I can’t shake the feeling that there is something vaguely antisemitic about this situation . . .🪄🐇👿

Holy Moses! The “suave devil look” for magicians (goatee, tuxedo, etc.) was invented by a Jewish magician named “Herrmann” (which I think is German for “Mr. Man”—which just so feels like a name assigned by a census taker who was fed up with weird Yiddish shtetl names he couldn’t spell) who performed for Lincoln!

New York Times: “How a 1933 Book About Jews in Magic Was Rescued From Oblivion” (🎁 gift link)

In fact, Herrmann (shown in the picture at the top, courtesy of his Wikipedia entry) is so synonymous with the look that if you prompt an A.I. with “create a poster for an 1800s stage magician. The magician needs a goatee” it gives you a picture of this otherwise obscure 19th Century French stage magician:

A.I.l generated image from the prompt “create a poster for an 1800s stage magician. The magician needs a goatee.” The result is a stereotypical "suave devil" stage magician--and happens to be a nearly spot-on portrait of 19th C Jewish magician Alexander Herrmann

October 7 and the “Pumpkin Spice Latte Problem”

The thing that I most connect with in this comic is that the Jews look like ghosts. I identify with that, as I’ve often felt like a ghost here in my Homeland. I guess the big change for me since October 7 is that before I felt like a ghost passing largely unnoticed or unacknowledged. That was sometimes annoying, but usually fine. Or, at least, I was used to it, which made it seem fine if I didn’t think about it too much.

Now I feel like some portion of the population has noticed us and decided we need to be exorcised and banished, while another portion has noticed us and wants us to summarize 3000 years of history in seven words or less and then explain what the hell is up with a bunch of other ghosts in some other country who we don’t even know, while a third portion have noticed us and insist we aren’t ghosts at all—just pale “regular” people who should get over whatever unpleasantness happened in the 1930s and 40s in Europe, or last October, or last week, or last night, or tomorrow, because it’s all the distant past and in our heads and maybe didn’t even happen or certainly isn’t or wasn’t or won’t be as bad as we say it was/is/will be.

But the biggest portion look at me and say “You’re a ghost? I had no idea you were a ghost!”

‘cause I don’t look like a stereotypical ghost.

But I am a ghost.

I’ve been a ghost this entire time.

A panel from the comic/essay "Haunt­ings: Look­ing Back at Fall 2023" by Abby Horowitz. The image shows two adults (rendered as black-and-white outlines) looking at three children in military-esque Halloween costumes. The caption reads: "We began a loop around the parking lot, trying to look like we belonged. We couldn' t escape our sense of dislocation, though; the shadow of war followed us the whole time."

One adult says "AM I BEING RIDICULOUS IF THIS MAKES ME REALLY UNCOMFORTABLE?"

The other adult answers "UM I'M PRETTY SURE THAT'S THE MILITARY
UNIFORM OF SYRIA..."

A thought-bubble above the children reads "JEEZ THESE JEWS ARE SENSITIVE." 

https://www.jewishbookcouncil.org/pb-daily/hauntings-looking-back-at-fall-2023

“Who’s Coming to Hurt Us?”✡︎

I first came across this image 20 (!!!) years ago in a Something Awful “Photoshop Phriday” thread (it’s evidently a riff on Who is Coming to Our House? by Joseph Slate and illustrator Ashley Wolff). It’s served as my shorthand for what it feels like being a Jew in America ever since.

(Brought to mind by this—which happened at my parent’s synagogue last week; that’s only about 40 minutes from where I live with my wife and kids today—but it really could have been basically anything from the last two weeks, right?)

HALLOWEEN TREAT 🎃👻🦑💀: “Mitochondrial Assimilation” by Khalifaziz @NightlightPod

This story resonates with me tremendously as a Jew. It captures the ambivalent, ecstatic trauma of becoming part of the thing that is America in a way that perfectly matches my lived experience.

NIGHTLIGHT (A Black Horror Fiction Podcast) # 422: “Mitochondrial Assimilation” by Khalifaziz

They also have an interview with the author, Khalifaziz, that’s well worth your time.