UUSD: No place for hateful rhetoric

I am outraged to be hearing from several directions about the antisemitic flyers distributed to Rehoboth Beach homes in the middle of the night Sept. 17. In addition to the trauma and incredible misinformation experienced by people waking up to this kind of message at their front doors, there is the additional anguish experienced by people throughout our southern Delaware communities and beyond who observe that this kind of thing can happen here and, perhaps, is tolerated. Together, we need to send a very clear and collective message that there is no place for hateful rhetoric.

I have lived here in southern Delaware long enough to know that we are a very interconnected community. Regardless of our ethnic or racial backgrounds, our political inclinations, our religious affiliations, our sexual orientations, gender identities, age or physical ability, we are mingling with one another on the roads and in the stores, at the post offices and on the boardwalks, at the schools and the gas stations. We are actually one large community of intertwined communities. Therefore, there is no us and them approach to this kind of incident. Whoever did this, whatever group they are a part of, they are also a part of this community, even if they drove in from out of town (which I’m sure some of us would like to assume, but it remains to be seen). We must, together, address this kind of hateful action with one another, presuming that there is bigotry right around and among us. I believe in acts of goodness and kindness to one another as Rabbi Sholom Vogel of Chabad of Southern Delaware encouraged in a quote in this paper Sept. 19, and I also believe in having direct conversations about difficult topics when need be. All of us have opportunities to correct misinformation and bigotry, and while I have learned that it can be difficult to impossible to change the minds of the people who create such hateful material, it is still possible to reach those who are consumers of it. No one of us is perfect; therefore, all of us have a responsibility to care for one another. We will all need others to show up for us one day.

My heart goes out to the Jewish people and community in southern Delaware, and I stand in solidarity, witness and resolve to root out hatred wherever it springs forth. As we say in Unitarian Universalism, our work during our lifetimes is to “love the hell out of this world.” May we do so alongside one another and with vigor.