מוצש"ק פר' כי תבא תשע"ג
When I saw this report, I really felt for this Jewish kid in Massachusetts, and his parents. Thirty years ago, my parents handled a similar situation in the same way. When it came down to "fight or flight," fight won hands down.
But, now that I am the adult, I would handle it in a completely different way.
Times Of Israel: Massachusetts Parents Sue for Anti-Semitic Bullying of Son
Couple accuses local school board of ignoring two years of abuse that included religious slurs and Nazi salutes
JTA, August 12, 2013
The parents of a 13-year-old boy are suing their Massachusetts school district for ignoring verbal and physical attacks on their son by other students for being Jewish.
Jennyfer Sordillo and Robert Groezinger filed the lawsuit late last month against the Carver public schools in the US District Court in Boston. It was first reported in the Boston Globe over the weekend.
They claim their son was subjected to daily anti-Semitic attacks by a group of boys at his school. The abuse included religious slurs and Nazi salutes, having pennies thrown at him, and being punched and kicked.
(“stingy Jew,” “dirty Jew,” and “Jew boy” and was told after being
saluted with the Hitler salute that he needed to “get in the oven.
)
There is only one other Jewish student in the class of 155, according to the lawsuit.
Esser Agaroth (2¢):
When my mother was running for public office, we had the, now proverbial swastika painted on our driveway. Police examined the crime scene, and pointed out that the street light was shot out. It was a professional job, the officers said.
My mother was not going to be frightened out of HER (non-Jewish) neighborhood. She refused to paint the swastika over, until every family on the block had taken a good look at it.
Why, we even received help and support from the
Anti-Defamation League [ADL]. And by now, you should all know just how much
I really do not care for this organization.
But, I digress....
Sounds like a good strategy, no? We won, right? After all, no one ever messed with my mother ever again. We were happily and safely tucked away, in our non-Jewish neighborhood, simultaneously trying to outdo the non-Jews at being non-Jewish, and complaining about our lack of contact with the Jewish community.
This led them to joining an Orthodox
schul, the "authentic Judaism" we did not believe in, where my mother's cousins were members. My father was forced to put his highly exaggerated "trauma" of coming from a
frum family aside, and had to deal with his new found popularity as the youngest Yiddish speaker in the community (age 38).
fWith all due respect to my well-educated, and very well-traveled parents, I am happy to say that this plan of action on their part pon the other hand, learned from my parents' mistakes.
I have lived in Israel for 16 years now, and haven't left in 15. But, I was not running away from the "good fight" for my Constitutional rights, including the right to live as a Jew safely and comfortably in the United States of America.
I was running TO where I am supposed to live as a Jew. We so easily forget that the U. S. is one of the many lands of our EXILE, and EXILE is supposed to be a punishment.
In the U. S., where Jews have worked hard for educational and professional advancement, and have had the freedom to do so, we so easily forget that the U. S. is a country of exile. We all heard the plight of the Jews in the former Soviet Union, of Jews getting arrested and imprisoned for teaching Jewish children Hebrew, of Jews being treated as second class citizens the minute they applied for permission to emigrate.
We all agreed that those Jews were oppressed, as were Jews still struggling to survive in Muslim countries. But, the minute it was suggested that we American Jews, too, should pack up all of our possessions, and start making our way to our "real" homeland, it was brushed off with a patronizing wave of the hand.e
We had become just like Israel in Egypt; we had become too comfortable in the land of our exile. Those Torah observant Jews conveniently clung to the relatively new concept, only about 500 years old, that Mashi'ah would come, and do all of the work for us.
We had fooled ourselves into believing that the shirking of our responsibility had been validated, that we were to sit back, pray, be patient, and not worry about it.
Eighty percent of Israel remained in Egypt, or rather, did not make it out. And, dare I bring up the all too sensitive subject of those 6,000,000 Jews, who never made it out of Europe? I hope that is acceptable for me to suggest that at least some of those Jews,
HY"D (may their blood be avenged!), became too comfortable in their countries of exile. Need I point to those Jews who are all too comfortable in Europe now, in spite of the rise in violence against Jews, and the rise in tolerance for such violence.
This brings us back to those of you still too comfortable in the U. S.
Those swastikas and other anti-Jewish (let's stop using euphemisms, shall we?) are blessings. That's right. Blessings.
They are direct communications to you that you should not be there. Oh, don't worry. I know what you'll be saying next: Maybe the rockets from
Azza (Gaza) and Lebanon, and threats from Iran are telling us Jews that we are not supposed to be in Israel
(God forbid!).
Although, to my parents' credit, my mother has since moved to a more Jewish neighborhood, and visits Israel. My father, who still lives in the house with the painted over swastika, is, shall we say, quite mobile, and speaks six languages, three on the level of mother tongue. I am not worried about my father. He already sees the writing on the wall. He just chooses to live dangerously.
Unfortunately, no matter how hard I try, Israel just does not seem to either of my parents as a realistic option.
So, that all being said, you are not wrong for fighting for your son. It's just that a drawn out court battle, which will just cause you to incur more anti-Jewish wrath (Arabs are Semites, too, you know.).
Instead of putting a band-aid on an old festering wound, old as in almost 2,000 years of
galuth (exile), use surgery, and come live in the ONLY, true home of the Jewish People, Israel.
About those rockets, and countless other terrorist attacks, which will never cease until our co-dependent, Israeli government (or another government, or a power greater than any government) finally does what needs to be done, and stops giving and giving and giving, without getting anything in return.
We need you, and you need us. Israel is where your efforts are supposed to be directed in the defense of your children. Israel is your family's home.
