On Tuesday night/Wednesday morning the City of Los Angeles deployed 1400 officers of the Los Angeles Police Department in a military style operation in order to evict 200-300 nonviolent protesters who had been camping out on the lawn around City Hall as part of Occupy LA. Beginning at around 3AM when the mayor when down to survey all that he had done (it was the first time he had come to the encampment) the official narrative took over. The Mayor and the Police Chief have declared themselves proud of the operation and satisfied at its execution. Nobody was hurt and the LAPD was given all the credit. The truth is, of course far more complicated. Nobody was taken to the hospital, but that does not mean that the LAPD was not violent. The operation was a “shock and awe” mission intended to terrorize the folks on the lawn and convince them that leaving was better than the alternative. And yet, the real story is that the Occupiers remain steadfastly nonviolent. They are the real heroes of the long night.
Discordant voices of truth tellers are emerging. Here are some of them.
Dear LA Times,
Speaking as a person who was arrested Wednesday morning at City Hall for the crime of peacefully, respectfully protesting the wholesale fraud perpetrated by our nation’s financial sector, I just want to
say:
I’m not mad that an LAPD officer slammed me face-first into the pavement.
I’m not mad that my personal property was forcibly stolen, destroyed and disposed of by the LAPD.
I’m not mad that my arms were painfully zipcuffed behind my back for 7 consecutive hours.
I’m not mad that the LAPD zipcuffs cut off circulation at my wrists, causing evident nerve damage to my right hand.
I’m not mad that the LAPD spent the entire day refusing to accept all bail postings for nonviolent Occupy LA protesters like myself, while at the same time dutifully bonding and releasing countless violent
arrestees back onto L.A.’s streets.
I’m not mad that the LAPD denied me access to a lawyer for the entire duration of my jail stay.
What I’m mad about is that none of the above has been done to even one of the Wall Street criminals who committed the most egregious act of larceny in American history, trashing the lives and futures of millions of Angelenos and hundreds of millions of American citizens.
Patrick Meighan
4174 Higuera St.
Culver City, CA 90232
Jewschoolers presenting: Sarah Chandler, Benjamin M., Ben Murane, Dan Sieradski, and David AM Wilensky. Friends of the blog presenting: dozens. Friends of the blog attending? About 700. Presenters to date listed here, partial program listed here.
Of the applications, two artists will be selected to participate in the Institute and share their work, teach a class of about 20 and share their work in communitywide program with people that come together from all across the country for the Institute.
Last year’s fantastic Artists in Residence were Joey Weisenberg and Jordan Herskowitz. Previous artists include Rabbi Greg Wall, Tracey Erin-Smith, Aviva Chernick, Ramon Tasat, Heather Stoltz, Bear Bergman, among many great others. Feel free to send any questions to poretskyair@havurah.org
One young man in Zuccoti Park in New York, part of the Occupy Wall Street encampment, holds up a sign which boldly declares: “We’re here, we’re unclear, get used to it.” This tongue in cheek message gets to the heart of what is uncomfortable for many in the media and the chattering class about the Occupy movement (OWS and its many many offshoots in all major American cities and many cities around the world). There is an expected, almost ritual nature to American political discourse. There are critiques, followed by demands, supported by emotional anecdotes and statistics, followed by the suggestion of legislative remedies. The chattering class then gets to work vetting these remedies on two levels. First, and most important, is the “horse race” analysis. The political climate will not allow this or the votes are there but only if the opposing party will compromise on this. And so on and so forth. Somewhere farther down, or on the inside pages, the wonks get to work dissecting the numbers. Within a week at most (usually a news cycle), its all old news. Nothing has changed. Perhaps a catch phrase has been added to the stump speech of this or that candidate.
It is very frustrating when a large group of Americans peacefully assemble to air their grievances without participating in these tried and true rituals. When they do not attempt to position themselves behind a candidate or leverage a powerful constituency, but, rather display their disaffection without feeling the need to issue bullet points which any politician or pundit could easily digest and regurgitate. And then they stick around. For a long time. And they do not feel the pressure of the news cycle to make decisions or appoint telegenic spokespeople. They just put up tents, hold long meetings which need to reach a consensus for a decision, put themselves in danger by reclaiming public space and using non-violence as a trigger and a weapon to reveal the repressive reflexes of the financial and political elites. It is maddening. More »
This is a guest post by Sarah Beller, Director of Education and Programs at J Street, the political home for pro-Israel, pro-peace Americans. This piece was adapted from a presentation given at Initiative of Change’s Trust Factor series in Washington, DC on October 11.
In the weeks following the speeches at the UN, the peace process feels almost totally stuck. The old approaches for bringing the parties together have run their course, and many of us who long for peace and security for Israelis and Palestinians are unsure where to turn.
At the same time, the High Holy Day season is drawing to a close. What fresh insights and directions do these days of atonement offer us?
I’d like to suggest three kavanot, intentions or outlooks, for getting un-stuck in the new year. While these are by no means concrete policy plans for bringing the parties to an agreement, this season of introspection calls out for us to start closer to home. As Gandhi famously urged, perhaps it is time for us to “be the change we wish to see.” More »
A half million Israelis demonstrated for social justice. But all year-long, young Israeli activists in their 20s and 30s have been fighting for a better, fairer, and more equal Israel. Come join this benefit celebrating five of those young Israelis and their work on behalf of housing rights, marriage equality, women’s rights and more to come.
by Kung Fu Jew [➚] · Wednesday, October 12th, 2011
+972 Mag is a brilliant idea. Take a dozen lefty Israeli activists, freelance journalists and independent analysts who blog separately in English and then consolidate their personal bloggings together in a sharp, clearly organized portal for the Anglo-speaking world to read first-hand accounts of political action in Israel and the territories. Few blogs on Israel-Palestine are a majority of original reporting and even fewer are as politically diverse as they are. If they blogged about Judaism every once in a while, they may as well be Jewschool’s sibling blog.
My friend Getzel Davis, a fourth-year rabbinical student at Hebrew College in Boston, delivered a tremendous sermon at the Occupy Wall Street Kol Nidrei here in New York.
All English during the service had to be shouted in short phrases, then shouted back by the crowd. (This is in keeping with the protesters who also use this method because they have no sound permit.) I vote that all sermons should be delivered in this fashion from here on out. I’ve never been among a congregation paying such rapt attention to a sermon.
Anyway, presented here in its entirety is Getzel’s sermon. Just imagine what it sounded like broken into short bits, shouted out in a call and shouted back in a response.
Getzel Davis about an hour before Occupy Kol Nidrei (Photo by David A.M. Wilensky (CC BY-NC-SA 3.0))
Friends – we are here tonight to celebrate the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur. Yom Kippur has been misunderstood to be a sad day. But really, an early rabbinic texts calls Yom Kippur one of the two happiest days of the year. What makes this day happy? It is the day of forgiveness. This is what Yom Kippor means “The Day of Forgiveness.”
According to our myth, Yom Kippur is the day that we are forgiven for worshipping the golden calf. What is the golden calf? It is the essence of idol worship. It the fallacy that gold is God. How do we become forgiven for worshiping gold?
I believe that G!d is infinitely forgiving. The harder question is how we forgive ourselves. How can we forgive ourselves for failing to live up to our own ideals? How can we forgive ourselves for failing to recognize others’ humanity? How can we forgive ourselves for remaining silent for so long in the face of injustice?
Forgiveness is important because once we can mourn our mistakes then we are no longer ruled by them. We are free to create things anew.
This is what Kol Nidreh is about. It is releasing ourselves from the oaths that we mistakenly took.
When people think about oaths, they usually think of verbal promises. In Judaism though, most of our oaths are “Chazakas” – or oaths taken through repeated action. By doing things again and again, we make internal promises about how we want to live. Other names for these might be habits, preferences, or addictions. These chazakas rule our lives, making things simpler by allowing us to live on autopilot .
The problem with this is that while chazakas are easy, they are often not skillful. It is easier to not make waves. It is easier to not make eye contact with those suffering. It is easier to trust others to run society. It is easier to sit on our butts.
Tonight, you are offered all the internal freedom that you can imagine. How do you want to live the next moments of
your life? Do you want to love more? Do you want to be more joyous? Do you want to speak your truth? What does
your truth say?
Yom Kippur is the happiest day of the year because it gives us the radical option of being here now. We don’t work. We don’t eat. We don’t drink. We don’t have sex. We dress in white robes.
We do these things because Yom Kippur is a ritual death. It is the way that we allow our old selves to die.
Tomorrow, when we break our fasts, we step into newness. We step into being the people we want to be and not just the people we have been.
You know friends, it is hard not to worship gold, or power, or any of the other idols that our society shoves down our throats. I believe that this is why the Torah tells us that there is something else created in the image of G!d.
Us.
In the first chapter of Genesis the first human was created in the image of G!d If we need something to serve here on earth, we are given humanity. Service to humankind is sacred and a reflection of service of G!d.
Urgent question: Anyone out there have a concise statement about Occupy Wall Street that would be a show of solidarity with the protesters. I need one suitable for a rabbi to read to his/her congregants on Kol Nidre this coming Friday night. The Collective Statement of the Protesters is a powerful manifesto, but the strong tone of confrontation on a night that stresses self reflection does not feel in the spirit of vidui (confessing sins) and forgiveness. If a well crafted statement that acknowledges the galvanized efforts of people around the country around the issues of economic justice and corporate responsibility exists, it should find its way to many pulpits this Yom Kippur.
(cross posted to Justice in the City) After a few persistent weeks of peaceful non-violent protests, the “Occupy Wall Street” folks or the “99 percenters” as they are beginning to call themselves, are appearing on the radar of the mainstream media. After a few days of lazy journalistic descriptions of the protests and protesters as disorganized and unfocussed some reporters and columnists are beginning to ask what these protesters want. One of the more interesting answers to the question was given in an interview conducted by Ezra Klein of the Washington Post with David Graeber who was one of the initial organizers of the protests. His answer was that the protesters, rather than making specific demands of the existing institutions (which created the income inequalities and precipitated the financial meltdown and yet were still in their offices controlling vast amounts of wealth) were attempting to “create a vision of the sort of society you want to have in miniature.” This raises the question: What is the society that we want? What would a just society look like? At this moment, it seems to me, there is no more important question to ask. As it happens, this is precisely the question I seek to answer in my book “Justice in the City” — and since that book is not yet out, I will attempt the short form answer here. More »
Jewschool founder Daniel Sieradski is organizing a Kol Nidrei minyan in at Zuccotti Park, home base of the Occupy Wall Street folks, at 7 p.m. this Friday night.
I don’t believe it’s set in stone yet, but Rabbi Arthur Waskow may be delivering a devar and or leading the service. Sieradski is looking for knowledgeable service leaders. If you can help and you’re interested, get in touch with him on Facebook or twitter.
This will be a service, not to mention a Kol Nidrei, of once-in-a-lifetime coolness. Let me know if you’re coming so I can make sure we say get the chance to wish each other a Gemar Chatimah Tovah.
by Kung Fu Jew [➚] · Thursday, September 1st, 2011
For the fourth weekend in a row, independently-minded Israelis in New York City are gathering to support some of the largest demonstrations in Israel’s history, in every major Israeli city demanding a change to Israel’s economic policies. This Saturday, Israel’s protest organizers have called for one million demonstrators to hit the streets. Possible or not, it’s the biggest change in politics there since 2002.
RSVP on Facebook, join the English- or Hebrew-language Facebook groups, and show your solidarity for average Israelis improving their own country. Read their full explanation below the fold, organizers are encouraging us non-Hebrew speakers to join as well. (Be prepared: learn by video tutorial how to chant “The people demand social justice!” in Hebrew.)
Brought to you by Pursue: Action for a Just World and co-sponsored by Hazon, Uri L’Tzedek, and the Brooklyn Bridge CSA, comes Chewing on Food Justice, a series of events offering a breakdown of our broken down global food system. The kick-off is tomorrow night on the topic of defining “food justice,” and followed by food sovereignty in July and food workers in August.
Hazon has created two new scholarships for the Food Conference. The Haas Foundation has funded a scholarship for LGBT folks and their families, and Pursue (a project of AJWS and Avodah) have funded a “Food Justice Cohort” for folks in their 20s and 30s who are passionate about food justice.
In addition, there are scholarships for Rabbinical Students, Teens, people from Boulder and Colorado, and…
...anyone who needs a little extra financial assistance and who is willing to volunteer while at the conference!
Complete Scholarship info is available here.
Money need not be a barrier to attend the Food Conference. Please consider which friends, co-workers, cousins and other networks you can invite to the Food Conference and share these great opportunities with. Deadlines are approaching very soon.
Additionally, prices are rising on June 7. So now is a great time for someone to register for the Food Conference!
2011 Hazon Food Conference at UC Davis, California August 18 – 21, 2011
Use code “summer11″ for $50 off registration – expires 6/7 Register today! Join the thinkers and doers of the New Jewish Food Movement
for four days of learning and celebration!
Featured Presenters: Dr. Oran B. Hesterman, Ph.D Founder and CEO, Fair Food Network
For those unfamiliar, NewCAJE is the successor to the Conference on Alternative in Jewish Education, which inspired the Limmud movement. The conference is an opportunity to learn from and with other educators, both formal and informal. There was minor Jewschool meetup at NewCAJE last year and if anyone is planning to go, please comment so we can connect with one another.
Last night, I attended a gala celebrating Storahtelling. And it was great*.
If you’re not familiar with Storahtelling, they’re a ritual theatre company, focusing on bringing the Torah, and Judaism, to wider audiences, making it more accessible and relevant today. I didn’t crib that from their mission statement, so allow me to excerpt it here:
Storahtelling restores the Torah Service to its original stature through a revival of the lost craft of the Maven, the traditional storyteller who translated the Hebrew Torah into local language. Rooted in biblical text and ritual practice, Storahtelling uses dramatized interpretations, traditional chanting, orginal music and live interaction to bring Bible off the page and onto the global stage.
The event was great, celebrating Storahtelling’s “b mitzvah,” which, as founding director Amichai Lau-Levie explained, is a “bar mitzvah, a bat mitzvah, a b mitzvah inclusive celebration for all genders.” And what a b mitzvah it was! Storahtelling turned 13, honoring their founding director, their incoming executive director and members of the board.
But what’s a b mitzvah without a little Torah? Jackie Hoffman, Jewish actress and comedian extraordinaire, studied with the Storahtelling staff, learning the Torah parsha that would have been her bat mitzvah parsha when she was a girl (raised Orthodox, Jackie didn’t have the option). She tackled a topic that many shy from: the rape of Dinah.
She broke the story up, making it more palatable, relevant and interesting. She interspersed chanting and discussion – with a healthy dose of humor, of course. (Amichai gave the English translations to Jackie’s Torah chanting on the fly.)
With more than a little (much appreciated) feminism flavoring her words, Jackie gave voice to Dinah. Dinah, the central character of this story, does not have any of her own words in the Bible. So Jackie, channeling Dinah, asked why the women of the Bible were too often chattel, to be swamped and shared amongst the men. She set the scene: Dinah had “two Jewish mothers. Think about that for a moment. And 12 stinky brothers.” She asked why Dinah’s mother was so willing to marry Dinah to the man who had raped her. (“Was she so desperate to see her daughter married, she’d ok a man who would defile her? Oh wait, that’s my mother!”) And she might have relished in her telling of the circumcisions of the men of Shechem: “They were in penis pain for three days!”
But it was an impromptu statement after she finished (and after she accepted her present from the “Sisterhood,” two gay Storahtelling staff) that summarized Storahtelling’s work so perfectly: “I’m a person who hates everything, and I dug this experience hard.”
And that’s just it. For Jackie, it was about bringing in some feminism, giving voice to the silent and suffering Dinah, and wrapping it all up in some jokes. For others, it might be highlighting gay characters or interfaith families, placing the Torah stories in contemporary settings, drawing and singing and acting the stories… bringing them to life. If you have the chance to get to a Storahtelling event], I highly recommend it.
*The only thing that would have made this night better? Had I gotten my photo taken with the hilarious Jackie Hoffman. And had she performed her Shavuot song, just for me.
Imagine late-night singing and philosophical discussions under the stars; engrossing Jewish learning; opportunities to participate in a variety of services, arts experiences, Shabbat celebrations, and outdoor activities; meeting a group of dynamic, thoughtful, energetic Jewish young adults as well as community members of all ages at a
weeklong institute. Sounds fantastic, right?
The NHC Summer Institute is now accepting applications for its Everett Fellows Program! Fellows participate in the full Summer Institute programming and in four workshops designed specifically for them. As a Fellow, you receive a scholarship for tuition, room, and board, and are expected to pay only for registration and dues ($120) for the full
week (August 1-7).
To apply for an Everett Fellowship, you must be 22 through 32 years of age, interested in exploring Havurah Judaism, and willing to participate fully in the Summer Institute. Preference is given to first time Institute attendees. The application can be found here
— it’s just four questions. Please see our website for more information or call the NHC office at
215-248-1335. The application deadline is May 2.
This program has been generously underwritten by the Edith and
Henry Everett Philanthropic Fund.
So this time of the year we are all asking ourselves the great question: how can I get my car cleaned and not support the exploitative practices of most carwashes? Well, if you are in the Los Angeles area there is an answer. Temple Beth Am (with support from CLUE LA and cheering from Shtibl) is sponsoring a Car Wash for Justice. This is a chance to clean your car before Pesach and, at the same time, support carwashers who were locked out and fired from the Marina Car Wash (for organizing activities).
When: April 10, 9am-noon
Where: Temple Beth Am parking lot
1039 S. La Cienega Blvd
Los Angeles Ca 90035
Car Wash includes: * Waterless Hand Wash * Interior Vacuum * Windows * Tires/Rims
Suggested Donation: Wash: $15 Wax (wash included): $35
Interior Detail (this is L.A.): $100 Compact Car $130 SUV/Truck
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