Is Greenday Right?

From sunset on Wednesday, 4/12 to sunset on Thursday 4/20 it was Passover. So any even slightly observant Jew was giving up bread for those eight days. At a meeting on Tuesday, 4/18, we had sandwich fixin's. As a vegetarian, I have long since gotten used to the idea that meat will be served at things like this, and as I've never kept kosher I certainly wouldn't complain about the frequency of things like meat as pizza toppings (kashrut forbids eating milk and meat), though I have been annoyed when all the plain or veggie is gone and all that's left is pepperoni, but that's only happened once that I can remember. But it was frustrating to have been on a bread fast and then have been served sandwiches. There were veggies and fruit, so I didn't go hungry, but I was tempted, and I noticed the other Jew who was there eating a ham sandwich, of all things. So what's my point?

Just because you aren't overtly/consciously prejudiced, you may still be making life harder for a minority. That wasn't the only time this particular organization has done this. The past Rosh Hashannah was on a Tuesday, and when the club meeting had low attendance, a chastising email was sent out, with no awareness that there was a religious holiday. The next week, the training meeting was switched from its original date to Yom Kippur. Meanwhile, Valentine's Day, which is not religiously significant to anyone I know, and a giant pain in the ass to many single people, was carefully scheduled around. Though the person who provided us with sandwiches certainly wasn't on some sort of antisemitic rampage, the fact is that as a minority, my needs weren't known; it wasn't antisemitism, but it was still a hostile environment. And this at a school that is ~20% Jewish and has one of the best attended Hillels and Jewish Studies programs in the country (I think. Don't cite me on this.)

I don't know what to suggest to correct this problem. I freely admit that I'm not very good at keeping track of the start of Ramadan, or when Tet is. So maybe the answer is just that we all need to make an effort ot be more culturally aware. But if you live in a community with only one Vietnamese person or a handful of Muslim people. . . you might not be at a level of awareness to even know you need to be more aware. And then there's the question of how much minorities need to be willing to assimilate. I've always been of the mind that immigrants should make an effort to learn English, because that's the language this country speaks. But how do I know that I've drawn an appropriate line? Arguably, my refusal to convert to Christianity means that I have made my interactions with fellow citizens more complicated. I know that all the Jews who don't work on the Sabbath definitely put stumbling blocks in the way of scheduling things (though it tends to affect them more than it affects others). I see a big difference between the two, but maybe I have just as much a responsibility to learn Spanish, as Spanish-speakers are an ever-growing demographic, as the recent waves of immigrants from South America have to learn English, or at the very least to make sure that my children learn it (which I'm sort of dedicated to anyway). I'm not opposed to it, but I chose French in middle and high school, and Hebrew and Gaelic are higher on the list of languages-I-want-to-learn; maybe I shouldn't have the option of not learning Spanish ASAP. Or maybe I shouldn't question the fact that sometimes I have to suck it up that people will serve me bread during Passover.

So maybe it isn't the responsibility of the ethnic majority/plurality to adapt to the needs of the minority. But ask yourself, if someone planned a meeting or gave you homework on Christmas, how would you feel about that?

Hmm, I seem to be writing ever-longer sentences in this blog. I promise I'll avoid that in the future.

And if you're wondering about the title, I'm referring to Greendays "I Wanna Be the Minority."