“[Both books are] singular gifts, full of little-known moments in the recent history of collective struggle and insights relevant for current fights for justice, dignity, and liberation…[The books] succeed in showing collective action, however flawed and complicated, as a viable alternative to the world we live in, and serve as valuable case studies for organizers and activists grappling with questions of effectiveness and solidarity in present-day movement work.”

***

Ben Lorber: This summer you took your book on tour. What was it like to see former New Jewish Agenda activists and the next generation of Jewish radicals reflecting together on the past, present and future of progressive Jewish organizing in America?

Ezra Berkley Nepon: It was spectacular. For the most part we would have a great group of NJA veterans and a room full of younger activists. Sometimes there were also people who came from the same generation of Agenda activists but hadn’t been part of the organization, so there was more than one dynamic — but there was consistently this exchange happening between Agenda activists and a younger generation, which was very interesting and moving to witness.

In the book, I focused on the organization at the national level, because I was trying to give an abbreviated version of a very long and complex history. The book tour events gave us all a chance to learn the juicy local organizing stories. People shared what on-the-ground organizing for Agenda looked like, with specific details about local issues and the flavor of each community.

BL: In your introduction to Justice, Justice Shall You Pursue, you write that in 2003 you were reading “all the Jewish feminist writing I could get my hands on, and references to NJA kept showing up,” which led you to be “curious about this organization that so many profound movement builders, writers and thinkers had been part of.” But when you went “looking for a book or good long article to learn more,” you found “a strange lack of record.” How do you explain this amnesia that the present Jewish progressive movement displays towards its past?

EBN: I’m in my mid-30s, and I find people of my age to be hungry for stories of people who have done really radical work, yet I’ve met very few  who have heard of Agenda — and that’s just very strange, because it was an influential element in Jewish Left history. One explanation is that NJA was so exhausting for people, especially at the end, because of the rigors of having direct democracy on a national scale, with international allies, but without e-mail, without easy conference-calling, without Skype — people, I think, were drained when the organization ended and were happy to move on to other things. In the ensuing years, Agenda didn’t get talked about that much because people kept doing and thinking about their new work.

But people’s eyes light up as they learn about Agenda, and it has been very powerful to create a space for activists from Agenda to witness the joy that younger people have in learning about their work. We have enthusiasm for critically engaging the details of Agenda platforms and the dynamics of its democratic process. People are excited to think about the theoretical questions Agenda was immersed in: multi- vs. single-issue organizing, the place of identity within organizing, the diversity of tactics,the intersection of issues, etc.

BL: One of the defining things about Agenda was its success as a multi-issue organization. When it closed up shop in 1992, it was replaced by a multitude of single-issue organizations, some of which formed in its wake, others of which were offshoots organized during its existence. One point you bring up is that today there is no unifying force such as Agenda to articulate and coordinate a mass progressive movement among American Jews.

EBN: Many single-issue organizations came out of Agenda, and some were led by leaders of Agenda, but the multi-issue model has been somewhat lost, especially that model of nationwide, membership-based, grassroots organizing. NJA helped a lot of different groups join each other’s struggles. It can be very valuable to have an organizational context through which Jewish groups can stand with other left groups and say, “We are in solidarity with what you are doing,” and to stand together in common resistance against oppression — and to promote that kind of visibility on the left for radical Jewish organizing. Agenda made that possible. Many of the qualities Agenda was known for could today inform the way we build organizations and the way our organizations can align with each other.

At our Baltimore event, at Red Emma’s Bookstore and Coffeehouse, former NJA members related that their organizational model was, “Every issue is a Jewish issue!” Definitely, I want to talk to other people who think that way! I want to talk about how our feminist politics and our Middle East politics relate to each other. I want a space where intergenerational Jewish activists can learn and work together. I want to work on Israel/Palestine, but I also want a broader range of Jewish issues. I want our ethics and our politics to intersect with all our work. There’s a conversation to have about whether the current political moment could support an organization like Agenda — and if not, what options do we have for at least bringing some of those qualities to the work we do now.

BL: Today’s political moment, in many ways, does remind me of the one in which Agenda took root. Two months before the NJA Founding Convention, Ronald Reagan was elected president, ushering in an era that would become known, as you write in Justice, Justice,  “for brutally cutting resources for the U.S.’s poor and low-income, breaking unions,” and concentrating “wealth in what we now call the ‘1%’; for supporting military terror in Central America, the Middle East, Argentina, Grenada, and around the globe; for the Iran-Contra scandal and the Savings and Loans crisis; for an obsessive battle against Communism; and for staying silent as the AIDS pandemic swept the nation and the world.” Since then, the failure of the Oslo Accords, the violence of the second Intifada and Operation Cast Lead, have increased the disillusionment many American Jews feel towards Israel; wealth has become further concentrated; and a neo-imperialist global war on terror has pushed the American political climate further right.

EBN: And we have plenty of organizations to say, “As Jews, we oppose this,” or “As Jews, we stand in solidarity with this” — but I would like to see the different pieces of our Jewish work for justice brought together through dialogue, so we can build wisdom. It’s a Midrashic version of activism, in which different kinds of Jewish work add complexity and nuance to each other.

There’s this story about a khasid who’s lost walking in the forest, and he’s saying to God, “Oh, it’s been days, I’ve been lost for too long, I don’t know if it’s shabes. I want to say the shabes prayers, but I’m so hungry and thirsty and out of my mind, I don’t even remember them. I’ll tell you what, God. I’ll say the alef-beys, and you, in your wisdom, can put the letters together.” I love that story so much: It’s like, we have all the pieces, and our work would be really enhanced by having more opportunities to talk about how those pieces fit together.

BL: In one of the afterwords to your book, Daniel Rozsa Lang/Levitsky speaks of the complicated question of Israel and Zionism in NJA. Agenda broke huge ground within the Jewish mainstream by getting a resolution for a West Bank settlement freeze brought up in the General Assembly of the Council of Federations in 1982, even though the proposal was tabled. And Agenda succeeded in balancing the work of the Middle East Task Force with the work of many other sub-committees devoted to other local and national issues.

EBN: It was a huge balancing act for Agenda, and I argue that they were successful in important ways. Agenda people had to work really hard to get their voices into the mainstream and not to be isolated by their Israel politics. They did that through committed, on-the-ground organizing in their local chapters, and by making opportunities for people who shared their politics —and even those who didn’t — to join in. In our session in Seattle, someone recalled the time in 1985 when Reagan laid a wreath at the Bitburg Military Cemetery in West Germany, which included the graves of members of the SS. The Seattle NJA chapter organized a protest about that, which attracted people who did not have the same politics about Israel but still connected with Agenda about this outrageous thing that Reagan was doing!
Agenda also had activists who were very involved in Jewish communal life and knew people who were “insiders” within the Jewish mainstream. The organization didn’t simply walk around outside the Federation with a sign saying “We’re against settlements” — they created an opportunity to present it to the Federations by finding allies inside. A group pushing hard from the left allows some that are closer to the center to make changes. Part of Agenda’s legacy is found in the changes that other people were able to make because of Agenda’s advocacy.

BL: Still, the Jewish Federation is unabashedly supportive of Israel’s policies, is extensively connected to America’s corporate-political establishment, and represents middle-class and upper-class Jews, marginalizing the voices of queer Jews, Jews of color, and working-class Jews.

EBN: Many things haven’t changed that much ­— but some have! I keep seeing reports of how few women are in leadership in the biggest Jewish organizations. It’s like, “What year is this?” It’s not as if there’s a shortage of amazing and capable Jewish women to be in leadership roles! On the other hand, in the course of my research, I’ve come to realize how many more opportunities I have as a queer Jew today, opportunities that were created by NJA’s generation. Many of the people pushing for those changes built analyses and gained influence together in Agenda — like Avi Rose and Christie Balka, who were national NJA co-chairs together and co-authored Twice Blessed: On Being Lesbian, Gay and Jewish, which was a groundbreaking publication in 1989.

BL: You end your book by saying that “the new Occupy Judaism movement, and the Occupy movement as a whole, have reinvigorated strategies of mass mobilization and direct action that challenge the trend of professionalization in social-change work, and bring new voices from the margin to the people’s mic every day.” What do you think Occupy Judaism takes from the legacy of Agenda?

EBN: One of the primary positives of the Occupy movement is creating big gathering spaces for people to come together in person and figure out what they want to do together. Agenda did not have social media, and people had to be together physically in a way that built culture, built community, and provided opportunities for synchronicity and spontaneous inspiration. That provides for the kind of relationship building that allows you to go through something hard with somebody and still want to talk to them: You actually know each other, and have actually seen each other grow and change over the course of days or weeks or years.
Another very powerful aspect of Occupy Judaism is the commitment to direct action, including the street-theater element — enacting spiritual ritual in the midst of public space. All the holidays that were celebrated during Occupy Judaism were mobilizing and inspirational, and that was a crucial New Jewish Agenda tactic, to bring Jewish life out into the streets, into public parks, into alignment with protest movements, and to put politics and culture together. It sets a great example for Jews on the left to say, “We are here as Jews in solidarity, we are going to have a public ritual to say why we are here as Jews, we’re going to talk about how Jewish culture has brought us here and about what Jewish culture says about this issue.” That’s what New Jewish Agenda did.

BL: NJA also allowed progressive Jews to ally themselves, as a unified bloc, with social justice movements in the larger community. As we speak, I am sitting in the office of No More Deaths, a humanitarian aid and advocacy organization that fights for migrant rights along the U.S.-Mexico border. No More Deaths grew out of the Sanctuary movement, which counted New Jewish Agenda as a powerful ally.

EBN: The Sanctuary movement started with churches providing sanctuary for refugees fleeing the dictatorships in Latin America, and NJA linked up early on to bring Sanctuary into synagogues. Agenda sent out packets with information on the sanctuary issue to over two thousand synagogues, and many congregations got involved.

This legacy of working with allies continues today. One example is Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ), which over the last decade has allied with the Domestic Workers Union (DWU) to fight for a domestic workers’ bill of rights and advocate for economic justice for domestic workers. JFREJ went to synagogues and did education, reached out to Jewish legislators and community members — many of whom employ domestic workers for childcare and elder care — to raise awareness on issues of fair pay, sick days and other rights.

BL: There are many times throughout its history that Agenda experienced what you describe as “growing pains” — instances when local and national task forces came face-to-face with manifestations of white privilege, racism, and homophobia within the organization. You relate how the Feminist Task Force (FTF), for example, sought in 1985 to convene meetings among African-American, Arab and Jewish women in New York to address the contentious “Zionism equals racism” equation that surfaced at the UN Decade for Women Forum in Copenhagen. FTF received a challenging letter from Carol Haddad of the Feminist Arab Network, identifying the problematic power imbalances inherent in the proposal for meetings, and pointing to the need for FTF members to examine their own white privilege and racism. Your book also brings up the lingering homophobia within NJA that challenged queer Jewish organizers in the mid-1980s, as well as NJA’s last official conference in 1991, which, as you wrote, “received significant criticism, especially for a lack of representation of Jews of color, reinforcing a false dichotomy between white Jews and African, Latino/a or Arab peoples.” How did Agenda deal with these problems within its own organization, and what can we learn from that today?

EBN: Everything that exists in the larger world also exists in activist organizations, and a lot of the time the exact dynamics we are trying to fix in the world show up in our organizations. This is part of what happens when people are building new awareness about the ways that privilege works in a community: people who are able-bodied and can’t imagine otherwise, or men who aren’t aware of all the sexism that’s happening, or white Jews who think all Jews are European. NJA functioned as a space where people could find each other, build power, and make demands. All the conversations and confrontations about the organization’s platforms, over the years, served as a space for analysis to happen, for people to show up and say, “We need to have a position about Jews of color, we need to have a position about economic privilege in the Jewish world.” That’s why that letter from Carol Haddad is so powerful: somebody taking the time to write a letter like that is offering a gift! It’s upsetting to learn that you’ve contributed to someone else’s marginalization, of course, but when people speak up about dynamics that need to change, that’s how we transform.

BL: If there’s one central legacy that NJA can leave to a new generation of progressive Jewish activists, what does that legacy look like?

EBN: As the keynote speaker at one of Agenda’s national conferences, Adrienne Rich asked, “If not with others, how?” Having all of our politics in the same room matters, having a space to show all the facets of ourselves matters. Being able to say “I’m Jewish and queer,” “I’m Jewish and feminist,” “I’m Jewish and working-class,” “I’m Jewish and wealthy,” matters. The ability to create that wholeness inside oneself and together in a room — that matters.

At our Seattle event, one veteran of Agenda  said that “the wins were momentary wins, and the challenges were ongoing — we were always in debt, we were always overwhelmed by the problems of democracy on a large scale.” Why, given that, did the organization last for a dozen years? The thing that was consistent, from chapter to chapter, was that people were in community with each other. They were doing life-cycle events, they were doing holidays with each other, their kids were friends with each other, they were partnering romantically and creatively —  people were in community together. That enabled them for a dozen years to handle the other things that were ongoing, and that was what weathered the storm.

Readers can learn more about New Jewish Agenda and its legacy at www.newjewishagenda.net, where Ezra Berkley Nepon’s book can be purchased.

• Print Copy: $13 available from AK press
• Digital Copy: $5.99 available at amazon.com
• Celebrate People’s History Poster: $4 available at Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative!

The back room at Modern Times Bookstore was packed with about fifty people and the mood was celebratory. One of the former NJA members brought a box of files and everyone was looking through them excitedly. Sascha Scatter introduced me, which was especially sweet because we know each other through anarchist circles and his parents’ NYC activism stories overlapped with New Jewish Agenda. Marissa of Thread Makes Blanket, also in SF at the time, read part of Rachel Mattson’s essay. Then Avi Rose, one of the interviewees for the book, spoke briefly – what a pleasure to meet him and hear him share thoughts on NJA in person! More NJA members shared stories and realizations about roots of so much of the current progressive Jewish culture of the Bay Area in NJA: synagogues, music festivals, film festivals that originated in NJA meetings. A question about the finances of NJA led into a conversation about how NJA’s gutsy connecting-the-dots between so many issues was enabled by being accountable to a membership base rather than a single foundation. Another audience member whose mother was in NJA talked about how much this membership-funding issue matters to him, how he and his mother talk about it as a key issue in how to build a sustainable Left. Members of Bend The Arc: A Jewish Partnership for Justice and Jewish Voice for Peace attended and made announcements, and another attendee announced that a Labor History festival was going on that week. This event was so spectacular – such engaged conversation, and joyful connected energy.

PORTLAND

This event was at Reading Frenzy bookstore, a specialty bookshop/gallery/event space devoted to supporting independent/alternative media and culture. The store’s founder, Chloe Eudaly, used to be on the advisory board of an organization I co-founded with Billy Wimsatt in 1998! Very cool reminder that activist collaborations can be long-haul relationships and you never know when you’ll end up working with someone again.

The room was full with about twenty-five people, a half-dozen of them former-NJA members. I was happy to meet many of the activists that Jenny Levison had talked about at the NYC event, and hear more details about NJA Portland’s anti-racist activism, Cousins (Jewish-Muslim) groups, and other local chapter activism. I was especially moved by one part of the conversation when a former NJA-member shared that he was upset that NJA didn’t get any credit for shifting the conversation about a two-state solution to be more mainstream, like when the Oslo accords were signed in 1993, none of the Jewish press acknowledged NJA. Another former-member said she felt differently – she felt like they had done the work and could know that they had made a difference, even if the mainstream Jewish world didn’t acknowledge it. I really appreciated that both NJA members were there to share their different responses.

Another woman spoke very powerfully about being the same age as the NJA-members in the room but she hadn’t found NJA when she needed it. In 1982 she was horrified by Israel’s invasion of Lebanon and when she tried to talk to her rabbi about it, he told her not to air the community’s dirty laundry in public. She said that she cried for a week and really broke with the Jewish community at that point. Now, so many years later, she’s an activist and poet devoted to working for peace in Israel/Palestine, but it took her a long time to find her way back to Jewishness and she wondered what her life would’ve been like if she had found NJA. (For more about these historical events, see this page about the Middle East Task Force)

One of the NJA members said “Ok so we’re telling our stories, but there’s all these young people in room and I’m curious what brought you here today? Are you looking for Jewish Progressive culture?” Other NJA members chimed in with similar questions. This led to a conversation about intergenerational organizing, and what the progressive Jewish activism landscape looks like in Portland today.

OLYMPIA

The event in Olympia was different from the rest in a few ways: my dear longtime friend Socket Klatzker hosted a book discussion and BBQ in her back yard and the group was a lovely collection of about fifteen radical Jews and other activists from Olympia (and a car-ful from Seattle!). Though the group was all people roughly people in our 30s, there was a bunch of diversity in terms of people’s relationships to Jewishness and activism. After some time for kibbitzing, schmoozing, and noshing, we sat on picnic blankets and I said that this event was a different model than most, and something of an experiment about how to do a rich conversation together, so let’s go around and introduce ourselves and also if you have any specific questions or areas of the history you’d like to focus on, let me know. People had great questions in that go-around and as the conversation moved along, and we had a great conversation about a bunch of things, but one that stands out for me is the issue of building spiritual or other kinds of transformative communities within social change structures, for example the ways that NJA worked because it was a spiritual home for so many, and because of people not just doing activist work together but also sharing life cycle events, Shabbat dinners, yearly holidays and celebrations together, and a shared set of cultural values. But on the other hand, the impact of Re-Evaluation Counseling was very mixed and controversial in the group, and they also had to actively kick out people trying to infiltrate from the New Alliance Party. (More about these stories on this page).  We talked about Andy Cornell’s recent book about Movement for a New Society and the overlaps in the organization stories/lessons – this was especially gratifying for me because I know Andy through anarchist West Philly life and I think of our books as sister research projects, but also because it deepened the conversation to add critical analysis of another group into the mix.

SEATTLE

This event was held at The Vera Project and hosted by my dear longtime friend Alix Kolar. The room was full with about 25 people including three fabulous former-NJA members in the group.

Content of this conversation had similar themes to the other events, but there were a few moments that especially helped some ideas click for me. One NJA member (and former national co-chair) was communicating very clearly about how hard it was to be in the organization, how the wins were momentary and the challenges were ongoing. For me, that led to a clarity about how the community element of local NJA-chapters must have been the other ongoing factor that sustained the groups beyond the momentary wins. In another instance, a friend who I used to work with in the Sylvia Rivera Law Project collective asked a great question about membership structures and fundraising which related to our work and research together – the question made something click for me about how much I’ve been applying my NJA research in my own work. Another question about how NJA worked with “most-impacted communities” led to me a new clarity about NJA’s commitment to a “change not charity” model – I was reminded of Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz’s writing about this in a section of The Issue is Power that originated as an NJA document. This was a very rich conversation in general and I’ve got video footage that I hope to post in some clips soon. Thanks again to all who came!

The next night I attended a potluck gathering of seven former NJA-members organized by Rainer Waldman Adkins. What an awesome evening! Rainer was really interested in exploring the way that Seattle had played a key role in NJA, including a ton of national-leadership positions being filled by women from Kadima, NJA’s Seattle chapter. I got to hear a lot of details, and I took notes so more on that soon. I was so happy to hang out with these deeply radical Jewish activists a generation older than myself, and hear their stories. At the end of the event they said “you would have fit right in at NJA!” and I really felt my joy to be with this group of activists and intergenerational activist groups at each of the events this summer, and I felt a little sadness, too, about how much harder it is to find intergenerational radical Jewish community without a group like NJA to connect with.

MT AIRY

About a week after coming back to Philly from the tour-adventures, I had a last tour event at Big Blue Marble Bookstore in Mt Airy which is a neighborhood of Philadelphia that many former-NJA members now live in. This was a small group full of wonderful Jewish and other radical activists. One story that really sticks with me: Rebecca talked about her brushes with NJA’s Feminist Task Force which essentially led to her finding Jewish lesbian community (and her first girlfriend). Knowing Rebecca now as a longtime radical queer and activist, it was wonderful to realize that NJA helped her find this path!

Here are a few photos from this Summer’s tour events. Thanks again to all who came, shared stories, offered questions, and learned together!

(Please Note: I’m not mentioning all of the people who attend and share stories at events by name, but I have done so where it seems especially relevant. If anyone wants to add to these report-backs or request that their name be added or removed, please do so! I’ll leave the comments open for this post so you can speak to it directly, or you can contact me here)

Big poster for the book at Reading Frenzy, Portland

Former Bay Area NJA Members finding their names in old NJA flyers!

Former NJA Bay Area member looking through old folders

I’m halfway through my summer booktour and wanted to give a little update. Events in Boston, DC, Baltimore, and NYC – plus an earlier event in Philadelphia – have been spectacular. Here’s some highlights:

BOSTON

This event was held at the Workmen’s Circle Center for Jewish Culture and Social Justice. Leah Madsen, Program and Member Organizer, showed me around the center before the event and shared some of the history of the local Arbeiter Ring. I was thrilled to learn that a screening of the documentary Young, Jewish, and Left had been part of a revival of younger activists’ involvement in the center – Leah reported that 100 people turned out for the screening!  The center has a great library and I loved seeing the work of the Shule classes around the room we met in.

Boston was one of the biggest NJA chapters, pre-dated by organizing including Boston Committee to Challenge Anti-Semitism, and active through till the end of the national organization.  This book event had a dozen folks and the conversation was rich and engaged with the group split evenly between former NJA-niks and people of my own generation (give or take a little). Gordie Fellman joined me and spoke about his experiences in NJA, reflecting on how Breira’s ending amidst intense attacks really contributed to the idea of creating NJA as a multi-issue organization, and how the 1982 Lebanon invasion was a formative moment in NJA’s work, and led to his own involvement in the local chapter and eventually becoming national co-chair of the Middle East Task Force.  Gordie talked about how much things have changed, how a two-state solution is now a relatively moderate position, but at NJA’s time it was heresy.  He also talked with great humor about the three rabbis who excommunicated all NJA members in a Tewksbury, MA Holiday Inn.

The stories of the former-NJA people at this event really lend to a snapshot of how people came from many activist streams to their work in NJA. Todd Kaplan, who met his wife Rivkah Lapidus in NJA, shared about his experience in the Central American Solidarity work of NJA. Todd mentioned that he wasn’t able to get involved in early NJA work because of his involvement with Ploughshares. Ellen Stone recalled that she was living in the Southwest when she learned about NJA, and when she moved to Boston the first thing she did was get involved in the chapter – she was drawn not just to the politics but to the space to make Jewish culture together, an alternative Jewish community. Freddie, a “red-diaper baby with lavender stripes!”, remembered that she missed the NJA founding convention because she was active in lesbian separatist politics, at the time but later got involved with the Feminist Taskforce of NJA. She recalled a major moment in her own life was seeing Ronnie Gilbert of The Weavers sing at an LGBT march on Washington (I think this was the 1987 march) that NJA turned out members to attend as a group – for Freddie it was a powerful moment of merging her Jewish, Lesbian, and radical political worlds -  and there weren’t many spaces for that at the time. That march shows up in the NJA history on this site here, because it was also a key moment of AIDS activism.

One comment that really hit me came up in a conversation about how Jewish activism on the Left as Jews is different than just having lots of Jews in Left organizing. Freddie talked about how the Communist Party was so Jewish, so culturally Jewish and known as a Jewish political center and indeed repressed around that identifiable Jewishness in so many ways (blacklisting, the Rosenberg trial, etc) … and yet it was never an explicitly “Jewish organization”. Todd wondered if New Jewish Agenda was, on a national level, a big “coming out” moment for Jews on the Left. While I’m sure there are many explicitly Jewish progressive organizations that came before NJA, I think this is true – the visibility of NJA among progressive movements in the 1980s was a groundbreaking cultural event. Agree? Disagree?

One more thing that came up that I want to link out to: NJA’s fact-finding mission that dispelled Reagan’s accusations of anti-semitism against the Sandanistas. Oh, and Freddie recommended that everyone read The Tribe of Dina, a groundbreaking collection of Jewish feminist essays edited by Melanie Kaye/Kantrowitz and Irena Klepfisz — and I agree!

WASHINGTON, DC

This event at the grand and gorgeous DCJCC was co-sponsored by Jews United For Justice and GLOE, an organization for GLBT Jews at the JCC. Rabbi Gerry Serotta and Reena Bernards joined me for the presentation and shared stories from their time in NJA.  A number of other NJA-members also shared stories and reflections, and Gerry brought a big poster from the 1984 Sukkat Shalom action – click for an article with more info about that story.

This event was attended by a full-house of about 35 people, a mix of activist-generations. Questions ranged from how to make our work sustainable, how to build intergenerational organizational culture and whether it’s most effective for people to organize within age-cohorts, wrestling with how to do anti-racist work within mostly white organizations/spaces, and how to learn from the lessons of NJA’s lesbian and gay leadership. Two NJA pamphlets that came up are scanned and linked out from the Feminist Taskforce section of this site, both from 1985:

• Coming Out/Coming Home about homophobia and gay rights within the Jewish community
• Israeli and Palestinian Women in Dialogue, A Search for Peace  which was widely distributed at the 1985 UN Decade for Women Non-Governmental Organization’s (NGO) Forum

Thanks so much to Rebecca and Halley for organizing and hosting this event!

BALTIMORE

This event was at Red Emma’s Bookstore Coffeehouse and I showed up early and ate treats from the cafe and read about Baltimore Occupy organizing in the radical newspapers. Though I didn’t have relationships with local NJA’ers, the day before the event Annie Kaufman had shown the book to Becky Pepkowitz – who, it turns out, used to host NJA meetings at her house! Becky spread the word and talked to lots of local NJA people and showed up with amazing stories about the local organizing. In Baltimore, NJA’s motto was “Every issue is a Jewish Issue!” and Becky told tales of  picketing the Argentinian Tall Ship to draw attention to the Disappeared, picketing the Rusty Scupper restaurant during the major Nestle boycott, and a fierce story about Becky standing up to Jewish Defense League’s (racist hate-mongering) founder Meir Kahane in a 1985 public speaking event and challenging him to a debate. He never showed up for the debate, but they got lots of visibility for opposing him!

Becky also gave me a copy of the Baltimore NJA Third-Night Haggadah that she wrote with Joyce Wolpert and others, and she reports that Joyce has a video of the event! One audience member asked “why not revive New Jewish Agenda now?”, and I basically said that while many of the qualities of NJA would be great now, we’re in a different time and need a different organizing model. Becky disagreed – she thinks the NJA model is needed now!

Rabbi Liz Bolton also shared stories of her NJA experiences in Toronto (in an un-official chapter since NJA couldn’t figure out what to do with the border) and how they led her to become a rabbi, and she brought a stack of NJA folders from her basement! A few more people in the group shared NJA stories as well, and reflections on the roots of Jewish activism.

At the end of the event, which had a great crowd of about 25 people, Annie and Mark Gunnery talked about the work-in-progress organizing to host an Alternative Jewish Assembly (AJA) in Baltimore this Fall and invited others to get involved. After the event, attendees agreed to hold an old-fashioned NJA potluck to plan for the AJA.

NEW YORK

This was a spectacular event! Jews for Racial and Economic Justice organized and spread the word for this event, and we had a packed house of about sixty people at Bluestockings Bookstore. Despite the hot night turning the store into a sauna, people stayed all night and listened attentively while contributors Rachel Mattson and Daniel Rosza Lang/Levitsky read from their afterwords essays, Nan Rubin spoke about the Denver chapter, and Jenny Levison spoke about the Portland chapter. For those that couldn’t make it to the event, you can hear some of Nan’s great stories about Denver in this Beyond the Pale Radio Interview (on the JFREJ show on WBAI). Our interview about New Jewish Agenda is the last 20-ish minutes of the show.

A lively conversation followed, including discussion of the damaging impact of New Alliance Party attempted infiltration of NJA and the controversial impact of Re-Evaluation Counseling (aka co-counseling) on NJA. To learn more about NAP’s activities, there’s some info in this section about why NJA shut down and here’s a great resource by Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates. I’ve written about the interaction between NJA and co-counseling in this section of the website, and here’s the letter to NJA about RC that I mentioned at the event. Other conversations ranged from discussing how the Jewish community is and isn’t different now than in NJA’s time, and how NJA managed to get traction in some mainstream Jewish spaces where other progressive Jewish groups continue to struggle. Yehudit talked about the children of New Jewish Agenda, and Shelly Weiss spoke about being queer in New Jewish Agenda. As in all of these report-backs, I know I’m missing a ton (maybe I’ll start taking notes during the conversations!), but suffice to say it was a great and engaged discussion.

Here’s a great video clipof me introducing the event and you’ll also see people in the audience saying what chapter/taskforce they were in -thanks to Rachel Mattson for getting that on video. If you’re on facebook, check out these great photos that JFREJ posted, too.

Thanks to everyone who has helped organize these events, hosted me on couches, and shared stories and questions!  My West Coast tour dates start July 11th in San Francisco and include stops in Portland, Olympia, and Seattle. Spread the word! More info here: West Coast Tour!

(Please Note — I’m not mentioning all of the people who attend and share stories at events by name, but I have done so where it seems relevant. If anyone wants to add to these report-backs or request that their name be added or removed, please do so! I’ll leave the comments open for this post so you can speak to it directly, or you can contact me here)

Great crowd at the NYC event at Bluestockings!

Rachel Mattson reads from her afterwards essay at Bluestockings

As promised, here’s a shout-out thank you to:

Aleksei Wagner, Aleza Summit, Alisha Williams, Alissa Wise, Aly Halpert, Amelia, Amy and David Mantell, Amy Brookman, Amy Laura Cahn, Amy Sadao, Annah Anti-Palindrome, Bench, Benjamin Haber, Benjy Ben-Baruch, Beth Pulcinella, Bob Gluck, Caitlin Barry, Caleb Hunt, Caryn Goldberg, Casey Chanton, Lee and Cerf Berkley, Charles Lenchner, Chris Bartlett, Cleo Woelfle-Erskine, Cole Krawitz, Corina Dross, Craig Willse, Daniel Sieradski, Danielle Redden, David Poplar, Dean Spade, Deborah Meyer, Dennis Fischman, DrewChristopher Joy, Elaine Dutton, Elaine Reuben, Emily Abendroth, Emma, Fivel Rothberg, Gerald Serotta, Hannah Fischer, Irit Reinheimer, Irma Preikschat, Jacob Feinspan, Jade Walker, Jason Molony, Jennifer Kates, Jennine Miller, Jenny Berkley, Jenny Levison, Jesse Bacon, Jessie Spector, Jim Barton, Joanna Kent Katz, Jordy Silverstein, Judith Seid, Jules Skloot, Julia Berkley, Julie Davids, Karen Pittelman, Kate Sorensen, Kelly Johnson, Laura Mintz, Leah Girardo, Leora Abelson, Leslie Batz, LJ Roberts, Malcah Friedman, Martha Kransdorf, Max Kaiser, Max Stein, MaxZine Weinstein, Mcdonald Sullivan, Meredith Slopen, Mica Navarro Lopez, Michael Chameides, Miel Leslie, Mike Shushan, Nancy Fuchs Kreimer, Natasha Agee, Nava EtShalom, Nico Amador, Noel Petrie, Pooja Gehi, Quito Ziegler, Rachel Beck, Rayna Matthews, Rebecca Alvarez, Rebecca Ennen, Rebecca Jarosh, Reena Bernards, Reina Gossett, Rich Wexler, Richard Silverstein, Rita Lowenthal, Roz Timberg, Sam Bick, Sara Zia Ebrahimi, Sarah Bleviss, Sarah Stippich, Sheryl Nestel, Shoshana Bricklin, Stefanie Brendler, Steve Masters, Suzanne Lipkin, Tessa Lalonde, The Shalom Center, Thomasin, Tyrone Boucher, Virginia A. Spatz, Virginia McGuire, Wendy Elisheva Somerson, Wooden Shoe Books and a dozen folks who gave anonymously!