Another example of our failure to build community: Jewish organizations apply for almost nothing in local government grants, while the Muslim groups apply for and receive hundreds of thousands of dollars to help their people with arts production, small business, and even housing. Muslim housing bulk leases and their congregants rent from them. Where is our community with housing as our community ages? Where is our community with short term rehab after surgery? For the latter purpose, Providence is the only one with any real willingness to work with patients who aren't wealthy and needing to use Medicare and Medicaid. The Muslim community has legal help? Where is that in our community? And the emphasis on dues in synagogues is horrible. Asing a person who earns $400,000 per year to pay the same percentage as a person earning $25,000 per year is not all right. And there is transportation and event fees, keeping people from being able to participate, with no recognition of disability issues. It's not too much emphasis on Tikun Olam. It's an extreme case of not practicing it in our own community.
There is a saying that people cannot be a light under the nations until they take care of their own people. Too often that has been a problem with our Jewish community, especially in the diaspora. As the rabbi said, we tend to carry our Tikun Olam on our sleeve and is it and has a calling card in liberal and progressive circles. It is also clear then when it comes to Tikkun Olam it is a one-way street that never leads to the Jews. We need to rally around our people and our homeland of Israel only then can we carry out a more noble mission
Well said, Emily and Rabbi Jay. Also, Linda Seltzer 's trenchent comments need to be carefully considered and discussed by Cholent readers and the Jewish community at large.
Yes, I was thinking about this as I was writing it up. The Orthodox world could stand to be a little more open (I have met people who have no idea we have a JCC and don't know what Temple De Hirsch Sinai is!) and sometimes can fail to give over the "why" of Judaism. But we can see from the data that American Orthodoxy is on the rise.
When I first moved here I attended a service at the synagogue on Mercer Island. No one said hello to me. No one said a word. No one greeted a new person in the community. It was a completely cold and unwelcoming experience.
Other religious communities aid and protect their people more than we do. We have to look at how churches build community and imitate it. In the widespread recessions of 2000, 2005 and 2008, other religions, such as Catholic and LDS, did far more to help people get jobs, whereas our community was missing in action. The Jewish Federation started a Jews in technology group. Workers showed up. Where were the employers? Where were the professors? They didn't care about us. The Presbyterian Church in Seattle had open job networking and career help every Thursday morning. The diocese had regular meetings. But while they had open meetings, they only did actual referrals and placements through managers of their faith with people of their faith. Where were our leaders and professors? Personally, I came to Seattle for a job that turned out not to exist. 14+ years later, still no real, professional job that matches my qualifications and skills, and no one who even cares. I ended up in poverty here. In NJ, the JFS wouldn't help Jewish workers unless you let them write your resume. In other words, take the degrees off your resume and forget about everything you ever worked for. Catholic networking worked with a Jewish career coach whom individuals could also hire. Catholic networking also invited me into an executive professional group in the NY/NJ area, which I am still a member of in NJ. Where is that in the Jewish community for educated Jewish women to participate in? This is not an issue of religious philosophy. It's a need for practical community building and people *genuinely* supporting each other.
What I hear Linda is the a critique of the "model minority myth." We should stop generalizing our community as wealthy and successful. But also, we did have all these services in the early 20th century: Council House, Kline Galland, JFS, etc. We had TONS of services but we mostly grew out of them. JFS still operates a kosher food bank and Kline Galland provides short term rehab (but they probably don't take Medicaid, to your point in your other comment). There is a fund in the Orthodox community that anonymously gives out grocery gift cards and helps families with holidays. And most synagogues are happy to work out a dues agreement and they have payment tiers. There's a lot to criticize about the community but I think some of this critique is a little unfair and outside the scope of this story.
And it is a fact that Jewish agencies are not applying to local government for enough grant money to back the taxes the community pays in, in order to aid our own community. And somehow the issue of all of the Ukrainian immigrants in the US, and those able to get out of Russia, are arriving here with nothing. That's going unseen too.
Your remarks about social services are are almost all factually incorrect. The articles here are often very triggering and upsetting because of this bias in this forum. The reply constitutes countering and denial rather than listening. You are completely refusing and failing to see that a generation of Jewish women is going into old age alone, in poverty and without a support system, despite all of the hard work to get an education. You are refusing to see all of the young Jewish students for whom the cost of college and the cost of future home ownership is prohibitive. You are refusing to see all of the Jews who don't or didn't have any such thing as inheritance, the families whose resources were spent on nursing homes and health care. The community did not outgrow social services. Large numbers of people came to the Jewish tech jobseekers events, but no management or professors. And the events were held at night in remote areas of downtown Seattle where it's unsafe for women to walk or wait for a bus at night. So events were planned in a manner that was detrimental to, rather than inclusive of, women. I had a completely negative experience trying to deal with Kline Galland over post surgery rehab. They had no social worker to talk to. Please do not make assumptions about other people's insurance, which, for me, is Medicare. But there are different types of Medicaid (are you aware of those), and Medicaid for short term rehab is different from Medicaid insurance and different from Medicaid for long term care. But if a nursing facility does not take Medicaid, that is a perfect example of a deficiency in a community. The Catholic community does lock out its low income elders. It is a perfect example of refusing to see and acknowledge that. I postponed my surgery because, generally, nursing homes are acting like a corrupt system trying to shut out Medicare and Medicaid, even when the government gave us those benefits and we paid out taxes in for them. "And most synagogues are happy to work out a dues agreement and they have payment tiers." This completely cancels the *facts* and what is on the synagogues' websites. I described a specific example, in which a $400,000 per year income and a family income of $25,000 are subjected to the same percentage. That is regressive taxation. A few years ago, a synagogue I was considering membership in refused to exempt me from dues when I had cancer, eye surgery and a rent increase all at the same time. That is a *fact*. This is not outside of the scope of the story, it's the whole point. That instead of rejecting tikum olam as a basis for Jewish action, it would be nice if the community actually practiced it within our own community rather than erasing and refusing to see and acknowledge that we are a discriminated against minority experiencing poverty.
Supporting civil rights isn't the problem. Failing to include Jews as a protected minority is the problem. Jewish leadership pretended that we aren't a minority and allowed the civil rights process to go along without protecting us. Employers didn't have to maintain data on whether we are hired or promoted. Employers didn't have to make sure to include our studies programs. Employers didn't have to recruit us to university faculties. The Jewish leadership was self-effacing on behalf of our community. But when you are Jewish and from one of the vast East Coast low-income Jewish neighborhoods, you see it differently. The Jewish community told the US government to go ahead and ignore us. Now there is no US Census data on how many Jewish people are renting, or receiving SNAP, or hired as engineers, or laid off in a mass layoff, or working in each profession. And no one considered the intersectionality of being Jewish + female as an underprivileged minority. The Jews who didn't have parents paying for their college, the Jews who didn't have inheritance, were simply erased. So when a university search committee looks for a professor, it is all right for them to bypass Jews in favor of minorities who stood up for themselves. And now we see the result of our community being self-effacing and not demanding to be counted and included from the start of the civil rights laws in the 1960s.
Another example of our failure to build community: Jewish organizations apply for almost nothing in local government grants, while the Muslim groups apply for and receive hundreds of thousands of dollars to help their people with arts production, small business, and even housing. Muslim housing bulk leases and their congregants rent from them. Where is our community with housing as our community ages? Where is our community with short term rehab after surgery? For the latter purpose, Providence is the only one with any real willingness to work with patients who aren't wealthy and needing to use Medicare and Medicaid. The Muslim community has legal help? Where is that in our community? And the emphasis on dues in synagogues is horrible. Asing a person who earns $400,000 per year to pay the same percentage as a person earning $25,000 per year is not all right. And there is transportation and event fees, keeping people from being able to participate, with no recognition of disability issues. It's not too much emphasis on Tikun Olam. It's an extreme case of not practicing it in our own community.
There is a saying that people cannot be a light under the nations until they take care of their own people. Too often that has been a problem with our Jewish community, especially in the diaspora. As the rabbi said, we tend to carry our Tikun Olam on our sleeve and is it and has a calling card in liberal and progressive circles. It is also clear then when it comes to Tikkun Olam it is a one-way street that never leads to the Jews. We need to rally around our people and our homeland of Israel only then can we carry out a more noble mission
Well said, Emily and Rabbi Jay. Also, Linda Seltzer 's trenchent comments need to be carefully considered and discussed by Cholent readers and the Jewish community at large.
Though American Orthodoxy has its challenges, the reimagining articulated by Rabbi Rosenbaum applies mostly if not entirely to the non-Orthodox.
Yes, I was thinking about this as I was writing it up. The Orthodox world could stand to be a little more open (I have met people who have no idea we have a JCC and don't know what Temple De Hirsch Sinai is!) and sometimes can fail to give over the "why" of Judaism. But we can see from the data that American Orthodoxy is on the rise.
When I first moved here I attended a service at the synagogue on Mercer Island. No one said hello to me. No one said a word. No one greeted a new person in the community. It was a completely cold and unwelcoming experience.
Other religious communities aid and protect their people more than we do. We have to look at how churches build community and imitate it. In the widespread recessions of 2000, 2005 and 2008, other religions, such as Catholic and LDS, did far more to help people get jobs, whereas our community was missing in action. The Jewish Federation started a Jews in technology group. Workers showed up. Where were the employers? Where were the professors? They didn't care about us. The Presbyterian Church in Seattle had open job networking and career help every Thursday morning. The diocese had regular meetings. But while they had open meetings, they only did actual referrals and placements through managers of their faith with people of their faith. Where were our leaders and professors? Personally, I came to Seattle for a job that turned out not to exist. 14+ years later, still no real, professional job that matches my qualifications and skills, and no one who even cares. I ended up in poverty here. In NJ, the JFS wouldn't help Jewish workers unless you let them write your resume. In other words, take the degrees off your resume and forget about everything you ever worked for. Catholic networking worked with a Jewish career coach whom individuals could also hire. Catholic networking also invited me into an executive professional group in the NY/NJ area, which I am still a member of in NJ. Where is that in the Jewish community for educated Jewish women to participate in? This is not an issue of religious philosophy. It's a need for practical community building and people *genuinely* supporting each other.
What I hear Linda is the a critique of the "model minority myth." We should stop generalizing our community as wealthy and successful. But also, we did have all these services in the early 20th century: Council House, Kline Galland, JFS, etc. We had TONS of services but we mostly grew out of them. JFS still operates a kosher food bank and Kline Galland provides short term rehab (but they probably don't take Medicaid, to your point in your other comment). There is a fund in the Orthodox community that anonymously gives out grocery gift cards and helps families with holidays. And most synagogues are happy to work out a dues agreement and they have payment tiers. There's a lot to criticize about the community but I think some of this critique is a little unfair and outside the scope of this story.
And it is a fact that Jewish agencies are not applying to local government for enough grant money to back the taxes the community pays in, in order to aid our own community. And somehow the issue of all of the Ukrainian immigrants in the US, and those able to get out of Russia, are arriving here with nothing. That's going unseen too.
Your remarks about social services are are almost all factually incorrect. The articles here are often very triggering and upsetting because of this bias in this forum. The reply constitutes countering and denial rather than listening. You are completely refusing and failing to see that a generation of Jewish women is going into old age alone, in poverty and without a support system, despite all of the hard work to get an education. You are refusing to see all of the young Jewish students for whom the cost of college and the cost of future home ownership is prohibitive. You are refusing to see all of the Jews who don't or didn't have any such thing as inheritance, the families whose resources were spent on nursing homes and health care. The community did not outgrow social services. Large numbers of people came to the Jewish tech jobseekers events, but no management or professors. And the events were held at night in remote areas of downtown Seattle where it's unsafe for women to walk or wait for a bus at night. So events were planned in a manner that was detrimental to, rather than inclusive of, women. I had a completely negative experience trying to deal with Kline Galland over post surgery rehab. They had no social worker to talk to. Please do not make assumptions about other people's insurance, which, for me, is Medicare. But there are different types of Medicaid (are you aware of those), and Medicaid for short term rehab is different from Medicaid insurance and different from Medicaid for long term care. But if a nursing facility does not take Medicaid, that is a perfect example of a deficiency in a community. The Catholic community does lock out its low income elders. It is a perfect example of refusing to see and acknowledge that. I postponed my surgery because, generally, nursing homes are acting like a corrupt system trying to shut out Medicare and Medicaid, even when the government gave us those benefits and we paid out taxes in for them. "And most synagogues are happy to work out a dues agreement and they have payment tiers." This completely cancels the *facts* and what is on the synagogues' websites. I described a specific example, in which a $400,000 per year income and a family income of $25,000 are subjected to the same percentage. That is regressive taxation. A few years ago, a synagogue I was considering membership in refused to exempt me from dues when I had cancer, eye surgery and a rent increase all at the same time. That is a *fact*. This is not outside of the scope of the story, it's the whole point. That instead of rejecting tikum olam as a basis for Jewish action, it would be nice if the community actually practiced it within our own community rather than erasing and refusing to see and acknowledge that we are a discriminated against minority experiencing poverty.
Supporting civil rights isn't the problem. Failing to include Jews as a protected minority is the problem. Jewish leadership pretended that we aren't a minority and allowed the civil rights process to go along without protecting us. Employers didn't have to maintain data on whether we are hired or promoted. Employers didn't have to make sure to include our studies programs. Employers didn't have to recruit us to university faculties. The Jewish leadership was self-effacing on behalf of our community. But when you are Jewish and from one of the vast East Coast low-income Jewish neighborhoods, you see it differently. The Jewish community told the US government to go ahead and ignore us. Now there is no US Census data on how many Jewish people are renting, or receiving SNAP, or hired as engineers, or laid off in a mass layoff, or working in each profession. And no one considered the intersectionality of being Jewish + female as an underprivileged minority. The Jews who didn't have parents paying for their college, the Jews who didn't have inheritance, were simply erased. So when a university search committee looks for a professor, it is all right for them to bypass Jews in favor of minorities who stood up for themselves. And now we see the result of our community being self-effacing and not demanding to be counted and included from the start of the civil rights laws in the 1960s.