Let's Marginalize "Marginalized"
What the radical right is doing to Jews, LGBTQ, and other minorities should no longer be tossed aside as simple marginalization.
We spend a lot of time, justifiably, bemoaning the predicament of so-called marginalized people. I do as well. The problem is that the term is not nearly strong enough to convey the vile, despicable, unforgivable hatred that leads to marginalization. Thesaurus.com presents the following synonyms for the term: criticize, demean, deprecate, diminish, disparage, and belittle. None of them does justice to the venomous hate that "marginalize" really connotes - and provokes.
Historically, the Jews have been a marginalized group, but the term simply doesn't do justice to the hate we've endured through the ages, and continue to now. I was both delighted and saddened this week that two Broadway shows dealing with antisemitism, "Parade" and "Leopoldstadt," both won multiple Tonys - thrilled to see antisemitism so openly discussed, but sad that it needs to be.
Micaela Diamond, who stars in "Parade," employed the "m" word in her recent op-ed in the New York Times. She wrote, “If we refuse to embrace our inherent otherness — the parts that make us definitively Jewish Americans — we forget our common struggle with other marginalized people.”
She is saying, "Hey, we are victims too!" That's true, but why clamor for admittance to this club of the loathed, in a Groucho Marx-ist kind of way. Instead, let's dispense with the caucus of the "marginalized" and replace it with something stronger, less passive and more defiant. We can join forces, but not as the marginalized and powerless, but as a fighting force, the legion of the lynched.
Listen to the songs from "Parade" and study the lyrics, and you can see that "marginalize" doesn't do justice to this lynching, to any lynching. To say that Jim Crow era Blacks were "marginalized" sounds like a parody of the systemic ostracism that they faced. The term is a euphemism designed to lessen the shock and numb the response, much as the Nazis euphemistically called deportation "resettlement." When facing down the most vile human impulses, we can't deliberately soften the blow.
I've always been a believer that transparency disinfects, and the antisemitic tropes exposed in the lyrics of "Parade" are so chilling that they rip off the bandaid of toleration, the illusion of acceptance that the Jews of Atlanta thought protected them then, and that American Jews think protects us now. These lyrics baldly lay bare the despicable lies, one by one.
How's this for starters - from the song, Real Big News.
So give him fangs, give him horns, Give him scaly, hairy palms! Have him droolin' out the corner of his mouth! He's a master of disguise! Check those bug-out creepy eyes! Sure, that fella's here to rape the whole damned South! They'll be bangin' down my door, Yellin' "More, Craig, more!" "Call for justice! We need justice! Beat the bastard! Kill the bum!" Big news! Real big news! My savior has finally come!
Some feel the words go too far. The ADL has put together a "Parade" study guide explaining how stereotypes like these invariably lead to much worse. Sticks and stones can break bones - but names too can hurt you. The demonization of Leo Frank that led to his faulty conviction and eventual lynching was hardly a mere marginalization. it draws a straight line from the medieval Blood Libel child-killing accusations right through Pizzagate and associated conspiracies - and straight to the "grooming" accusations of today's news. As the ADL has stated, "The antisemitic Goyim Defense League has distributed fliers across the U.S. claiming "every single aspect of Disney child grooming is Jewish.” No wonder this show was targeted by neo-Nazi protesters.
What the radical right is doing to Jews, LGBTQ, and other minorities should no longer be tossed aside as simple marginalization. According to the Beyond Bullying website, half of all trans students in the US are bullied at school. Half! When you kick someone to the curb, that's not mere marginalization. It's pure evil, and it cannot be allowed to become normal.
It is incumbent on all civilized, kind people to stand up to the bullying of trans people that has become all-too-normalized in our society. As Rabbi Lauren Tuchman described it when she spoke to us two weeks ago, this population is feeling "utterly and maliciously assaulted and attacked by absolutely unjust and - I would say blasphemous - legislation, trying to legislate them out of existence." The goal, then, is not to marginalize, but to push them beyond the margins and off the table altogether. Our role as religious leaders, she added, is to affirm that God stamps no two people alike - that we should revel in our unique sacredness, for we are all created in the divine image.
Want to know how this marginalized community feels right now? Look up the Nuremberg Laws. These laws targeted Jewish participation in civil service, medicine and law, and went as far as to control their sex lives, health care and finances, ultimately relegating them to disenfranchised, second-class citizens. We are heading in that same direction now.
The Nazis called Jews "untermenschen," sub-people, and filled people's minds with conspiracy theories about how Jews preyed on children - much as the term "grooming" is bandied about now for LGBTQ.
When the haters attack LGBTQ. it is an attack on all who have historically stood up to bullies - and that means Jews. It's an attack on all of us. Like NATO, an attack on one must be met by a response from all. The hatred directed toward the transgender and others who are LGBTQ is the same hate we have stared down for centuries. We must not stop responding now.
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This Shabbat morning, at our "Praying the Margins" service, I'm going to be discussing in detail a landmark decision, passed last year by the Law Committee of Conservative Judaism, introducing a new, gender neutral way to call people up to the Torah. Given the serious threats posed by so man, you might wonder what good this simple gesture will do. Well, a lot, actually. For this little gesture, in a subtle but significant way, affirms that we are all unique yet completely equal in God's eyes. The new practice rings of tradition while making room for non binary perspectives, and simultaneously it relaxes the Hebrew language's built-in masculine bias. It's really rather brilliant.
The fact is that since I introduced the concept to the board several months ago, I've been utilizing the formula in calling people up (I've been the primary gabbai during this Covid and preliminary post-Covid period). But I've never had the right moment to present this responsum and teach it to a wider audience. This week, at this "marginalized" service in the midst of Pride Month, when our focus is on both passages and people that are marginal - this is the perfect time to teach it. You can preview it here. I hope that as we move toward having gabbais not named Hammerman, others in this synagogue will have the courage and compassion to continue this practice.
It's a little thing, but little gestures add up. There's much more that we can do, that we should do, but this is a good beginning. The mere fact that we aren't afraid to make this statement sends a signal out to the world that reverberates far more than calling up a few people to the Torah.
As we state in the second Torah blessing, we are grateful for the "seed of eternal life implanted within us." That seed is the Torah; it is also the image of God.
And that divine image is implanted in all of us.
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Coda: Speaking of living in God's image, we're still falling short in affirming the dignity of all of God's creations. At last week's concert, it should not have been a struggle for someone with a walker to get onto our bima. With all of our accomplishments (elevator, ramp, bathroom), we still have a long way to go in the area of accessibility.
Coda II: For all the hate that it exposes, "Parade" features loads for Jews to be take pride in, including a recitation of the Sh'ma, and the cast says Kaddish before every performance. | 
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