How Antisemitism Works
It's Different From Other Forms of Bigotry
On the list of things I’ve worried about throughout life, antisemitism never appeared as a concern. I was ignorant of its enduring power.
But THREE THOUSAND YEARS is the greatest game of whack-a-mole ever played. Somehow, I lived blissfully unaware of its lurking presence for five decades while married to a Jewish man for the last three of them.
I could argue the obvious: I did not grow up in a Jewish family, so I was insulated from that intergenerational trauma. But after 29 years of marriage to an actual Jewish person, you’d think I’d have had a heads-up prior to October 7th. The truth is that nothing prepared me for the antisemitism I’m seeing now.
How is this possible?
I’d thought that antisemitism had been cured. Having grown up exposed to so many Holocaust narratives in books and film, I’d imagined that hatred toward Jews was safely stored in history.
I want to emphasize that I’m not the sort of person who takes fear lightly; in fact, I’m the opposite kind of person, the one who scans settings for potential threats and imagines all kinds of worst-case scenarios. I consider it a talent despite the accompanying anxiety. I should probably switch to writing horror. I could transform my mental inventory into terrifying short stories instead of letting it take up internal space.
Allow me to present three absolutely ridiculous scenarios I’ve spent real time pondering:
On more occasions than I care to admit, while strolling to my mailbox, I suddenly remember that giant cats roam the earth, and while they should be living overseas, somewhere in Africa, there are dozens of them here in south Florida. Lion Country Safari is only a short drive away. What if a zookeeper leaves a gate open? Or a local tornado blows a fence down? A roaring creature could make its way down my street, hungry and happy to eat me.
Since having brain surgery in 2020, I’ve often wondered if things did not go as well as I’ve been told. I imagine my dear husband has called all my friends and delivered this news: Jen’s brain is done for. She is doomed to suffer all kinds of delusions from now on. For instance, just today, she started screaming that Roe v Wade was overturned—that’s how mad she’s grown—so for the sake of my own sanity, can y’all just go along with her?
About once a year, I lie in bed, struggling to fall asleep, and remember the Florida man who was devoured by the earth itself. He’d been at home, asleep in his very own bed when the ground opened up and swallowed him whole. His brother heard his screams and ran to rescue him, but it was impossible. A sinkhole had claimed the guy along with his entire bed. I start looking over the edge of my own bed, peering down at the wood planks just to make sure the floor is still intact.
My aim in sharing these three scenarios is to inject a bit of levity into the current misery we are up against. Reality is grim. If you have not yet seen yesterday’s essay in the New York Times, I beg you to have a look here.
Even if you’re not Jewish. Even if you’re anti-Zionist. The red flags are flying high. Historically, antisemitism surges when society becomes unstable.
The sinkhole is already sucking us in, and while the Jews might collapse underground first, the consequences of normalizing the exclusion of Jews from intellectual spaces will not stop with Jews alone. The dynamics that usher fascism into power are already underway, and the consequences will be poor for everyone. Those who survive early stages of structural collapse will be left to fight the lions.
It’s imperative that everyone learn how antisemitism functions. I didn’t understand it myself and thought the oppression of Jews functioned in the same way as other forms of systemic bigotry. I believed that with time, oppression could be conquered. That Jews were safer and safer the further time carried us away from WWII.
Seeing the sudden surge in Jewish hate in the aftermath of October 7th made me desperate to understand how the shift could happen so swiftly. It seemed as if everything was prewired and plugged in, ready and waiting for someone to flip a switch.
Indeed, that’s how it works. I recently took a webinar through Project Shema to learn more about antisemitism, and I encourage everyone else to do so too.
Here’s a graph, (compliments of Project Shema), that illustrates the phenomenon of (non-Jewish) oppression over time:
As you can see, oppressed populations gain safety slowly, but as time continues, their relative safety persists. One expects safety to continue to rise, albeit at near-glacial pace.
But antisemitism is special. It doesn’t follow the same narrative arc as other prejudices. Antisemitism is a rollercoaster, and the relationship between Jewish safety over time looks like this (compliments of Project Shema again):
Antisemitism is a totally different ride. Jews can be living a perfectly safe existence, when suddenly, their safety plummets. There is little to no warning. It is the sinkhole of bigotry, the total collapse of security in a mere moment.
I should note that many Jews also occupy other segments of marginalization. For instance, Jews are not all white, but come in all shades, including Black. Last I checked, the Jewish population in Israel is only 30% white. That our college protesters have erased Jews of color from the entire picture is quite spectacular.
Moreover, whiteness is no armor against antisemitism. Whereas light skin and/or high socioeconomic status often protects people from oppression, being white and being a member of the educated and/or wealthy class does not insulate a Jew from harm.
Our safety is at stake. And if you are a friend to me or my family or any other Jewish person, I beg of you: Please learn more about how antisemitism functions. Please be alarmed by what is happening all over the world. And become an ally.
Our very safety depends on your participation.
I’ll leave this post with one last pic of the two graphs, side-by-side, so everyone can visualize the difference between how antisemitism functions versus other forms of systemic oppression:
Thank you for reading.
xoxo Jen
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