keshetchai:

I will be very, very honest with you, because I feel that is the best thing for me to do:

The morning of my beit din, one of the Rabbis was a few minutes late. We were concerned he might have ended up even more late than that, but luckily, he wasn’t. The reason for his being a few minutes late was because he worked at the local JCC/Day School and the entire campus had to be evacuated that morning because another wave of bomb threats had been phoned in. I’m not sure if it was the second, or the third. 

So imagine, not being me (waiting nervously in the Synagogue library), but instead being that Rabbi. His morning schedule – whatever it was he normally would have done as a Rabbi of the community – was interrupted by a death threat to him, his colleagues, anyone on the campus, and the children under their care. Coffee, Breakfast, Work, Phoned in Bomb Threat, Evacuation, and then waiting for an all clear. 

…Then serving a beit din for a conversion candidate. 

You may imagine that most Rabbis or even most beit dins will bring up the issue of antisemitism, and that it is a serious part of the process of educating a conversion candidate. 

This rabbi was the one to bring it up on my beit din. He had, after all, spent his morning evacuating a Jewish organization’s building and talking with police, and he thought it was important to question if, given the circumstances, I was really going to throw my lot in. 

He wasn’t necessarily turning me away, but he was definitely questioning my judgement, if you get what I mean. He wanted to know why, and he more or less asked something similar to what you are asking me. 

My answer may not be your answer. My answer may not help you. My answer is a personal one. 

I explained who I was already, and I don’t remember everything I said then to the letter, but this is more or less the essence of it: I am mixed race, I look white, but I am Mexican-American, and plenty of my family is visibly brown. If they are in danger for being Mexican, I am in danger. I was taught that the most dangerous gangs were neonazis and the KKK. I’ve worked in a Latino cultural center where we had to make the choice to be non-political in Arizona because if we put up political art, we might have rocks thrown through our windows, or worse. 

A white supremacist murdered a friend of mine’s family – the culmination of an evil, slimy scumbag of a human being worming his way into a woman’s life, abusing her, and terrorizing her, her children, and baby grandchild. I went to the candlelight vigil, the triple funeral (a fourth person also died), my friend the only survivor in the house. 

I pointed out then that I am not going to ever be out of the line of fire of acceptable targets for white supremacists or neonazis. My existence will never be acceptable to those kinds of people anyways, so letting them dictate my choices through fear doesn’t leave me with very many choices.  I didn’t really need to find extra or newfound strength, because I am applying already learned skills to a new scenario. Minorities in America do not have the luxury of going about their existence without any sense of fear for them or their families. We just don’t. 

I also don’t believe that I would have stopped interacting with the Jewish community if I hadn’t finished my conversion. It would be foolish to state I have no fear whatsoever, but also at some point, I have recognized my entire life has included navigating fear. 

Anyone can be afraid. Anyone can want to hide. Hiding is a strong survival mechanism. So is fleeing. It’s a privilege to recognize you have safety, and few people are eager to forfeit their own safety. I don’t see any point in diminishing that. Your average WASP has led a life which has not prepared you for the idea that people who don’t know you might want you dead on principle of your ethnicity. Even on a smaller scale – there’s probably been almost no vandalism in your daily life that marks a place, location, or world that is not welcoming for you. 

 I don’t think there’s any particular answer I can give. 

Perhaps it is more prudent to answer a question with a question: 

Are you underestimating yourself, or are you doing what is best for you? 

______

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