Leading Post: Greenstone, Attenello, Pruce

"Learning the Meaning of One" by Jessica Greenstone
An incident in Greenstone's childhood has lead her to dedicate her life to be a social justice educator and an activist. When Greenstone was in elementary school, she encountered a moment with her friends at lunch where her friend made a stereotypical comment about Jews people. As a Jew person herself, Greenstone was offend by both the comment and the reason her friend used to say the comment did not apply to her; this is what Greenstone learned to be called "re-fencing," making her an exception from the stereotype thus clearly creating a divide between "them" and "us." Looking back at the situation Greenstone acknowledge that she did not handle it correctly; instead of challenging and correcting the view her friend had, she made it worse by fighting fire with fire (replying with mean comments).

In addition to this event, the Jewish history (the Holocaust) led Greenstone to see education as a vital battleground to make sure history does not repeat itself. School is a place where students spend most of their time and a great place to promote good social justice principles and address various "isms." As I am taking an education course this semester, I am constantly reminded about the potential big role schools can have in fostering tolerance, acceptance, and respect for those who are different from what we are used to. However, we see a trend of how sex education, sexuality, and religion are pushed out of education because they are not socially accepted ideas or these topics infringes upon certain group of people's rights. Schools continue to breed and perpetuate intolerance and the same structural bias people have. As Greenstone points out that we all have biases "because we have been deeply affected on an unconscious level by societal messages and values" (80) she see education as a place where we can realize the the connection between our differences. 

Greenstone goes to further provide examples of sexist and gender stereotypes she have encountered in her life and job. With these examples it signifies the much need for society to be an active participants of changing the world and promoting a society conducive to all. To promote a greater understanding for difference so that we do not hold so much biases, stereotypes, and misconceptions about people because of their religion, race, gender, sexuality, age, etc.

"Navigating Identity Politics in Activism" by Allison Attenello
Dissatisfied with the lack of representation of women leaders in her course readings, Attenello went to discover these historical women with leadership position on her own with the help of a professor. Once she discovered these works of literature that demonstrated the power and abilities of women, she was proud to embraced her inner feminism. While Attenello understands that difference groups of people can be connected through similar experience, she is also aware of the role that race, socioeconomic status, social and cultural backgrounds are strongly influential in a person's choice of action and strongly correlated to power. Her fond interest and awareness of using these elements as the lens to see the relation between identity and power has resulted in a narrow perspective. While working as an vice president in an activist group for Mexicans tackling issues they sought to be most urgent, Unidad de New Brunswick, Attenello was confronted with how her racial, economic, social and cultural identities did not coincide with the faces of the group. She felt that because she was a white middle class highly educated women, her status did not fix well with the agenda of this group. After a while, with this reasoning alone with the reason that the agenda of the group was not what she intentionally wanted to focus on (violence against women), Attenello decided to resign from her position. From this experience, she discovered her that while although it is important to participate in organizations that does not represent your own community, at the same time being a part of such organization can also defeat the purpose of the agenda. Overall, Attenello sees her role in making social changes.

While I see Attenello's concern, I am not sure if I agree with her concern about being a part of a group that does not represent your community. I think if you are in it for a cause that your support than regardless of all the factors, Attenello is aware of, should not be factors that hinder her passion to help out just because she is different (racially, education wise, socially) from the group. I guess it should be more about the goals rather than the people of these goals.       

"Blurring the Lines that Divide" by Shira Pruce
Pruce discusses her realization of the power that leadership holds. Through her many experiences-- traveling, college, and activism--she also discovered the bias that she has; and through working with different people she has bias on (i.e. Palestinian women and the Christian women), Pruce learned how to control these bias and learn from it, which furthering adding to her personal development and guiding her to her passions.
           

Caroline Potoclicchio's Resonding Post

Greenstone’s “Learning the Meaning of One” really struck me because I am currently trying to major in psychology, and she touches upon a lot of psychological terms. Her experience as a little girl in middle school was a typical conversation that could occur on any day. One of her friends said, “All Jews are snippy and obnoxious.” Greenstone happened to be Jewish and she got upset and took her anger out on the girl instead of trying to influence a change in her beliefs. However, after studying the psychology of prejudice in college, she understands the difference of in-group and out-group. Being apart of an in group allows you to connect over some similar value or belief while considering all of the people in your group different from one and other. When an in group is looking among people of an out-group, that are not apart of their identity, they will associate those people as all being the same person, just as Greenstones friend did about Jewish people. It is also common within sororities and fraternities. The girls of their own sorority view each other as a diverse group of young ladies but when looking at another sorority that may be a rival they view them all the same, rich, bitches, weird etc. Greenstone goes on to talk about her experiences trying to prevent genocide, and her position at ADL in New Jersey (Anti Defamation League). 

In Attenello’s “Navigating Identity Politics in Activism, she talks about how New Brunswick New Jersey’s population is primarily made up of the Rutgers student population (40,000) and the Latino community of immigrants and illegal immigrants. After posing this fact, she goes into the rape cases that were occurring in New Brunswick. She found that the excerpts about the rape cases primarily focused on the Rutgers women’s students and initiatives were taken to prevent students from being raped, whereas little focus was applied to the Latino women. Lupe “spearheaded” a march for the Mexican community to protest the “marginalization of Latina rape victims.” She discussed how Mexican women are vulnerable when walking home late or early in the morning because they don’t have a safe alternative when it comes to travelling. I thought this point was very interesting and sad at the same time. It is upsetting to me that just because a Latina woman can’t afford to travel, and puts in the effort to walk to work every day, she has the most vulnerability to get raped. I think that in order to prevent rape that is high among certain cities, they should provide a hotline taxi service of volunteers who are willing to pick people up. 

Pruce’s article is actually very similar to Greenstone’s. She talks about her identity as a Jew and the responsibility she felt to prevent genocide, like Hitler’s Holocaust, from happening again. She wanted to “grow up and change the world.” I think that all three of these articles connect well with each other because they all provide insight on each woman’s identity and what they wanted to change among their community and the world. They were active people with goals in reach and they all were able to achieve them.  All three of them majored in women’s studies.

One Jewish Stereotype

While reading Jessica Greenstone's article titled "Learning the Meaning of One: Reflections on Social Justice Education" I found myself thinking about my own experiences with stereotypes about Jewish people. I was very interested to hear how she had become involved in social justice, however it was sad that negative stories lead her to where she is today. Her opening story about Lisa insulting Jewish people and stereotyping them reminded me of an incident in my own life.

The town I grew up in, Newton, is predominately a Jewish neighborhood. When I was younger I never really noticed this until highschool when one of my friends referred to my neighborhood as "jewton". I was immediately taken back by this. He used the term so causally like it was the real name of the town. Ever since that day I have noticed more and more people using the term as a joke, though I do not think it is funny.

Another incident Greenstone's article made me think of was during a friends birthday. A few girlfriends and I were all pitching in to buy our friend a present for her birthday. However, one of my friends Sarah only gave 10 dollars, where as everyone else gave 25. When I told my friend Alice that Sarah had not given as much as everyone else, she replied "well obviously she's a jew" in the most nonchalant way like it was the most obvious answer ever. I scolded Alice for saying this. Sarah was jewish, but that did not mean she didn't give enough money because she was jewish. Later I talked to Sarah about the birthday gift and asked why she had only given 10 dollars. She told me that it was because she had gotten into trouble with her parents and they wouldn't give her any money, and all she had was 10 dollars. Alice had been wrong. Sarah had given all the money she had, and was not under any circumstances being "cheap". I was ashamed of Alice, I felt like she had wronged her friend.

It is a common stereotype to call a Jewish person "cheap". I think that people are too casual about this stereotype. People seemed to be focused on scolding stereotypes against different races, where as religious stereotypes often are overpassed or deemed not as important. It is unfair to ignore the stereotypes Jewish people face. I know the next time I hear someone say "jewton" or refer to someone being cheap because they are Jewish, I am going to speak out against it. I think it is unfair and that in order to create change, people must start on a small scale by trying to change the way their friends or relatives think of Jewish people.