Use of Title VI Misguided
As much as I agree with the aim here, I think it is misguided to use Title VI this way (“Jewish Community Reacts to Executive Order,” Dec. 19).
Title VI does not list religion as a protected class. In order for Jews to be protected under its rules, we must be a race, ethnicity or nationality. From the article: “Title VI requires that programs and activities receiving federal funding not discriminate based on race, ethnicity or shared national origin. The executive order says that Title VI should be enforced against discrimination rooted in anti-Semitism ‘as vigorously as against all other forms of discrimination.’”
Under this rubric we are classified as a race, ethnicity or nationality. We are no longer a religion. The Obama administration used Title VI to combat anti-Semitism by adding the addition, if the group being hurt is perceived as a race, ethnicity or nationality, then Title VI applied. No definition of Jews or Judaism. Finally, all of this could be corrected by an act of Congress.
Myron Bassman | Center City
Writer Misinterprets French Hostility
Regarding the opinion piece by Eli Reiter in the Jan. 2 edition (“What if My Chasidic Community Was Right in Teaching Me to Avoid Non-Jews?”), he showed his absolute ignorance in dealing with foreign experiences (and yes, “foreign” has two meanings).
In describing his café experience, Reiter described how a waiter headed toward him, angry body language in full force, yelling in French, a language Reiter admits he does not understand. “I surmised that to him I was poison.”
What an outrageous, xenophobic interpretation. I can only surmise Reiter’s immediate thoughts about anything that he may interpret in any way as being negative arrive from his belief the world is ganging up on him just because he is Jewish. What a small world he lives in.
Based on my personal experience of living and working in Paris for a number of years, I can tell you, and of course there is an element of sarcasm here, Reiter received the full-on French waiter experience. He didn’t hate you because you were Jewish; he hated you because you were a customer.
Ben Stone | Media
