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A way to marginalize the bullies and bigots In what we are proud and prone to describe as "the most cosmopolitan nation on Earth," reported incidents of anti-Semitism in Canada rose – or descended – to an all-time record of 857 in 2004, prompting my wife, Elizabeth, and me, with other Canadians of good will, to stand up and cry: Enough! As Justice Minister Irwin Cotler perceived when he was still teaching at McGill University, there is a virulent new kind of anti-Jewishness now infecting the planet, one "without parallel or precedent since the end of the Second World War." Meanwhile, thoughtful and well-informed people are now forewarning of a "second Holocaust," this time nuclear, set in the Middle East, and in the not-so-distant future. Elizabeth and I have been energized by a single sentence in a recent book titled, forebodingly, Those Who Forget the Past: The Question of Anti-Semitism: "If anti-Semitism is to vanish from the Earth, it will be from the transformation of non-Jewish rather than Jewish peoples." We believe that, in the end, this is a crisis that must be resolved by non-Jews. And so we founded FAST, short for Fighting Anti-Semitism Together, as one way of crying: Enough! And we have recruited an all-star cast of non-Jewish Canadian business leaders to the cause. Why have we chosen to focus on one specific manifestation of intolerance when tragically there are so many others crying and vying for our attention? We deplore intolerance in any and all of its manifestations, but also realize that the more well-defined and focused the target, the better the chances of having an impact. We encourage all those who feel strongly to start up a version of FAST on their own – which, if asked, we will help along in whatever ways we can. Meanwhile we will focus on encouraging non-Jews to join the battle against what has been described, sadly but accurately, as the oldest and longest of hat-reds. FAST in its earliest efforts addresses itself to the young, in the form of a vow that if we can help it, not one more generation of Jewish children will grow up in fear of the people around them. Elizabeth and I have been profoundly influenced by stories we've heard over the years from contemporary-and-older Jewish friends and colleagues, and the childhood fears they knew in the face and wake of the Holocaust ... even here in pre-cosmopolitan Toronto, where being Jewish was reason enough to get beat up on the way to and back from school, along with torrents of verbal abuse that would make a psychopath cringe. The other reason for an accent on the young is that if indeed we are to make anti-Semitism "vanish from the Earth," this seems like the place to start, reaching out with truth and reason to young, still-interpreting minds. Thanks to the generosity of the supporters FAST has attracted thus far, our first educational project is a curriculum-based learning program called Choose Your Voice, which FAST is developing in close partnership with the Canadian Jewish Congress, Ontario Region, for use initially in Ontario schools. The DVD and learning guides address anti-semitism in the broader context of bigotry – of which it almost surely provides history's most ancient example. Watch for the launch of Choose Your Voice this fall. We realize that this initiative – and for that matter, any others that FAST may undertake – is unlikely to touch the hearts and minds of the real hard-core crowd, the ones who most likely learned their hatred at the parental knee. But it could serve to further marginalize them, which sometimes is the best you can do when dealing with bullies and bigots. How so? First, by stripping them of their potential power base, the people who really don't know any better; and who, for whatever reasons, haven't sought out the truth for themselves. Second, by going one step further and helping to encourage active opposition to the Jew-haters and racists and assorted other bigots and bullies the moment they start telling their despicable lies or making their ugly, pathetic "jokes." We believe if the truth can make us free, it should also make us bold. Reproduced with permission from National Post
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