When Ignorance and Prejudice and Fear Walk Hand in Hand

Back in the 1990s, I was teaching a media analysis course at Emerson College, and one night, after class, a student from Saudi Arabia had a question he needed to ask me. He was a very good student, and I was expecting a question about one of the readings. But what he really wanted to know about was the secret. I wasn't sure what he was referring to, so I asked him to elaborate. "The secret," he said. "We all know that the Jews run the media. How do they do it? What is their secret?"

He was serious. He had been taught all his life that "the Jews" were a powerful, often-sinister force in the world. And he was told, "the Jews" exercised their influence in secret-- they controlled the banks, the world economy, and of course, the media. Since I was perhaps the first Jew he'd ever really met in person, I guess he thought I'd teach him the magic words or the mystical handshake or whatever it was that allowed us to be so diabolical yet so influential. 

But, alas, I wasn't able to be much help. Truth be told, the Jews really don't control the media. There may have been a time circa 1911 when there was only one movie studio and it was owned by Jews, but historically, media outlets were always owned by a wide variety of folks-- and in the US, the majority of those owners have tended to be White Anglo-Saxon Protestants. Were there some Jews who owned newspapers or magazines or radio stations? Yes, of course. Did some Jews own TV stations or movie studios? Absolutely. And were some Jews presidents of networks? Sure. But did Jews control entire industries? Nope, not true-- no matter what my student was told. 

But myths like that one refuse to die. As recently as last week, someone suggested to me that the US government feels obligated to support Israel because of "how powerful the Jews are in the world." (However you feel about Israel, somehow I don't think that's the reason.) And there are other enduring myths about "the Jews" (always "the Jews"-- as if we're a monolithic group that thinks alike, and acts alike). The whole time I was growing up, I heard lots of jokes about "cheap Jews." According to the popular culture, "the Jews" were greedy and their god was money. Examples were everywhere: Judas in the New Testament, the poetry of T.S. Eliot, the character of Shylock the Jew in The Merchant of Venice... (Interestingly, Shakespeare probably never met an actual Jew in his life-- they had all been forcibly expelled from England in 1290, after more than a century of brutal antisemitic persecution. But he certainly met the stereotype: he created Shylock, the moneylender, a man who loved money more than he loved his own daughter.)

It doesn't take much to reawaken some of the old stereotypes, and social media hasn't helped-- some platforms (thanks, Elon) have willingly embraced the haters, and allowed them to spread old hatreds to a new generation, sometimes with deadly consequences. And some extremist politicians (on both sides) have been happy to blame society's problems on "the Jews." Meanwhile, it doesn't take a war in the middle-east for some folks to lash out at "the Jews." In fact, it's a tactic used by autocratic leaders all over the world for centuries.   

During a recent Senate hearing on worldwide threats, FBI Director Chris Wray said that while Jewish Americans are about 2.4% of the American public, they account for something like 60% of all religious-based hate crimes. That's not a number that makes me feel very encouraged. I grew up at a time when antisemitism was on the wane, compared to how it was during the Nazi era; but it was still a part of the culture, and I worried that it might come back. Agreed, things are nowhere nearly as bad as they used to be. But it doesn't take much for bigotry to recur... if we allow it... and if we remain silent when, as the late Neil Peart put it, "ignorance and prejudice and fear walk hand in hand." 

That Day When I Lost My Job

I have to admit I'm someone who doesn't like surprises.  I'd much rather know what's going on, and I usually do. But last Wednesday blind-sided me. That was when I got the email that the provost wanted to see me for a quick Zoom meeting; it concerned my future at the university. About two dozen others of us got similar messages. It was not something I was expecting-- I mean, only a couple of weeks earlier, the university was celebrating those of us with work anniversaries: mine was 15 years. 

So, needless to say, I was not expecting to be told my services were no longer required. I sincerely thought I had done a good job: I taught some very well-received courses in media studies, ran the school newspaper, tutored, mentored, advised, belonged to various university committees, and I'd like to believe I made a positive impact, both on my students and on my colleagues. 

But maybe I didn't. Maybe what I have to offer wasn't what was needed or wanted. I would have thought that in the world today, a person who specializes in media analysis, someone who can teach a wide range of media-related courses (along with other courses too), would be useful. But evidently not.  

I still don't know how I feel about all of this. I'm getting a lot of emails from former (and current) students who think the university made the wrong decision. And I can't forget that there were 30 of us, all of whom were names in our fields in some way, all of whom worked hard for our students, all of whom went above and beyond... and yet, we're all gone. Just like that. Turn the page. 

I know it's not personal (at least, I hope it's not). Business decision. I ran a business and at times, I had to let people go too. But to be honest, I never thought I'd be the one to lose my job. I sincerely believed I was making a difference. And now, I don't know what the next thing is. I'm 76. Still young and cute, widely quoted and published, but 76. Will anyone want to hire me? Only time will tell.

It's times like this when I'm glad I have a blog, because there's something cathartic in writing this. As I said, I don't like surprises, and this was certainly not what I expected to be blogging about. Sometimes, life is fair (and predictable) and sometimes it isn't. As a cancer survivor, I'm still grateful to be alive. But I do hope there's still someplace where I can contribute. And not knowing what the next thing is, and not knowing what I can do about any of it... that too is not what I expected...