I\u2019ve been quiet in my own words for a week, which you know isn\u2019t like me. So here they are.<\/em><\/p>\nLast Sunday I reposted somebody else\u2019s post about Macklemore\u2019s set at Ed Sheeran\u2019s show. It said things in words I didn\u2019t write, and I wouldn\u2019t have chosen all of them. Then the comments came, and I did what I do when I\u2019m hurt, which is post snarky memes and act like I\u2019m fine. That\u2019s on me. A repost isn\u2019t a statement, and a meme isn\u2019t a spine. Social media makes all of us cheap and fast, and we all know it. But I\u2019d rather be disagreed with for what I actually said than hated for what anybody else wrote, so let me say it.<\/p>\n
I was born a Jew. I didn\u2019t pick it, and I\u2019ve never hidden it. And this week a whole lot of people decided what I believe without asking me, without checking a single thing I\u2019ve ever said or done, because a repost and the word \u201cJew\u201d were apparently enough to fill in the rest. But let me fill it in\u2026 myself.<\/p>\n
Of course I don\u2019t speak for Israel, or for any government. I never have. What I said in October 2023 is still exactly what I believe: Hamas is a terrorist organization. Palestinians deserve a future that honors their humanity and their aspirations. Protecting innocent life comes first, everywhere, and nobody should ever celebrate the death of a child. Anybody\u2019s child. I\u2019ve spent a decade as a UNICEF ambassador for kids who didn\u2019t choose the country or the war they were born into, and I have grieved every one of them, on both sides of that fence. I didn\u2019t do it from behind a screen; I went to those children and held them. I\u2019m not going to litigate a complex war in an Instagram caption, and I\u2019m not going to recite anybody\u2019s slogan to earn back a follower.<\/em><\/p>\nHere\u2019s what I was reacting to. I was in the room at the Grammys in 2014 when Macklemore rapped \u201cSame Love\u201d and thirty-three couples, gay and straight, got married to it, and I cheered, no questions asked. Four months later Macklemore put on a hooked nose, a black beard and a bowl cut, performed in it, and called it a \u201crandom costume.\u201d Every Jew I know knew exactly what it was. The same love, it turned out, had a guest list, and we weren\u2019t on it. But he apologized, and I let it go, because that\u2019s what we do. We let it go. Then last weekend he stood in front of a stadium full of music-loving families, with violent images from a war on the screens, dedicated a song to the movement of his choice, and then took the mic to tell all of the Jews in the stadium that it wasn\u2019t about them.<\/em><\/p>\nYou don\u2019t get to decide that for us.<\/em><\/p>\nThat\u2019s what prompted my repost. Not \u201cFree Palestine,\u201d and not anyone\u2019s right to say it. I have never asked for another artist to be silenced and I\u2019m not asking now. I don\u2019t need anyone fired, and I don\u2019t need a refund. What I need is to be able to say, as a Jewish mom, \u201cthat scared me, and it scared people I love,\u201d without being told our fear is just propaganda, and without being told I\u2019m somehow cool with genocide because I noticed?<\/em><\/p>\nAnd please don\u2019t talk to me like I\u2019ve never stood up for my beliefs when it was unpopular. In the middle of the Gulf War in 2006 I put out a song called \u201cDear Mr. President\u201d and sang it every night on tour while my country was in a war I didn\u2019t support, and I took the hate for it, and I sang it anyway because my sharp criticism was of a government, not this flawed country I love and who my dad fought for. I stood with gay kids before it was fashionable and with trans kids now, when it isn\u2019t, and with their families, and I handed out the books that got banned, and you know I got called every name there is, and I\u2019d do all of it again tomorrow. I have stood up for other people\u2019s people my whole career, and I know exactly what it costs.<\/em><\/p>\nAnd now I\u2019m standing up for my own people, and I thought I knew going in how lonely that would be. And it\u2019s lonelier than that. But I\u2019m doing it anyway.<\/em><\/p>\nSomething has changed in this country, and I can read it in my own comments. \u201cFrom the river to the sea.\u201d \u201cZionist,\u201d spat like it\u2019s a slur, by people who couldn\u2019t tell you the details of what I believe, because I hadn\u2019t told them yet. I wasn\u2019t asked. I was told. I don\u2019t think most of them hate Jews. I think somebody handed them a story where the Jew who won\u2019t apologize for existing must be the villain, and they\u2019ve been putting words in my mouth ever since.<\/em><\/p>\nBut I\u2019ve been portrayed as the villain before. I can take it. I just won\u2019t take it quietly, and I\u2019m not going to teach my kids to.<\/em><\/p>\nSo, to the ones who are furious with me: you don\u2019t have to agree with me. You never did. That\u2019s been our unspoken agreement for twenty-five years, and it still stands, and so do I. You don\u2019t have to agree with one thing Israel\u2019s government does to not want the Jewish family two rows down from you to be scared or targeted at a concert. That\u2019s the only thing I\u2019m asking anybody for. To the ones who are frightened this week, Jewish or Muslim or Palestinian or Israeli or just tired of all of it: I see you. And if anybody wants to really know what I think, just ask me. I\u2019m right here. I\u2019ve never been hard to find. And I\u2019ll keep speaking out, in my own words.<\/em><\/p>\nIt\u2019s Friday. For working people who have more to worry about than pop stars and pile-ons, it\u2019s the end of a hard week. It\u2019s also the 25th anniversary of September 11th, and my prayers are with the innocent souls we lost that morning. And at sundown, for Jews, it\u2019s Rosh Hashanah, our New Year.<\/em><\/p>\nNow I\u2019m going to go make dinner for my kids, light the candles, dip some apples in honey, pour a glass of wine and be full of gratitude. That\u2019s my tradition. It also happens to be a Jewish one.<\/em><\/p>\nShana tova.<\/em><\/p>\nPosted To:Israel<\/a> Macklemore<\/a> Palestine<\/a> Pink<\/a> Politics<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n