December 18, 2010
We’ve never had it so good
by Rabbi Dow Marmer
Canadian Jewish News
Harold Troper’s new book, The Defining Decade, documents
the transformation of Canadian Jewry in the 1960s into the respected and
influential minority that it is today. Though we’re barely one per cent of the
population, our presence is felt far beyond our numbers. We’re widely regarded
as the most integrated minority in the country.
But not all Jews
experience it that way. Many continue to see themselves as victims of
antisemitism, at best enjoying a respite from discrimination and often pointing
to the pockets in society where they aren’t welcome, usually the odd private
club where the movers and shakers huddle together to keep out Jews. Even when
the evidence is questionable, the sense of unease remains strong and
painful.
Whenever I venture to suggest that Jews have never had it so
good, I encounter opposition from the most unexpected quarters, sometimes even
from those who have made it big in the country. Should my Jewish interlocutors
occasionally concede that things are good in Canada nowadays, they’ll hasten to
recall blatant past antisemitism and its continued traces, often manifest in
what they perceive as the persistently and perniciously negative image of Israel
in the media.
Thus, for example, instead of celebrating the fact that
almost all young Jews in Canada get a university education, we’re told again and
again about what’s at times bombastically described as “the campus wars,”
because of the actions of some student groups led by Muslim and left-wing
hotheads who maliciously castigate Israel and its defenders. Though the glass
may not be full to the brim, many mislead us to believe that it’s more than
half-empty.
Some Jewish organizations appear to fuel this version of the
story. For as Troper has shown, the danger to Israel around the 1967 Six Day War
mobilized the Jewish community in ways thought impossible before. There has been
a desire to retain the momentum in order to continue the mobilization in the
laudable pursuit of building Jewish institutions here and supporting worthy
causes in Israel. Some seem to fear that satisfaction will lead to
complacency.
But whereas this negative attitude may still cut ice with
the older generation that remembers what Canada was like before the 1960s, when
many came here as Holocaust survivors, the reluctance to celebrate achievements
and enjoy them is bound to have a negative effect on the young.
That’s
implied in Peter Beinart’s widely publicized analysis of why many American Jews
keep away from the community, especially in its relations with Israel. Canada
may soon be in the same leaky boat.
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Original link http://www.cjnews.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=20467&Itemid
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