10 January 17 • 2019
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attended our Detroit community’
s vigil 
to mourn the 11 victims. She also vis-
ited the Holocaust Memorial Center in 
Farmington Hills with her son and spoke 
about her meeting with survivor Mania 
Salinger and her family. For those in the 
activist community and beyond, Rashida 
is known as a woman with a big heart 
and an unwavering sense of justice.
Rashida is also Palestinian American. 
Like many Jews, Rashida has personal 
and family connections to Israel and 
Palestine. She has visited her family there 
many times and has seen the growing 
discrimination against Palestinians, the 
implementation of the separation bar-
rier, the daily experience of waiting in 
long lines and being harassed at check-
points, as well as the encroachment of 
settlements on Palestinian land in the 
West Bank. Palestinians have different 
colored license plates than Israelis, drive 
on different roads and stand in separate 
lines — ultimately living by a separate set 
of rules.
Rashida supports human rights for all 
Palestinians and Israelis and has repeat-
edly stated this, calling for more connec-
tion between the groups and a fair and 
just solution that protects the rights of all 
people living in the land. When Rashida 
speaks about the discrimination her 
family and other Palestinians face, she 
is not attacking the Jewish community. 
Rather, she is bringing to light issues of 
oppression that affect us all.
To chalk up Rashida’
s recent remarks 
to “chasing the global spotlight” (Dec. 
13, page 8) is extremely unfair. At best, 
this is a tactic to deflect the issues facing 
Palestinians and, at worst, a harmful 
insinuation that a woman of color 
has an ulterior motive in her position 
of service. This narrative upsettingly 
echoes anti-Semitic tropes of Jews being 
seduced by power, which have been 
wielded at our own community to dehu-
manize and alienate.
As young Jews in Metro Detroit, we 
know how hard it is to have nuanced 
conversations about the complexity 
of Israel and Palestine. But we also 
know that we must. We will not stand 
for divisive rhetoric that attacks one 
of our Detroit community’
s best lead-
ers and allies simply because she is 
shedding light on Israeli oppression of 
Palestinians, which she has witnessed 
firsthand. 

Daniel Hurwitz-Goodman,

Hannah Miller and Rachel Lehrman 

Members of IfNotNow Detroit/Ann Arbor

“Pure Michigan” advertising cam-
paign to draw tourism, there’
s also 
the soft underbelly of racism that 
isn’
t so pure. 
Racism doesn’
t get the same 
attention in rural and urban 
communities across the state 
(and nation), especially as mass 
media continue to shrink. Detroit 
News editorial page editor Nolan 
Finley opined that the new face 
of anti-Semitism in America is 
increasingly black, liberal and 
famous: “Last weekend, LeBron 
James, the biggest name in basket-
ball, posted on Instagram the lyrics 
to a song by the rapper 21 Savage,” 
he said in a recent column. “The 
line James typed out to his followers 
feeds off the ancient libel against 
Jews, that they control the world’
s 
money supply: ‘
We been getting 
that Jewish money, everything is 
kosher,’
” he continued.
“James quickly apologized, saying 
he didn’
t understand the historical 
context of the slur or even that it 
was offensive,” Finley wrote. “The 
NBA and James’
 Los Angeles Lakers 
accepted that lame excuse and now 
want to move on. No mandato-
ry sensitivity training for James, 
no scrutiny of pro basketball for 
evidence of a broader problem. 
Starbucks should cry foul.” 
Unfortunately, people like 
Meyerson and Finley often stand 
out among only a small group of 
objectors. When first learning about 
the situation, many empathize and 
say, “How terrible!” as the incident 
is forgotten, and most people move 
on with their lives.
Petoskey Library 
Director Meyerson 
also wrote: “Thinking 
that these acts are 
small, thinking that 
these acts will not 
amount to anything; 
keeping quiet and not 
making waves, was the beginning 
of the Holocaust. I will not forget, 
and I do not want my community 
to forget. I found my line, it is not 
only when views lead to violence or 
destruction of property, but if there 
is intent of violence.
“While graffiti is more than a 
freedom of speech issue — it is also 
destruction of property — in this 
political climate, a swastika has 

a strong and terrifying meaning. 
Maybe the person that drew these 
symbols does not know the true 
meaning and the nauseous feelings 
that they evoke. But maybe they do. 
We may never know.”
Like newspapers, Meyerson finds 
herself in the same position of pro-
tecting the first amendment when 
it’
s not popular and refusing to 
accept swastika graffiti as “informa-
tion” explaining a point of view but, 
rather, as an act of aggression and 
power.
“Information about the swastika 
symbol and information about the 
Nazi party will always have a place 
in the public library,” she writes. 
“The first amendment is a core 
public library value and, as a public 
librarian, I will always fight for this 
right in and outside of the library. 
But, the value of providing a ‘
safe 
environment’
 is key to our service. 
Graffiti swastikas invoke a feeling of 
fear, hatred and death.”
Our five-member library board 
meets later this month to discuss 
the issue. Personally, I am strug-
gling and — like many others have 
asked — what can we do about rac-
ism? I don’
t think there is a quick 
fix.

WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE? 
I have seen and heard so much 
firsthand working for 34 years at 
the Petoskey News-Review. My worst 
exposure was hiring international 
interns through the University of 
Michigan master’
s in journalism 
program.
A mid-career professional intern 
from Japan was called a “Jap” at a 
local ski resort during the winter 
night-ski league races. Another 
African American intern had to 
stay at my home temporarily when 
I received anonymous calls telling 
me to watch out for the “n****.” The 
caller asked if she would become a 
permanent staff after her internship.
One time, I threatened a local 
apartment complex manager with 
a call to our local prosecutor if 
he continued to refuse to rent an 
apartment that had been available. 
Another time, a Lebanese physi-
cian called and asked if an intern 
was Christian or Muslim before 
answering whether he would allow 
a Lebanese journalism graduate stu-

dent to interview him.
I know from experience that 
building a culture of tolerance 
is much harder than tolerating a 
divided one. We know that from 
the last decade living under two 
U.S. presidents. There are the 
urban-based associations like the 
InterFaith Leadership Council 
of Metropolitan Detroit and the 
Mosaic Youth Arts and Music pro-
gram that work hard to change peo-
ple’
s acceptance of others. In small-
er communities and neighborhoods, 
there are opportunities.
Unfortunately, I think it’
s going 
to take more to change a racist 
cultural attitude that has existed 
since the founding of this country. 
Surveillance cameras, arming the 
public, the mass media and public 
service announcements won’
t do 
the job.
I was intrigued after watching a 
television interview of U.S. Sen. Ben 
Sasse (R-Nebraska). He shares simi-
lar concerns in his new book, Them: 
Why We Hate Each Other — and 
How to Heal. He talks about Hitler’
s 
obsession with bloodlines and com-
plained that the United States was 
“not a nation, but a hodgepodge.” 
Sasse points out that Hitler was 
partially right: In the U.S, we are 
all minorities but came up with 
the wrong solution to the issue of 
bringing a nation together.
Unfortunately, Sasse writes, “… at 
home, we’
re scared of real intimacy. 
As both the size of our residences 
and the distance between houses 
increase, people are physically more 
isolated. Strolls around the neigh-
borhood and time on the stoop fade 
away.”
Sasse suggests that while technol-
ogy improves some people’
s quality 
of life, we also need to think about 

The Petoskey Public Library

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Library Director

Val Meyerson

continued on page 12