Anti-Racist Kudos August 28, 2007

One blogger deserves kudos for speaking up recently against racism among Orthodox Jews.

I started avidly reading Life of Rubin after the whole Matisyahu-leaving-Chabad fiasco. C. Rubin and I got into a discussion over the validity of using tradition-based or other extra-halachic guidelines when analyzing something’s permissibility. C. Rubin is a vocal opponent of unnecessary rabbinic bans and of religiously fueled BS in the Jewish community.

It was this Life of Rubin piece that inspired me to comment:

Today Yeshiva World posted a story/warning about GPS’s being stolen from cars in Lakewood. Right away the racism and nastiness began.

This is a comment I just left at Yeshiva World.

“I can’t believe talk like this so openly. I can only assume its because you have a false sense of security by posting on an anonymous blog. I’d like to hear you all talk like this about Mexicans around them…I’d like to to hear you speak like this with any Mexicans you might do any business with.

When did being a decent human being go out of style? How about Chillul Hashem. This blog is public goyim could read they way you talk here. How about Yidden being above hatred, labels, racism and being judgmental.

You have no idea who stole this GPS. For all you know it could have been a drugged out white person or even (gasp!) a Jewish kid who wishes he had what every tom, dick and yankel has.

Regardless of who committed the crime this is not how Yidden are supposed to talk…”

The post in question at the Orthodox newswire Yeshiva World News, is actually a relatively unoffensive article about a guy whose GPS was stolen during back-to-school shopping. But then come the commenters. Two comments jump to my vision:

“There is no question that those that employ all the illegals are to blame for many of Lakewood’s crime- and other- problems…”

“What do you mean what the Mexicans need GPS for? To enable more wetbacks to find their way to Lakewood. Now call me a racist, even a vile one. If calling spade a spade is racism, so be it. But remember, a conservative is a liberal who was mugged once. It takes a fool to ask for seconds….”

First of all, why someone’s immigration status determines whether or not they steal GPS’s is beyond me. But regardless: no inhabitant of any religious community should ever use the term “wetback” for anything. Ever. And we all know what the reaction would be in the Jewish community if one of those “Mexicans” were to react with an anti-Jewish statement upon reading those comments. In fact, as one commenter on the Yeshiva World notes:

“From the standpoint of the Torah, there can be no distinction between one human being and another on the basis or race or color. Any discrimination shown to a human being on account of the color of his skin constitutes loathsome barbarity. It must be conceded that the Torah recognized a distinction between a Jea and a non-Jew. This distinction, however, is not based upon race, origin or color, but rather upon *k’dushah*, the holiness endowed by having been given and having accepted the Torah. Furthermore, the distinction between Jew and non-Jew does not involve any concept of inferiority but is based primarily upon the unique and special burdens that are incumbent upon Jews” — Rabbi Aharon Soloveichik z’tz’l, *Logic of the Heart, Logic of the Mind*, page 61.

I think that says it all.

That which one commenter implied to be understandable, one of the greatest Torah thinkers of the 20th century called “loathsome barbarity.”

And that’s what racism is, disgusting “loathsome” conduct only befitting a sub-human barbarian and certainly never appropriate for members of the nation of the Torah.