Sunday Soundoff: Transgendered Women, Christening Ceremonies, and Israel

By Donald H. Harrison

SAN DIEGO – Having been “retired” as editor and publisher of San Diego Jewish World for more than a year, I find myself wanting to write occasional opinion columns in addition to the book reviews and features which I’ve continued to submit to our publication’s new leader Jacob Kamaras.

So, with the indulgence of you readers, I’m going to sound off periodically on issues of concern to me as a Jew.

I’ll start with the fuss at the YMCA in Santee over the transgender woman who was spotted from behind by a 17-year-old girl who was emerging from her shower.  Thinking it was a man, the girl hurried back into the shower.

But it wasn’t a man; it was a transgendered woman, who has no male genitalia and from the front looks very much like any other woman.  A friend of mine, who is a grandmother and regularly works out at the YMCA, told me she has seen the transgender woman in question without clothes, and has been seen by her in the same condition, and “it’s simply no big deal.”

However, right-wing groups, seeking to turn this young girl’s misunderstanding into a social cause, have been protesting outside the YMCA and are militating for changes in the law that would prevent transgender people from showering with those of the gender with which they identify.

This kind of politically-motivated hysteria deserves to be denounced as nothing short of hate-mongering.  As a people who often are the victims of hate, we Jews should add our voices to those who support and sympathize with the transgendered woman who is being victimized simply for who she is.
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Next, I’d like to take note of the fact that Supreme Court Associate Justice Elena Kagan was called upon at General Dynamics-National Steel and Shipbuilding Company on Saturday to honor the USNS Earl Warren, named for the former California governor who went on to become the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

Kagan, a member of the Jewish community, smashed a bottle of bubbly over the bow of the 742-foot-long oiler that like other ships of its USNS designation (rather than USS) will be staffed by civilians rather than armed personnel.  The oilers have been named for pioneers in the field of American rights.  The first was named for the late Congressman John Lewis, who marched with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. to end segregation in the South; the second was named for the assassinated Jewish San Francisco Supervisor Harvey Milk, who was the first elected official to come out publicly as a gay man.  USNS Earl Warren recognizes a jurist whose court issued the famous “Brown vs. the Board of Education” decision in 1954 that overturned a previous ruling in “Plessy vs. Ferguson” that permitted segregation, so long as it was “separate but equal.”  In Brown, the court ruled that segregation is inherently unequal.

I’m delighted that Warren was so honored and that Kagan did the honors.

However, I think that the Navy ought to rethink its tradition of naming these symbolic events as “christening ceremonies” given the fact that sometimes the honorees such as Milk and other cases the honorers as in the case of Kagan are not Christians, but are Jews.  The same objection would apply if those involved in the ceremony were Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Zoroastrians, Baha’i, Shinto, Druze, or any other non-Christian religion.   Let’s find a word that gives meaning to the event without dressing it in the parlance of any single religion.
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Third, I would describe myself as a strong supporter of Israel as a Jewish homeland.  But, the new right-wing government assembled by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has me worried if Jewish values of inclusiveness and trying to be a “light unto the nations” are being sorely tested.  I can understand the reluctance of people to stand with the Israeli government when some of its members threaten to turn the country into an Orthodox theocracy while other ministers inveigh against Israel’s Arab citizens.

I believe that Jews, as the majority population in Israel, have an obligation to reach out to their Arab neighbors to let them know that they are welcome partners in the building of the Jewish state.  We have seen Arabs and Druze at the highest echelons of Israeli society.  Some have been elected to the Knesset, or appointed to high positions in the Israeli courts and in the Israel Defense Force.  There are Arab and Jewish doctors working side-by-side in Israel’s hospitals.  But more needs to be done.

Here is a suggestion.  Add a stanza to Hatikvah, Israel’s National Anthem, celebrating the state as an opportunity for Jewish, Christian, Muslim, Druze, and Baha’i Israelis to work together in a country that all five religions regard as holy!

While we’re on the subject of Israel being a “Jewish state,” I don’t understand why anyone would object to this terminology.  Surrounding Israel are a host of “Islamic” kingdoms and republics and no one objects.

Well, those are my thoughts on three issues – one local, one national, and one international. Thanks for reading this, and I’ll welcome your feedback.

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Donald H. Harrison is editor emeritus of San Diego Jewish World.  He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com