The new normal-If you disagree you are insulted or attacked

The new normal-If you disagree you are insulted or attacked

In the final book of the Torah, called Devorim or Words in English, Moses, our teacher, gives a five-week speech before his death.

The former tongue-tied leader who didn’t want the job as leader because he couldn’t speak well, now gives the most eloquent speech in the history of the world, that is unmatched until today.

What was especially special about his speech, is that he made his points indirectly instead of attacking his nemesis head-on. In this speech, he foretells the future of today, where if you disagree you are insulted or attacked or even stoned. I added the word stoned now, which is what I wanted to say in the headline to this story, but if I had it wouldn’t have been published so you wouldn’t be reading it. I took what I learned from Moses and said it indirectly at first and more directly in the body of the letter, which is usually less censored than the headline.

Moses alludes to the places that traveled in their 42 stop itinerary, as an indirect way to refer to the constant rebellions. If he had mentioned directly the rebellion, no one would have listened to his speech, and worse, of course, turned on him and tossed him out as the leader. Moses himself learned from his Great-Grandfather Jacob, who gave a similar speech on his death bed as well. People think and hear with emotions, not their logical selves. You can’t make your point, unless people open not only their ears but their brains. Early in my career as a psychologist, I learned that if a person closes his brains, the ears are not open. If a person doesn’t accept the possibility that there is another side besides their own, you might as well be talking to the wall, to be able to make your point.

Today, nearly all the news we read is censored by the publication you write for. Google and Facebook go farther, and if the narrative you write is different than the party line, it won’t be printed. As a result, the majority of the people are now brainwashed before you can make your point. And when you do make your point, it is not heard because of their brainwashing before they read your piece. The fact that people make up their mind emotionally and not logically is not wasted on Google and Facebook, all they have to do is bombard you with the point of view they want to get across, and they have achieved their goal of brainwashing. If a magazine like the New American allows publication of a piece that I read this morning written by Dennis Behrendt “Dehumanizing and Demonizing Skeptics Who Don’t Wear Face Masks” (https://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/politics/item/36484-dehumanizing-and-demonizing-skeptics-who-refuse-to-wear-face-masks ) it is attacked by the comments of which I will quote a couple:

UPDATE: Fauci Responds; Busted: People Aren’t Happy With Dr. Fauci’s Mask Hypocrisy

7/24/20 Katie Pavlich – townhall dot com

Marlene writes:

“Dr. Fauci says he was dehydrated and therefore, pulled his mask down. “I had my mask around my chin. I had taken it down. I was totally dehydrated and I was drinking water trying to rehydrate myself” Photos taken by the Associated Press show Fauci failing to properly wear a mask while being seated directly in between two other people, one who was also not wearing a mask & not social distancing

And Tim H responds:

Fauci wasn’t dehydrated from the mask. He was dehydrated because it was almost 100 deg. at the baseball game, he was attending. Taking your mask down temporarily to get a drink isn’t violating mask protocol. The story goes to show just how low a gutter the anti-mask science deniers will climb into.

So if a point is made that disagrees with your narrative, Marlene was insulted by Tim to say first of all she was an “anti-masker”, similar to a person who believes that the world is flat, and therefore can’t be taken seriously, but worse to say that she belongs in the gutter because she disagrees with the new narrative that everyone must be masked, both nose and mouth.

The deliberate making up of news stories to fool or entertain is nothing new. But the arrival of social media has meant real and fictional stories are now presented in such a similar way that it can sometimes be difficult to tell the two apart.

While the internet has enabled the sharing of knowledge in ways that previous generations could only have dreamed of, it has also provided ample proof of the line, often attributed to Winston Churchill, that “A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its pants on”.

So with research suggesting an increasing proportion of US adults are getting their news from social media, it’s likely that more and more of us are seeing – and believing – information that is not just inaccurate, but totally made up.

There are hundreds of fake news websites out there, from those which deliberately imitate real-life newspapers, to government propaganda sites, and even those which tread the line between satire and plain misinformation.

Dennis Behrendt goes on in his story to point out that violence or getting stoned is not far away. It was not very long ago that if a person was smoking, you walked away from him if you didn’t want to smell his smoke. Now is the person who slips the mask from his nose, he is allowed to be ostracized. The brave new Normal. I could live without it.

Asparagus for Sale

Moishe from Moishe’s Kosher Grocery always had trouble selling his asparagus. So he put up a sign that said, “Asparagus: 25 cents each/ three for a dollar.”

At the end of the day, one of his customers, Mrs. Rosenbaum, came in exclaiming: “Don’t be ridiculous! I should get four asparagus bundles for a dollar!”

Moishe capitulated and packaged four asparagus bundles. Moishe’s new clerk turned to him and asked him, “Are you going to fix the mistake on your sign?”

“What mistake?” Moishe asked. “Before I put up that sign no one ever bought more than one asparagus bundle before.”

ABOUT THE AUTHORYehuda Lave writes a daily (except on Shabbat and Hags) motivational Torah blog at YehudaLave.com Loving-kindness my specialty. Internationally Known Speaker and Lecturer and Author. Self Help through Bible and Psychology. Classes in controlling anger and finding Joy. Now living and working in Israel. Remember, it only takes a moment to change your life. Learn to have all the joy in your life that you deserve!!! There are great masters here to interpret Spirituality. Studied Kabbalah and being a good human being with Rabbi Plizken and Rabbi Ephraim Sprecher, my Rabbi. Torah is the name of the game in Israel, with 3,500 years of mystics and scholars interpreting G-D's word. Yehuda Lave is an author, journalist, psychologist, rabbi, spiritual teacher and coach, with degrees in business, psychology and Jewish Law. He works with people from all walks of life and helps them in their search for greater happiness, meaning, business advice on saving money, and spiritual engagement

A Murdered Rabbi’s Sefer

By Israel Mizrahi

During the Holocaust, the Nazis systematically murdered millions of Jews, often not just ending their lives but erasing any memory of them.

Many victims left behind no possessions – i.e., no trace of their existence for future generations. It is thus always an emotional moment for me when I find a book whose owner was a Holocaust victim as it may serve as the only tangible memory of the deceased’s existence.

One such book I recently acquired is a 19^th-century edition of Ginat Veradim with a beautiful lengthy dedication to R. Shlomo David Frankel upon his wedding in 1928. R. Frankel’s father – R. Meshulam Feish Frankel – was a rav and dayan in Debrecen, Hungary. R. Shlomo David married Miriam Blum, the daughter of R. Ben Zion Blum, author of Shivat Zion, and a granddaughter of R. Amram Blum, author of Shu”t Bet Shearim.

R. Shlomo David Frankel assisted his father-in-law in the rabbinate until the war years, during which he was taken to a slave camp and suffered terribly. His health deteriorated rapidly, and by the time the camp was liberated by the Russians, he was critically ill and passed away shortly thereafter.

The inscription in the book is from a Yisrael Eisenberg upon the occasion of R. Shlomo David Frankel’s wedding. Following lavish praises of the chatan, an acrostic poem featuring his full name appears, with blessings and good wishes for the newlyweds.

Although R. Shlomo David Frankel died at the age of 42, his daughter survived and married R. Menashe Klein, the Ungvarer Rav and author of numerous sefarim including Shu”t Mishneh Halachot.

Don’t accept the myth of ‘Jewish privilege’ by JONATHAN S. TOBIN

Jews reclaimed a hashtag by writing about anti-Semitism. The problem is how extremists seek to shame them into silence or acquiescence to radical schemes.

For one day at least, Twitter became a forum for some honesty, as opposed to the usual orgy of nastiness and pointless memes. After seeing the hashtag #Jewishprivilege used to spread anti-Semitic smears, a Jewish activist responded—and the result was a tidal wave of tweets testifying to the fact that the phrase has generally meant that Jews have been singled out for persecution.

Hen Mazzig, an Israeli writer and public speaker, began the effort to reclaim the hashtag. Soon some Jewish celebrities, such as comedian Sarah Silverman, used it to recount incidents of anti-Semitism, as well as the list of relatives lost to the Holocaust and other stories of bias, insults, violence and persecution. That provided an education to the Twitterverse about the lachrymose nature of much of modern Jewish history.

But it will take more than one day of trending tweets about the hashtag to reverse the way those on both the far right and the left have promoted the notion that Jews use some mythical “privilege” in order to manipulate the world or need to repent of an equally false status as beneficiaries of “white Jewish privilege.” Both are intended to intimidate and shame Jews into silence or acquiescence to radical agendas that are inimical to Jewish interests.

The notion that Jews are both the masterminds of some elite international conspiracy intended to rob, cheat or otherwise misuse non-Jewish victims was a popular trope of Jew-hatred long before it was formalized in the anti-Semitic conspiracy text, The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a fictional pamphlet first published in Russia by tsarist agents in 1903. The spread of that forgery helped fuel the acceptance of these lies around the globe. To this day, the Protocols still help to fan the flames of hatred in the Arab and Muslim world after having helped set the stage for the Holocaust in Europe.

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So when extremist white supremacists write of Jewish privilege, they intend it to signify the way they think Jews benefit from some imaginary advantage that is denied to non-Jews. ut it’s just a lie used to justify hate.

As those who tweeted in response to the use of the hashtag by anti-Semites, the only privilege most Jews have experienced is being singled out for hatred, discrimination and violence.

That doesn’t only refer to the Holocaust but also encompasses centuries of persecution that preceded that genocide, as well as the many instances in which Jews were subjected to discrimination since then. In the last 72 years, the State of Israel has become the stand-in for traditional Jewish scapegoats by hatemongers, including those from the Arab and Muslim world, as well as Western elites who think that Jews—alone of all the peoples—must not only be denied sovereignty over their ancient homeland, but the right to live in peace there or of self-defense.

That’s one way the phrase has been weaponized to harm Jews. The other is the way the intersectional left has promulgated the notion that Jews are merely a branch of an oppressive international culture of white supremacy.

This notion of “white Jewish” privilege is one that has, sadly, been embraced by some Jews who think that unless they atone for their part in the Western crimes of imperialism, colonialism and racism, they will stand accused along with the rest of the white world.

This version of Jewish privilege, however, is just as toxic as the one floated by white supremacists.

The notion of white Jewish privilege fits in with a mindset that sees the world divided into two groups: evil white people and virtuous people of color victimized by whites. In that formulation, American Jews are participants in the outrage of systematic racism. Israeli Jews fall into the category of oppressors of Third World people, even though the majority of its citizens are actually “people of color,” according to the criteria of the ideologues.

Both assertions are as false as the more traditional tropes of right-wing Jew-hatred.

While America is far from perfect, the idea that it is an irredeemably racist nation and that Jews are part of that problem is simply untrue. America remains an exceptional nation when it comes to anti-Semitism; Jews have been accepted in virtually every sector of society. It’s also true that anti-Jewish hate crimes remain the most prevalent form of religious bias in this country, according to two decades of FBI statistics.

Jews are not the beneficiaries of some mysterious privilege, either in the sense of the conspiracy mongers of the right or the intersectional ideologues of the left.

As far as the Jewish privilege of Israel, it remains singled out as the one nation on the planet that is the focus of an international movement focused on its extinction. That it has thrived and grown just makes its enemies all the more frustrated and angry.

As the posters on Twitter noted as they seized back the Jewish privilege term from the haters, the story of modern Jewish life has been one in which tragedy looms large. It was necessary to point out that the only privilege Jews have been given throughout history is that of being despised. They’ve been hated for being poor and for being rich, as well as for being insular and for seeking to assimilate. Anti-Semitism has little if anything to do with Jewish actions.

As much as it was appropriate to make that point, it would be equally mistaken to embrace the mantle of eternal victimhood. In 2020, Jews are no longer a weak, powerless people at the mercy of others, ripe for persecution. Hatemongers should be answered with the truth, but not by a mindset in which Jews compete for sympathy. In both the United States and Israel, Jews need not apologize for their freedom or their prosperity. Nor should they accept any attacks on their legitimacy. If holding onto such basic human rights is seen as Jewish privilege by anti-Semites, then so be it.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNS—Jewish News Syndicate. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin.