Re
The Plot Against AmericaPhilip Roth.
From me to Gross:
It was hard for me to accept the tossing out of the hotel scene, and the overt anti-Semitism in the restaurant. I did not find it believable. I don't think that there has ever been another fiction that I found so unbelievable.
Why? It has something to do with my faith in America, and my lack of experience with anti-Semitism. Of course, I admit that my usual denseness makes me miss what others see; and my defense against anti-Semitic actions or words has always been to deny them--or to realize-rationalize that the remark came from a lowlife, not anyone whom I respected.
Elsewhere I have described the Ohio Wesleyan Sigma Chi incident, which was the only time in my life that I was ever directly affected in a meaningful way.
So what happened in the Katz household that protected me from knowing that anti-Semitism existed? Well, our parent's friends were mostly in mixed marriages like my father and mother. The families that weren't Jewish never expressed any overt indications of anti-Semitism. Dad never discussed the anti-Semitism issue--I don't think that it was an issue to him. His male friends were Jewish, Italian and a few Irishmen including one horse-playing priest and all other friends always were in our house or he was at theirs'.
Mother's side of the family seeemed fully accepting, as far as I could see.
It just didn't come up. When we went to Bermuda and he wanted to play mid-Ocean he found a way, although I think that later he did acknowledge that his Jewishness was a problem to be worked around. Mother and Dad vacationed at the Greenbriar, which later I learned was not a place to which Jews went--but....
and now to dinner, more later....
From Gross to me:
We are Jews by default. We are Jews because we are not Christians. We did not choose to be Jews, nor do we practice Judaism. Notwithstanding, we are not welcome in the society of our own country. That is humiliating, especially for a child. They long term effects of that exclusion are what we need to examine in order to understand ourselves.
From me to Gross:
Michael, something's wrong with your thought process here. The reverse is true also. Non-Jews are outsiders because they are not Jewish. Is that a tautology or what? We are Jews because we call ourselves Jews, we do not deny our Jewishness, and finally others call us Jews. The fact that some Jews insist that we are not Jews is irrelevant. That's their opinion.
"Notwithstanding, we are not welcome in the society of our own country."
Well, we are not welcome in some parts of our country. So? Do you welcome everyone, anyone into your home? the fear of the stranger is a part of the human dynamic. Some people overcome it. Others overcome their fear of the stranger to a small extent. The most fearful never overcome it.
"That is humiliating, especially for a child. They long term effects of that exclusion are what we need to examine in order to understand ourselves. "
I don't deny the sense of humiliation in others. I see it in X, and now, for the first time I see it you. I know it exists in me--but I do not relate it to being Jewish.
I was never accepted by groups--Malkin was asked to join a baseball team, the Spiders, long before I even knew him. Coincidentally, I knew other members of the team. they wouldn't have me--I was left out. Not unusual for me, but there was a sense of loss, of humiliation, yes. But it had nothing to do with being Jewish.
Boy, did I long for one of those Maroon rayon jackets with Spiders scrawled across its back.
But it was not to be. I had to peer through the cyclone fence and watch them practice. I was alone, only my trusty, loyal Schwin Phantom waiting patiently at my side.
Much later in life, when I received two luggage tags from Western Union as a prize for something or other, I put them on my luggage, proud to be a member of the Western Union team. At age 50 when Gary Miller gave me the HM letters that Coach Q. didn't give me, I still felt cheated, left out, and the falsity of my late award overwhelmed any proud or good feelings that Gary's gesture should have engendered. The fact that I knew I didn't deserve the letters from Coach Quinn made Gary's letters meaningless. But I wasn''t part of the team. Was that humiliating? It had nothing to do with being Jewish.
Humiliation, disappointment, loss each exist apart from being a Jew.
mek
