My first experience with anti-Semitism was in middle school. I thought name-calling was as bad as it could get. But I was incredibly wrong.
In March 2009, I woke up one morning and saw my parents talking to a cop in a police car.
Still half asleep, I turned around and behind me I saw what I thought I would never witness — Swastikas, “Hail Hitler” and “F— the Jews,” graffitied on my home. Everywhere I looked, I saw more hate and slander towards the Jews.
At that moment, I felt personally attacked because of my religious identity, and I was unfortunately able to understand what other Jews before me have suffered.
But even after speeches, constant re-education to classmates, peers and members of the community, I still saw acts of hate. And I still do to this day, not just toward the Jewish community, but also people of different races, ethnicities and disabilities.
Last week at the University of California-Davis, an off-campus Jewish fraternity house was hit with graffiti similar to what I found on my own home years ago.
Alpha Epsilon Pi Vice President Nathaniel Bernhard told The Sacramento Bee that the hate crime threatened to rekindle race tensions at UC Davis.
“Jewish people still can’t feel safe on their own campuses and in their own houses,” Bernhard told The Sacramento Bee. “Anti-Semitism still exists today. It’s not a fairy tale.”
And boy, is he right. It is scary how blind we are to even the smallest acts of hate toward the Jews and other individuals who are part of a minority group.
Nothing rivals a Swastika — a repugnant symbol of anti-Semitism and a horrific representation of hatred toward the Jews.
And to make matters worse, this incident had to happen just after the 70th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz.
If you ask any Jewish individual whether he or she had relatives in the Holocaust, I can bet they will somehow identify with the Holocaust as an attack on our people.
Hate crimes like these just perpetuate the ideology that caused this genocide, and it is our responsibility as the millennial generation to help educate others about the truth behind the Holocaust.
If we don’t make it our responsibility, who will?
The definition of a survivor differs between every individual. In fact, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, a survivor is any person, Jewish or non-Jewish, who was persecuted or discriminated against due to racial, religious, ethnic and political policies of the Nazis as well as any prisoners or refugees.
The number of Holocaust survivors we know of unfortunately keeps growing day by day. But USHMM has on file approximately 195,000 survivors.
And this is by no means a comprehensive or complete list. This is a voluntary list, and there are so many undocumented survivors that we are not even aware of today. We may never be aware of them.
The Anti-Defamation League is a nonprofit organization that helps victims of anti-Semitism and all forms of bigotry, and protects civil rights for all.
Yesterday, the ADL even reached out to Urban Outfitters, urging them to remove a tapestry resembling the uniforms gay male prisoners wore in Nazi concentration camps.
It is no surprise that Urban Outfitters has pushed the boundaries yet again.
And the ADL has no shame in calling out Urban Outfitters on its offensive idea of fashion trends.
In 2012, the ADL criticized Urban Outfitters for selling a T-shirt with the yellow Star of David symbol Jews were forced to wear in Nazi Europe.
But I guess it is about time Urban Outfitters pulls its head out of its butt and finally sees the light about what “true fashion” really is.
Unfortunately for the Jewish community, this bigotry is something we are all too familiar with. And we aren’t the only minority that consistently deals with these acts of hate.
It is about time that people screw their heads on straight and realize all of this hate is not causing anything but turmoil and distress.
Jen Blate is a 24-year-old sociology junior from Miami, Florida. You can reach her on Twitter @jblate_TDR.