views commentary Bay View Shouldn’t Be For Christians Only T he community of Bay View, Mich., some in Bay View object to this practice — and sued to stop it. sits along the shores of Lake The ADL filed a brief supporting Michigan, a picturesque summer resort destination for families across the them, arguing that Bay View’s policy cannot stand under fair hous- country. Full of historic build- ing principles enshrined in ings and Victorian cottages, Bay federal and state law. Moreover, View boasts that it is one of the under state law, Bay View has “prettiest painted places” in the significant authority akin to United States. a governmental body — like Yet behind its pristine facade, appointing a marshal to arrest Bay View hides a shameful past and imprison those who vio- of discrimination that continues late its bylaws — and so must today. Around 1942, Bay View Rebecca honor the Constitution as cities started to limit renters and Guterman and towns do. It cannot put the owners to those “of the white government stamp of approval race” and Christian faith, later on practicing Christians over all restricting Roman Catholic others. membership to 10 percent or Bay View’s policy does not exist in less. The race restriction faded out by a void. Rather it operates alongside 1959, but the religious one persists. decades of religious and racial discrimi- Today, Bay View homebuyers must not nation in housing, both in Michigan and only be Christian, they must also have a across the nation, where Catholics, Jews minister’s letter to prove it. and other minorities were kept out to In other words: Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, Muslims, Sikhs, atheists and many maintain a neighborhood’s image. In Grosse Pointe, for instance, real others — including Christians who don’t estate agents in the late 1940s and attend or belong to a church — need ’50s used a rigged points system to not apply. exclude those who were not considered Fifty years after the passage of the “American” enough because of their federal Fair Housing Act, Bay View’s country of origin, occupation, friends, policies seem stuck in the past, harken- appearance, accent, education, religion ing back to an era where blatant and or a number of other factors. While discriminatory restrictions on home- most buyers needed only 50 points to ownership were commonplace. Luckily, make the cut, those of Polish descent needed 55, southern Europeans needed 75 and Jews needed 85 (later raised to 90). Blacks, Asians, and Mexicans were flat-out denied. When Congress passed the Fair Housing Act in 1968, followed promptly by the Michigan Legislature’s fair hous- ing law, lawmakers formally recognized what was already common sense — that these discriminatory practices should have no place in our society. Fifty years later, the United States is more religiously diverse than ever before. According to the Pew Research Center’s Religious Landscape Study, a growing portion of the population (22.8 percent) identifies as unaffiliated or as a member of a non-Christian faith (5.9 percent). Michigan’s population, in par- ticular, has set milestones in religious diversity. Congressman Sander Levin, who represents suburban Detroit, is the longest-serving Jewish member of Congress, and Hamtramck became the first known city in the United States to have a majority-Muslim city council. But with this diversity has come increased targeting of people based on their religion, national origin or other protected characteristics . Hate crimes against Muslims and Jews increased in 2016, according to FBI data, as did hate crimes overall. There is evidence sug- Bayview, Michigan gesting that such bias has spilled over into the housing realm, with Muslims significantly more likely to experience housing discrimination than their non- Muslim counterparts. In light of this data, it is ever more important to eradicate discriminatory practices like Bay View’s and ensure that the Fair Housing Act and the Constitution remain bulwarks against them. As the Michigan Legislature said upon celebrating the Fair Housing Act anniversary, “[d]iversity creates stronger communities and provides Michigan[ders] the best opportunity to achieve the American dream[.]” We hope Bay View will soon live up to these ideals and realize that religious diversity will strengthen, not harm, the beauty of their community. • Rebecca Guterman is a paralegal for the ADL’s Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief. This essay was first published on the ADL blog. Editor’s Note: The Department of Housing and Urban Development ruled this month that the Bay View Association has failed to prove it is exempt from the federal Fair Housing Amendments Act of 1988, allowing 15 complaints to move forward. These com- plaints are separate from a federal lawsuit, which will go before a judge in July. commentary W e are Jewish and pro-Israel students who are active within our Jewish communities on college campuses across North America. Many of us have helped organize against the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions- affiliated movements throughout our time on campus. Over the course of our time fighting BDS campaigns, Canary Mission was brought to our attention repeatedly. Canary Mission is an anonymous site that blacklists individuals and professors across the country for their support of the BDS movement, presumed anti-Semitic remarks, and hateful rhetoric against Israel and the United States. As a group of conscientious students on the front lines fighting BDS on our campuses, we are compelled to speak out against this website because it uses intimidation tactics, is antithetical to our democratic and Jewish values, is counter- productive to our efforts and is morally reprehensible. This blacklist aggregates public infor- mation about students across the country under the guise of combatting anti-Semi- tism. It highlights their LinkedIn profiles, Facebook pictures, old tweets, quotes in newspapers and YouTube videos. The site chronicles each student’s involvement with pro-Palestinian causes and names other students and organizations with whom the given student may be affiliated. We view much of the rhetoric employed to villainize these individuals as hateful and, in some cases, Islamophobic and racist. In addition, Canary Mission’s wide scope wrongfully equates supporting a BDS resolution with some of the most virulent expressions of anti-Semitism and anti-Israel rhetoric and activity. Throughout our time on campus, many among us have been active in the fight against BDS. Some of us have campaigned against BDS, others have vigorously spo- ken out against BDS, and some have even cast votes on our central student govern- ments against BDS. We have opposed, and continue to oppose, BDS because we believe that BDS delegitimizes the State of Israel, aims to isolate it as a pariah, paints the Israeli-Palestinian conflict as a zero- sum and oversimplified issue, continually reinforces double standards and polarizes our campuses in the process. Given our experiences on our campus- es, we believe that the best way to combat such ideas is through open discourse and critical analysis of the issues surrounding the conflict. That said, we condemn all forms of hate in the strongest possible terms, which includes any and all anti-Semitic rhetoric used by some pro-Palestinian activists. However, we believe that promoting a negative perception of Muslims, particu- larly Muslim students on our campuses, as Canary Mission does, is similarly hate- ful. As students on the front lines, we hope that Jewish and pro-Israel communal organizations will trust us and work more collaboratively with us to handle this fight in a credible, respectful and moral man- ner among our student communities. We believe that Canary Mission is anti- thetical and destructive to our shared cause of supporting Israel and eliminating anti-Semitism on campus. Instead, we expect credible Jewish and pro-Israel com- munal organizations to help us combat anti-Semitism on college campuses, and around the world, in a diplomatic man- SAMII STOLOFF PHOTOGRAPHY Canary Mission Hurts Israel Supporters On Campus U-M students Gaby Roth of New Jersey and Natan Gorod of Atlanta participated in Israel Day 2017. Roth was an author of the Canary Mission letter. ner that seeks to protect our community rather than shaming the other side anony- mously, as Canary Mission does. We wish to highlight how counter- productive this blacklist is to our efforts refuting BDS on campus. In some cases, such as at the University of Michigan, fear of being blacklisted led pro-BDS students to successfully argue in support of a secret ballot, which made student government members less accountable to their fellow continued on page 10 8 May 24 • 2018 jn