OPINION
Mardi Gras Of 1992:
Bigots Take A Bashing
JOSEPH COHEN
T
here's one thing you
can say about living in
New Orleans: It's
never dull. This is a cake and
circus town, charmingly
reckless over the declining
state of its health, taking
credit because the cash is
long since gone, partying
from weekend to weekend,
with all of its madcap revelry
culminating in Carnival, bill-
ed hereabouts as "The
Greatest Free Show on
Earth!'
The Mardi Gras "Free
Show" has become big
business. It is New Orleans'
chief tourist attraction. Now
a 12-day event, every hotel is
jam-packed with visitors, and
there is a substantial infusion
of money into the sorely
stressed economy. A recent
study estimates that a total of
$500 million is generated,
although a lot of it is simply
local money changing hands.
The city government con-
fronts an annual outlay of
several million dollars to pro-
vide police, fire and sanita-
tion services to the parading
groups and the thousands of
parade-goers.
The carnival season started
early this year though Mardi
Gras itself arrives late, on
March 3. No sooner had the
people of Louisiana recovered
Joseph Cohen is emeritus
professor of English at
Tulane University and
founding director of its
Jewish studies program.
from last November's ordeal
of watching that once-and-
always Nazi David Duke run
for governor than the citizens
of New Orleans found them-
selves engaged in another
racially divisive conflict.
The battle lines formed over
the city government's at-
tempt to eliminate
discrimination in the private
carnival organizations (called
krewes) and the sponsors of
several of the oldest parading
groups, the downtown elitest
men's clubs, none of which ad-
A black majority
on city council is
changing the face
of New Orleans'
big street party.
mit Jews, Italians, African-
Americans or, needless to say,
women.
Though the Boston, Pick-
wick, Louisiana and Stratford
Clubs have members who
have proven civic credentials,
they and their forbears have
for a century maintained a
double standard that is
hypocritical and flagrantly
un-American.
In the past, attention has
been called periodically to the
anti-Semitic, racial and
gender prejudice rampant
among the city's elite. Among
others, Calvin Trillin exposed
the anti-Semitism and racism
in an article in the New
Yorker in 1968, Eli Evans
wrote about it in The Provin-
cials in 1974 and James K.
Glassman did a piece on it in
the Atlantic in 1978.
In other articles in the
Times-Picayune (1982) and
New Orleans Magazine
(1988), I have decried this in-
tolerance vigorously, not
because I want to associate
with these pillars of a delu-
sionary aristocracy that has
long been morally (and some-
times financially) bankrupt
but because the kind of pre-
judice they foster and practice
has throughout history held
tragic -consequences for Jews
and other minorities.
But these high-profile
bigots have paid no heed to
their critics. • Until now they
haven't had to; they've had
the power in sufficient quan-
tities to match their
insensitivity.
That power has shifted. The
change is reflected at many
public levels, but it is
nowhere so evident as on the
seven-member New Orleans
City Council which now has
a four-member black majori-
ty. Late this past autumn, its
president, Dorothy Mae
Taylor, introduced an or-
dinance prohibiting "any
club, marching society or
parade organization sponsor-
ing public Mardi Gras ac-
tivities from excluding any-
one from membership
because of race, color, sex, sex-
ual orientation, national
origin, ancestry, age, physical
condition or disability!'
Outnumbered, three white
members of the council
went along and joined in a
unanimous vote for the
resolution on Dec. 19. They
weren't happy about the new
law but with partly-black con-
Rabbi Glazer's Lesson
PHIL JACOBS
Managing Editor
A
t a time when there
isn't a great deal of
good in the news com-
ing from the Middle East,
there was a quiet explosion
of hope happening two
weeks ago at Temple Beth
El.
Over 400 Jewish, Chris-
tian and Moslem clergy
gathered as part of the 50th
Rabbi B. Benedict Glazer In-
stitute on Judaism. The in-
stitute was part of the
deceased rabbi's dream, to
bridge differences between
people, with a common belief
in God as a means of unifica-
tion.
This year, Dr. Marc
Tanenbaum, international
relations consultant of the
American Jewish Com-
mittee, reinforced the no-
tions that people of differing
religions have got to seek
common ground, some way,
some how.
But if there was anything
more powerful than the mes-
sage from the bimah, it was
the sight, the physical
presence of men in collars,
kippot, turbans and gowns
approaching each other in
the Beth El corridors and
chatting.
It was the small talk that
was so important, the hand-
shalKes and the opportunity
to listen to what the person
sitting next to you at lunch
had to say. For many of us, it
broke us out of the comfort
zone in an attempt to become
more comfortable with a
Christian or Moslem
neighbor.
On this one cold afternoon
in February, ecumenicism
was working. The key, ac-
cording to Beth El Rabbi
Daniel Polish, is to take that
spirit from the bimah or
altar and move it into the
congregation and then the
home.
"One positive thing is that
I have a good, ongoing rela-
tionship with many of the
Christian clergy who were
there," said Rabbi Polish.
"There is an ongoing rela-
tionship that goes on from
the Glazer. As clergy, we
meet, we study together. For
Continued on Page 10
Artwork by Barbara Cummings. Copyright. 1990. Barbara Cummings. Distributed by Los Angeles Twos Syndicate.
stitutencies their political
futures would have been
jeopardized if they appeared
to be supporting discrimi-
nation.
Afterward, they began to
dismantle the measure, weak-
ening the stringent penalties
built into it, and as of this
writing the five-month jail
term for offending club of-
ficers and the threatened loss
of liquor licenses for the clubs
have been rescinded.
Fines have been reduced
from $300 to $100, and a pro-
vision requiring the city to
file suit against Carnival
organizations who discrimi-
nate has been abolished.
Most, though not all, of the
measure's teeth have been
yanked out.
Whatever happens to the
ordinance, the significant fact
is that for the first time in a
century of arrogant
discrimination, the elitests
have found themselves on the
defensive. They are proclaim-
ing that their constitutional
rights to privacy are being in-
vaded, but their pitch is fair-
ly shaky at best because for
years they have voluntarily
entered the public domain,
using tax-supported city ser-
vices during the Carnival
season.
In their first-time frustra-
tion, two of the oldest krewes,
rigidly restricted, Comus and
Momus, have canceled their
parades. Their parent clubs,
the Boston and Pickwick,
have canceled their annual
arrangements to put up
stands from which their
members can view the
parades since the supports for
those stands must rest on the
city's sidewalks, and this
could be legal proof — as if
any were needed (they use the
sidewalks every time they
walk into their clubs) — that
they are in the public domain.
Maybe they should use
helicopters and land on the
clubs' roofs. That way, they
could stay off the sidewalks
and really "drop in for lunch!'
The controversy has ripped
the city apart because all the
fantasy and the mythology of
the New Orleans Mardi Gras
is regarded locally as sacred.
The matter is so serious that
it was the subject of a front-
page article in the New York
Times Feb. 2. There is a pall,
and the acrid, near-hysterical
tone of the debate is appalling
since any number of non-
elitest krewes don't like the
law either.
Everybody is angry, many
people because they believe
the city council has run
roughshod over the convivial
mood that makes Mardi Gras
the best of all possible parties.
No convivial mood means no
mirth, and a lot of folks in
these hard times, whatever
the merits of the law, won't
stand for being deprived of
"The Greatest Free Show on
Earth!'
If nothing else comes out of
this controversy, one thing is
clear. The bigots have taken
a bashing, and the meaning
in it is one they can't ignore:
Sooner or later, the evil of in-
tolerance not only takes its
toll on its victims but on its
practitioners as well.
❑
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
7