A Jewish response to "Ethnic Notions"

Today my class and I watched a very challenging movie that documented the development of caricatures of Black Americans and the notions they created.Through watching “Ethnic Notions” I comprehended the full scale of systematic oppression in the history of the United States. I learned about the beginnings of a system that has been engineered to disadvantage an entire class of people. I learned why and how the black female has been at times sexualized and desexualized to discredit her valor. I learned why and how the black male has been at times depicted as violent and docile to discredit his humanity. I learned to understand the full scope of a system which utilizes the most innocent mediums to perpetuate a cult of the pure and impure. I learned how these stigmas still pervade reporting and commercials today. However first and foremost, however, I realized that I as a jew bear a fundamental responsibility to empathize and advocate for the oppressed.

This movie helped me understand why countless American Jewish leaders, such as Abraham Joshua Heschel, partook in the civil rights movement and fought against a paradigm that had too often been weaponized against the Jewish People. The youth, in particular, must internalize this notion so this weapon of dehumanization can be disarmed and never again used against a vulnerable minority.