Recognizing Diversity

The first time I learned there had been Jews prominent in the government of the Confederacy and in the South at all was in high school history classes. It surprised me but my firmer feeling was that it proved that Jews could assimilate into even the Southern culture with success. It was for me a positive thing. Now wokeness is trying to destroy both this fact and this recognition of true diversity. Living for the last 20 years in Savannah I have come to understand that the assumption that all Jews have always taken the liberal side of things is totally false. In Europe, in fact, Jewish authorities for centuries were more inclined to support established elites and their programs when possible; this actually helped Jews to get some relief from the normative hostility their presence aroused among so-called Christians.