Passing

Ninety-eight percent of caucasian Americans surveyed
consider me a "white guy."
Boy, am I glad
they don't know that I'm a Jew.
They usually think I'm Italian "or something"
if they think about it at all.
I'm really glad,
because if they knew I was a Jew

It would mean that I am greedy
and obsessed with money.
It would mean that I'll try to
cheat you out of your money
every chance I get.
It would mean that I am dishonest in business
and have no sense of honor or fair play.
It would mean that my people own all the banks
and control all the money
and won't give good Christians a break.
It would mean that my people
want to dominate the world
and keep all good Christians under their thumb.
It would mean that I am an evil communist
who wants to destroy the American way of life.
It would mean that I'm an agitator and trouble-maker
who wants to subvert and poison the minds
of wholesome American youth.

It's a good thing that I'm passing,
because if people knew I was a Jew

It would mean that I am loud, obnoxious and pushy.
It would mean that I am ugly:
Beetle-browed and fish-lipped.
My nose is too big; my hair is too kinky;
I'm too swarthy, too oily, too hairy.
It would mean that I'm a christ-killer;
a sin for which I and my family
can never be forgiven.
It would mean that I am hated and eternally damned
for not accepting Jesus as my lord and saviour.
It would mean that the very word
that my people use to proudly acknowledge themselves--
JEW--is a dirty word, an insult!
It would mean that I'm an OUTSIDER, a pariah.
Boy, am I glad I'm passing.

If I was living in 1930s Germany,
being a Jew would mean that

I am shamelessly over-sexed and have loose morals.
It would mean that I am sub-human
and racially inferior.
It would mean that I am a "problem" to be solved;
a vermin to be exterminated.
It would mean that my business was destroyed
and my house and possessions stolen.
It would mean that I lived in a ghetto
where people died of disease and starvation every day.
It would mean that I was stuffed into an overcrowded train car
where people died from suffocating or being crushed.
It would mean that my parents died
choking on poison gas
from death camp shower nozzles.
It would mean that my children were taken from me
and burned alive in ovens.
It would mean that certain people hated my people
so much that they wanted to kill every last one of us.
It would mean that entire nations
of former friends and neighbors
turned a blind eye as we were dragged away to our deaths.

It would mean that now my soul carries the pain
of six million murdered.
It would mean that I am denied healing
by those who want to deny the reality of a genocide.

I sure am happy for those blonde-haired, blue-eyed
German Jews who were passing.

"All men are created equal" really means
all Anglo-Saxon Protestant males.
Every other American is a
dirty immigrant or a savage.

If I wasn't passing,
If I could speak freely,
I'd tell the other Americans my secret.

I'd tell them that when their ancestors
were being decimated by imported disease and rifles,
their land stolen and their food supply wiped out,
my ancestors were being expelled from their homeland,
forced to abandon the things they held most sacred
and burned at the stake for refusing to deny their identity.
When their ancestors were separated from their families
and sold into slavery like livestock,
when their ancestors were being whipped, raped and lynched,
my ancestors were being butchered by cossacks,
women and children run through with swords,
houses burned, entire villages destroyed
because local politicians needed a scapegoat
and the local militia needed to blow off some steam.
When their ancestors were denied jobs, kindness, and dignity,
my ancestors were denied safety, basic human rights,
and refuge from a holocaust.

But I can't say anything.
You have to do as the Romans do
when you're passing.

David W. Aronson
September 2005