ashkenazi on both sides of my family meaning I am Jewish. But not growing up religiously Jewish I don’t wear a kippah, I didn’t have a bar mitzvah , but ethnically I am Jewish.

I was always proud of my Jewish background. The stories I heard about our family and the path to America. The rich history of my people. The sad history of our people. The reality of what it means to be a Jew in modern society.

October 7th, 2023 - a wave of sorrow crashes into my body reminiscent of the stories I used to read and hear about the Holocaust. The difference being this was happening in modern Israel. A terrorist group named Hamas attacked a music festival. More than 1200 people tragically lost their lives in the most horrific fashions. Women being raped and murdered, children being thrown in ovens in front of their parents, people being kidnapped and killed. To this day there are still brave men and women still in captivity by Hamas.

The thought crossed my mind at least we live in the world that will condemn this hate and rise up to protect Jews so that another Holocaust doesn’t happen. Man was I wrong. We have seemed to totally forget what our history was.

What I saw was visceral hate for Jews masked in the guise of Free Palestine. We blamed the 1200 + men, women, infants, grandparents, aunties, and uncles that their deaths were somewhat justified from a perceived oppression. We celebrated Hamas as a freedom fighting group. We saw major companies like Starbucks allowing their employees to post public letters celebrating the death of infants by the hands of Hamas. College campuses including Virginia Tech allowing their Jewish students to be attacked. We allowed fliers to be dropped off on Jewish students door steps with swastikas proclaiming the camps were coming back. We saw tenured professors blocking the access to college and college campuses to Jewish students. We saw college campuses being taken over by other students flooding all common areas of campuses demanding that Jewish student wear bands on their arms notifying the public they are Jews. You know who else did this, Nazis.

I chose that last word deliberately this country has taken over this word and it has lost all meaning. Let me school you for a second what that word and other words mean:

Nazi -a member of the far-right National Socialist German Workers' Party.

Fascism is a far-right form of government in which most of the country's power is held by one ruler or a small group, under a single party. Fascist governments are usually totalitarian and authoritarian one-party states.

Authoritarian - favoring or enforcing strict obedience to authority, especially that of the government, at the expense of personal freedom

I bring these words up because due to October 7th and recent political climates we have gotten too comfortable demeaning and dehumanizing people who oppose your thought process.

The amount of times I have been called a nazi in the last year alone without people knowing they are calling me it is countless. They seem to think those that intellectually have a difference of opinion they are racist, fascist, a nazi, etc. I find it contradictory that having a difference of opinion makes someone an Authoritarian but yet you have the right to still live and think those thoughts.

Do you know what a real Nazi would do if they truly existed in your neighborhood, in your job, in your friend group, in your social club? They would have locked you up at best but more than likely you would be eliminated you. Well that is at least what Nazis would do.

This is why I am frustrated. We see actual atrocities happening but your political party didn’t win and that is some sort of atrocity.

In my life I have never have had fear just because I am a Jew until this last year. While this sounds extreme it is reality for Jews. I had to reach of to friends to make sure I had a safe place to go if shit hit the fan again for Jews.

Do you know how hard it is to be around people that you don’t trust would help you if someone was hunting you down? This is real life fear.

I was in public with people this past week where they casually were calling people nazis just because they wanted to voted for someone else or more importantly because they didn’t want to vote for the person they demanded them to vote for.

Surprisingly a lot of people spouting hate in the name of abolishing hate. The ends justified the means.

I am tired, I am tired of the hate, I am tired of feeling I am not human because of the heritage I was born with, I am tired of ignorant people using words they have no clue what they mean.

We are all human. Humans with beautiful and colorful backgrounds. Humans with varying ideas, thoughts, beliefs. Humans that have to share this speck of dust floating around in this void of space. Humans that will argue, debate, have discord, will irritate, will frustrate, will even make mad, but we are humans. No common person at their core is evil.

I urge, I beg, I plead, look at the people around, recognize they are beautifully different from you and they might be all you have.

Drop the ignorance, embrace love, we have to heal.

Most importantly if you know a Jew in your life regardless of what they believe or don’t believe, hug them, love them, let them know they are safe.