Ayanna Nahmias writes: Any man I’m with has to be committed to raising my son as his own. It’s very hard for a man to do that if he can’t see himself in a child — and that would be the case with most Ashkenazi men and my biracial son. Depending on who’s looking, my son is seen as either Latino or Israeli. But no one will ever mistake him for an Ashkenazi.
…It’s not just that the process has been difficult for me — my son has suffered because his mother was “not yet” Jewish, and because he is biracial. Bullied from kindergarten until he left Hebrew school, he was often excluded from events like birthday parties or sleepovers, and he never really made friends. He missed out on opportunities to develop the social skills that are practiced during these formative years. It was painful for him, and excruciating for me to watch him go through this, though I tried to protect him as much as I could so that he’d continue to get an Orthodox Hebrew education.
During all this, we kept on attending Orthodox synagogues — mostly Chabad, sometimes Modern Orthodox. But after my conversion was complete and we were fully Jewish, I noticed that my 13-year-old son was starting to look at non-Jewish girls his age. I confronted him: Why didn’t he like the girls at synagogue?
Because of the rejection he experienced, and the fact that he never saw himself reflected in the community, he observed that Jewish girls were “very pretty, but they all look the same.”
When he told me that he needed diversity, needed to see people from all different parts of the world — including Jews who looked like him — I explained that he could find that in Israel one day, but that we couldn’t make aliyah at the moment. He was firm: He wanted to see himself and he wanted to be seen.
Daniel de Porto comments:
The Forward jumps at every opportunity to make the orthodox community look bad. First of all, at 13, this boy should not be dating for marriage. Second, I don’t know where or in what decade this article was written, but in LA, where I live, which is the largest Jewish community west of NY, I look around and see a lot of diversify. There are bi-racial and fully racial Asian and black Jews, besides those of middle eastern descent. Gone forever are the days you walk down a major street in my neighborhood on Shabbos and only see Ashkenazim. Where is she living? Borough Park? Who knows? The Forward conveniently left that out.
I have visited orthodox Jewish elementary schools where racially diverse kids are fully accepted by their peers. So I’m gonna guess that this kid may have social or psychological issues that is causing his inability to blend with his peers. Young people these days, more than ever, are color blind and easily accept those who look different. But liberal rags, like the Forward, and race baters want to believe that the problems are all about the religious pale face’s inability to accept diversify.
As far as this woman’s difficulty in dating, it’s just too easy to blame the men for not accepting a bi racial son. An interview with any Ashkenazi middle aged woman with a fully Ashkenazi son will expose the difficulty even they have of finding any man who is willing to take on the responsibility of raising another man’s child. Marriage is a big step for anyone. I’m sure most women would also avoid a situation that would force them to accept an instant family.
But this rag was determined to, once again, paint orthodox Ashkenazim as intolerant racists. So they avoided inconvenient information that might present another side to this story and, thereby, got the outcome they desired.