The floorboard test

Last night a colleague sent me a gracious message, wishing for the safe return of the hostages and expressing disgust over the antisemites in my comment section. I wanted to share my reply.

You have no idea how much this means to me.

I’ve just been shaking with anger after an exchange with the latest antisemite to email me. After I asked her whether she really wished for my family and friends in Israel to be murdered, she said that if I “read a fucking book that’s not about computers,” I would understand that “violence is the language of the oppressed.”

The experience of the last few weeks has radicalized me like nothing else in life. I’m not the same person as I was in September. My priorities are not the same. 48% of Americans aged 18-24 now say that they sympathize with Hamas more than Israel. Not with the Palestinian people, with Hamas. That’s nearly half of the next generation of my own country that might want me and my loved ones to be slaughtered.

I feel like the last thread connecting me to my previous life are the people like you, who write to me with kindness and understanding, and who make me think: there are Gentiles who would’ve hidden me under the floorboards when the SS showed up.

Be well.
—Scott