Different groups have different interests. Blacks, Muslim and Jews have frequently conflicting interests and occupy opposite sides of the socio-economic spectrum.
In America today, about 5% of Jews do not identify as white because they have incentives to identify as another oppressed minority. Blacks and Muslims and other non-whites, however, tend to see American Jews as white.
On Sunday, the University of California Students Association voted on divesting from companies that do business with Israel.
In the time slot dedicated for UCSA representatives’ comments, UC Berkeley graduate rep. Imam Sylvain accused the pro-Israel Jewish student body of being too rich and too white:
“This might sound really harsh, but I really want us in the audience to check our privilege because I feel like what I saw this morning really reflects economic inequities. Just the ability to mobilize so many students with T-shirts and banners. I wish there was equal representation, and I wonder how much that reflects across these oceans. Isn’t this what we are really talking about?”
Apparently, calling the UC Jewish population spoiled wasn’t enough for Sylvain. She continued, “Also, I just want to reflect on the diversity of voices that we heard today. I feel like one side represented so many identities, so many ideologies, and the other was pretty one-sided, and so I would urge some of the supporters against to reach out to other constituencies and figure out what people are really talking about, and how they really feel.”
Sylvain only said this after admitting that her pro-divestment stance would remain firm regardless of what the students at the hearing had to say. She asserted, “Coming in to this space the decision was kind of already made where my association stood. We voted, passed a straw poll vote, 80% of the UC Berkeley graduate students support this bill.”
Sylvain then had the audacity to conclude with a lecture on anti-Semitism: “This charge, that supporting divestment, or really student activism calling for divestment which is a distinction there, is anti- Semitic or anti-Jewish; you don’t know our personal lives. You don’t know who we love, who we’ve been raised by, so please don’t charge that I am being anti-Semitic.”
