Chocolate Chip: Tangled Up In Jews

Several lines from Michael Chabon's intensely critical op-ed piece "Chosen, but Not Special" in last week's Sunday Times stopped me dead in my tracks: "Jews are stupid in roughly the same proportion as all the world's people… A stupid Jew is like a hole in the pocket of your pants, there every time you put them on, always forgotten until the instant your quarters run clattering across the floor." Say what? Jews? STOOPID? I guess it kind of sucks to be Jewish right now, what with THIS and THIS-and now Chabon, too? But I remember when it was so cool to have a smart, rich Jewish friend (especially the rare Persian breed with a posh pad in Beverley Hills). I remember the day when having Jewish friends meant you had some kind of smart, get-out-of-dumbass-land-free card. Like, you could say, "oh, IIIII don't know about THAT, but my Jewish friend thinks THIS" and everyone would ooh and ahh because, Jewish! Now that's brains!

But no more! Today, it's a different jar of gefilte fish. You may have Jewish friends, but you can't hide behind their smarts anymore. Now, you need your own intelligence, because even the Jews are outing themselves as regular Joes (Moishes?), subject to the same laws of nature as you and me. It's not okay to say, "I bone Ivy-league educated Jews" or that "I went to school with and was educated by Jews" or even, "I AM a Jew!" and expect people to assume you've got what it takes to explain the Theory of Relativity. NOPE. Today, to be Jewish, or an honorary Jew, you're going to be held to the same standards as EVERYONE else. In other words, it's time to drop the "chosen people" moniker and adopt the "hey, we're human, we do dumb shit (shoulder shrug)" M.O. that the rest of us have taken to using with alarming (but consistent!) frequency.

Although Chabon denies that Jews have "an inborn, half-legendary agility of intellect," he acknowledges that his background includes "highly intelligent, quick-witted, shrewd, well-educated" Jews. Kvetch all you want, Mr. Chabon, about being "trained, implicitly and explicitly, to ignore" the stupids of your race but, let's face it, no one wants to learn about stupid people. Jews have done a masterful job in this regard, accentuating their best assets and not calling attention to the schmuckelsteins. A shrewd and tactful bunch, which, MAZEL!

Before anyone starts crucifying me, I would like to point out that I love matzah and brisket. And a good bagel with whitefish salad is to die! Further, to put it frankly, I love me some Jews. I am in awe of the sheer diligence and determination of the race and the history and the lore, the mysticism and the $$$$$. I mean, the work ethic! No, but, yes: these are people who do NOT settle for a hand out. They are the people who said, "Fuck you, Jesus. I don't care who you say you are! Do what you will in the quote unquote AFTERLIFE. Ha. Ha. Ha. You're a dead man!" Now that's balls. That's chutzpah! The Jews have all of that and then some.

This is why, in spite of the fact that it is becoming more and more evident that Jews are no Ãœbermenschen and that they don't posses a special seichel wand, you still don't want to fuck with the Jews (shalom, Helen!). Hence, I would like to take this opportunity to reiterate the very special bond between Jews and blacks. Sarah Silverman did a phenomenal job highlighting the various similarities between the Kikes and the Spades in a supreme effort to get the old Jews in Florida to vote for darkie and I would like for us to carry on this tradition.

Some naysayers have argued that Negroes and hymies don't get along. Barry, Axelrod and the son of the devil's spawn that they chill with don't count because Netanyahu says Emanuel and Axelrod are already on the self-hating Jew tip anyway. And sure, blacks hate Jews for stealing jazz. Jews hate blacks because we're better looking. But I say, don't hate the player! After all, you can't blame Jews for their shitty klezmer music and you can't blame blacks for their obsession with sexy-time.

We can, however, establish our coalition of soul people and bagel people and use it to fight this country's crazy cracker domination. Jews have already figured out how to make white people do what they want them to do and this is a skill black people need to learn from Jews immediately. Again, it's not enough to say "I'm down with the J-Team" and expect to their cunning to mysteriously rub off on you. It wasn't enough for me to sit next to Anatoli in class and expect his higher GPA. That's missing the point. It's not about being a secondhand Jew (you know who you are), we need to learn to BE more Jew-like!

This is no easy task, of course. Especially because the key to this equation seems to be historical tragedy (in our case the "peculiar" institution of slavery) and if there's one thing white people in America don't like talking about, it's slavery and racism in America. These things will suck the air out of the room full of white people faster than you can say "reparations." You know what DOESN'T seem to suck the air out of a room full of white people and,in fact, sometimes even attracts discussion and dialogue (not always the good kind though!) in America? The Holocaust. How do Jews do that? The Holocaust can make shit happen-and it can get people to shut the fuck up. It's pretty magical if you think about it. I mean Native Americans said "Holocaust" and all they got were a few casinos. Blacks have assailed the terrible conditions of our ghettos/projects, but Jews lived in ghettos too and you know what? When life gave the Jews lemons, they made the diamond district. Now that's progress! (I hope you blacks are taking notes.)

Jews and blacks once worked in concert during the civil rights movement; marching together, dying together, singing and then getting stoned by the local policy force together. But somewhere along the way it seems the Jews and the blacks just stopped liking each other and the narrative diverged. To add yet another twist to this tangled Gordian knot, some crazy crackers have taken to comparing the president to Hitler, instigating further conflict, driving the wedge even deeper. This is unfortunate because Jews and blacks have both experienced terrible atrocities at the hands of white people and yet they're still getting away with all this.

The real bone of contention between Jews and blacks is this idea (and a possibly wrong one!) that Jews get special treatment for their tragedy, while blacks don't seem to get that much respect for theirs. (What's more, while the blacks in America haven't had much success exploiting their crippling past and figuring out how to use it to gain uncanny political sway, some Jews do sometimes give us hope, reminding us that suffering is much worse when you can't turn it into profit or power.)

Here. Try this nifty exercise with your various white friends:

Step 1. Close your eyes for ten seconds.
Step 2. Tell them to picture devastating images from Bergen-Belsen or Auschwitz.
Step 3. Tell them to picture devastating images from the Zong Massacre and Rosewood.
Step 4. Wait from them to ask you: what the heck is The Zong Massacre?

Okay, so this is misdirected thinking. "I am not Jewish. I am not black," said one freakishly Caucasian buddy of mine, "but it's kind of silly to say that one struggle is more important than another. All struggles are important to those who toil in them." He is absolutely right. So stop hating on Jews, black folks!

Jews have been persecuted over the centuries and too often they are criticized for their resilience and fortitude as opposed to being applauded-as opposed to our saying, "Hey, if the Jews can do it, so can we, because Michael Chabon says they can be stoopid too!" Certainly there are stupid Jews who will continue to argue that "chosen" is tantamount to "special," but the harsh reality is, we are all human and the more you push the "we're special" line, the more credibility you'll lose when the next flotilla sets sail.

The takeaway: As stupid as some Jews may be, their incredible history offers an amazing education that everyone should study and learn from. Another fat fact: The history of every race offers an education. Jews ain't all that special. While blacks and Jews may have a fraught relationship, we need to recognize that what unites us is more important than what divides us. While it may not be a great month to be a Jew, it's always a good time to learn something from them and their mistakes.

Charlie is the pen name for a young professional black woman living in Hymietown.