One, Two, Here are the Blews
Counting different populations and communities stirs an obsession with numbers. As the sum grows, the value of an individual number diminishes until what or who truly counts is obscured. There is an ancient tradition to not count Jews as numbers. Yet where G-d counts, it tends to be out of love for his children. Each individual is unique and counted individually because they matter.
Every night I wait for my son to fall asleep, kissing his cheek and forehead, before I close my eyes on the day that’s passed. Most nights, I feel comforted by the innocence of his face, a look of secure protection and peaceful breathing that drifts him into a new day. Occasionally, a knot travels from my stomach and untwists into tear-filled eyes because I know that, at some point, a distinct pain and hurt will disrupt his childhood peace in ways that I cannot completely protect him from. As a Black and Jewish person, will he count and be valued in both Black and Jewish communities and will they protect him from those within those spaces who believe he doesn’t?
Counting In
The conversation about counting can divide Jewish communities. As a minority within a minority of approximately 300,000 British Jews and 1.9 million Black British people, it can be hard to impress how much Black Jews matter. Counting is not simply about tallying how many individuals there are; most of its synonyms illustrate concepts of mattering, importance, validity, acceptance and inclusion.
Within both communities, the existence of Black Jews may seem a moot point. To some Black Jews, it is significant particularly at times of conflict between the two communities or when bigotry stealthy wanders into conversation and behaviour. The significance manifests in how, sometimes, there are groups within both communities that fail to have our back and exclude rather than include, invalidate rather than support.
The resurgence of the #BlackLivesMatter movement has ignited a renewed spirit of intention to dismantle systemic racism. The knee upon George Floyd’s neck representing the harmful oppression experienced by Black people in our personal and professional lives. The way that the colour of our skin can lead to death, either physically, emotionally or spiritually. It is my reminder that, although lighter skinned than his Black brothers and sisters, my child will always be seen by those within systems built with the best intention, as another Black person where it doesn’t matter if the system breaks them. It is my reminder that as a Black woman, the strength I must muster to overcome the micro-aggressions, the tropes, the decades of trauma experienced since I was a little girl flitting through my mind upon sight of physical and virtual triggers, the pressure of working several times harder to be valued as my non-Black colleagues every single day is beyond exhausting. When the layer of my Jewishness is applied, there are no words I can offer to describe what is needed for that strength.
To see @ukBLM use the passion of #BlackLivesMatter with clumsy wording to support our Palestinian brothers and sisters meant I would, once again, have to dig deep for strength: Black Jews were going to be caught in the middle of the interconnected nexus from which we live our lives. But I am so low on strength because like every other Black person, I am tired. Whether I fit the political mould of @ukBLM is not the point because all Black Lives Matter, right? @ukBLM’s lack of engagement or intervention when Black Jewish women were called “Zionist whores” for highlighting what was wrong with their tweet, excluded rather than included Black Jews. I’ve grown up in the Black community where having each other’s back is one of the ways we survive the systems. It questioned whether, as a Black Jew, my life mattered too.
Fast forward to the antisemitic ramblings of Wiley. His previous behaviour degrading people within his own community including misogynistic rants about Black women have been ignored by non-Black people for a long time. Embedded within Wiley’s rants were statements based on little to no knowledge of Black Jews. Much of Black Twitter have either been blocked by him or cancelled him before he bounced into antisemitism. The demand for Black Twitter and Black British people to answer and condemn Wiley both disregarded that he had already been disowned and that the Black community are not responsible for an individual. It also questioned the lengthy absence of uproar it has taken for non-Black people to view him as problematic. The treatment for Wiley’s antisemitism exposed muted action on racist and Islamophobic individuals over many years with little to no consequence. Subsequently tying his antisemitic rants as a conditionality of Blackness or Black culture could be viewed as an inherently bigoted position and a future discussion we should come back to.
Several Black and Jewish people not only faced the antisemitic ripple that began to seep throughout Twitter but a flaw within the Jewish mainstream community: the lack of protection some give to Black Jews when faced with anti-blackness or bigoted positions from within the community itself. Social media accounts claiming to be the bastions of demolishing antisemitism are known within the Jewish mainstream community to target those who do not fit a certain vision of British Jewry. This can include Black British Jews particularly those with socialist principles. As with @ukBLM, the absent intervention of Jewish institutions and leading voices led me to question whether my Black and Jewish child will ever be safe in the Jewish community whilst those in prominent positions stay silent or support similar social media accounts. It questioned whether, as a Black Jew, #NoSafeSpaceForJewHate, included Black and Jewish hate too.
Making both Black and Jewish communities value and feel safe for Black Jews requires them to take some form of intersectional approach to responding to systemic and online racism. The work of Seyi Akiwowo and her company Glitch UK champions the need for tech accountability to be “intersectional and inclusive” and is a call to arms for counting those with intersecting identities in for all forms of anti-racist campaigns. Aside from who benefits from the status quo, they challenge all to think: who is part of the same community as me that is not in the room with me?
Globally, Black Jews are on the frontlines of anti-black racism and antisemitism. There are many opportunities for these to be tackled together rather than apart. For example, education is crucial to the dissolution of racism and antisemitism. The absence of both Black British history before Windrush and British Jewish history before World War II needs to be rewired into education and the school curriculum. Colonisation and anti-Jewish behaviour dating back to the days of William the Conqueror is British history.
A unique number within the collective
Whilst Black Jews can be counted as part of the collective, it is important that our unique individuality counts. It is crucial that “Blews” count and are seen to count. It is my love for being Black, for being Jewish and my deep motherly love for my Blewish child and his future that summons my strength to be counted.
The harm sparked from both Black and Jewish communities breaks you down emotionally and spiritually and intensifies when both are in conflict. The legacy of these conflicts remain with you. Sometimes, I don’t want to be strong. Sometimes, I need others to be strong for me, my child and those who share a similar nexus to us.
Fundamentally, we are Black and Jewish. Show us how our lives and safety matter too. Count us in, not out.
