Adventures in Mama-Land

What do you think – am I overthinking this? Before I tell you what this post is about, let me first say that I believe “over” thinking isn’t always a bad thing.  Given how many people in the world under think things, including certain book publishers, it’s a good thing some of us are thinking more than others… I also want to admit that this wasn’t going to be a blog post.  There’s just too much at stake, I feel.  Too much emotionally riding on this.  Some of those near and dear to me has already heard my rant about this children’s book cover.  Some have agreed.  Some have just shrugged. But last night, working on an essay about images of male Jews and masculinity in Judaism, it all just came out on paper and I figured once it’s out, I may as well share it here, too. The book is called “ What was the Holocaust? ”.   Amazon says it’s published by Penguin Workshop and isn’t due out until June 2018, but that can’t be right because I first saw this a long t...

I just got flamed on Facebook – now that’s something that doesn’t happen often. (My life’s pretty boring, I guess.) But when I saw this story in a Facebook group, about the Jewish Defense League setting up shop in Montreal, I mentioned that I found their tactics "disgusting." Oops. (photo credit:  JDL Canada website) Apparently, it was the wrong thing to say. Apparently, for criticizing those who hate the haters, I become hated myself. Moi? I was attacked on all sides by my fellow Jews who offered such threats as: "Wait until one of the savages comes after your kids and delivers their heads on platters to your front door," "[you are] the poor little Jew who skips into the cattle car excited to get to the spacious work camps," and "[you] to Nazi officer: "Sir, which cattle car door should I use?'", "[you] portrait of a Jewish lemming." These comments tell me everything I need to know about the JDL, its suppo...

Remember that Paperclips movie a few years ago?  There’s a book out about it now , too.  The movie made me angry, and tonight I’m angry again, for almost the same reason.  Am I the only one? In case you missed it, h ere’s one description of the Paperclips movie: When the principal of Whitwell Middle School sought a program that would teach diversity to a predominantly white, Protestant student body, the notion of focusing on the Holocaust--specifically Hitler's extermination of six million Jews--seemed like an obvious way to go. Seriously???  If you’re trying to teach diversity to kids who have never met a Jew, you teach the Holocaust?  That makes as much sense as using slavery as the core of a curriculum about African pride, history and culture.  Or smallpox as a way of teaching about native Americans. See why my brain is steaming out my ears just thinking about this movie?  Do I really want the only thing kids in Mississippi to learn about m...

✡✡✡ As a Jewish homeschooler, I beg anyone who is studying the Holocaust today (Holocaust Remembrance Day) to not stop at the pictures and stories of horror, but also to talk about what Judaism is and continues to be. We mustn't forget the atrocities, but please emphasize that Jews lived and STILL live with an eternal Godly mission. Our covenant has never been broken or replaced. The Shoah is one of many terrible times in our very long history, but Am Yisrael Chai (the nation of Israel still lives). ✡✡✡ I don’t write much, here or anywhere else, about the Shoah (a term many Jews prefer for the Holocaust, in which more than 6000000 Jews and millions of others were killed by the Nazis). I got a lot of it as a kid – too much, too young.  In order that we should never forget, we were shown movies, photos, newsreels that would horrify fully-grown adults – only we were 7 and 8 and 10 and 11 and indeed, I will never forget, but I never wanted to remember, either. So I resolved not to d...