A Different World
By W. F. Twyman, Jr.
Part of the human condition is living in a world where millions of realities compete for our attention and time. A member brought to my attention the horrible and tragic attack on Israelis in Amsterdam. I am close to someone, Jewish, who recently spent a semester in Amsterdam, so this outrage hits close to home. 86th anniversary of Kristallnacht ‘marked on the streets of Amsterdam’ I am so glad my reader brought this incident to my attention.
It pains me to hear family members fear ancient dragons in the southern night while right now, today, Israelis are hunted down and thrown into canals. Israelis truly fear the night and for good reason. I live in a reality where privileged, free, comfortable black Americans wax lyrical about the Klan in Idaho today while honest to God Jewish individuals engage the larger world with fear. It was a literal pogrom in 2024.
What can I do as an individual in San Diego? I cannot pilot a plane to rescue the Israelis out of Amsterdam to ensure their safety home. I can’t do a Vulcan mind-meld and cause pro Palestinian terrorists to forget hate. I have no street cred with terrorists.
Nonetheless, I am so grateful that my reader brought this fear and anxiety about the larger world to my attention. People should live in peace. I asked the reader to educate me at every opportunity about these types of things. I need to know.
It is a privilege to be a Black American in New Haven in 2024. No one who self-identifies as a Black American experiences an off duty police officer/security guard around every black church. No one. No one knows the feeling of bulletproof glass around the windows at the local African Methodist Episcopal (AME) church. No one knows those primal fears of terror. Jewish Americans know these anxieties every…single…day.
More Black Americans should step out of their bubble of ancient fears and feel for Jewish American living in the (metaphorical) southern night today. Here there be dragons!
Conclusion: It is part of my personality to care profoundly when someone else of a different race or ethnicity is harmed. I carry the gene for out group empathy. So, I write out of my bubble reality this Sunday morning because harm to anyone anywhere due to Jewish identity is harm to me.