Confronting Hate Exhibit Not Quite Ready to Confront the Public

Beset by opposition, the Asian-Black-Jewish exhibit may change locations.

After its opening was thwarted by an activist walkout in May, Confronting Hate Together, an exhibit about historic and ongoing Jewish, Asian, and African American discrimination in Seattle hosted by the Wing Luke Museum, is not ready to reopen and may have to change locations.

The uprising around the exhibit involved one panel produced by the Washington State Jewish Historical Society that explains how modern-day anti-Semitism can take the form of anti-Zionism, such as when Jewish students are ostracized and synagogues are vandalized with slogans about Gaza. Wing Luke staff upset about the conflation of anti-Semitism and anti-Zionism walked off the job, causing the museum to shut down.

In a joint statement on May 30th, the exhibit partners announced a plan to reopen the exhibit by June 30th after updates to the panels. But that date is about to pass.

As of last week, Wing Luke spokesperson Steve McLean said that the museum still plans to host the exhibit, but security concerns are holding things up. “Every intent is to move forward with the exhibit, but the particulars we don’t know yet,” he said. He noted that the threats aren’t violent or specific, but referred to last September’s racist attack on the museum as part of the precaution.

But in an updated statement on the Wing Luke homepage, the June 30th reopening date has been removed and the focus has turned to “getting back to work,” suggesting that the larger issue is with the staff. “Getting back to work means that we continue to operate by restarting group tours, continuing education programs and neighborhood projects while we prepare for Museum and Marketplace reopening with additional safety and security measures for all. The reopening date is forthcoming,” it reads. The episode is described as one of the “most challenging” in the museum’s almost 60-year history.

“I think that the museum has internal issues to deal with, and part of it is education,” says WSJHS director Lisa Kranseler. She says Wing Luke didn’t train the staff on some of the terms and definitions and that the staff only saw the exhibit right before it opened. “I don’t think [the museum] really fully anticipated this.”

McLean says the walkout wasn’t a surprise. “We had done a press briefing so we could take a look at the exhibit. Staff were able to view the panels, and the next day, the 15th of May, staff had begun to express some concern, and we were aware that the staff might act on their concerns. I wouldn’t say it was a surprise, but the speed at which they created the WLM for Palestine [Instagram account] — that was a bit of a surprise.”

The Instagram account hasn’t posted since May 24th, when they listed their demands, called for the removal of the panel in question, and stated that “Zionism has no place in our communities.” An action letter with the demands and a call for solidarity with Palestine has been sent to Wing Luke leadership by over 900 people.

Since then, McLean says the museum has been trying to “listen and hold complexity,” though details about what this looks like are unclear. “There are strong opinions on either side of this, and I don’t have lived experiences on either side. We may never truly come to a complete agreement. That is a process we are undertaking. Hopefully we can model the way.”

Nevertheless, museum leadership has shown strength supporting the partnership, invoking the words of the museum’s namesake in its online statement: “In fact, the essential vitality of the American life is that it is constantly enriched by heterogeneous cultures. This fact is recognized in the freedoms protected under the Bill of Rights.”

“The good news is we’ve gotten tremendous support,” Kranseler says. In addition to local Jewish organizations and national Jewish museums and heritage societies, Kranseler says she has received words of support from the Nordic Museum, MOHAI, and the Washington State History Museum. As news spread internationally, she received calls from friends and relatives as far as France and Israel. She credits the JCRC for working around the clock Memorial Day weekend.

While buoyed by support, Kranseler is emotionally drained. “From an emotional standpoint, I did not expect to be hit like this,” she says. “I tried to look inward to see if we did anything wrong. We didn’t.”

Kranseler heard that Wing Luke decided it couldn’t host the exhibit two weeks ago, a claim that McLean denied. However, as of this week, according to Kranseler, the partner organizations are looking for a potential new venue for the exhibit. Details are yet to be worked out.

The panels are available online, at least, on the WSJHS website. “I think our community deserves to see the exhibit,” Kranseler says. “I can’t go anywhere without someone asking me when they can see the exhibit.”

If nothing else, the experience proved the point that historical societies are not irrelevant, she says. “Everything we do has a need for relevance. History repeats, and we’re seeing how important it is.”

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