DISMANTLING ANTISEMITISM
How to talk about antisemitism like we believe we can end it together
Jewish tradition teaches that words create worlds.
The words we use to talk about antisemitism profoundly shape our reality. They inform our understanding of the nature of the problem, what solutions might be appropriate, and who has the power to do something about it. For those of us working toward a future where all of us can live full, thriving, joyful lives, no matter our religions, races, or genders, language is an essential tool.
Most importantly, our language should conjure the world we wish to create, and reflect the truth embedded in that vision that antisemitism is a problem we can—and must— solve.
What World Are We Creating?
Unfortunately, much of the language commonly used to talk about antisemitism today does just the opposite. In subtle and overt ways, this language, in use over many decades and expressed by a wide range of messengers, has undermined the idea that we can live in a world free from antisemitism, discrimination, and oppression of all kinds.
This harmful and inaccurate story presents antisemitism as a problem completely different and separate from all other forms of discrimination and bigotry—one that has and will exist forever.
This leaves Jewish people feeling afraid and isolated, suspicious of our neighbors, and unable to see our fates as fundamentally interlinked. For audiences of all religions and backgrounds, it can make the idea of taking decisive action to end antisemitism seem pointless.
The stakes are very high.
While antisemitism harms Jewish people of all racial and ethnic backgrounds directly, antisemitism isn’t just an issue for Jewish communities to address. Antisemitism is used to deflect blame for the failures of those in power, to remove fundamental freedoms, and to weaken democracy. It is a core component of white supremacist and white nationalist ideology that is used to directly undermine movements for social, economic, racial, and gender justice. In some cases, white supremacists use antisemitic ideas about Jewish people as a supposed “explanation” of Black excellence and the transformative success of Black-led movements, the thriving of transgender people, and the imagined threat of those who are immigrants, particularly people of color—all of which should be impossible according to supremacist ideology. In other cases, those same supremacist leaders and individuals point the finger at Black, brown, and Muslim people as the source of antisemitism, inventing or exploiting mistakes and missteps— which should be opportunities for growth and repair—to break apart our efforts to join together across differences to win the future we all deserve. This two-pronged strategy pitting Jewish communities and communities of color against each other is particularly painful for Jews of color, who exist fully in multiple communities across this manufactured divide.
We cannot dismantle antisemitism without addressing anti-Black racism and all other forms of institutionalized oppression. And the reverse is true as well: we cannot dismantle anti-Black racism, nor any other form of institutionalized oppression, without addressing antisemitism. Ending antisemitism is critical to achieving a thriving multiracial democracy.
