Of Course You Do, You Are A Jew!

The conversation started innocently enough.

As you might imagine, I am one of those people who like to talk to my seatmates on planes.

So, boarding Delta flight 1878 from Atlanta to Baltimore on Friday, July 24th at 9.30am was no exception.

I took the aisle seat and a woman eating peanut M&M’s (only remember this because I thought it was an unusual breakfast food) was already sitting in the window seat.

She was quite friendly.

I found out that she was from the vicinity of Huntsville, Alabama and had been up that morning at 3am, holding her first grandchild in her arms. She has 2 kids of her own and one of them is in Baptist seminary. I also found out that she is a board member of the National Education Association and was travelling to DC for a meeting.

“Have you heard of the NEA?” she asked.

I nodded.

“What do you think of the NEA?” she inquired.

Seeing as I was talking to a board member and knowing my strong opinions on the subject, I demurred (yes, I know, hard to believe).

She sensed my hesitation and said something to the effect of “don’t worry, my husband has a lot of problems with the organization.”

“Ok,” I answered, “if I am going to be blunt about it, my biggest issue is that I think unions tend to protect the underperformers and when it comes to education, in particular, that really bothers me.”

“Well, the NEA has 3.2 million members and we do a lot of good,” she replied.

“I’m sure you do, but that’s my biggest issue with the union.”

The conversation eventually migrated to my family. (Keep in mind, the plane hadn’t even backed away from the gate yet.)

I told her I have 3 kids ages 5.5, almost 4, and 17 months and their genders.

“So, your oldest daughter is going into kindergarten?”

“Yes.”

“And is she going to public school?”

“No,” I responded.

I could see from her face that she was disappointed and it came out in the tone of her question, “Why?”

“Well, we are observant Jews so I will be sending her to private school.”

“Now, that upsets me more than you not sending her to public school.”

Now, I happen to think that compared to most people, it takes a lot to shock me, but here I was, not believing what I just heard. Of course, I couldn’t let it go, so I followed up,

“you mean to say that it is more upsetting to you that we are Jewish than the fact that my daughter isn’t going to public school?”

“Yes. I’m a Christian.”

Now, I’ve met and become friends with MANY very seriously devout Christians over the years. I even had one (and I am still very good friends with her to this day) tell me that she thinks I am going to hell, but I had never been confronted in this manner. Not even close.

I said something to the effect of “Jesus was Jewish,” which got a reluctant nod, but I didn’t really know where to go with this.

Of course, I then offered to interview her with my video camera for my blog on the merits of public school AND why she was so disappointed that I am Jewish.

She declined.

Still thinking that this chat somehow could be salvaged (the eternal optimist, I suppose), the conversation turned to my work where she asked, “are you successful?”

“Don’t know,” I said, “what is your definition of success?”

So, at this point, it gets a bit hazy as to the exact words that were used because what followed was such a shock to my system, a mini-trauma, if you will, that I think the precise memory is gone.

She says something like, “well, you must be successful if you are flying over the country talking to people on planes all the time.” It was a joke, I got that.

“No, I don’t have that kind of money,” I said in a similarly joking manner.

Then, she dropped the conversational equivalent of the A-bomb (of this part, I have NO doubt of my recollection).

“Well, of course you do, you are a Jew!”

My jaw dropped.

“Excuse me?”

I glared at her.

Thinking to myself, “it takes a lot to offend me, but you’ve just managed to pull it off.”

“Ma’am,” I said, “you’ve just managed to reinforce a major stereotype of Southern Baptists.”

She looked at me in disbelief.

“I was just joking,” she insisted.

“It’s not a joke. It’s not funny. And I’m very offended.”

“Well,” she replied, “you said that the NEA protected bad teachers!”

Talk about taking a bad situation and making it worse…

“and you are telling me that a blatantly anti-Semitic remark is the same thing as an opinion on the NEA?”

“Yes, it is!”

“Are you kidding?”

I really didn’t even know what to do at this point.

I mean, I lived in Germany for a year and I can’t remember experiencing something like this. Certainly in 2009 America in one of the biggest, most cosmopolitan airports in the world, I wasn’t ready for it.

I felt attacked and alone.

So, I did the only thing I could think of to vent my frustration (without getting thrown off the plane), I updated my status on Facebook.

It so happens that I saw when I got on the plane that Delta (at least on that plane) had in-flight wi-fi. Of course, I had to try it.

By the time we got to Wi-fi altitude and I was online, 3 different people had commented on my note.

By the time the flight was over, 12 in total had. (If you are on FB, here is the link).

What was surreal was the fact that I was discussing the incident with these people in near real-time from 25,000 feet (or however high we were) while this woman was sitting right next to me. It felt very empowering and gave me a huge sense of support.

I suppose there are a couple takeaways from this story.

1. The value of community that social networks bring-sharing this moment and having others contribute changed the nature of the experience for me for the better
2. I had kind of pooh-poohed anti-Semitism of this nature, since I had never experienced it before. I’m not going crazy about it yet and still think that Radical Islam is a bigger issue, but it definitely made me think.
3. In a Google/Social Media world, you can’t hide.
   You/we/ everyone will be held accountable for their behavior (see recent post on this).
   In fact, this is a key lesson I give in my presentation on “Marketing Survival Strategies for the Attention Economy” (ironically, the very reason I was in Atlanta in the first place).
4. Now, I have another reason to be concerned about the NEA.
   

Let’s dig down on #3 though.

For example, what did I know about this woman next to me at the time?

1. she’s on the Board of the NEA
2. she’s from the area near/around Huntsville, Alabama
3. her name is Pam (I heard her identify herself on her cell phone when she landed)
4. she lives in a town in Alabama with two words (I saw this on the label of the magazine she was reading)

Putting that all together, know how long it took me to find out who she most likely is?

1 minute 27 seconds (I timed it).

(I didn’t find a picture, so can’t say 100%, but here’s what I’ve got)

• the NEA board of directors page lists a Pam Hill from Alabama (no other Pams listed)
• the 8th annual indoor air quality tools for schools national symposium lists an attendee roster by state, where Pam Hill of Cross Roads, AL was present (including the address of the Huntsville Education Association and her email address)…no, I didn’t send this post to her.

Oh, and without much effort I know her maiden name (Cagle), where she went to high school in Huntsville (Lee), the year she graduated (1973), and with a bit more, her home address and phone number (no need to share this).

I am not doing this to harass her or give people reason to embarrass her. She did a stupid thing, didn’t apologize for it, and has views that are not consistent with mine.

What is important to know here is that the world we all are living in is very different that the one most of us grew up in.

Once upon a time, you just had a bad experience with an annoying person on a plane.

Now, you can find that person and do a lot with the information you discover.