JULY 2 • 2020 | 27
Marching in
Crown Heights
Michigan-based grad student Ilana Spencer helped organize a
groundbreaking solidarity rally among Brooklyn’
s Chabad community.
ELI REITER CONTRIBUTING WRITER
O
n June 7, more than 200 members
of the Crown Heights Chabad
community came together in
solidarity to march along
Eastern Parkway. Across
Orthodox communities in
New York there were ral-
lies against police brutality
and to build solidarity with
people of color. One of the
organizers of the Crown
Heights rally was Ilana Spencer, a University
of Michigan research assistant who helped
organize the event from her home in Ann
Arbor. She even made sure to include her
maiden and married name on banners, to
normalize being an Orthodox Jewish pro-
gressive.
This interview was condensed and edited
from a phone call and email exchange.
TELL US ABOUT YOUR NEW YORK
AND DETROIT CONNECTIONS.
I moved to Crown Heights to go to a
religious high school (Beis Rivkah High
School). I moved to Detroit three years ago
to help facilitate the opening of a Jewish
Montessori school in the area. I stayed with
the school for a year before moving to Ann
Arbor to pursue my master’
s degree.
WHAT’
S THE STORY ABOUT THE FACEBOOK
GROUP THAT STARTED THIS OFF?
The group was a place where we could
really be ourselves with like-minded people,
which doesn’
t seem like a big deal unless
you understand how much regular frum life
clashed with our inner worlds and realities.
This hadn’
t really been as much of a prob-
lem before Trump’
s election, and then we
looked around at people who we respected
and interacted with daily and couldn’
t real-
ly relate to their value systems anymore.
Something had really broken permanently
in many of our relationships when we saw
that.
It started with a Facebook group and
migrated into a WhatsApp group of
like-minded progressive, observant and
formerly observant Jews who shared
articles, Twitter screenshots and memes,
which started so we could follow the 2019
Democratic primary debates. I was already
in Michigan at that point.
HOW DO JEWISH VALUES PLAY INTO BOTH
THE GROUP AND PROTESTS?
Part of the reason I was drawn to religious
life and community was the focus on
self-improvement and community respon-
sibility. Judaism offers something that
American daily life is sorely lacking — a
sense that we are responsible for our neigh-
bors and to becoming the kind of person
who can support our community members
through tzedakah and acts of kindness. To
us, civic engagement and liberal values align
with what we love about Judaism because it
gives us permission to care deeply and feel
responsible for others and our own impact
or potential inaction in the world.
Ilana Spencer
COURTESY OF ILANA SPENCER
“Judaism off
ers
something that
American daily life
is sorely lacking.”
— ILANA SPENCER
jews and racial justice
continued on page 28